The Beginning After the Supposed End [short story]

"What were you thinking?"

"That's it. I wasn't. Ironically, my head was never as clear than when I've decided that I was going ahead with it."

"If there's anyone who has to go, it should damn well be Jericho Rosales."

He laughed.

"Hey, I'm not kidding, ok? Don't ever scare me like that again. Ever. I know it seems like you're like given a preview to hell right now, but believe me, it will get better. Think about it: How could it get any worse?"

"You know what? Of all the people I wish to talk to, it's you, because your hell is closest to mine. Well, no offense meant."

"None taken."

He smiled but did not say anything.

"Just... I don't know. Just breathe. Breathe, ok? You have to start somewhere. Start with your breath."

He nodded at her noncommittally. She stood up to leave.

"’My future is a cadaver crunching in a very fast decay...’"

She looked back at him and raised an eyebrow. "Plath again?"

"No. Mine. Narcissistic, huh?"

She shook her head and closed the door behind her.

He sat alone in the empty room, silently contemplating. Everything seemed to be trivial. Funny. Because he was so convinced he would be dead by now. He had written his farewell journal entry to his fictitious friend Holden. His stories and poetry were neatly set aside to be left posthumously. He even returned the rented VCDs. It was funny that those were all he managed to put into order.

The poet stood up. This called for a walk. Walking was his substitute to weed. He would've preferred the real thing, but walking would have to do right then. Stepping out into the open air of the street, he was oblivious to the usual cacophony of the city. Instead, his mind wandered elsewhere.

He remembered his flunked subjects. His suspension from the University. The painful talk with his parents. The equally painful email he had to write to his aunt who was supporting his college education. The pleading. The refusing. The white lies. He found it amusing that he had to lie to spare them all from the pain of knowing the full extent of the reality.

"Nobody fails if everyone studies."

His mother's words echoed within the hollow corners of his head, taunting him. Aggravating him that he had to be burdened by the truth.

"I don't have the heart for it," he had said. And barely getting the words out, he choked, "You would never understand me because you don't even read the books I read."

He remembered his asphyxiation attempt. Somewhere along the long and painful effort to restrain his breathing, a tiny part of him wanted to let go. He remembered his struggle for breath. In his life full of difficulties, he tried to deprive himself of something that was easy. The air was his and it never failed him, was never disappointed at him, and never had to question him.

A vehicle's blare snapped him back into his senses. He quickened his steps. He had to get home soon. He had to find his copy of J.D. Salinger's Catcher in the Rye.