In Continuum.

It started with a sensation that rushed up the back of his neck and up into his head. It was like a claw that pulled out his brain, leaving it light and empty upon his neck. His frail arms swung about in the air and tried to grab hold of something, anything to keep his balance at that time. Yet, nothing prevented him from crashing towards the ground as his legs gave way and crumbled. His body gathered itself into a pile of skin and bones, like the broken parts of a porcelain doll swept together by a broom. His eyes were gaping, mouth opened into a silent scream. He tried to utter something, anything to catch the attention of the maid next door. He hoped dearly that the loud thud that his body made as it crashed to the ground would be worth something, perhaps the neighbors downstairs would notice something amiss. No, he thought, they'd think that it is the children again, or books falling off the shelves. You know, the books next to the dresser, the dresser with the medicine, inside the bottles next to the photo frames. The photo frames, the old man thought, and he looked up towards the dresser where they were. His sons, his daughters - oh his daughters - and then his late wife. Oh lover, he thought, hold on. I am tired, so tired - so tired. 

*

Two weeks, the doctor told the old man, whose face was dyed yellow from the liver failure. That was a year ago, and he survived to tell people about it. He adjusted his eating habits, took a substantial amount of his wealth and distributed it to charities around the country. He did a great deal of things within those two weeks of his life, hoping that it'd buy him more time. He didn't want to die so early, not the first one after his father in the family, not so soon. He still had things he has yet to accomplish, a job he couldn't bare to leave to his sons. Oh his sons, he thought, he couldn't possibly leave them on their own. That was the greatest regret to the old man, not being able to have a proper son to succeed his business. The old man has two sons, both in their forties, all grown up and know nothing but how to play golf, play pool, and play poker cards all day long. The old man tried to make things right a few times, giving them key roles in his oil business, but like everything else in their lives, they messed things up on a royal scale. The old man blamed himself for the most part, for not bringing up his children with as much care as he gave to his business. If only a part of that care went into his children's upbringing, he thought, they'd be different people today, different men. The old man didn't want to die, and all he thought about was to live. To live, not to earn more money, but to see the day when he could be proud of his sons all over again. 

Seeing that his sons were incapable of handling his business, he pulled strings a few years ago and managed to secure a few managerial roles in a few 7-Elevens around the city for his sons to work in. Even then, though, they'd slip away to gamble with their friends, to drink, or do anything but the work they were supposed to do. Those men grew up drifting through their lives, living off the riches of their parents and getting nowhere on their own. They were big babies, babies that needed caring from their aging parents. Still, they lived with little shame, never having a proper job, and nobody in the family gave them any respect whatsoever. That is the biggest regret of the old man, and yet he managed to put those aside for a while. He wanted to live in the mountains, to farm whenever he can, and to give to charities when he could. And that was what he did, after the yellow in his complexion faded away, and he managed to lift himself off the side of the bed to walk out of the hospital on his own. His daughter flew back from the States to take care of him, and his health gradually returned over the months. Yet, his sons never shook off their bad habits, always the black sheep of the family, still living off his sick father. 

They did grow a conscience eventually, however short-lived it was. They decided to drive their father around whenever they could, and nobody complained about it despite how trivial it may have seemed. I suppose it was the least they could do for the old man, a small redemption of the things they did or did not do in the past. Guilt catches up with people, you can never run away from it forever. The family thought that it was a kind gesture, however small it may have been. It could have been the first step to a great many things that they could do for the old man, and everybody could see that. Maybe, just maybe, they could live up to their father's expectations, and finally make him proud of them again. Take over the business, pull the family together, do something good. The old man was hopeful, just like everybody else, because things were changing in the family, it really was. It was just a simple job of driving the father around, but that could be the first step to many more steps, and those steps could eventually lead to somewhere beautiful, somewhere nice, somewhere that the old man could only dream of. 

