The New World by Rebecca Ferguson
Welcome to the new world.
There are rules here, like laws of nature. They are important, and they are absolute. There will be no exceptions.
In the new world you cannot go back to the past. You can never go back. It is the essence of it all. You will want to, of course you will, but you cannot. Nobody lives there anymore, and nothing remains of it except the faint smell of perfume that has long since dried up and the last golden days of your happy childhood. Her things will wait in the dark like ghosts, and the memories will haunt you for the rest of your life. In the new world the mistakes you made you cannot change. All you can do is replay them in your mind as though you are watching through a window, and you can bang uselessly on the glass as much as you like but none of it will make any difference at all.
In the new world it is not a feeling but an ocean. It is not a static thing. It ebbs and flows with the weather, the seasons, the way your heart beats when you look at a photograph of her. You will never be safe from the choice to sink or swim, to paddle in the shallows or venture into the dangerous depths that will look ever more tempting depending on the time of day and the pain in your chest. Life carries on too easily too close to the shore, and sometimes it will seem easier to go under and never resurface. Nobody will tell you to be careful.
Drowning is pleasant in the end they say.
In the new world your dreams will have claw marks and you’ll awaken with salt in your mouth as you reach for someone no longer there. Your dreams will be sirens calling you out to sea, to that ocean of grief that may ebb and flow but is still always there. In the new world you will want to claw through time until you arrive home with your fingers bloody and raw, until you satisfy your unyielding need for the way things were. If she were here in the new world she could take your hands in hers and gently wipe off the blood as she always did and say you’re alright, I’m here now. What was all this fuss for? And you could cling to her and say, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. Please, please, take me home.
But this is the new world and so you cannot find home again. You will need to remember the reason, the one you learned when you got here and turned around only to find the door slammed shut and disappearing behind you. Rule one, the essence of everything. You can never go back. You can never go home. This is the new world after all. Remember why you are here.
She has been dead since the beginning.