Leonora’s arrival

For a quiet moment, nobody else was present in my room for a brief few seconds. It was just me and these familiar four walls as I lay in tranquility. Relief washed over me as silence filled the room like a mist, laying lightly in the ir. But dread hung like a dead man in the back of my mind, knowing soon that the undertakers would enter the room and fill me into that squat little box that will be my carriage to the underworld. How dark and somber my mind has turned. Now I can only think about what awaits me as I 'am laid into the ground along with my ancestors in the family plot. Even my room that I always felt was a place of cheerful memories filled with innocent child play and long-held treasures now had a essence of death. The alarm clock on my dresser had been stopped at three minutes past seven o clock. A morbid indication of my passing. My vanity mirror no longer adorned in necklaces and ribbons but was buried under an ugly black cloth and so was the wall one. Family pictures turned down, no loved one's presence and smiling upwards onto me.

Faced down, protected from me. Protected from death. Protected from his ghastly glare

I wish my room could become my mausoleum, why did I have to be buried underground with only the worms and the dirt to comfort me? I just didn’t understand it. I just wish my final days weren’t spent hacking up blood from my lungs, writhing in pain and sweating profusely. The doctors tried to convince my father to send me to a clinic by the sea to try and help me recover but I actively refused – well, as passionately as I could whilst lying in a bed with phlegm dribbling from my mouth- I didn’t want to spend my final days surrounded by other dying people with that bastard called Death haunting them every day, waiting for the right time and the right day to snatch them away. I knew why they didn’t want me in the house for long, in the fear that I spread it to my family. But as much I hated the idea of infecting my loved ones, I also couldn't bear to be away from them. I pleaded with my father, stared him in the eyes and clasped a sweat- soaked hand onto his. I believe my words to him were

“Please don’t let me die there, I don’t want to die there”

I feel guilty now, manipulating him that way but I was desperate to not rot in some sanatorium away from my family. I wanted to be with them in my final days, wanted them to hold my hand and kiss my forehead and whisper how I was going to be okay. A comforting lie. I was very selfish in my last few months alive. Arguing with doctors who wanted me to move, using every single ounce of strength in my body to make my point clear. I allowed them to move me to the garden when my coughs got worse, I enjoyed that aspect of the illness, the fresh air I got rewarded me with small releases of joy in my heart. The sweet smell of grass being soaked in the hot rays of the sun mixing in with the scent of dry soil. Breezes relieved me from perspiration for short periods and me and Cordelia chatted side by side; joking and forgetting that death was just lurking around the corner.

My mother spoiled me too. On days when I could lift my head up she would bring me new books to read along with the latest magazines; often accompanied with something to eat and drink, although there were days when the food would often go to waste. I loved and cherished her dearly in the finite days being counted down.

Everyday doctors came in telling of the latest surgery and experimental antibiotics that they could perform. The antibiotics I didn’t have a problem with, it was the operations that scared me. They tried to reassure me of their effectiveness but I quivered in fear as they described the procedures to me. They were like something from Frankenstein some of them. As much as I wanted to live, I also didn’t want to be cut open and experimented on with something that may not even ended up working.

I never wanted to die, but just because you don’t want to die doesn’t mean you must have to go through any means necessary to fight. Yes, I 'am angry at death and yes, I curse his bloody name every time I think about him and his hallow eyes. But I also didn’t want to die alone, amongst strangers and being prodded and cut open and sewn back together bay doctors again and again. This may not have been the ending I wanted but dear God at least I had some control over it. I had control in the end and that is the one thing i can say I 'am proud of.

The undertakers came in with dreadful box, a whole black parade of them with top hats and black tailed coats. True workers for death. My final descent.

Here it comes. My big day. I cannot wait.