Alvin's Death

Thunder is crossing the sky, lighting the whole body of Alvin. But the white light cannot flash his face as it’s already pale enough. He was awakened by the loud sound and jumped out of bed. He seems to be surprised by the thunderstorm roaring outside the window as the weather broadcast said there isn’t going to be raining for 2 weeks. Rains are splitting inside from the opening window and wet the wood floor.

“It’s bad for the woods,” Alvin murmured.

He quickly approached the window and shut it down. The moment the window was closed, he began to feel cold. His hand can feel the freezing air penetrating from the window. His ear can hear the biting wind hitting the wall. His body can feel the temperature of the room is far lower than he expected. He cannot sleep under such cold conditions. So he quickly lit the bonfire in the fireplace. Soon, an orange flame appears and dances inside the fireplace, splitting warm light across the room. This light is not bright but strong, strong enough to penetrate the air, even the floor, and the wall. Alvin felt like he could smell the dirt and fungus beneath the wooden floor.

The room began to retain its original temperature. The orange light had now turned into red which was much stronger and brighter. Black smoke began to rise reluctantly as they also didn’t want to move out into the cold wild. Alvin sat on the bed, lying his back on the wall. His spine can feel the hard brick wall. He just cannot fall asleep. He had been ill for a long time and he just recovered a few days ago. The illness is probably because of some mushrooms he ate or the bite of some bug. Each time, a strange dream will come up to him when he is asleep. But weirdly, he cannot remember any of them after he wakes up. Fortunately, he had recovered. Even though searching for the memory in the dream is a lot of fun, Alvin has become tired of doing so as he never succeeds.

A piece of leaf flies out from the fireplace, between the flame, on the floor. Alvin climbs to the end of the bed and picks it up.

“No wonder why it’s not burned,” Alvin said to himself, “it’s wet, by the rain”.

Water began to drip down onto Alvin's finger like they were racing with each other. With the water off its surface, the leaf reveals the orangish light of the fire behind it causing the leaf itself to turn yellow. Suddenly, the leaf seems to have some great attraction which drags Alvin inside. Its yellow body turns into a vast desert. The small stem on it turns into the edge of the dunes. Standing in the middle of this sea of sand, Alvin could even see the camel far away walking slowly on the looming route.

Alvin looks around, and nothing but sand. Moving sand, steady sand, only sand. This view creates a very bizarre feeling. It’s hard to describe through language. It’s like sand could hear you. They are in front of you and, at the same time, behind you. The dunes seem that they could move around to surround you in the middle. Air seems to freeze, freezing Alvin inside it as well. Nobody can save him, even god and especially god cannot regardless of whether it’s a Christian god or a Buddhism god.

Alvin cannot tell how long he stands there, mainly because his legs don’t feel sour at all. But instead, his eyes do. The reflection of the sunlight from the sand began to hurt his eyes. Tears began to come out spontaneously. Really interesting, what makes eyes tear is light not darkness. Alvin could not hold any longer, he closed his eyes to prevent them from further damaging. However, when he opens his eyes again, he goes back to his bedroom, sitting numbly on the bed. The leaf, the port, is in his hand still. But this time without any vitality. The orange light vanished. Alvin’s instinct tells him to throw the leaf into the fireplace and burn it entirely, but his mercenary inside stops him.

“It’s a very good adventure, isn’t it” Alvin rubbed his eyes and said, “It’s not harming my eyes anyway. Besides, I had never been to a desert before, during my childhood.”

Alvin falls asleep again and falls back into the cycle.

Candies are very important at a funeral, they can make the atmosphere not so sad. People are standing in a circle around a big wooden coffin put on top of a pile of firewood.

“Thank you for coming to my son’s funeral.” Daniel, Alvin’s father, said, “Curse that bloody disease that kills him, but fire will save his soul. Lit the fire!”

The fire keeps burning for an hour. When it stops, some of the wood turns into ash and others are carbonized. Inside the waste, hidden beneath a pile of black ashes, there is a small mushroom, the same mushroom as the one under the bed.