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Tanya Maliarchuk
about life on the other side,
about paradise and hell,
about the soul, but back then
I used to love talking about
such things.
And grandmother suddenly
said:
“I don’t believe in the soul!
I don’t believe in anything. A
person dies and their bones
decay and that’s it. Period.
The end. There’s nothing
more.”
“Grandma,” I said to her.
“it’s really terrifying to think
that way. Aren’t you terrified
you’ll die, and your bones
will decay, and that’s it?”
“What’s there to be afraid
of? That’s the way it should
be.”
“Then why live at all then, if
afterward there’s nothing?”
“How is that nothing?! Look,
you are! You’ll remember my
life, I’ve told you everything.
That’s immortality.”
I came to realize then that I
needed to run away. I stopped
tearing off the bean pods and
ran away. I ran away from my
grandmother and from her
life to mine. Because I don’t
want to be her immortality!
I want to have my own! It’s
not fair like that! I also have
a right to my own life and to
my own immortality! I don’t
want to be a victim of her
lack of faith! That’s what I
thought when I ran away.
I’m thirty years old now. My
grandmother died a long
time ago. I didn’t even go
to her funeral. But I wasn’t
able to save myself anyway.
For sure, I escaped too late.
I don’t have my own stories
– just hers. And I tell other
people her stories. Against
my will. Unintentionally.
Something sits inside me
that constantly spurs me