Chapter 96 #3
Be angry with me, curse me and my selfishness. But the Quill who would have been kept alive behind bars for the rest of her days would no longer have been the Quill you would have wanted to love. Believe me. You would have loved a corpse.
So take the memories we were able to make in our time together, which was limited from the start. They are worth so much more than what would have awaited us if I hadn’t made that decision for us. If I hadn’t closed our book.
You know that the best books are the ones that leave you with a longing ache in your chest. The ones that don’t give you what you wish for, but that awaken desires, dreams, and the full spectrum of emotions within you, making you feel alive for a moment.
Thank you, Davian, for being my final chapter. And even if it may not seem that way to you, you were my happy ending. The one I never knew I deserved. I couldn’t let fate take that ending away from me.
Who would have thought that life would give me one more chance to spend my final breaths in hope? To spend my final heartbeats in sync with the most beautiful soul I could ever have met?
This is my story. And I had the strength to pick up the pen and make the best of it.
I’m grateful that you have far better options than I do, Davian. You’ve always been better than me at surviving in this world.
And I know you’re thinking about ending it right now, because you can’t bear this pain any more than I can, and it’s tearing me apart. But please… Promise me you’ll keep going. Promise me you’ll turn the page and start a new chapter. You’ve already done it once without me. You’ll do it again.
There’s the bucket list we made in your car. A handful of beautiful chapters you have to write for me. Please, Davian, promise me.
I haven’t accomplished much in my short life, but hey… I brought an author back to writing. Back to breathing. And now I want him to live without looking back, to pick up the pen and finish the book he started. To give Atrianima what he deserves.
Think of me every time you cross off a point. I’ll be with you. In every moment. You just have to close your eyes and imagine it hard enough.
But at some point, Davian, you have to let me go. Okay?
I was never meant to be more than a memory. More than an ink stain that fades with time. Just like everything in this world.
And I’ve found my peace in that.
In you, Davian.
If you’re reading this, I’m already there, where the fog kisses the pine forests and where dark shadows piece together the broken parts of me that the light could never have reached.
Where the rough sea crashes against the rocky coast of that island where I’ve belonged since the beginning of my existence.
I’m in Wonderland now.
With Mama.
And I’m waiting for you.
But please know that you have time. So much time.
If you don’t know what to do next, take the key charm in your hand and remember my words.
You only need this one key to make the best of your life.
I never meant your typewriter.
I meant hope.
The hope I saw in your eyes whenever you wrote, whenever you stared at your typewriter.
Give Lara a hug for me. Tell her I love her. That I could never have had a better friend, and that I never would have made it through high school for so long without her.
And tell my brother he has to forgive you. That this is my last wish for him.
I don’t believe in something like an afterlife. But if there is such a thing, I promise you I’ll find you there. How could I not?
You shine, Davian. Keep shining for me.
I’m damn proud of you.
How could I not?
My Inkbird…
Wounds from the Past
Gustavo Santaolalla
The last word was barely legible.
Tears dripped onto the page. Too many. So I pulled back and wiped my face with my fists, unable to control my sobs.
My hands were trembling, and the tears wouldn’t stop.
With a growing knot in my stomach, I looked back at her blood writing.
The way her last words were so jerky, so smudged, how many drops of blood had soaked this paper and invaded her words…
The realization that she had written these lines while bleeding out on her shredded manuscripts drove a knife into my chest.
I let the letter sink, buried my face in my hands, and let all the emotions flow from my eyes, letting the tightness in my chest overwhelm me.
Keep going.
How did she imagine this?
“What do you expect of me, Feather?” I sobbed into my hands, but lowered the one holding the letter to avoid destroying the last thing I had left of her with my tear salt.
I wanted to put it back in the plastic bag, but noticed something else glinting at the bottom of the bag.
I reached in and pulled out the piece of metal, covered in a red-brown dried crust.
The pen nib I had used to write on her skin.
Your Ink. My Veins.
That was the final blow.
This wasn’t fair.
Not fair.
Not fair…
The snowfall grew heavier, determined to cover the cemetery landscape around me. But I wasn’t really there. And I didn’t know if I ever would be again.
Walked Through Hell
Anson Seabra
THREE MONTHS LATER
Nothing makes sense without your ink.
Nothing I write. Nothing I think.
So every word and thought in my head.
Feeds the craving of being dead.
– Leaking Batteries Diary