We Sold Funeral Flowers - Chapter 5

in writing •  8 years ago 

Disclaimer: I'm a poet....yeah that 

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>> Chapter 1 << | >> Chapter 2 << | >> Chapter 3 << | >> Chapter 4 <<

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Chapter 5

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So we cut off our hair
and laugh at ourselves in the mirror
and watch the red clock digits tick
while we talk about what you'll miss most
and I take your pale hand and ask "will you still haunt me, as a ghost?"

There is something excruciating about a hospital room. The pale blue, the bleached sheets, the linoleum floors, with pastel pinks. The hardware they hook you up to, the bleeps and beeps...the way you become just another blip.

I never think of a happy place, a healing place, and retreat to a fucking hospital in my mind.

We were in a room that overlooked downtown. The lights at night, would charm her. The ministry of being her escort to the edge, would ruin me.

I was sitting next to Hannah. We weren't speaking. The TV was off. The lights were too.

She squeezed my fingers, "I'm worried about you Felix"

I didn't say anything. Just climbed in that heartless hospital bed, and she broke a peaceful smile and let out a surpirsed gasp and we giggled together.

"We should ring the nurse now!" she sputtered in a low laugh.

How do you face death with someone you've always believed would live forever? We did what we would do about everything. We held silence like a blanket, then we talked.

"We are all afraid, ya know? Usually of losing. Cuz we think we own our lives, think it belongs to us somehow. But you're not losing me, because we are not limited to these bodies, so we never leave, death is just something new, something different...I think" She spoke strong but distant.

I took a large breath for both of us and squeezed her tight. After a few minutes of silence, I whispered, "are you afraid Hannah?"

"yeah."

Her face went blank and she turned to me and looked up, putting one hand to my cheek, the other gripping my hand harder.


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>> Next Chapter Will Post Tomorrow 8/5/2016  

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Not for redistribution, © John Oliver Westbrook

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This is a nice series and I really like the #micro-novel format. I'm starting to do some curation around the #longform tag and would like to include this.

Have you seen anything else (either fiction or non-fiction) that might be worth me checking out? I'm kind of interested in giving things a bump that got missed in the first payout round, but could still get some $ in the 30 day window - and just giving some more visibility to posts that have some staying power.

  ·  8 years ago Reveal Comment