“Yeah well, I know she is mad, it just makes me feel better to think that she is alive.”
“But she thinks she is dead!”
“That’s the point; she knows she is alive enough to think that she is dead!”
"Ok, what is wrong with you?”
“Why can’t I talk to you about my insane sister and come off as sane?”
“What makes you think, that I think that you are insane?”
“What makes you say I am not?”
“Oh god! You are insane! Just forget it, goodbye!”
“Isn’t it worth it just to see what it would be like to be dead?”
“But she IS alive!”
“I mean, this is her own little heaven, or hell, she is living in; and you better hope it is hell, cause I don’t want heaven to be so white.”
“You know what I think? I think that next week, you should exchange places with your sister, for all your fascination with her world. Or better yet, get a room next to hers, you will fit right in!”
“Aha! So you DO think I am insane!”
“Just go, will you?”
“Bah! You have no imagination whatsoever. No wonder you have such an immensely boring job. Talking to people like me, exciting it must be, your life. It’s better to pretend to be dead, at least that way, you have something to do!”
“Yeah yeah! Be gone with you; and bring some flowers for your beloved corpse next time, and bring me a coffee.”
“You mean coffin.”
“Aaah!”
“Ok ok, I am going!”
It hit me straight in the face when I stepped out. The noise, the smoke, the light, the wind; assaulting all my senses at once. I could even taste the bitter air. I drew my coat tighter around me and blended into the seething masses as I made my way home from my weekly visit.
It wasn’t a burden, like people seemed to think, when I’d tell them, they’d say, I’m sorry. I’d say don’t be, she’s having the time of her life (oh well, death actually).
I truly look forward to visiting. So far away from reality, it was my hiding place too, where I could isolate myself once a week. She is my therapist, she listens most patiently (well, no duh!) while I pour my innards on to her.
Then there are those times when she comes back, when she is alive. She listens to my stories like only a sister could. She asks; and it feels strange to believe that she is all there, but it feels worse to think that someday she might not be.
The elevator doors opened with a hiss, the kind that says I am great technology, I don’t make noise. Derailing from my train of thoughts, I enter my apartment. After the usual motions, I settle on my bed with a frugal dinner of leftovers by my side. I power on my laptop and wonder when he will be home. I remind myself, 3 days. It is not something that one wishes to encounter, waiting. And yet, we build our own lives, waiting. Waiting for a pay rise, waiting for a birthday, waiting for winters. Waiting for him to get home, waiting for the day that she will go, waiting reluctantly, but waiting nevertheless; waiting.
The sharp notes of Beethoven’s symphony took moments to place as the phone, as opposed to the melody of the doorbell or the trilling of the microwave, unearthing it from under the bed covers, I pressed talk.
“Hi hon!”
“Hi ney!”
“What’s ney?”
“You know, hon-ney? Like the cheesy concept of I complete you?”
“Yeah, I forgot I was talking to you, well I don’t know about completing you, but I did complete my work!”
“Really? Early? Aw hon, I am so proud of you, you deserve a gold star!”
“Ooh ooh! Can I have you to go with the gold star? You’ll match perfectly!”
"Are you telling me that I look like that man Da Vinci painted? That star thing in Da Vinci Code?”
“How ho…… you make me speechless, I mean how? How’d you get there?”
“Yes, I do realize you have the imagination of a cynical 80 year old.”
“At least I’m human; you on the other hand, are unearthly.”
“Does that mean I am also pretty in an unearthly way?”
"Yea….sure whatever, listen my boss thinks I am a diligent worker, so to speak, and thinks I need more work, so as a reward, dear unearthly beauty, I get to stay here and work for additional 3 days. Sad smiley.”
“You know, the whole point of having a conversation on the phone is that you don’t have to say things like sad smiley, but I am still proud of you, my diligent worker, and you will still be back in time for her birthday, smiley with a D.”
“Yes, my ethereal beauty. Remind me to go past all my deadlines, and also to activate your answering machine.”
“Douglas Adams groupie, I understand that you like the whooshing sound deadlines make as they go by, but explain to me the inexplicable need of a parroting tape?”
“This is exactly why, so that I can get to the point without getting into a discussion over the pentacle and its finer, ethereal features.”
“Right, nighty night hon; and I give you permission to ask the other worldly beauties to give you a goodnight kiss.”
“Goodnight dahlin.”
To tired to get anything productive done, I heat a cup of strong coffee, put on real bad music real loud and dance my a-- off. Now this, I am not too tired for. Thank the lord my apartment is sound proofed. In a caffeine driven frenzy I dance till I can dance no more, totally winded, I tidy up and crawl into bed. I lie there, thinking about sleep, how nice it would be if I fell asleep, and catch my self every time I am in the place between sleep and wakefulness. I wonder if she feels this way.
I look drugged the next morning. Grappling my way out of the sheets, I make my way to the bathroom, that’s oh so far. I drag myself to work once I am sure that no one can call me zombie woman today. As an animator, life is not as animated you would imagine. Forcing my way through drawing of random graphs, planes and unspeakable parts of funny looking things, I finally wind up, and switch off my workstation. The funny creature on my screen advises me to keep it real. The advice makes me think, what is reality? Then I think, that’s not for me to figure out, let’s leave it to the likes of Robert Frost. Oh but wait, he’s dead. Yeah well, so is my sister, albeit in a hyper –real plane.
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“Hello sweetheart.”
“Hey sis!”
“Oh! You’re awake today.”
“Yeah, I thought I should say goodbye.”
“Goodbye for what?”
“Goodbye because, I am going to die.”
