The Beginning of the End

Once a simple sales representative, now nothing but a sack of bones piled onto some back alley couch. I sit here, picking at my skin as my head spins. My eyes burn as I blink while I scan the room.

A decade ago, I had a perfect life, a wife, kids, and such. I wasn't fit, but I was able to run, unlike now. The endless hours I would spend slaving away at a computer, strolling the streets while the sun blazed down upon me, all that time I could've been using with my family. Yet, everyday I found myself doing overtime at work to avoid my responsibilities at home. I stayed at work everyday just to be berated by my boss instead of my wife. I would return around 2 AM every night, sluggishly trudging through the front door and laying down on the couch all so that I would only share a brief glance with my wife in the morning. The regret has been eating me from the inside out thinking back to all the time I've lost with my family.

My hands graze the torn couch cushions, closing my eyes and sighing. Watching star trek with my boys on our leather couch was everything. Chasing them down the road as they pedaled off with my underwear, stained with a brown skid mark, despite my humiliation, I would give anything just to hear my boys laughing hysterically. My stomach growls as I clutch it, anything for my wife's hot pot pie.

I now sit here with a scarce amount of food a decade after a great disaster occurred. There was a power plant that had exploded near my home, my wife died in the initial blast, my boys had struggled against the nuclear fallout. I saw their deaths when I was forced to watch the news by my colleagues, haunted by their laughter and sarcastic empathy as I watched my boys take their final breath. A thousand emotions grabbed ahold of me, nearly strangling me as the realization that I had just lost my family weighed down upon me. My heart ached as I excused myself from the bar, walking aimlessly until I felt so weak, my legs gave out. Shuffling into an alley I wail and cry loudly, the love of my life, the woman I spent years avoiding because of my own selfish desires, is gone. "Come back to me! Come back!" I cried out, passersby giving me weird looks as I clutch my chest. My heart spasms causing me to gasp for air, I've always had a weak heart, the sorrow I felt causing a heart attack. I wheezed heavily, trying to receive assistance by those walking by. Everything blurs together as I feel my body start to give up, desperately trying to fight it I eventually give in. Life without my family may be better than living alone. My eyes start to shut, a blurred figure bounds up to me trying to shake me awake, my body is too weak to respond.