Sunday, December 10, 2023

Reality's End

 


Reality’s End


They say the world will end with a whimper. That phrase echoed in my mind, its poetic simplicity always finding a way to lure me in. But reality doesn’t have the luxury of being poetic. It was never a whimper that I heard when the Earth’s life-thread was cut; it was a colossal roar of torment that would put the most catastrophic natural disasters to shame. A cataclysmic explosion erupted, tearing through the very fabric of the universe, and for a moment, chaos reigned.


Before Hell broke loose I was just a man struggling to make ends meet. A medically Retired Vet living on too little, the aches never ceased. My personal life was its own kind of hell; an estranged wife who considered alimony a blood sport, a daughter too young to understand the complexities of love and betrayal, and parents who made me wonder if family was just a six-letter word for “trap.” Luckily, none of them wanted anything to do with me nor me them.
In an atmosphere already pregnant with misery, the Apocalypse felt almost comically excessive. I’ve lived in the South long enough to know what heat feels like, but this was different. This was a blazing inferno that rendered everything else trivial. But that wasn’t the end. Oh, no, Hell had only just clocked out for its lunch break.

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