Death's Door

CONTENT WARNING: Death

It’s the end of the world. Oh, God it’s the end of the world! What am I doing? I need to pack the kids’ clothes – four pairs of clothes should do it - no I don’t have space for that … two, I’ll take two. I yank two jumpers and trousers from their wardrobe. They’re sleeping. I’ll let them rest for now – they wouldn’t exactly be any help tottering about, half asleep. I look at Raed sprawled across his bed with his duvet long flung off him. After I untangle it from his feet and cover him with it, I check to see if Mona’s okay. She’s sucking her thumb again – I keep telling her to stop doing that; her teeth are starting to grow wonky. I gently pull it out and cover her up so that she’s nice and warm. I look at their sleeping forms in wonder. The world is dying in all its agony, and they, safe in the land of dreams, have no clue. I almost feel proud of myself - the earplugs were a good investment I think.

I shut the wardrobe but the loose door that I never got round to fixing creaks open. Staring at it, I feel a smile creep up on me and yes, it feels wrong, but I can’t help it. That creaky door used to drive me crazy, and it just seems so stupid now to think about how much I used to get worked up by it. But I need to concentrate.

What else do we need? What else? I can’t think, all I can hear is my heart thundering in my ears– Oh yes! Toothbrushes! And…toothpaste, obviously. No point in packing toothbrushes without toothpaste. I grab our three ‘family deal’ brushes from the bathroom and rush to find a bag to put it all in. Maybe I’ll put some things in their little backpacks too. They can carry those. I tear through piles of tattered clothes; some mine, some not, to look for the duffel bag I remember putting in the back of my wardrobe a while back. Oh, for goodness sake, where do things go when you need them? All I can see are boxes of random paraphernalia, books that I said I would read but didn’t, and stacks of shoes. Why do I have so many bloody shoes? Finally, I notice the familiar faded strap of my duffel bag peeking out from under a pile of useless junk and yank it free. The pile comes tumbling down like an avalanche and I quickly scan its aftermath on the floor. I catch onto four pairs of eyes looking at me from an old family photo. My gaze falls on to my younger self in a blue dress, holding a glass of lemonade in one hand, and a baby in the other. She for one, had no idea that in five years’ time the world would end - or did she? Maybe I’d always known something like this would happen – now that I think about it, I guess most of us did. I don’t smile back at the four pairs of eyes grinning up at me, instead I take the photo out of the frame and tuck it into my pocket. I wonder if I’ll see those smiles again one day - or three of them at least. But again, my mind wonders. Back to the task at hand, what else do we need?

Oh my goodness, food! I can’t believe I almost forgot – but in all fairness it is very hard to think when all I can hear is that stupid siren. On and on it drones, piercing the silence of the night with its song of death. I sprint to the kitchen and quickly ravage the cupboards for anything canned or in packets. There isn’t much – Oh, how I wish I’d done this week’s shop. My eyes quickly scan the small kitchen that I’ve had a lengthy love-hate relationship with before heading for the stairs. But as I take my first step, a thought crosses my mind. What about water? I rush back and fill up the kids’ water bottles. I don’t have one; I’ve always hated the taste of water from plastic bottles.

As I leave the kitchen one last time, I feel my chest tighten. The thought of leaving all this behind and never returning causes a heavy feeling to form in the pit of my stomach. The four walls of this home have witnessed so much of my life. It was there for us when we put up the first hideous decoration after buying this house – a ceramic cow key hanger if I remember correctly. It was there for Raed and Mona when they took their first staggering steps into our arms, and it was there for me when I slid down it crying after I received the news of my husband’s death. Having spent so much time together, it almost feels disloyal to leave it, but I have no choice. I pass the door frame decorated with five years’ worth of pencil markings, each with a date and either Mona or Raed’s name next to it. Human development is such a terrifying and magnificent marvel to witness – it’s so dramatic, yet at the same time it’s completely unnoticeable. Raed was born in 2016. I blinked and now he’s five, I’ll blink again and he’ll be ten, and before we both know it, he’ll be a strapping young man of twenty. But that’s life I guess.

