A Leaf in a Book

I saw them coming, both very solemn. So many couples passed me by, but there was something about them that caught my attention. I was feeble, I was counting my days, I couldn’t do much but observe. They stopped slightly ahead from where I was. They got off the bike, and then the man started quarrelling. Without prelude, without warning.

He started throwing his limbs about, his gestures rude. She stood there, looking at him. I could only see them from a distance, couldn’t hear anything. But it was not very difficult to imagine her imploring eyes. The agitated man spoke –shouted- for a long time. She tried sometimes to say a word or two, maybe trying to reason with him, trying to tell him, but he would have none of it. He alone spoke, accused, shouted, threatened. Then, abruptly, he just took his bike, and drove off, leaving the girl there. I thought I could make out her feeble attempt at calling him back, but of course, to no avail. She stood there, looking after the biker vanishing in the distance. I could only see her from far behind, black top, blue jeans, jet black hair falling over her shoulders.

I realized that my time had come. That this was what I had been waiting for. It hit me, all of a sudden, at the very last moment of my life. I had found what I was supposed to do in life. I had found my purpose in life. The purpose that I would give my all for. The one thing that mattered above all else. I had waited, wondered, all my life. I had wondered, what difference did I make? What difference did I make to the survival of a tree full of green leaves? Why did I jostle with the others for my share of the sun? She would be none the worse for me! What was I doing here? What was the one thing that I could do, that no one else could do, better than me? What was the one thing that would define me, my life? I wondered, and I had thought that I would never know it. But I knew it then. In that one moment of revelation, I realized what I had come into this world for.

I had come to rub off the tear that I knew was rolling down the girl’s face, right then. I gathered all the strength I had left, and, finally, broke free. I landed in a gust of wind, and was flung towards her. Just when I was a foot above her, the wind left me, and I drifted down. I saw the beautiful, innocent, sad face, the deep, aggrieved, despairing eyes, staring into the distance. And I saw the tear drop, gliding, in silent complaint, down. I twisted, I turned, and I landed on it. I soaked it in.

She put a shaking hand on her cheek, lifted me up in her palm, and looked at me. I breathed my last. My life was worth it.