The Last Leaves Falling

by Sarah Benwell

  Almost, perhaps, but it is too simple. It lacks elegance.

  Except . . .

  Goes on living? Goes. On . . .

  What about people who die and are brought back to life? They must know what’s out there, right?

  Nobody ever comes back to tell me, she said. But I bet they’ve told somebody.

  I think Doctor Kobayashi looks at me strangely when I smile to myself, but she does not say a word.

  Finally, the clock hits its target, and I’m free. I cannot wait to get home and look this up.

  “Thanks.” I grin as she escorts me out.

  “What for?” She sounds confused, but there’s no time on the clock left to explain.

  does not bring me any more results than the last time, but draws up more than simply reviews of old B movies. Halfway down the page I see, SCIENTIST SEES THE LIGHT. LITERALLY. Professor Gregory used to believe that when you die, it’s all over, until . . .

  I click.

  Professor Simeon Gregory, a lecturer across the sciences at the local university, would have been the first to tell you that the afterlife was nothing more than fairy-tale poppycock. Would have. But one frosty morning in November, everything changed.

  Gregory slipped on ice, hit his head, and wound up in an ambulance. Where he died.

  “I died,” says Gregory, “clinically, properly died. I had no pulse, wasn’t breathing. I was gone. Except I wasn’t. I could hear everything that went on in that ambulance as the paramedics brought me back.” And that isn’t all, Gregory goes on to explain. “There was a shadow-figure, beckoning to me. That’s when I knew I had a choice. Walk with the shadow and leave this place, or stay and finish my work here. It was an easy decision. I know now that when I’m ready, there is something waiting for me.”

  Paramedics say that the professor should not have survived. “It was a miracle; the kind we always hope will find us.” And Simeon Gregory would agree.

  There are more stories like his—of bright lights and watching loved ones at your bedside. Of things that people could not possibly have seen and heard and known. And there is one, nestled amongst all these tales of hope: OUT OF BODY ‘AFTERLIFE’ IS NOTHING MORE THAN ENDORPHINS AND THE DEATH OF CELLS.

  I bet the scientists have explanations for everything, but right now, I do not want to know.

  70

  Hiiiiii guys! So all the way home I was thinking, and we SHOULD bve making the most of everything. All of us. You’re right. So I’m starting right now, and I have something for you.

  Really?

  ME OR HIM?

  Haha. Both of you (-: Here . . .

  A file appears, and I click download and wait, watching the progress bar turn blue. What is it? The filename is just a string of numbers. No clues there.

  WHAT IS IT WHAT IS IT WHAT IS IT?

  Heee! You’ll have it in a second. Wait and see.

  The blue bar inches forward. Shudders.

  Oh! I hope you like it! :-S

  Finally!

  I click, and the file expands across my screen.

  A picture, in black ink. A picture of three snow monkeys, sitting beside a pond.

  I can feel a smile spreading across my face, and I stare and stare at it, trying to soak up every last pen stroke, every detail. The right-hand monkey is small and dainty, and she’s gazing dreamily into the sky. It is undoubtedly Mai.

  On the left, a larger monkey slouches in exactly Kaito’s way as he casts a line into the water. And in the middle, on a throne of rocks, there’s me, staring out directly at the viewer with eyes that hold a hundred thousand tales.

  I love it!

  WOW, MAI, DID YOU DRAW THAT?

  (-: yes. You like?

  Yes!

  YESSSSSSS!

  *blush* yay. I am SO glad. I was worried you would think I was a talentless fool, or think that I was making fun.

  No! Not at all!

  NOOOO!

  ALTHOUGH I NEVER PICTURED MYSELF AS A MACAQUE BEFORE.

  Haha. It’s a compliment.

  *BOWS* THANK YOU, KIND LADY.

  Hmm . . . out of curiosity, what would you see yourself as?

  HAHA.

  PROMISE YOU WON’T LAUGH?

  Yes.

  A LEOPARD.

  Hah. I would not have guessed that.

  HEY! YOU SAID YOU WOULDN’T LAUGH!

