The Last Chapter
I couldn’t bring myself to flip the page. Curiosity was killing me and so was grief. Curiosity to know what finally happened to the man I had loved so deeply for the last 457 pages and grief over the fact that I didn’t have another chapter to live with him…
It was the heart of the reader in me. It had fallen in love yet again, despite all the heart breaks and lost relationships with my past protagonists.
I had believed that this reader in me would be more rational, wouldn’t let history repeat itself, but looks like I was wrong…
Nevertheless, I let curiosity win and flipped the page.
I was barely three lines into the chapter and my reader’s eyes were brimming with tears. Tears of pain as I realized my trust had been broken and tears of anger for letting myself be misled again. That last chapter changed everything. The person I believed was honest, deceived me. The man I had loved so deeply was brutally killed, leaving me with a void I didn’t know how to fill. I was stunned to see how two-faced a person could be and how I was carried away by all their false promises. I must mention that this was not the first time the reader in me was going through this, it wasn’t her first betrayal or first heartbreak. And yet, it stung her just as deeply.
But the emotions didn’t end there. Beyond the pain of deceit lay the pain of parting. Each word of the last sentence felt like a part of me being torn away. By the time I came to the last word, it felt like I had lost family. The people I had lived with for so many pages and whose every sorrow and joy I had been a part of, were no longer going to be a part of my life. I wouldn’t get to spend another page with the man I loved or laugh at another terrible joke cracked by the girl who had become my best friend. As I finally turned the last page and shut the book, I was overwhelmed by the memories we had shared over all these pages. I had never seen that man, yet could see the color of his eyes and the shape of his jawline in my mind’s eye. I had never spoken to that young girl, yet could revisit every telepathic conversation we had ever had. I had never eaten a meal with that family, yet could taste the spices in the curry and feel the smoothness of the wine on my tongue. With every passing page, the bond had just grown stronger. And now, with no more pages to live with them, I was left stranded on this road, frantically looking for any signs to reconnect with my 490 page old family,
The emotional turmoil in my reader’s heart was inexplicable. As much as I could relate to most of what she was feeling, I was surprised to see her going through emotions I had assumed only I was silly enough to feel. As she struggled to strike a balance between the grief due to loss and the pain due to heartbreak, the reader in me suddenly turned to me and asked, “Why did I let it happen again? Haven’t I learnt this lesson several times in the past? In spite of that, how could I be naive enough to let history repeat itself?”
I was stunned into silence as I realized I had no answer to her question. But instead of embarrassment, I felt an unusual but warm wave of relief wash over me. I felt relieved that I was not the only one. The only one who trusted deeply, despite multiple failures and deceits. The only one who loved with all her heart, even if she was still picking up the broken pieces from the last time it was shattered. The only one who made a similar mistake, if not the same one, despite having vowed to never repeat it.
It was an innately human trait and I was convinced that the reader in me had imbibed it to perfection, silently following in my footsteps.
