The Last Gift From Your Loved Ones

By

EvelioandZgroup

Adapted from an original story from the same name

Dedicated to all of those on Valentine's Day

1

I began walking over to her house. It was cold here in Elmore, but I didn't care. This was something that I had to do. I can't think about it some other time; I can't dream about doing this and say I did; I can't put my myself like this. I needed to do this. I don't care what it takes for me to do this; I don't want her to suffer. I made it to her house, where it was unlocked, so there was no need to use her emergency key that she kept under the Welcome Home mat. There I ran up to her room, where she was sleeping. I saw a lot of tissues placed all around. There was enough to fill the whole block's recycling and trash buckets (even the side can for those extra trash you can't fit in your trash bucket).

She saw me and said, "What are you doing here?"

I sat by her bed, on her white blankets (I swear that I couldn't tell that some of the waded-up tissues were on the bed. They camouflaged so well.), telling her that it was time to go. She went back to her pillow and hugged it for comfort.

She said, "Leave me be. I don't want you to get sick, too."

I told her, "You know that's not true."

"Does it matter?" she said. "I just want to stay in bed and—"

"And what?" I interrupt. "You can't stay here, mope about what happened. It's Valentine's Day. And here you are—hanging around like you're nothing."

"I am nothing. There's no point for me to even coexist in this world. I'm nothing, and you know that damn well."

"No," I said. "You are better than that. I'm not going to let Rachel consume your happiness from what it truly deserves. You need to get out of bed and just be."

"I'll die if I go there."

I knew what she meant. I said what came to mind first. "I thought you were a fighter? I thought you said you like the odds against you."

"This is different."

"What is?" I said. "Your happiness or what can kill you? You're going to die; I'm going to die. What about that feeling when you know you'll die, but you say 'fuck it!' and we stare Death in the face, while we enjoy ourselves because we know the outcome of our lives is death. We know that. But what we don't realize is that we take for granted every day when we should live up our lives to what we want. We don't waste our time with things that won't get our dreams; we do it when we know when there is nothing more for us, but it's our time to take advantage of it because time may be against us; there are dreams and thrills that we can accomplish in a snap."

She stared at me, thinking I was crazy. Then, out of nowhere, she started to laugh. I couldn't believe what I was hearing. She was laughing. I never heard her laugh since what happened. I don't think anyone did. Her parents, sure hell, didn't.

I began laughing, laughing with her.

After a while, I asked her why she was laughing.

She said, "Because you really are something."

"Well, why don't you get up then?"

"Because you know what will happen if I go outside, remember? I already told you." She reminded about it.

"You know what your problem is?" I said. "You think too much, and you feel too little. That's how you fall flat. You think about the outcomes in different ways, but you should get it through your head that life doesn't give you a hand, but it delivers many opportunities that remained unnoticed. Well, this is it—it's that opportunity. So, come on—spit in the eye of the outcome; don't let it ruin what could be a happy ending to your life."

She sat there, this time with a smile. That smile was real, not fake. You can't fake death, but you sure as hell can feel the pain and joy of it.

"Okay," she said. "I'll go. But if I die, you're responsible."

"I'll take responsibility of giving you a happy ending."

We got up and left.