Lost and Found
words by Liah Chung, art by Lanie Myaing
The last sunset
She has never been good with change. She fears the unknown, deeply. Yet oddly enough, as she stands shivering on the ledge of a thousand-foot building, she feels no fear. Only shame.
She stares into the horizon, watching her last sunset. The colors bleed from the dried-out yellow sun, wisps of a fading purple and bloody red painting the skies above. Once it is completely gone, she will jump. And then she will be gone too.
She thinks about her regrets, those ropes that tie her down. She’s cutting them now, in a single leap. Her mother, who doesn’t understand anything. Her sister, who she hasn’t talked to in months. Her long-lost crushes, who she never told she loved. Texas Roadhouse cinnamon butter she never tried. Pickleball games she never won. Fighting about group projects, about Christmas, about going to Church, about the GPS. Tiny things that spiraled into catastrophic collisions that defined her life. Her whole life, a train of “I hate you”s and “what a shame”s and “so what”s. People leaving but never saying “goodbye.” People using her and never saying “I love you.” Her using people too. Her leaving people too. She sits there, cold, embarrassed of her cruelty and her cowardice, her ugly outside and insides.
She thinks about what people will say once they learn she has left. At least shame cannot follow her past death.
—
She wakes in a blank room wearing nothing but a white dress, and her head is pounding. She feels 10,000 marching soldiers desecrating the temple of her mind, as if she is nothing but a piece of rock on the side of the road, a blade of grass to be trampled over: a means to an end.
She lays on the bed, silent at first, and then fat tears begin rolling down her cheeks. First silently, then shatteringly. She shakes like an earthquake; she burns like a firestorm; her skin is cold as winter. I have never met someone so desolate. She starts to scream, yelling about an Earth that no longer listens, whose ears have all abandoned us, whose hearts could never hold ours too. She screams and screams, and she begs and stomps and prays to the devil and curses the heavens, and then she sees me in the reflection of the darkened window. She stops. Then she gets down on her knees and begs, sobbing, for me to be set free. From the ghosts that follow us and the chains of her own earthy-brown eyes.
She starts an apology, though she’s not sure she has the words to say “I’m sorry.” But when I see her, all I can do is stroke her hair and start to braid it and tell her to go back to bed. I am exhausted, and I am hurting. But as I fade away, I know I have already forgiven her. The truth about life is that we were made to tear and tailor our own hearts; no one else shatters them but us.
10 years later: the last last sunset
We lie on the roof, watching as the burning horizon turns from yellow to red to midnight blue. The concrete is hard beneath us, but the blanket is familiar and comforting. I watch the sky glow.
I could blame it on time, on the asteroid, on the future we were never given. But I know it is my fault. That time is up, and these were all my choices—the ones I did and didn’t make—that brought me to the end of the world.
If I think about it too much, my heart starts to beat too fast, my hands sweat, my lungs heave, my head hurts, and my fingers can no longer weave.
My mom, who I wished I had hugged goodbye. All my grade school crushes; I wish I had been braver. Laughing with my sister at the river. Regretting how things ended with my other one. We haven’t talked in years. Wishing I had been nicer to my mom. Remembering how much she loved me. She loved me so so much. Texas Roadhouse I still haven’t tried. My dreams of getting through school. The margarine-coated all you can eat Olive Garden breadsticks. All you can eat Sushi Kingdom. Pickleball games I never won. The career I never had. Love I pushed away.
I feel feverish with regret. The truth about death is that there is no coming back. There are no second chances for us. But the truth about life is that there was never enough room for us; we were always running out of time. I think about that girl 10 years ago. Then I think about who I am now, and I feel a surge of pride and love. The monsters still haunt me, but I have gotten better at battling them. Some, I have embraced. Breathing deeply, I decide to give myself a choice. I will choose to choose. And so I release myself from every moment that ever chained me. From the joy that keeps me tethered to this Earth and the regrets that still pain me. It all drags out in front of me, but I keep my eyes open, and I see my life play out, and I choose to live with my mistakes and let them go. At least for today.
When I open my eyes again, I am staring into a chocolate-brown abyss, deep and passionate, sweet and intelligent, snappy but kind. Just as lonely and confused as I am. She gets up, and I watch her walk to the edge of the roof and stare down and wonder about the afterlife, as if she knows anything about death, as if she has learned anything about life in just eighteen years on this planet.
I go over to her and take her hand, and I guide her back to safety. She smiles at me, and with that, I know I have been forgiven.
We lay under the flaming, burning sky. At the end of the day, there is nowhere else I’d rather be. Wrapped in the arms of someone who loves me and who I love back. Not worrying if God will damn me tomorrow because I know I reached heaven today. What sweeter dreams exist than this one, where eyes can hold and fingers can braid and just one touch can tell you that you are beautiful?
The truth about me and you is that we’re worth it. We’re worth everything. Good and bad, happy and sad, living and dead—we are beautiful under every light and shadow of our world.