Then, it was one day at the office when the old man stumbled in on his own. His sister in law was there, tending to business around the office when he came in, and his clothes hung around his body like dead flags on a battlefield. That was a few months ago, and he was just dropping by at the office to see how everything was going. "Everything is fine", the sister in law said. "Where are the sons?" The old man looked up for a while and said nothing, until she asked him again with a hand on his shoulder. "They didn't come along," he replied. "I came over on my own." The old man, with his failing health, was not able to drive around on his own anymore. His sons, who were supposed to be driving him around, took a backseat on things and decided to let their father drive them around, instead. That afternoon at the office, he walked all the way from his home to the office, a frail step at a time, to the office where the sister in law was. She looked upon his sullen face, his deep eye sockets, his greying hair, and it overwhelmed her. She wept at the back of the office where the water cooler was, where nobody could see her, she wept. It pained her to see a proud man, a great man, falling so far and so deep - and most of all, so lonely. 

*

The old man was at his mother's place one day, with his other sister in law, this time his youngest brother's wife. She brought along her sister to visit the old lady, ninety four years of age and still going strong. They were all in the living room that afternoon, just talking about life and how things have been with them. His youngest brother has been living overseas with his family for over ten years now, and they really only visit once or twice every year. The old man spoke of his health with much glee, and his small audience listened attentively to every word. His words seemed more fragile now, with his shallow breathes and his thin lips. It was as if any interrupts would break his the remnants of his health again. So they listened, and he talked. 

He talked about his life in the fields, and about giving to the less fortunate people of the society. He talked about his days in the hospital bed, about how it was like knowing that he'd die in two weeks. He talked about how it was like to find out that he'd live more than two weeks, and then he talked about his changed perspective on life. Then he talked about his family, his daughter, his son, and that was when he stopped short for a while. The ladies in the room held their breath, for they knew it was a hard topic for him to talk about. Yet, he soldiered on, and he told them about his sons and the failure he felt as a father. All the money that he earned, and all the money that his wife stuffed into the pockets of his sons to gamble, all of those could have been used to help someone, or help themselves. He talked, and he talked, and that was when he finally gave in upon himself, and he gave up trying to pretend. The old man wept in front of the ladies, and for a moment they didn't know what to do. They've known him for a while now, the man with the big heart in the family who knew when to give back to the society. And there he was, the once proud man of honor, drowning in his own tears for the mistake that he could no longer mend, and the sons he could no longer bring back to life. For they were, to him, as good as dead. 

*

Death came upon him in the morning, in the hospital alone surrounded by his relatives. Everybody was there when they heard about the news, they rushed down to the hospital after the maid found him in the bedroom. Everybody was there, save for his children. His daughter was overseas, and no doubt that she has already heard about the dreadful news. His sons, however, were not contactable all through the night and in the morning. They vanished, not just from the driver's seat in their father's Mercedes Benz, but also from the side of their father's death bed. Despite all the people that were there, the old man died a lonely, lonely man. It saddens me that, towards the end of his life, he became so poor that all he had left was money. 

Me, because it is a true story. Me, because everything you've just read is a true story. Me, because my uncle just died this morning. I can't believe that such a tragedy happened in my family, let alone the fact that it happened so far away. It saddens me that a relative of mine should live a life as tragic as his, but at the same time it saddens me more than I do not feel more sympathetic than I should. I feel like I should be sadder, more affected than I am right now. I feel like I should be doing more than just a blog entry about the man's last moments in this life. I feel like I should be calling up my father, and asking him how he is dealing with the death of his brother. I feel like I should feel something, but I don't feel much. Which disturbs me, like any other death in my family overseas. I've been so distant from them, so far away for so long. So much as that I do not feel an inkling of anything, anymore. So I pay my tribute in the form of words, things that I know and do best. I do them to try to feel something through the words, to imagine what it must have been like if I did maintain a close relationship with my relatives somehow. 

I tried to feel something. 

Yet, I still feel the same as I did when my mother broke the news to me. 

Nothing.