“Umm, aren’t you dead already?”
“Yes, that was just a thing I was doing, it was amusing while it were but now I am going to die, like really die.”
“That was just a thing? What do you mean by thing? You were pretending to be this way?”
“Yes and no, I mean I couldn’t help it, but I did know what was happening.”
“What? And now you are going to die? Just like that, I mean how do you know that you will die?”
“Yea whatever. Well goodbye then!”
The covers seem to strangle me as I open my eyes. I am short of breath and it takes me several minutes to try and shake of the image of hers, being dead and all. Her face seemed to echo the smirk of knowing what I do not. Her prostrate figure is burned onto my retinas. It just feels like a staggering leap across a broad chasm to think of a world without her. Its not as if she offers great counsel, I mean corpses, even pretend ones, don’t have a lot to offer; but she is, in a way, me. We are Siamese twins, mentally. I can’t afford to have her chopped off. She is a part of me; it’s made who I am.
It doesn’t take long for me to fall asleep again. Partly because I know she’ll stick around till I will, and probably even after that, and partly because I am just so tired. There is another part of me that knows, that if I fall asleep, tomorrow will be here faster, and so will he.
Waking up to the sound of food cooking, I smile drowsily. For once he seems not to have left the keys behind. The first cooked meal I have had in days, it makes my stomach squirm pleasurably. Having a stomach full makes me feel more optimistic than I was last night.
“It seems we have some shopping to do!”
“Can’t you let me at least sit down before your birthday endorphins kick in?”
“Oh! But what will we buy her? I mean something that can be used by a person who pretends to be dead?”
“An air freshener?”
“One who pretends to be dead.”
“A vampire coffin that opens and makes scary noises?”
“That’s actually kinda cool, except I don’t know ant vampires, do you?”
“You."
“Pray tell me why Buffy?”
“You have sucked my brains out, so yeah you.”
“You know, you are not even funny anymore. Hmmm, I wonder if I have ingested your brain? I was feeling squeamish last night.”
“Ha Ha! Very funny, now get ready.”
“Thank you, my sweetie poo. Hey, that rhymed!”
“You called me poo! How rude.”
While I waited for the water bucket to fill, I sorted through my wardrobe, trying to decide what to wear that wouldn’t have me looking homeless. My clothes hadn’t been washed since long, and the dregs of my remaining wardrobe were the dregs for a reason. Long since have I learnt to save resources. This was the reason I had a bath with a water bucket, the reason why I lived on frugal sources. Long since have I learnt how my frugality could save someone else’s life.
Dressed and all spiffy looking, I was all ready to go. We stepped out of the house in style, with all the sun glasses and bling we had on. It was only fitting that our blingy sunglasses were notably conspicuous in the fact that, the sun wasn’t out. It was one of the cloudiest days I have seen. Amused and sort of annoyed with the sun, we stowed away our eyewear and tried shopping with a vengeance.
It turned out, the shops had an identical vendetta against us as the sun, we couldn’t find anything for her.
“How ‘bout an urn?”
“To… put the flowers we bring her, in?”
“No, like the urn they put the remains in you know…”
“You, my dear, are ingenious! All we have to do now is to find an urn her size.”
“Yes, but I think, and I am going out on a limb here, even though she is dead and all, I doubt she will be very amenable to being stuffed in a vase with a lid.”
“Point considered, now let’s just go and buy here some pretty fake flowers.”
“Why fake flowers?”
“I don’t want the live flowers to face the dead sister. I don’t like such irony.”
“The pretend dead sister.”
“Close enough.”
So we went and bought her a pretty bunch of fake lilies and also a lidless vase that we could put it in. It was actually a futile effort because nothing is actually allowed inside the room. They seemed to think it might act as some sort of a trigger and she might want to stab her self with the lidless vase. I would think that it is quite difficult to kill your self with a thing that has a rounded bottom, but then again, I could think wrong. Just as we were about to set out, I remembered the coffee/coffin that I had promised and bought a hazelnut flavored cup to break the monotony.
We made our way to the place and started going up the stairs to her room. The place had no elevators because that is another one of the ways people can kill themselves, it might have seemed crazy but then again, I considered where I was and it fit right in. Just as we approached her room, I remembered the coffee that was still warming my hands and I grabbed his hand and started making my way downstairs.
I had my foot poised on the top of the stairs when I heard a click behind me; she stepped out and looked towards me.
“Don’t.”
Startled I began walking towards her. My stomach lurched as I pitched backwards. In slow motion I could see her begin to walk towards me and I could see the alarm in his eyes. My hand slipped out of his as I started to tumble down the stairs. I felt something warm on me after the first bump and I saw that the coffee had spilled down my ratty clothes. Oddly, it gave me satisfaction I hadn’t ruined my good clothes.
The second turn round I hit my head on one of the corners and it wasn’t the best feeling in the world. The white walls continued to spin around me as I made my way down. I could feel him thudding down the stairs, speechless in alarm. I reached the bottom, battered and bruised, I thought, well what do you know, you could die by the stairs too.
He reached close behind, squatted next to me and put my head in his arms. I could feel the light dimming, my heart slowing and my brain struggling to keep shop open. I squinted at him and tried saying something. I saw something move at the top of the stairs, it was a womanly figure, my sister.
“I tried warning you. Come with me.”
And just like that, she collapsed. I knew finally what had happened. The urn would have been of use. I looked up at him; he was struggling to say something. I smiled at him.
“Don’t miss me. I have her.”
I felt the light fading and with a smile on my lips, I felt her consciousness urging me to follow, I finally got her back. Now she led and I followed.