I gather some blankets from the sofa and roll them up. There’s no guarantee that we’ll find warmth where we go, if indeed there is any left at all in the world. Going up the stairs, an unexpected thud shakes the ground and makes me trip. I scrape my knee, but that’s about it – nothing too serious. I close my eyes and steady my breathing. It’s begun. Despite feeling pure terror run through every nerve in my body, I feel a sinister curiosity tug me to the window. Pulling the curtains apart, I look up in woeful awe. Deadly constellations light up the sky and make it rain fire. If it wasn’t death’s parting gift, I might actually think it was somehow beautiful. The balls of light swim in the air, their soft edges lulling the beholder into a trance. But then it dawns on me. The largest possible thing that every human can see; the sky, has been conquered. With every second as I watch it being torn apart by blazing trails of missiles, the hope inside of me dwindles away. I look down at the street I once knew, now unrecognisable under all the rubble and debris left behind from previous explosions. Streams of people frantically fumble for cars or run aimlessly with the futile hope of escaping this tragedy. It’s chaos. Everyone tramples over each other, their eyes shining with raw instinct of survival - or I guess they could just be watery from all the smoke and ash. I understand now. It’s all as hopeless as ants scuttling away from the boot that will inevitably squash them. I look down at the blanket rolled up in my hand, and let it slip from my grasp. No one within a 600 mile radius will survive this. A dry laugh escapes my lips. How far did I really think that I, my children, and our meagre supplies would go? We wouldn’t have gotten half a mile before it was all over. This is it. We’re going to die here.

Another thud shakes the house, this time followed by Mona and Raed’s cries. They’ve woken up. I slowly climb up the worn out carpeted stairs once more and think about what I should say. How do you tell a child that they’re going to die? How do you tell them that they’re about to take their last living breath before being burnt if not crushed to death? How can I look into their innocent and confused faces and tell them that? I’m sorry kids, but it looks like we just got unlucky in the lottery of death. Why? Well now there’s the real question, but my mind runs blank. Doesn’t everyone deserve security and peace? I hear the whistle of another rocket. I guess that answers that one.

I enter the room and see a wailing Mona clinging onto Raed’s arm. He has teary eyes which he wipes away, but he can’t hold back his sniffles. They look so cute holding each other like that – you’d never get them to pose like this on any other day. I crouch down, beckoning them closer and they come running. I bundle them up into my arms and all I can think to say is ‘Everything’s going to be okay’. Everything’s going to be okay? What kind of a line is that? The sky’s on fire, and I’m telling my kids that everything’s going to be okay. I want to say that we’ll meet daddy soon, but I stop myself before I do - something about that seems macabre. I make sure to turn their heads away from the window as they bury their faces into each crook of my neck. I can feel my shoulders soaking up and my children shaking with fear. Mona’s got her thumb in her mouth again but I think I’ll let her off this time. I stroke their soft hair, but I can’t think of a single consolatory thing to say, so I remain silent. Instead, I hold them tighter than I ever have before and try to be strong for them, because that’s my job as their parent – to protect them. But I can’t even do that; all I can do is hold their hands as we walk together into the jaws of death. I held their hands as they made their first steps in this world, and I’ll hold their hands as they walk out of it. It’s actually kind of poetic in a dark sort of way.

Tears start to sting my eyes. I wonder what kind of people they would have been if they had the chance to grow up. Would Mona have been as shy as she is now? Would Raed’s voice have had the same grumbly cadence as his father’s? A sense of helplessness overwhelms me as I stare at the destruction outside, the sky now donning an orange hue. It’ll be over soon. The world will end - or rather, our world will end, not everyone else’s. I imagine people on the other side of the world, probably going about their day as normal whilst we perish in the night. We’ll be gone in the morning, our corpses probably stiffening in the cold of dawn, but they’ll still be here. There’ll be no one to mourn us or feel any grief at our absence. It’s weird, I never felt any bitterness before, but here at the edge of death, something in me burns. I can’t help but think that maybe things didn’t have to be this way, if someone somewhere had just said or done something. But who would dare to care? A single tear rolls down my cheek as I realise just how insignificant and small my world really is in the grand scheme of things. Ironically, it’s as if my understanding of everything in the world has shifted in to place, just as it’s ending no less.

The sound of manmade thunder grows louder. I try to block it out and breathe in the scent of my children as I recall the big moments of my life. Graduating, getting married, the birth of my kids. All of these joyful moments that meant everything to me mean nothing to the rest of the world. Was it all…meaningless? What was the point of it all just to end here? It crosses my mind that I haven’t left a mark on the world – after my body decomposes, there’ll be no trace to suggest that I even existed. The doubts terrify me, but an ocean of relief washes them away as I look down at my kids. I feel them clinging on to me just as they used to do when they were babies. I smile and whisper loving words into their little ears. All of this couldn’t have been meaningless. How could it be? After all, I got to meet these little ones who complete me. Taking one last look out the window, I close my eyes and listen to the sirens. They repeat over and over, softly in the distance like a lullaby, sending me to an eternal slee-