I carry (or well try to carry) my father to the cart. My mother and brother rush to help me.
"Ma, we can't go to Lord Acacia. We need to get dad to a healer!" I say extremely worried.
"Son," my father rasps.
"Yes dad!" I answer.
"You can't save me."
"No dad!"
"Go on with your life. Keep playing music,"
"DAD!" I scream.
"Don't mourn me to long." He croaked. "It's time for me to leave this world..."
And then it stopped. The harsh breathing, the fluttering heart beat. All stopped.
"NO! DAD! no..." I cried into my mothers arms. I could here her sobbing. I could here my brother sobbing as well.
I cry for a long time. In fact all the way home I cried and cried. I don't know what my emotion is I'm sad that's all I know. Sad and devastated and really ,really depressed.
I glance down at the fiddle clenched in my hand. I want to throw it away and never see it again except, my father asked me to keep playing music. So for him I will.
I look toward the blanket hiding my father from view. Tears roll dow my cheeks slowly. They feel hot on my face. One drops into my mouth. It tastes salty. Memories of dad roll through my head. Slide after slide after slide. Suddenly I burst into tears I sob into my brothers shoulder. He has a musty smell, like dads.
* * *
My brother, mum, Hibiscus and some others around the village and I, help to dig the hole my dead father will rest in for the rest of the worlds time. We give him a funeral and pray he will be safe wherever he's going. Then I just can't take it anymore I go back to our house and sit on my bed and stare down at my grinning picture of dad.
I hear someone enter my room.
"Hey," Hibiscus says quietly "are you okay?"
"Yeah," I say dryly "I'm okay."
She sits down next to me.
"I know that this is hard for you," she says looking directly into my eyes. "But try to be the Johan I know."