THE SAFEST SPACE FOR MY UNSOLICITED OPINIONS

The burning waves inside my veins once made me feeling like I was only one lab mistake away from becoming a partially damaged antihero bringing the power of wrath and shock to battle a monster in front of me: my own already fractured reality. The punch clouded most of my good senses of judgment for a while when I was extremely struggling after losing my brother all of sudden back in 2018.

We probably hear this somewhere before: grief will be overcome as time flies, and those who are going through it will finally find peace. But when it exactly happened to us, would we? Would myself? Got my heart broken twice, and none of them was more worth to cry for than what it felt when death ruthlessly bereaved us of somebody we love without advance warning.

I recall every second the moment I opened my eyes that morning, picked up the call from my Mom who freaked out telling everything and asked me to check the news. I was petrified. No, no, no, that could not be real. My lungs felt so heavy. I took my breaths slowly. As much as I tried my best to not open the social media, all I did was googling things here and there to make sure how and when it happened, how could I exactly do, waiting for a miracle, waiting for him to come back alive with the jokes he always had and the crazy ideas inside his head, to later only made myself screeching in a painful squealing noise on the left side of my bed. Alone.

My brother was a 23 year-old young man living his best life. Genereous, funny, opinionated, smart, super kind. Even my best friends love him. He treated me like an old sister (like he should, ha!) and a best friend. He liked to share with me about his days, his college life, his relationships, complained tiny things, being grumpy and hilarious at the same time, while always being compassionate and respectful. We both laughed at whatever life threw us together and I could talk about many things to him.

For that time being, my brother was all healthy. He called me the day before, asked me to come to his apartment room and to cook for him later once he finished his business trip. He was so ready to go for his work project the morning after. It never came to mind it was our last conversation when God decided his time was up. That was a moment when in a blink of an eye idiom felt way too literal.

Some relatives came to me respectively saying “don’t be sad too long, he’s happy in heaven now”. I wasn’t sad. I was mad. They did not lose their loved one tragically, I thought, so talking might be easier for them than done (with a sincere apology, I knew they meant no harm and just had pure intentions to console me). My running tears they would never see were not only made of sadness, but also rage, and regret. Yet the worst part of it all was I still played pretend all along with fake-happy-face. I posted fun memories with my brother to my gram, always tried to be normal in front of all the others, tried to look strong because I had no clue on how to handle the flame of my burning wound while being consumed by nothingness.

As if it was not enough, last year I lost one of my closest bestfriends too. He called me one day and proposed a quick meet up. It sounded as a fun coincidence because that time I was having a short vacation with my family in Bogor, close to where he lived. He was excited that he went like “yeah let’s do it tomorrow, Sunday will be perfect” straightaway. I agreed. Fast forward to some hours later, it turned out that our Sunday hangout was just a plan. He had to cancel our appointment due to a personal emergency and texted me “I’m so sorry to cancel last minute, please send my regards to your family. Miss you, and yes we should meet up asap”. I never expected that asap meant I came to his funeral three weeks after that day.

It’s crazy I was always aware that someday people we deeply love will leave us sooner or later, and so will we, but I used to think I still had much more time with them. Death was never for the people I personally know well, until I went to the burials of my closest uncle, my grandpa, my brother, and my bestfriend less than 3 years. Sometimes I wish I was just a little kid so falling from the bike or losing someone forever wouldn’t hurt too much. I never expected a damage by continuous silent mourning can eat you alive.

Another years have gone by now. I have been trying to overcome the bereavement. I didn’t count my stages of grief, and I didn’t want to. Even I didn’t know if I skip a stage or two. Grief might change the way my brain works. It taught me that I should not take those who care about myself for granted and I should kindly appreciate the amount of time we have.

What I realise now is I am slowly taking the entire new phase, accepting the fact that life might be unpredictable, but death is a sure thing. You can’t avoid it, you can’t cheat on it. I think I have finally mastered how to get used to with telling to other people about my beloved persons who were gone in a past tense.

To our beloved ones who passed away before us, rest in peace.
Here we strive our best for having a peace with ourselves too.

– Kéké