The Bridge

I felt a jerk and slowly gained consciousness. I slowly tried to open my eyes. Everything around me looks unclear. I feel as if I'm a stone. I'm feeling terrible pain all over my limbs and my head is too dizzy. I try to move but I'm unable to move even an inch of my body. My lower body, I can't even feel it, it is as if it never existed. It's getting harder for me to breath. I slowly tried to move my eyeballs around and all I can see are numerous machines all around the room and there are many tubes attached all over my body. Some on my wrist, some inserted through my nasal. I can feel them all. They are giving me immense pain but I can't even complain as I can't even move my tongue. I'm waiting for somebody to enter the room and notice me. I don't know how long I have been here but it feels like ages.

It's getting harder for me to breath and at that moment, a woman entered the room. She noticed my open eyes and rushed out. After a while, there were many other people in the room. I'm feeling hazy and all I can see are white coats. They must be doctors. They were all talking. Some words sounded like commands and others sounded as if they were trying to wake me up. Though I cannot hear them clearly, I tried to speak but it was of no avail, I couldn't utter even a word. My inability is making me suffer more and drops of tears run down my cheeks. I know I'm not going to make it. And the only reason I'm trying to hold on to this pain is so that I can say I'm sorry to my Mom for all the trouble I caused her but now I can't hold on any more, death never sounded so beautiful to me. This pain is making me crave for my death.

After a while, the pain began to leave and it was relieving. I can feel I'm losing my consciousness or maybe it is my life I'm losing. In a while, I opened my eyes and I could no more feel the pain. I sat on the bed and looked around, it was all chaos. The doctor's rushing around and then my Mom entered the room and sat down next to my bed. I turned around and saw her holding my lifeless hands and crying. I stood up and went near her and tried to caress her hair but my hand slipped through her body. I told her I'm sorry but she couldn't hear my words.

Then a man in black and unusual clothing approached me and said it's time to leave. He must be the angel of death I thought. For once, I looked around at my lifeless self and nodded at the man. Within a blink of my eyes, we were at an unknown place. There was a wooden gate in front of us. I looked around and there were few women sitting at the corner of the gate. The man approached the gate and knocked. The gate was opened by an elderly woman and asked me to come in. I went in and saw there were two gardens connected by a bridge. The one I was standing in was very crowded. There were many women, some elderly, some teenagers like me, some pregnant, some kids and some looked like newlyweds. The elderly woman greeted me and asked about my whereabouts and left.

I stood there and saw a group of girls about my age approaching me. I smiled at them. They smiled back. We introduced ourselves to each other and then one of the girls asked me how did I die. I was taken aback by her question. I paused for a moment and said my head was crushed by a rock. As we were talking, a kid with two plaits, wearing a beautiful white frock came to me and gave me chocolate as if to welcome me. I kneeled and kissed on her forehead. Seeing a kid here shattered my heart into a million pieces. The girl smiled and went to the other new people joining us. I stood up and then I saw that there was a woman waving at me from the other side of the bridge. She was saying something but I couldn't hear as we were far from the bridge. The other girls said "She is new here" in a loud voice.

I turned towards the girl and asked who the woman is. She replied She was a brave woman and lived with them for about eight years and just left to the other side of the bridge a few weeks back. "Oh! why don't we go and meet her on the other side of the bridge," I said. The girls laughed at my words and one of them said, "it's not that easy dear. It takes years to cross the bridge and some of us don't even get to cross the bridge." As we were talking I could hear the knock at the gate every few minutes and women entering the gate. I was confused. I was still not used to being dead. The girl understood what I was thinking and said: "You should start adapting to the knocking because every few minutes someone joins us".The girl completed her sentence and there was a knock at the gate again. There was no one at the gate. So I went forward and opened the gate, but nobody came in. So I peeked out and saw the man standing with a baby in his hands. The Man came forward and said, "She can't walk yet. Can you please take her in?"