Time.
What is time? The numbers we see on the clock? The digits we see on the calendar? Or is it the past, present and future?
We know what has happened in our past. We know what is happening right now, but do we know what will happen in our future? Do we know what will happen to us?
Not all of us do.
But he did.
It was January. 13th January, 2:40 p.m to be exact. This was the time when Eric got to know that he had eleven months left. He swallowed the fact with a heavy heart. Nothing can be done now because if there was, they would have told him and he would have agreed to it; surgeries, therapies, long-term medications, anything. But no. Eleven months was all the time he had left.
Eleven became his least favourite number since that day.
4:00 p.m and the young man arrived home. The ride on the subway was quiet. Too quiet. Eric hated silence because it made him remember and recall everything. As the words that spilled from the doctor's lips replayed over and over again like a broken record, his own lips quivered and his eyes turned into a pair of glasses. He was so close to breaking down into tears when the bell of the train indicating that it had arrived at its stop rang.
Eric took a long tour on the way back home. He was walking along the sidewalk when he saw two children playing hopscotch; bright smiles on their faces as they hop around without worries.
A small yet sad smile appeared on his face. He wished that he could go back to those days when what hurts the most was a knee scratch and nothing else. The thought was shrugged off and the young man continued his walk, lazily shuffling his feet. Half of him wanted to get home and the other half was afraid of being alone in the closed space.
4:20 p.m and Eric found himself on his bed, buried under the blanket. The pillow which he held close to his chest moved up and down slowly as he tried to breathe in the calmest way he could. He had been lying in bed with nothing specific on his...