Futility

She couldn’t fall asleep. The eerie comfort of the hospital was more disorienting than calming. She thought about the rope, how the rope felt around her neck, the hard ridges slowly closing in on her and then her grasp for breath. Her hands went to her nose, as if the blood had started flowing again. She had to look down to see that her legs were not writhing. But she had lived. Now she had to live a life she had not wanted – a life she did not want.

Her parents were completely in shock. She felt sorry for them. She had no reason to kill herself. She was their life. They had given her everything they could. They did not understand why she would ever try it. When she tried to think of why she wanted to kill herself, she could not find an answer. She never had a proper reason. Or was that the reason? She could not remember the exact moment she had decided she would do it. Her entire life felt like one blurry motion till the act.

Was she disappointed with her life? She did not know. She could not find a reason to be disappointed. Was she a failure? Nobody else thought so and she could not bring herself to believe that she was one. She had everything that anyone would envy. But was she happy? Always, she thought. She had never been unhappy in her life. Then why did she do it. The answer, for some reason eluded her.

The doctor had said that it was some form of post traumatic stress disorder and she will be ok. She had been drugged for most of last week. But she could not think of it as a trauma. She knew she had wanted to do it more than anything else. It had not been a fascination, but more of a need that she had felt. Her head started hurting and she did not want to think about it anymore.

She sat up and looked out the window. The night air was still and the moon was lost some where behind the clouds. She found the presence of the trees calming and she began to relax. It was then it came to her. It was as if the last week had never happened. She felt as if she was in her room again. She started looking around frantically. She got up and walked out of her room. She found the nurses station empty. She saw a half eaten apple and a knife lying next to it. She walked to the knife and slowly picked it up. Her hand clasped around the handle firmly. She saw her reflection on the blade.