The Essence of Life (FFC, One-shot)

What is death? This is a question that has yet to wield an answer, although we humans had searched for one for eons. Some search for the meaning of life, which is much the same thing with a different name. Our instincts force us to need to survive in every situation; including that one greatest conqueror. We give ourselves the illusion of goals; reincarnation, an afterworld, eternal bliss, to keep us from becoming mad. If all life held was an end where our minds – our existence winks out into nothing and we are converted to rotting meat incapable of thinking, of feeling… to us, that is the ultimate horror. We spend our lives on education and then on working for everybody else to make a form of income; create more lives that spend their own following your footsteps, and perhaps all this would lead to nothing. No spirit, not even remorse for wasted time as we all lay absolutely unaware; never to think at all, never to dream, laugh or smile, and never to even know that once you had done these things and just become… nothing.

Thoughts like these could turn a person mad if dwelt on for too long. Luckily, I will not have all that much time to do so. I lay in my room on sheets drenched with my sweat, supposedly deep in a fever brought on by an infection. However, at the brink of death, sudden, despairing clarity fills my mind.

I am fourteen, and tonight, I shall die.

I know my leg burns, but I feel it as if I were another person, watching the pain and sympathetically acknowledging it rather than being victim to it.

I wish my father were here. I want to tell him that I'm really sorry we had a fight - a fight over the stupid garden. Who cares whether the geraniums were to go in a pot or not?

I want to hug him and cry like I did when I was smaller, and let him take all the pain away. He could heal a hurt just by being there and letting you cry. Gosh, I'll miss him. No, wait; I won't, because I'll be dead.

I can't imagine what it would be like not to think. Neither can anybody else, for we have never had anything relative of that experience. You won't care if you're buried under the earth, or that your best friend had grown old and forgotten you. Heck, you won't even not care; you just won't be.

I need to apologise to my mum. We non-verbally fought over lots of little things. Like how Vee, my Grimer, was to be treated inside the house. How tidy my room should be kept was another thing under our slightly aggressive consideration. Stupid. Stupid, stupid, stupid. Vee didn't even mind only being restricted to sliming over newspapers; it saved my mother a lot of work, she had always indicated. And the bedroom?

I wonder what others will feel at my funeral. To feel… that right may be stripped away from me because of a stupid cut. I wonder how many people will even turn up. I wonder who really considered me a true friend.

Emotions. They are a thing to be envied. Emotions signal life and passion. Sadness, anger, joy, surprise, confusion and all the other ones you could think of. There are the different shades of each emotion; content to ecstatic, for example, could all really be considered as "happiness" or "joy". Humans are extremely complicated, and we have tried to name everything; even those that can't be described. Then there are those wretched mixed emotions where you don't know if you should be happy or angry, sad or mad.

The two easiest emotions to feel are happiness and anger, in my opinion. I've had my fair share of both. Well, if you could call the rebellious, teenage feeling "anger".

Who am I? Perhaps I will exist no more when I die. But I want to hold on to the last vestige of me until then. I am Hanna Jagel, I have dirty-blonde hair and my eyes change colour from blue to green, regularly. I am bony and others jokingly call me freakishly tall. My mother gave up her job as a chef to stay at home and care for me in my adolescence and never went back because she didn't like her boss. My father is a travelling businessman and makes just enough income to keep us afloat and still buy a few luxury items.

I was loud and sometimes rude without knowing it. I say the first thing that comes to my head, no matter if it even made sense or not. Usually that comment made others turn around and say "'Excuse me?'".

I have a sympathetic ear and manage to keep quiet when others reveal their problems to me. I…

My name is Hanna Jagel, daughter of Mary and Simon Jagel. My first crush was on an older guy who thought of me as a kind of sister. He moved away someplace else when his father got a better job in some other region. Sinnoh, I think it was.

My favourite flowers are tulips, and my favourite colour is yellow. I like all sorts of food, but I despise anything with carrots. I eat more vegetables than fruits and more fruits in a day than sweets in a week.

When I grow up, I want to be a Pokémon Breeder. If I grow up, I mean.

