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He snapped up from his sleep with a jolt. He could feel his heart pounding inside hard. Tiny drops of sweat moistened his forehead and he could feel his eyes burning.
He looked at the clock. it read 3 AM.
He had that dream again. He had dreamt of her again.One moment she was chuckling at him, the next moment she was on bed ,pale,screaming out the pain.This vision has been haunting him for the past 6 months.
He picked up the photograoh from above the pillow by his side.She was smilimg at him,her eyes reflecting all the happiness of the world. This was the most valuable thing he had gifted her. The smile.All the years they had been married,he didnt let the grin on her face fade away even for a single moment. He would do anything on earth just to keep her smiling. And when she giggled like a small child and chattered out all her days work to him,he would sit in front of her,staring at her for hours,lost in her smile. Her smirk would wipe away all his weariness and drift him to an entirely different world.
They had been in an enviable marriage for 2 years before they planned to give their love a shape in the form of a baby. And that was when fate started mocking.Destiny had other plans for them.
They were in a shopping mall when she had her first attack. Like an insane person he had driven her to the doctor,only to learn the difficult name of a disease that had possessed her secretly a long time back.
And since then he had knocked the doors of several hospitals helplessly like a starved traveller does, craving for food. Only that, he craved for her to be saved, but in vain. The doctors had given up on her.But he didnot give up. He had heard that true love has healing power. Bringing her back from the grasp of darkness had become the mission of his life. He could not imagine a moment of his life without her.
The tug of war between him and Death went on for several months. He had lost his most treasured possession-her smile.And that was driving him crazy. Every passing moment gnawed on her life bit by bit.
In a few months she had became nothing better than a living dead. The disease had already devoured her soul. It was only his love and boundless care that kept her vessel alive. What would not leave her was the pain. The excruciating pain out of which her screams would pierce the silence of the night. And he could do nothing but wail helplessly on his knees. Sometimes her screams would stab him so hard into his heart that he would close his ears with the palm of his hands and cry out loud to Heaven for help. He was losing it all. He was losing his mind,he was losing his hopes. He was losing her.
To see her suffer everyday crushed him inside.Everyday he would die slowly with her.
And that night her yells tore through the darkness of the world. That night he couldnot bear her painful cries any longer. He wanted her to be in peace. He wanted the calmness back on her face.
And that night he did it.
A final scream from her and all was quiet again. Her eyes were closed. Her face was calm. Her lips had a mild smile on them. Then he blacked out.
The nightmare still haunts him. Everyday death has been beckoning him since then. But he chose to live the pain. The pain of a life without her.Inside,he is dead..
And keeping him breathing, is a phootgraph that lays on the pillow beside him.
