A groan from the floor wakes me up from my uneasy doze. My final moment, the last sound I would ever hear, slices across the calm and peaceful nighttime. My closing memory is a black figure waiting for me in the doorway. And somehow, I know he is Death, as a dog knows his master. I shriek, disturbing the rest of the world with a pitiful wail. If I am lucky, someone will remember me. They might put flowers on my grave. I would have liked petunias, their scent reminded me of my mother. The thought makes me merry. I remember that I am about to die, and I try to regain seriousness. But I cannot! I am escaping this horrible existence where people leave you one by one till all are gone and you are alone forever. I laugh, madly, and Death approaches, a vulture in a blue sky, circling closer, and closer, and closer, till he sates himself on the flesh of the dead. He comes for us all eventually, a hand, waiting to grab us back from the contented existence we had endured, never realizing how lucky and indulged we were.

It was a Sunday when I knew he was coming for me. I could hear it in every whisper of the wind. In the buzz of everyday life. Did I think it bizarre that he first made himself clear to me on the Lord’s day? Was he my lord? The thought amuses me. The Church seemed smaller that day, the last day I would attend a sermon. I had walked down the winding street that held our small town together, and men tended to stare, whereas before, they could hardly spare me a passing glance. There was a buzz in the air, and I instinctively stopped to say goodbye to the closest things I had to friends in that suffocating village. The doctor, when I expressed my feelings, asked me if I had been taking my medication. I was smiling too much to answer.

All creatures knew that He was following me as a child, following his mother, holding my hand, and looking up at me with all the curiousness and innocence of young lies. The smell of death constantly filled my nostrils, that wonderful perfume of promises. I had stopped eating, for I was too excited, I had stopped drinking, for I did not want my final moments on this earth to be seen through the haze of spirits. I only waited for that final moment that was promised to me with all the certainty of life. The cats, Molly, Margret, and Oliver, my only companions, had stopped visiting. I supposed it was better that way. Creaks issued in the middle of the night then slunk away. Mice, I told myself, simply mice, looking for a crumb, or a forgotten nibble. A noisy floorboard shared its music with me. But I knew they were the sounds of Death, studying me, waiting till I was ready to depart. And I was ready. 

Wasn't I? I luckier than most. I had traveled to the land of the Orientals in the service of my country, and experienced all that the world had to offer. I had felt true freedom, and I had survived where others had not. I knew what it was like to marry the woman I cherished. But over time, I looked into the mirror and saw the wrinkles and the lines, those tell-tale signs of age and experience. I saw my friends and family pass away either in a restful slumber or in the violence of war, and realized that life had lost its luster. I was alone now. I was ready to die.

And with those final thoughts, I slipped into the everlasting slumber that all things knew.