As I lay there in bed caressing it, holding it close. I think back on the last 40 years. I remember the first memory I can recall with any real clarity.
A young boy stands in the New Mexico dirt, the hot sun beating down on the 4 of them as tears slowly drip from his small chin. He looks up at the tall man and slowly reaches out to take the large calloused hand not knowing what to expect or what to feel. He cant remember ever seeing this man before but his mom leans down and whispers in his ear. Her voice is sharp and harsh with an edge of danger.
"That is your father, you and your sister are going with him. now get in the fucking truck and wipe those tears from your face before I give you a reason to cry you fucking pussy."
He knows that tone means if he goes to slow or fails to do as he is told that there will be pain but still he freezes unsure what to do. Seconds pass but to the young boy they might as well have been hours when suddenly the woman screams - "move your ass NOW boy!"
The boy shudders and flinches away from his mother he instinctually knows that next comes the pain, he knows that next she will emphasize her point with her hand, but it doesn't come. The pain doesnt come. He opens his eyes as he is swept up into the arms of the large man. Fear grips his heart as the man places him in the cab of the small yellow Datsun pickup next to his sister who wraps her arms around his and tell his in a small voice- "no worry Bubby, Daddy is going to save us..."
I blink away the memory forgetting the rest of what my older sister said to me. I stroke it again and a single tear escapes from my eye. I reach down with a trembling hand. I slip my thumb inside it. My body shakes violently as more tears join the first. Every painful memory that makes up my life playing over and over again in my chaotic head. I tuck it in tight to my chest the cold steel pressing under my chin hard enough to hurt as I stretch my arm to its limit so I can reach. I pushes my thumb down against the trigger...
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With a click it is over. The sweet release coming with a flash. Time seems to slow to a crawl as a bright flash ejects from the barrel the fire burning my skin while the pellets rip up through my skull. The pain is gone in an instant. Nothing left of the back or top of my head larger than a quarter.
I felt nothing. I feel nothing. Surrounded by black so deep I start to believe that light never even existed in the first place. Silence so profound that I wonder if sound was ever even a thing.
Suddenly there is a dim flash in the lower right corner of my sight, if you can really even call it that. The darkness here so utterly black that the sudden light is more blinding than the sun. Slowly my eyes adjust to the searing light and I can read what is written there in the corner of my vision.
"What the hell?" I ask myself. "No!" I scream out into the silence, nothing can hear my voice though I am not sure if it even made a sound. "I cannot do this again! Please let me just die! Let it end"
N
I stare at the n that appears on the next line for a second, hoping with all my soul that it will all be over before reaching out in my mind and confirm my selection.
I scream at the words that appear again in my vision "NO! NO! NO!" fear gripping my very being. I know only one thought, I cannot go through all of that again. I just want to cease to exist.
N N N
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