  I’m not, I’m just surprised.

  REALLY? YOU DON’T SEE THE RESEMBLANCE? SLEEK AND MUSCLY, POWERFUL, MYSTERIOUS?

  Hahaha. Mayyybe. What d’you think, Sora?

  I picture you as

  a raccoon dog.

  I type out the words slow and steady, in short bursts so my friends are not left waiting.

  Which I PROMISE

  is a good thing.

  They’re brilliant.

  Smart and funny and loyal

  And when she’s sure I’m finished, Mai adds:

  And they’re sort of adorable.

  HAH. YEAH, BUT THEY WOULDN’T LAST TWO SECONDS IN THE RING WITH A LEOPARD.

  Ok. Sora? What’s your animal?

  I think the monkey’s perfect.

  Aww thanks ^_^

  IT IS. BUT IF HE WERE ANYTHING ELSE, I THINK SORA WOULD BE A CRANE.

  I think of the crane, long-legged and beautiful, a bird around which legends are weaved; a creature strong enough to carry people up into the heavens, long-lived enough to observe the world and impart happiness and wisdom. I am neither of these things. So why the crane, out of all the creatures he could choose from? I try to see myself that way, imagine myself strutting serenely through wet green pastures, offering advice to minnows, but I cannot. When I try to place myself inside the bird, it changes, shrinks into itself, feathers tousled and wings chained to a tree.

  I shake my head to rid myself of this awful image, and I change the subject.

  It’s GREAT, Mai

  You’re really talented.

  ^_^

  YEAH. SORA’S RIGHT. YOU NEED TO DO THIS.

  Has your mother SEEN these?

  Does she know

  How good you are?

  Aww, you two! <3

  I’m serious . . .

  Please please please please tell her

  I can’t! The interview is in 3 weeks, it’s all organized. I can’t pull out now.

  Please?

  71

  Between each mouthful, I watch my mother’s face, the attention written over it as she waits for me to chew and swallow. Neither of us says a word, but the silence screams with meaning.

  Scoop, lift, wait. My son.

  Open, close, chew. I’m sorry.

  Scoop, lift, wait. I will always be here.

  Chew, swallow. You shouldn’t have to do this.

  Scoop.

  Chew. I’m sorry.

  It takes an age, and by the time we’re done, my mother’s plate has long gone cold, but she does not complain.

  She swallows hers in two bites while she waits for water to make tea, and then she sits back down beside me.

  I watch her steady hands pouring the light green liquid into mugs, listen to the familiar sound of tea on china as it flows, and my mother’s breath, slow and calm, above it. But somehow it is different tonight. The tea sounds stressed, stretched, as though it is being poured from too great a height and would rather stay inside the pot, and Mama’s exhalations are tight, deliberate.

  “Here.” Her voice is too loud, and there is not room for it in here with all the quiet. But if she notices, she is not saying anything. She lifts a mug up to my mouth, and I close my lips around the rim and sip.

  And I recoil, but it’s too late, the burning liquid is already on my tongue, blistering my palate. I splutter, spitting tea all over the table as my mother leaps up to fetch water and a cloth.

  My mouth stings, and I have to swallow fast as saliva pools into it in response. My eyes water.

  “I am so, so sorry, Sora,” she says, mopping up the mess, using the cloth to wipe my chin. “I should have c
hecked it first.”

  “It’s okay.”

  “No, it’s not. It was careless.” She sighs, wrings the cloth between her hands, spilling drops of tea back onto the table, and looks up at me with a newly serious expression. “I should be taking better care of you.”

  “It’s fine, Mama. I shouldn’t have drunk it.”

  “No. I mean always . . . I spoke to my boss today about some proper time out of the office.”

  I have only met my mother’s employer once, but I cannot imagine he was pleased. “No! You can’t!”

  She folds a warm hand over mine. “Yes, I can.”

  “But what about your job?”

  “It’s fine. I’m going to work from home for a while, until . . .”

  Until I do not need her.

