two souls

Two souls meet in a room.

“Hi.” says one.

“Oh, hi.” responds the other.

The room is black and endless, only the soft glow of each soul causing any sort of illumination.

One of the souls an older woman, the other a young man.

They stand side by side looking out into the nothingness, curiosity buzzing between them in the midst of the silence.

“Where are we?” the young man asks eventually.

“I’m not sure, but I think we’re dead.” responds the woman.

“Oh.” he says.

She turns to look at him for the first time and takes him in.

His skin is porcelain and smooth in such stark contrast to her own. How young he is encapsulating him so strongly that it makes her stomach swirl.

His eyes, however, were tried and aged.

“What’s your name kid?” She asks.

He thinks for a moment, “I don’t think I remember.”
She scanned her memory for her own a second later then laughed, “I don’t think I do either.”

He huffs a breath that could possibly resemble a laugh then says, “Kid works. I like Kid.”

She pauses, “I remember my daughter calling me Mom.”
He nods, “Okay Mom, tell me. Are we in hell?” 

She looks around, “I don’t think so. My pastor always told me hell would have more fire. But this doesn’t quite look like heaven either.”

He thinks this over, then looks over to her. He couldn’t imagine someone with as frail a body as hers being damned to eternal suffering, but he also couldn’t imagine himself deserving anything less.

“How did you die?” She asks curiously.

He blinks once, then twice. Nauseated, he asks instead “You said you remember your daughter, what else do you remember about your life?”

She studies him and his suddenly nerved demeanor, but allows his obvious subject change, “I remember lots of doctors and hospitals and needles. Mostly towards the end.”

He turns to her fragility again, “Okay, what else?”

She closes her eyes and allows memories to flood her system, “I remember my husband, and willow trees and ladybugs. I really loved ladybugs. I also really loved my husband.”

She smiles softly at the thought then asks, “What do you remember of yours?”

His pulse that he no longer has seems to still somehow quicken and he lets a shaky breath escape his now tight chest.

“I remember my sister. And I remember the ocean.”

“Hm, was your sister older or younger?” She follows.

“Neither,” He answers, “We were twins.”

“And what of the ocean? Which parts do you remember?”

“I remember it’s anger.” He states as if the ocean told him so itself.

She laughed, a true laugh this time and he furrowed his eyebrows at her.

“I”m being serious.” He huffed.

“I know,” She replied, catching her breath, “that’s why I’m laughing. It’s so angsty and juvenile of you to believe that the ocean is an angry entity.”

“Of course it’s angry, what else would you call it’s crashing waves and destructive storms?”

She considers this, “Well, I would call them passion. Not everything that holds such intensity is anger you know. Where did you learn that intensity must be a cruel thing?”

He quietly reaches for his forearm and the woman follows the movement, her eyes meeting the marks that covered it. Her heart ached for his youth, and the pain that she now knew filled his too little years.

She sighed, “Yes intensity can be a cruel thing, but it isn’t always. I’m sorry if you only ever experienced its wrath. I wish you had experienced its beauty. But I guess that’s just what life is, wrath and beauty. And although the wrath loves to remind us of itself, we must still never forget of beauty.”

He traces the lines on his arm, “You seem like you were a good mom. I would have liked to be your son.”

She smiles softly, “I would have liked to ground you.”

Silence met them once again, long enough for her to think of her daughter.

Without meaning to, she says, “For what it’s worth, I don’t think I was a good mom.”

“Why not?”

“I was really sick for the last of my life, cancer they said. It made everything about me and keeping me alive. It should have been about her, and keeping her happy.” Her eyes threatened tears.

A tender hand fell into hers, “I don’t think she blamed you. Even now that you’re gone, I just think she loved you. One thing I did learn in my life is that we tend to blame ourselves much more than others actually ever blame us. I think in a way it proves how selfish and self centered we are. And you don’t want to be selfish and self centered, do you?”

She laughed away her tears and held his hand tighter, “No, I suppose I don’t.”

Before he could change his mind and lose his courage he says, “I killed myself.”

Silence follows, but she doesn’t release his hand. So he continues, 

“I was really sad, for a really long time. I think it lived in me for so long that I can’t even remember what originally caused it. It grew into its own thing, its own being. Until I couldn’t even find myself anymore, all that was left was that sadness.”

She hummed in response, then looked at him deeper than she had previously. She allowed herself to take in all of him, from his matted hair to his thin frame to the scars that now made much more sense.

“Well, I can see you just fine. You ever hear that vampires can’t see their own reflection? Maybe it’s like that. You may not have been able to see yourself, but I bet everyone else could see you just fine. And I bet they could see you clear enough to love you anyway. You said you had a sister, right?”

His heart ached at the thought of her, “Yes, Grace.”

“Grace. You remember her name even while you can’t remember your own. And that’s because you love her, isn’t it? Well I bet she would remember yours even if she couldn’t remember her own. Because she loves you. And the only thing we can ever really trust in ourselves is love.”

He wiped a tear with his palm, “Love. I guess that’s all life really is, huh?”

“I guess so.” She says back.

A light begins to glow across the black room, slowly getting closer to the two souls who now stood with hands intertwined.

“What do you think comes next?” He asks.

“I don’t know,” She answers, “But I hope that it’s full of love.”

The light grows, and swallows the room whole.

Including the two souls.