I sit in silence and I watch out of the window where I see the sting of death piercing through the hearts of men and women alike, while I sit still. 

Unmoved. 

There is chaos around me, but it doesn't seem as chaotic as the mess that has bubbled up inside of me. The damp eyes, the shouts of death and grief, the screams plunging out of the darkness and the heat of death started speaking to my dead soul. 

What am I, a beast? A heartless creature ? Or an outcast ? Perhaps I'm all of them. I try to scream and wail but not even the tears are in control of me, I try to call them but they don't seem to arrive, as if they don't seem to exist at all. 

I have seen the world on fire, dripping down to ashes, moment by moment the springs of life begin to dry up right in front of my very eyes. It was nothing lesser than a chaotic hell, yet here I stand holding onto my selfish desires to be among the best and even more to be the best of the best. 

The desires of man are what make him who he is, yet at times, at most of times, the hell with it!!! All of the time, it's the desires that lead to the path of destruction, while man foolishly believes the other way. 

It was man's idea to run a race towards perfection, while the whole point of existence was to just live in connection. 

The frame of death still plays in my mind, over and over again, and the song of grief has become the only melody I hear all the while. 

Am an artist by nature, a gift given in mercy, but what good is the art while I beheld soul crushing pictures that break my spirit into pieces.

The walls seem to have fallen, second after second as if the air around me seem to vanish moment by moment and i strive for life, but every time I try to hold it close, it slips away. 

Life seems to be vanished and everything that is in me is nothing but a canvas painted in grey. I stare at my reflection on the window pane, into those dead eyes that plunge a dagger into my soul every time I look at them. 

"You don't deserve to live"

"You don't deserve to be alive"

"You are a nobody"

"You are an outcast" 

Says the voices that I have never heard. And slowly I unleash myself from the clutches of the most dangerous task master, myself as I cut my skin. 

The first cut doesn't go deep but the blood seem to drip, pain surge through my being and tears seem to be unstoppable and the dagger seems to enjoy the taste of my blood.

As the time began to slip, my skin slit open, with the kiss of the daggers uprooting every piece of my shattered soul. I felt the deep warmth of grief surrounding my mind and ofcourse my heart. I know what's about to happen. I know it is unstoppable or irreversible. Just like a curse. Or perhaps I'm cursed. 

Death has already stuck it's label on my head, and it's only a matter of time for his arrival. But I haven't told you the reason for his arrival yet.

Grief.

Unbearable and a weird kind of grief, that I have ever seen before. It was so new that I needed to calm myself down, atleast i tried but eventually I failed, and at that moment i understood that death is inevitable. Even to the best of the best. Death spares nobody because of its sovereignty. 

I was the best in my field, "The best click award" holder, yet what good has it done. Except to burden me with an unending grief. The very pixels that I loved from the very beginning has taken my hope off life. I was just trying to fulfil my job, which I love with all my heart. All I did was to take a picture, show it to the world. But I didn't knew at that time I was being selfish, I was being self centred, maybe all of us are. But selfishness is what makes us human, if not for selfishness we would have made this world a much better place. Atleast some part of it. But at one or the point we tend to act selfishly. And that was my point, and I acted. And I mean it, when I say I acted. But nobody listens, nobody is even ready.  

I stood up at once, looked around my room. It isn't just a room, it's my whole life, all those smiling faces that I have clicked, those portraits that I have pictured, those smiling faces that I hangout with and all the memories attached to it all began to rush in my mind. Every single thought like a picture is being painted was being dropped in my mind. 

Taking in a long breath, I eyed my camera, my only best friend and the one that never left my side. No matter what it always had my back. "It was your fault" I hear a voice saying. "You shouldn't have done that" another voice immediately suppressed it. 

Tears went tumbling down and my heart began to break gently, i can sense the pain spreading through my chest, like a virus that is ready to eat me up from the inside, perhaps this is what a real heart break looks like. 

I pulled up the camera, placed it on my table, powered it on, with trembling hands. As I look at the lens, I see a whole world looking at me with accusing eyes that wanted nothing but my doom and here I am fulfilling it. 

The blood was still dripping, and i began to lose control over myself, everything around began to I go blur, my head was spinning, i remember my childhood days where I used to run around the home taking pictures of everything in my toy camera, it breaks my heart to even think about it. 

I feel a nausea hit my head and I see fingers pointing at me shouting "die!". The medicines didn't help, the therapy didn't help, perhaps nothing in this world really has anything that would pull me out of this pit I'm in, the pit of shame, guilt and agony. 

I look at the camera one last time and set the timer to one minute, the last minute of my life. Atleast I am lucky enough to savour the last minute of my life. Before the inevitable takes place.

Death. 

Thirty seconds down, and I feel half of my life being slipped away, funny how even a minute seems long enough while you're on the verge of death. 

And as I wait, here comes death, the one loyal friend who keeps his word no matter what. I feel my chest being emptied, my heartbeat began to go down, I turn to the camera and with a smile on my face I let go of this life.

Pranay Raj 

IG : @the_spilled_auth