  “. . . anyway, I can manage the accounts from here. I am staying home, and that’s the end of it.”

  “But—”

  “The end of it.”

  • • • •

  The next day, my mother does not leave for the office. She lingers just a little over her first cup of coffee, and then she sets up her computer and a stack of papers at the kitchen table.

  I should be glad of it. Glad of the company and the assistance. Grateful that my mother is both willing and able to change her schedule for me. I know this. And I am, but still I find myself wishing for the click of our front door closing behind her.

  Everything is different now, and I wish with all my heart it weren’t.

  72

  “Breathe in.”

  I let my lungs expand until my head fizzes and my chest feels like it’s going to burst, and then I close my mouth around the tube that the doctor’s holding out for me.

  “And out.”

  I blow. Hard. And I deflate. I imagine all the bad things passing through me, out into this box where they can’t harm a single thing. Silence: gone. Cramps: gone. Fear: gone. Every last faulty neuron: gone.

  I wish.

  “Good. All right? Right. Breathe in.”

  We do the test, designed to see how strong my breathing muscles are, three times. “Best of three,” the doctor says, loud and cheerful, as though he’s doing me a giant favor, sneaking me extra turns at a fairground game.

  Each time my lungs expand and then contract, it hurts a little more. I’m tired, and my chest feels like I’ve just been punched. But he does not seem worried. He jots down numbers on my chart, and nods.

  “Good. Okay.”

  “Am I . . . normal?”

  “You are anything but normal, Sora,” he says, grinning. Not funny. “But your breathing’s fine for now. A little low, perhaps, but nothing to be worried about.”

  “Thank you.”

  He sets down the chart, reaches for my fingers. “Your other symptoms though . . . how are you managing? Is the pain all right?”

  Is the pain all right?

  When is pain ever all right?

  I nod. If I go home with increased medications, my mother will worry. And I do not want to make a fuss.

  “Doctor?”

  “Yes.”

  “What will happen when I fail the breath test?”

  I’ve read all this a hundred thousand times, but I need to hear it from someone who knows, not an article that could, for all I know, have been written by a first-grader.

  “There is no failing, Sora. It is not an exam.” He pauses, and his eyebrows sink right down over his eyes. “But, when the time comes, there are machines to help you breathe. Respirators. And there is the possibility that further down the line we might insert a trach tube. But you’re good, for now. Let’s focus on that.”

  73

  “Heyy, Sora!” Mai slips into my room, with Kaito close behind her.

  “Hi?” I was not expecting to see them, and for a moment I’m confused. Worried even. But Kaito flashes me a red-eared, sheepish grin, and my fears dissolve.

  “Sorry, I know we didn’t plan to meet up, I hope it’s okay that we’re here?”

  I smile, try to push myself upright on the bed. “Of course.” And I mean it. I have missed them. The last time I tried to log on, I had to call my mother in to press the power switch, and then I could not use the keys. Even the mouse felt fiddly and small against my touch, and navigating the forum was near impossible. I tried. And tried. And if I had the strength I would have thrown the whole machine out through a window.

  Twice, I nearly asked my mother if she would do it for me; if she’d navigate through screens and type my words. But KyoToTeenz is mine, and I do not think she’d understand.

  Mai perches on the bed beside me, grinning.

  “We got you something.”

  “You what?”

  “Well, when you didn’t show up online, we missed you. And we figured you’d miss us, too”—she grins impishly—“so you wouldn’t be absent by choice. And we thought . . . well, here.”

  She looks at Kaito, who pulls a bright pink plastic bag out from behind his back and thrusts it toward me.

  “I . . .”

  “Oh right, yeah.” He pulls it back and reaches inside. “Ta-da!” He pulls out a webcam and the biggest computer trackball I have ever seen. “It’s a super-sensitive “one touch” thing. You’ve got no excuse now, you have to come online and listen to us whine about our teachers and parents and terrible code.”

  A sharp lump rises in my throat, and I know that if I speak, my voice will croak, and crack, and break, and that will be the end. I swallow and swallow again, until finally my throat opens enough to whisper, “Thank you.”

