Promise of death

Death had always scared me.

It came to me as a child, moments after entering the world, umbilical cord around neck, starved for oxygen.

"We can be together," it offered.

I would not have remembered if it had not made the offer again and again in my dreams, drowning me. Burying me. Choking me of life. Promising me it would be there when I was ready. I'd wake up, heart racing, gasping for air and lie awake for hours to prevent another reunion.

It wasn't until high school I realized the relief of its promise. I held my grandma’s hand as she stared out the window. She was beautiful and lost. Far, in a way we could not reach. Years before, she had scolded her children for reviving her. It was one of her few lucid moments. Life had taken strength from her bones, memories from her head, and voice from her tongue. It was then I realized that life could strip you from yourself, and, in desire to remain, we would still cling to that which has taken everything.

I held her hand, and death held mine, and it promised it would be there when she was ready.

She claimed it a month later.

I felt guilt for holding her hand with death's, and relief because it was life that had killed her and death that had promised her more.