MC POV
'I died' was the first thought I had, 'I am alive' was the first conclusion I came to from my existence.
I didn't know why I had that thought at the time or how I made that conclusion or how was I able to possess such coherent thinking but when none of your senses are working and all you can feel is the air entering your lungs.
Your mind is compelled to think, to makes conclusions, to keep thinking to prevent itself from going insane in that unending darkness.
My mind kept drifting in and out of consciousness for unknown periods of time, drifting in my thoughts being the only thing I could do, and that's what I did. I forced my mind to think so that I didn't succumb to my fears, to the darkness, to prevent myself from becoming mentally unsound.
In the following period of time, I had flashes of incoherent, broken flashes of what appeared to be someone's life; the flashes were mostly fuzzy, silent, and devoid of voices, yet somehow, I understood what transpired. Like I knew the events that took place yet missing out on details, of all those scenes and events none completely immersive yet laden with traces of emotions that made me realise they were memories; potentially my own, and through those memories, my thoughts became more coherent and I came to know a few things about myself.
Trapped in darkness, feeling neither alive nor dead and unaware of the passage of time, those memories became my only companion; they became the threads that kept my conciousness together and prevented my sanity from falling apart.
Those flashing memories became my sustenence, nutrients for my mind's growth, those emotions accompanied by those memories became my solace from the despair that rose from being trapped in darkness.
Immersing myself in those fragmented flashes of memories, I pieced together the story of a life, a life I would like to believe I've lived, yet remain unsure.
If I choose to believe those memories are mine, of the life I lived or am still living than my story was quite a nice, nothing great or world changing but I think I did good enough with what I had.
The beginning of the story wasn't great, I was an orphan; never knew my parents; I grew up in an orphanage which, like most, was underfunded. Life was tough yeah, but it wasn't so bad that we would die from starvation, while we didn't have abundance we scraped together enough for us to survive, sometimes we struggled a little yes, but as the say a tough life make you tougher.
I didn't gather much about my name or habits probably because I saw the world from my perspective, so I was more focused on what I saw and felt than myself.
Life at the orphanage, while tough, made me grow up earlier than my more privileged counterparts; the hardship taught us to think and to work hard, and I worked hard and by the grace of Lord my mind was competent enough to keep up with my spirit.
By the time I reached my early twenties, my hard work started to pay off. I was successful in life, and I was rich enough to live lavishly for the rest of my life, yet life has a way of tormenting men, for destiny had other plans for me.
Just when life was settling down on the smooth path for me, I came to know I had cancer, and according to the doctors, I had about a year.
The news pulled me to despair palpable even in my fragmented memories, a sense of futility thet drowns your entire existence, a suffocation like falling into the depths of the ocean with no light and your lungs desperate for air yet deprived of it.
But like lost children who find solace in the warmth of their homes upon return, I too found solace in the only place I called home in my life, the orphanage where I found myself in a drunken stupor, the place I called home.
The matron who found me sprawled at the doorstep recognised me and took me in, and I spent the next few weeks there, the time spent there pulling me out of my despair. There was no grand journey of self-discovery for me, just a slight realisation; sometime you reaslise a nudge in the right direction and slight distraction at right time can work wonders on mind that no spirtualists or doctors can replicate.
As I spent time in the orphanage, perhaps it was the positivity of those children who were like me that shook away the negativity clouding my mind, and before I knew it, I was peaceful.
It was like a sudden realisation just one day that I had this feeling that it's okay, perhaps it was this changed mindset that made me see things differently, I spent the next month or two dealing with the matters of my company and turned all I could to sustainable wealth and usable funds then I retired.
I decided to spend my leftover life enjoying things I didn't before, and I decided to leave whatever sustainable wealth I had in the name of the orphanage.
I enjoyed my 1-year vacation and died, or maybe I am just strapped to some machine and still alive; who knows? I mean my situation never really leaves a leeway for certainity.
The whole in and out of consciousness lasted months or years, and I scrapped my option of being strapped to a machine just a few days after I had that thought; why, you ask, because of the fresh air I could breathe.
You said that sounds stupid? Oh, please when you had to breath smoke all your life and the you feel the ait that feels like a fresh breath from the mountains you know there is no hospital with such good service and because the air quality was too good compared to anything I had during my life(?) and yet the same fresh air that filled my lungs denied me the certainty of my death.
But as time passed slowly I started to gain more of my senses and as my perception grew I knew
'I was Alive.'