My dearest Ananya,

If I could make through this night, I will live forever. As the pain is growing inside me, I see how easy it is to get carried away. As every cell of my body have risen in revolt against my very existence, I am finding it harder and harder to breathe.

A slimy shadow has clogged up my lungs. It rose from my belly, flowing up and settling inside my windpipe. It has dried up since then, tightening its deadly grip over my ribcage. An old coir rope it is now, with needles sticking out at every crevice. Like a vile serpent, it is moving inside my chest. With every sway, a thousand iron needles pierce me from inside. Death is an escape, I am sure. Can’t you see?

An artery behind my right forehead is thumping the walls of my skull with an urge to burst out and flow through this world. My head, my pride, is flooded with bad blood and muck. Everything that I am is rapidly disintegrating. My neck is tightening, my mouth turning dry. The lungs has intimated about its intention to retire soon. As an invited death comes nearer, I desire asphyxiation.

A sick stomach and a chest muddled deep in turmoil. What do you expect me to do? Asphyxiation is the only punishment conceivable. Maybe this is why people hang themselves, who knows?

I have written many letters to you before. Just like them, I don’t intend to post this one as well. In this world of instant messaging, who reads letters anyway! As I go through the many letters I wrote, I can see how we grew up through the struggles of life and our tempestuous relationship. At this juncture, I can totally understand why men end life after a failed relationship. I will be pleasantly surprised if I get to sail through this night and see tomorrow’s daylight.

In the islands of comforts that dawn me in this ocean of suffering, all I get to see is your half closed eyes. Your winsome eyelashes trembling, warping to hold contorted tears - emotions overflowing as if stars strewn around a dying spiral galaxy…

Your lively lips and shining cheeks. The thousand different marks on your body. Only I can see them, only I can tend to them! All these marks that define you will wither away in my absence. You told me that you can live without me. But if I can’t kiss you, what’s the point in staying alive?

Don’t you remember? In half blind classrooms, tight in embrace, how I used to smell your armpits? We getting lost into each other in park benches, movies theatres and in that hotel room which we finally managed to book? How you metamorphosed into a serpent who could crawl under my skin? And me a lightning that could pass through you?

The thousand stories we exchanged between short exhilarating breaths that refused to die?

But someone stole the thunder from me. I don’t stir you anymore. Our stew has turned stale. What’s the point in living? I am not a coward. I am just fed up with the world. It doesn’t make sense to me without you. Now that you are irretrievably lost, why should I shy away from this irreversible decision?

No, I am not going to kill myself. That will be stupid, considering the beauties of life that I am foregoing. Who knows of what is in store for me? The thousand splendid suns or the barrels of honey stashed in underground caverns. The places unseen and the pains to be endured. Another heartbreak, perhaps?

A stray odour in air might trigger me back into your spoor. Your roots are still deep inside my heart and the stump is ever hurting me. The void that you left behind is being filled with shape shifting monsters that make me shudder. But I will grow out of this. Can I give up so easily?

I want to hold you close, my nose deep in your neck. As I move, crossing the nape, your head must fall back to my waiting shoulders - if this is not home, I don’t know what is.

All those are lost now. We should be moving on in life! What fate befell on the memories that we made together? I know they are safe inside me, but you? I don’t trust you!

I know that you like someone else now. I can only assume of what you did with our memories. I cringe at the thought. But this is the only inference I can make out, how else do I explain your sudden amnesia of all the sweet things we did together?

It hurts to know that I am expendable. That someone else will take my place and you will live happily ever after! I don’t know where I faltered, but I will never forgive myself for not doing enough!

Never did I realise that the time we had with each other was limited. How many times I skipped telling you of how much I loved you! Deep in work, a sudden urge will consume me - letting me know of how much you mattered to me. I wouldn’t pick up the phone and call you. Now that I can’t do it anymore, I realise that I failed.

Plans to surprise you, showing up for breakfast. Take you out for dinner, I sometimes vouch to spend more time with you. May be a movie, may be a short drive - all these things I didn’t do. Now that I can’t do it anymore, I realise that I failed.

To buy you gifts, to dote on you, to kiss you. To brush your forehead, pat you and kiss you again. To stand close to you, to support you and let you support me - all those beautiful lives lost to time. Not that I can’t do it anymore, I realise that I failed.

In love, this moment is all that we have. To defer something is to lose it forever. I will never make this mistake again.

Maybe I will find love again, maybe I will not. Hope I get to live long enough to find out.

Regards, Sagar.