AFTERLIFE

I tried, I failed. Then I tried again, and failed once more. It was only then I realized, I was already dead. Not in body, but in spirit. My funeral would not come until my body followed.

She slowly killed the fun-loving boy inside me, the one who had too many friends, but was happy, carefree. She left behind a hollow shell, just a body, trying to move on, trying to find traces of her in other girls, but failing miserably. Now, the laughter has faded, the joy extinguished. The boy who lived for fun is gone, replaced by someone much too serious for his age.

I grew up too fast, forced to be the one who gives advice, the one who watches over others while searching for the pieces of my broken soul.

But in this search, I failed, again and again. Still, I keep trying...not for myself, but for my parents, for my brother. My nights are filled with tears and silent breakdowns, while my days are spent doing what is needed, nothing more.

What remains is just a body, a vessel that moves, breathes, speaks. But where is the soul that once lived inside? Perhaps it’s waiting, quietly, for its funeral.

For now, I live in the in-between, neither truly alive nor completely dead, just a soul lost in the aftermath.

But then I realized, I was hitting a wall. No matter how hard I tried, she was never coming back. It wasn’t her I needed to find but myself. And in that moment, something shifted. I’ve finally moved on, because the only thing I was holding on to was a memory, and I no longer needed it to define me.