XXX

I have been running away from it for quite some time now. I do not precisely recall when it started. Perhaps some 3-4 years ago. But I cannot say for sure. It is like having a nightmare of sorts where you always find yourself in the middle of things. It’s always impossible to tell when that nightmare started and what triggered it. But before I could realize, the haunting had already begun. And it was only the fear which mattered and not the causality.

During all these years, I was simply running away from it, hoping to outrun it someday. I was being foolish, I knew that, but it is only when we act foolish that we tend to believe in miracles. And surely it needed nothing less than a miracle.  But the truth was that it was outrunning me. Whenever I looked back, it was a tad bit closer to me. I never could really gather the courage to stop, to turn back, and to have a good look at it. I was too scared. By not looking at it, I wanted to convince my self that it was surreal, merely a shadow and nothing more. But it was me, who was in the dark.

What option did I have but running away? I had seen many souls go down to it. They had tears in their eyes and certainly not of happiness. When they were on the brink of embracing it, they broke down like castles made of sand. With a sudden stroke of time, all the aesthetics comes down crashing like a glass vessel shattering away against the hard emotionless floor. Like others, they wanted the time to halt. They wanted the greys not to take over the blacks. They wanted the euphoria to become their virtue for perpetuity. And then, when it arrived, it would smirk upon them mercilessly, like a butcher in an abattoir.  And eventually, that gigantic knife would put to rest all the desires.

I know many, who thought ale would aid. That it would lessen the pain and the suffering.  But for how long you think this masquerade would keep you content in your denial.  When you wake up to embrace the virgin lights of dawn, it would hit you even harder. You would be ambushed to confront it in your most vulnerable state. And then I am afraid, all the lemons in the world would not be enough for the hangover it will embark upon you.

After surviving for so long, I feel that it is now almost inevitable. There is no running from it now. There is no point of hiding in the closet, no point in locking the doors and no point in turning off the lights. The beast is finally here to bring me down. As I sit alone in my room, I can feel that it has arrived somewhere near. I can feel its heartbeat. I can sense those taps on the floor. Did I lock the door right, I pondered while I shivered. It was not the cold that made me so, it was the eminent moment of truth.

I looked away, to divert my attention, only to meet the cruel gaze of time. That ugly clock on the wall. Those mean hands were moving so fast. The longer one moving faster. The longer one approaching the smaller. Perhaps only seconds away. And then they became one. It was time. It was here. It was finally upon me. I had no option but to bow to it.

It, the fateful, the dreadful and the inevitable, thirtieth birthday.