a story i found

His name was Jupiter before he died; now, i wonder what his name is.

They say - this being before i met him - he was the man to look up to. The family man - children loved him, wife adored him, parents respected him - the work man: if you could find someone that worked as hard as him, you'd be looking at Jupiter in the mirror; the man's man - he once smiled at a waitress, made some small talk - received a complementary dinner, and tipped the entire bill.

By the time i had run his fourth check up, he was a shell of  his former self, or so his loved ones would say. They would come crying. His wife, the first day i met her, was so sure that he would die. She immediately began telling me her plans - plans that i had no interest in, plans that betrayed her husband. I would look at all the fake smiles i saw everyone give him; i also saw the tears that surrounded his death. They told me he was the man. Mighty. Muscular. Important. Rich. I knew him for five months. Others knew him for thirty five years, some forty.

When he died, he was silent, in pain but too drugged to know it, and frustrated. Two weeks before his final date with life and love, we shared a cup of warm tea - actually, his was medicine. A long day had just played itself before me - another day, lives saved, a life lost, a broken arm mended, and crying complaints, overwhelming. I was taught, professionally, to cherish relationships- for the good of the patient - but to never become attached: they come and go - they either get well and get up, or stay down forever, but never do they stay with you. But i began to see shadows of the man he was. I saw jupiter, bedridden yet powerful. Never did he once complain about the pain. Once, he came close, and all he said was, "And i thought i felt everything there was in life." And laughed. When i told him he was living balancing on a piece of floss and that God was coming back to take borrowed time back, he said, with a calm look on his face, "I would die for a piece of pie." He hadn't had pumpkin pie since he became ill two years ago: i gave him the napkin to wipe his mouth, he gave me the jokes.

I asked him how he was feeling.
"I feel like i just gave birth. Full of life, literally."
Always in the cheerful mood.
"And all good things come to an end," he said, "which is why i wanted to tell you..."
I lost it then. I knew he was dying. The melancholy on his reminiscing face - i could touch that nostalgia that brimmed in his eyes now. I didn't hear the next few words. Like a reverie, everything became hopeless. The only man i knew, almost gone. Death touches us all. Always on the fringe - the edge of the black sheets - and here, in ten years, finally, i felt it close. No more white curtains. No more black bags. No more eternal wooden homes, that smelled fresh and new.

When i found myself, there was a handkerchief. How he got it, i have no clue: his uniform was strict and i had never seen it before. And there it was again, that melancholy smile, talking to me it said; "Take me, this is all i have to offer, 'tis all i have left." I left, thinking, muttering to myself: "Ever the gentleman..."

Four hours and about twenty minutes later, I was left alone, broken and shaken, to reminisce upon the last conversation i ever shared with that man. And i didn't even remember half of it.