"Are you done?" the man in a black suit, complete with a black tie and black leather loafers asked the taller. The past twenty minutes they had been floating on a boat, the liquid below them reflecting a shade of red. And in that twenty minutes the taller boy had been talking non-stop. About his family, his friends, his life. He was not satisfied with anything. Everything he had was not enough. People had never thought of his feelings while he had always thought of others. He complained and complained and mentioned umpteen times on how he had kept everything to himself selflessly.

"Excuse me?" the boy asked, not very happy he was interrupted. But the man had not spoke at all throughout. He only nodded and kept looking out at the red skies, as if waiting for something to happen. Now their boat had floated itself onto an island, where the sand was vacant and the only thing that could lead to anything was a wooden staircase. It went up to a wall, which the trees had covered over the rest of the building, making it impossible to see how talk or wide it really was.

"We have arrived," the man told, his voice rasp and low. He stepped out of the boat and walked towards the staircase with calm steps. The boy tripped over his steps as he followed behind, not sure which question to ask first - where are they? Where are they going? What happened to him? Who is this man in black?

"I'm sorry but where are we again?"

"Did you not wonder about that earlier?" the man stopped in his steps, halfway up the stairs to turn around. He raised an eyebrow at the boy who backed up on his steps.

"I-"

"You died. We are going to your afterlife. And I am not someone you wished you have met."

"I... Died?"

"If you are done with listing down your life tragedies and grasped on the idea of being dead, shall we proceed?"

The boy's eyes ran through the sand, unsure where it should land. He tried breathing. It felt normal. It felt like his heart was beating. How could he have died? Maybe he had breathed unconsciously before that he could not even tell when he's actually not breathing?

The man rolled his eyes and stepped up the rest of the staircase, waiting by the knobless door for the bout, his arms crossed across his chest. He watched the boy's mouth gape in uncertainty, his eyes blinking wildly. Finally, his sight landed on the man in black and he realized someone was waiting for him. He quickened his steps and jumped the planks of the staircase, two at a time.

The man uncrossed his arms and placed his left palm on the door, but the boy held it, stopping him from opening it open. "I'm dead. Are you sure?"

"It depends," the man told him. "If you decided that you are alive in this life, then you are alive. And I believe you have already made that choice."

The boy was not sure what to say. The man took the boy's hand by the wrist and removed it from his other hand. He pushed the door, the edges glowing with a white light from the other side. He stopped halfway before he turned back to the boy, his gaze softening.

"Whatever happened in your past life, it is best to let it go. It does not matter anymore. You will be happier here."

The boy opened his mouth to say something, but he was not sure what that would be. So the man gave the door another push before it opened wide, blinding the boy with light as hot as the sun's fire and a glow that passed through his eyelids as if they were nothing but mere thin cloth. The boy felt moisture in his sockets, and the liquid passed through his lids just as the light softened. He separated them, and he saw the ceiling of his bedroom.

Labels: death, fantasy, the unreal

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