Accepting Reality

Frank was at the third stage of grief now: Bargaining. He knew that no matter what happened, his humanity, like the shards, would never be come back again. Quietly he made peace with that fact and expelled every hope of a possible change in future. Now he decided to focus on the other part of the glass that wasn't shattered but covered in cracks. He knew it represented his present existence. Since the part of the mirror, although cracked, could still reflect his image, it meant, Frank reckoned, that there was still some relevance that his present existence had. It meant that it wasn't completely useless, that there were things he could still accomplish even with the absence of his humanity. He knew that there could still be a purpose—heck, he knew that there was a purpose, a destiny, that he could start pursing again. And it was nothing but the hunt. All evil men must be caught and killed.

For about an hour, Frank stood in front of the cracked part of the broken mirror and allowed his mind to reflect deeply on the state of things. He made a lot of bargaining with himself, trying to weave a meaning out of a meaningless existence. But he soon moved beyond this stage and arrived at the forth stage if grief: Depression.

Damn, what was the purpose of it all, the purpose of the crazy hunt, if he could never be happy or fulfilled? He mind flashed back to the happiness he felt whenever he played tricks on his enemies before killing them. But, goddammit, he spat, that wasn't happiness! It was too superficial and too transient to be called happiness. It was nothing but a mischievous euphoria, a spark of fire from a matchstick that died off almost as fast as it was ignited. That couldn't be happiness. What, then, was he to gain from the endless hunt?

Frank knees sagged at that moment and he allowed the wave of sorrow to take him wherever it wanted. Suddenly weak, he dropped to his knees. The shards pierced his knees but he couldn't care less about that. He couldn't feel pain anyway. A thick, dark cloud formed not just over his head but also over his mind. He couldn't see anything anymore at that moment. The darkness stood in front of him like a living, breathing thing, swallowing him up, adding more layers of blackness to the crushing gloom.

Too weak to remain on his knees, Frank allowed himself to fall. He fell backwards and his naked back came in contact with more shards. He was bleeding slightly now, but what was that to him? He shut his eyes right, trying to orientate himself with the darkness surrounding him, trying to melt into it and be one with it, trying to ascertain if the wave of darkness was emanating from him or if it was something coming at him. In any case, that wasn't necessary now, he was already one with the darkness. He had turned into a thick, weighty mass of blackness, into the blackest soot having the shape of a human body. The depression was total, enormous. And he embraced it because there was little else he could do. He welcomed the ache, the pangs, and the spikes. He surrendered to the pain and let it ravage him. No, he wasn't thinking of death at that point. He had gotten to the place where he couldn't process a single thought without experiencing a profound mental outage. So he lay on the ground, supine, on a literal bed of shards—bleeding, surrendering to fate.

And then, after what seemed like hours—for he had doze off in the darkness—he opened his eyes and for the first time in almost two hours, he could see the ceiling again. The darkness had given way. He had passed the fourth stage of grief.

He staggered to his feet and looked at the cracked part of the broken mirror again. Oh, how ugly he now was! How wraith-like he looked. How dead. How lost. But he looked at the reflection in his eyes and he saw a sparkle, a familiar glint that reminded him of himself, of who he was, of how, no matter what the circumstance, he had a soul that would never be annihilated by the vicissitudes of life.

He turned around slowly and walked to the bathroom. Getting there, he allowed his back to lean on the white, tiled wall of the bathroom, allowing it to absorb the heat from his body. Oh, how cold the wall was. How cold. It reminded him of the coldness of life, the coldness of the world. It reminded him of how frosty everything was when he lay on the floor three months ago, dying his a pool of his own blood. Yes, he had lost the big fight of life. There was no doubt now. The force responsible for the immortal life that he had was way stronger than anything his mind could ever conceive. It was pointless to keep fighting against this force, against the destiny imposed on him. There was nothing he could do now. Nothing at all. He knew he couldn't change things no matter how hard he tried. He knew it was pointless to even try. The powers that be, whatever they were, had chosen this path for him, aided by a decision made by his own father—a decision whose rationale still remained a great mystery. This was his life and this was his fate. This was the river he had been tossed in and through which he must swim. Stripped of the power of choice, the power to make a single decision that could influence the tide of things, Frank stretched his arms out as if to embrace this destiny. He had gotten to the end of himself now; all that was left was for him to live each day at a time and see if the hand of Providence would be merciful enough to lead him to a path where he could extract, no matter how little, some genuine joys from all that his life was.

Frank took his back off from the wall and stepped into the bath. It was empty and it felt like a grave, but Frank had stopped fighting now, so he turned on the tap and let the water flow onto the bath. After some moments, the water cover his horizontal body, with just his face over the surface. And then he switched off the tap. Yes, this is where he was now. This was his life. The cold water pierced the pores of his skin and he shuddered. He had gotten to the fifth and last stage of grief.

Acceptance.