  Mai’s cheeks redden, and she shakes her head. “We really, really missed you.”

  “Yeah. It’s not the same without you, dude.” Then, “Shall we set it up?”

  I nod. “Yes, please.”

  He turns on the computer and rips open the packaging, and Mai moves up the bed, leaning her head against my pillow.

  “I can’t work with you watching me!” Kai mutters, tugging at his fringe.

  “Okay, then how about a story?” She had insisted on taking the half-finished book home with her, “to practice,” and now she pulls it from her bag and settles herself in to read some more.

  74

  “Hey, dude.” Kaito’s face slides across my screen and settles clear.

  “Hi.”

  “I don’t see you. Turn your camera on.”

  I move the cursor to turn camera on and click, and my face joins his.

  I look like an idiot.

  “Heyyy!” he cheers. “Looks great, huh?”

  “Yes. Thanks. Best idea ever.”

  He bows theatrically, and I laugh.

  “How was your day?”

  “Uuuuuh, Sora, I am not good at the pretty stuff for websites.”

  “It just takes practice, surely?”

  “Yeah. But it’s. So. Slow. And I want to be better at it noooww.”

  “Hahahaha. Patience, young grasshopper.”

  He pouts, but then Mai signs in and joins us, and he cannot help but grin.

  “Hiiiii!” Her camera loads before she sits down, and there is a second, before she bounces into view, where there is just a chair and cream-white walls behind it.

  Kaito’s walls are blue, and behind him are two posters: one of Kirby, bright pink and jolly, and the other dark and ominous, a shadow in the mist, with the tag FIND HIM, BEFORE HE FINDS YOU stamped across the bottom.

  I feel like a little boy, my nose pressed up against the windows to see what is inside, to guess who lives there, what they do, imagine myself sitting at their tables, eating from their larder, lying in their beds. And it is wonderful.

  75

  During the final stages of illness, utmost care shall be taken to ensure the patient’s comfort and minimal suffering for the patient and their families.

  I’ve been reading. Hospital policies and everything that I can find on Peaceful Death. Mostly, I’ve discovered that it rarely is. It’s desperate. People desperate to let go. Family desperate to help, worn dow
n by watching as their loved ones suffer.

  I don’t want that. I do not want my mother left with those decisions.

  I imagine tracking my eyes across a screen, spelling out one single word: please.

  I imagine Mama watching, breaking, cracking further every day until finally, finally she can’t bear it any longer and she snaps and reaches for a pillow or a cable tie or pulls the plug on the machines.

  And I picture her standing over me, watching my last ragged breath escape and knowing that she took it, and suddenly I cannot bear it anymore. My eyes itch with the words I’ve made them see, and I taste the bitterness of bile at my throat as my stomach heaves. I call out for my mother before I even know what I am doing, and I only just have time to switch off the screen before she rushes in.

  I retch and retch and retch again, and my mother holds a bag before my face and rubs my back until finally it stops.

  “All right?” she says.

  I nod.

  “Okay. I’m going to call the doctor. If you’re coming down with something, I think he ought to know.”

  “No, Mama, I’m fine. Honestly, much better.”

  She frowns, but she hesitates.

  “Please?”

  She puts a hand to my forehead and sucks her breath in through her teeth as she thinks.

  “You’re not warm. Perhaps you are all right.” She reaches for my wrist, feels for a pulse. I’m sure she does not know what she is looking for, but if it makes her feel better and means I don’t have to explain or see a doctor, I am not saying anything. “All right. But if it starts again, no arguments.”

  “Yes, Mama.”

  I won’t think about it. I won’t.

  But as my mother helps me to clean up, I cannot help seeing the imagined faces from all those cases; wondering what life they left behind, what they were giving up.

  “Mama?”

  “Mmmm?” She pulls my arm free of its sleeve and reaches for the other. “Left arm.”

  “When I was small, what did you dream I’d become?”

  She stops, frowning, and my half-pulled sleeve flaps gently at the end of my arm.