I was christened Hanna Jagel. I want to get married in a greenhouse-like structure during a thunderstorm. My dream guy would be funny, easygoing, caring and sometimes quite immature. Our house would be one of those little cottages with flowering vines sneaking up the walls, a little way apart from the rest of the town. We will grow our own vegetables and surround ourselves with Pokémon. When I'm twenty-five, I'll give birth to identical twins; a boy and a girl. They will bicker with me constantly but not with their father. I will be the responsible one in the house, and I will covet them until they're eleven. Then they will engage in other activities; Pokémon and soccer for the boy and Pokémon and a bit of drama for the girl. By then I would have a five-year-old boy who loved getting dirty and fighting.

The children will exasperate me to no end. Then, I and my husband shall grow old and my children will grow into adults and move away. My husband will die first, and I'll become known as a slightly crazy widow who talked to Pokémon and thought her Muk was her dead husband.

My grandchildren will visit me out of sympathy and I'll give them sweets until they stop coming. Then I will move to the village, leave the cottage for them in my will, and die.

I am Hanna; I am fourteen, I…

There is no pain anymore. I hear my heart beat. I feel my blood running sluggishly through the veins. I try to close my eyes, but those muscles just lay limp. I don't even feel my eyes burn. Can I see? Yes, but everything is slightly unfocussed.

I am… I am Hanna, and I hate carrots. My best friend is… poisonous. My… my favourite… colour is yellow. Loud… slightly obnoxious…

Hanna. I… am… Hanna.

~*~

Outside a small, bricked house, a pile of purple ooze raised its head and gave a mournful cry. Nobody listened, as they had done for the past few days. The Pokémon's call echoed through the neighbourhood as its best friend's life was snuffed out as quickly and painlessly as a candle flame.

~*~

The sun shone brightly and several fluffy white clouds floated past peacefully. It was a great day for going to the beach or going outside to play.

A huddle of people was seated, facing a newly dug grave. Several were weeping quietly; anything louder would seem sacrilegious. A man called Simon and his wife, Mary, were at the front, both of them stony-faced. Their complexions were ashen, and their jaws clenched; hands clasped together.

A priest in black faced the crowd who were wearing much of the same colour; albeit with the technically impossible, different shades of it. He watched the crowd sombrely and began to read in a droning voice which he thought appropriate for funerals. The words had been provided by the friends and family of the poor girl.

'We are gathered here today to witness the burial of the deceased and departed Hanna Jagel,' he frowned as a bubble of laughter reached their ears from several boys playing in the orchard. It provoked some of the audience to tear up. Somewhere, a bird sang.

'Hanna was fourteen, and a lively, optimistic youth. She was also incredibly stubborn and would never give in unless she was absolutely forced to. She loved life, people and Pokémon. She was great in spirit and showed support to all her friends and loved ones, listening quietly to others' problems and just being there,' he paused, scanning the crowd again.

Those that were weeping had renewed their fervour as he spoke, and the father of the girl had curiously moist eyes.

'She brought joy and laughter to the lives of all whom she considered friends, but believed in having a balance of emotions… She brought, along with the joy, amused exasperation, anger, surprise, confusion and sorrow. This was part of her unspoken agreement with those she loved.

Her litany was; "I am Hanna, human, loud and my favourite colour is yellow". The loss of her life shall forever be with those who are left behind and without her. We must hope that we shall meet again in the kingdom of God,' the priest finished, adding in the second part of the last sentence. It went against his beliefs not to.

Suddenly, dry sobs welled up from Mary Jagel, and she buried her face into her husband's shirt, the sound of despair close to that of a Pokémon whom had disappeared after its tribute to her daughter. This broke the self control of the others, and a chorus of sobs floated out into the bright and sunny day.

Oh...my...god...You really touched my heart, sweet_dreams...Imay have actually let a tear fall down my cheek, i don't remember. I was too busy thinking about how amazing this was. By far, this was the most sad pice of writing i have ever read, but so heartfelt and loving. I really want to cry now. It is kinda funny, too, because i always finding myself thinking about what happens when one dies. Do we just stop thinking? Do we see blackness for infinity? Or do we really live forever in heaven?
You are an amazing tragedy writer, and you should write more of these depressing one-shots.

Right Now, you are my idol. Thank you for touching my soul...