"Where are we going, Kiyomi?" Olympia asks as she waits patiently for my hand. "Where is it that you want to go? Come with me, and we can find it. The truth you've been looking for all this time."
"Olympia," I refuse to call her by Venterra, "I don't know where we're going, and I don't know where I want to go. But if we can find the truth, if we can live within reality, I'll go wherever you want. As long as you're there, I don't care."
"What if the truth is a dark, cold, and empty place? Would you be fine with that as long as I'm there by your side?"
I hesitate to answer. But I muster up the strength to tell her, "Reality or not, delusion or not, I want to be with you. Even if we find ourselves in an abyss, I'm fine with that, as long as you're there."
I grab her hand in mine.
What she seeks is delusion.
What I seek is reality.
But is there such a clear distinction between the two?
Doesn't it depend on the observer?
The people that you meet. You can't know for certain whether they're a part of reality or merely a delusion that you've conjured.
No matter how much you hurt them.
No matter how much they hurt you.
It doesn't matter in the end.
They'll become forgotten.
There are plenty of things that I've already forgotten.
There are plenty of things that I wish I could forget.
If something is forgotten, it's as if it never happened.
The feelings experienced were never felt.
Pain, joy, hate, love.
It's all meaningless in the grand scheme of things.
All of this is meaningless.
Maybe someone will remember what we do here today. But what happens here and now will exist only between two people who no longer will.
So.
"I don't care," I tell her. "It doesn't matter. Matter doesn't matter."
In the end.
I couldn't save anyone.
I couldn't save Olympia.
I couldn't save myself.
In the end.
It was Olympia who liberated me from the constraints of reality and delusion.
It was she who broke me free.
So.
"This is my atonement.
"I was never meant to live a life I could be happy with.
"But I was able to love you."
Who was it that spoke these words?
I don't remember.
But the words were spoken—out loud.
And that has to mean something, right?
Even for a moment, they mattered.
The breath mattered.
So.
Hand in hand.
We take flight to somewhere where matter matters. Or maybe, somewhere where we know for certain, matter doesn't matter.
What's important is that we're not wasting time, suffering over the distinction.
We'll have answers. Or maybe we won't.
But what I know for certain is this:
We won't matter.
As we descend to our freedom, all that I can think about are the things that I should've done differently, the things I should've done, and the things I shouldn't have done.
I remember the times I've spent with the people I care about. There aren't many, but the mere fact that there's at least one person, the person I now have wrapped within my arms, is all that matters.
Our descent feels like an eternity, but in reality, it's but a mere moment.
Maybe we've already fallen to our deaths, but my brain is stuck in this particular moment, showing me a mental image of my moments before death to help me cope with the fact.
I wonder if Olympia is experiencing what I am, too.
I hope that during her final moments, she's not suffering.
Only a fool can dream of such a thing.
I hope that once I finally, finally experience death, it's not painful.
Wait.
Oh, that's right,
After everything that's happened, I seem to have forgotten.
I've forgotten my curse.
I've forgotten this cruel Joke that's been forced on me.
Upon death, I don't die. I come back to life, seemingly restarting at a certain point in time to experience this hell all over again.
This isn't something that Olympia is aware of, so to her, this is the end, but to me, this is only the beginning.
I'll continue this story over and over again.
I won't change anything.
I'll try my best to keep everything the same.
Why?
Because in this singular moment,
Olympia seems happy.
I don't want her happiness to die.
Even if she and I have to.
So.
The story will go on.
I will wake up over and over again.
All for the sake of her happiness.
Happiness.
Sadness.
Pain.
Suffering.
Love.
Just because these feelings are forgotten, does it mean that they were never felt? The you in those particular moments still exists within. Just not now, but then. There's someone, somewhere, sometime, who is experiencing things that you aren't, but just because you aren't doesn't mean that you haven't and won't.
By being alive, by staying alive, you open yourself up to possibilities, futures in which anything can happen.
Sure, bad things may happen, bad things may be felt.
But also, good things may happen, and good things may be felt.
Is the brain as wide as the sky?
Who cares if there's a limit to the brain?
The brain is a vessel, a vessel that contains things. Things that will be tossed out, but also things that will be added. If our brains lacked a limit, we wouldn't know what to fill our heads with.
How can you possibly argue that our brains have limits, but shortly after say that humans don't use their brains to their fullest potential? That humans don't live to the fullest. Humans always want more.
It is our hunger for knowledge, for experience, that pushes us beyond our limits. It's because we are weak that we can one day become strong.
Even if it seems meaningless.
Even if it seems as if nothing matters.
We exist.
We're matter.
We matter.
What we feel and what others feel.
Just because there's no goal in sight doesn't mean they don't carry weight.
The brain is wider than the sky—
That's how the poem goes.
That's what you told me when I was at my lowest.
The brain is wider than the sky.
And one day.
Some day.
We'll be able to peer out beyond our horizon and view a sky further than the one we can see here and now.
We have limits.
But those limits, as long as we continue existing, will one day be broken.
In the corner of my eyes, I think I noticed the girl whom I hold within my arms as we fall, Olympia Ventura, whispering in my ear:
"We're just matter. And matter doesn't matter. But maybe memories do. And maybe, just maybe,
"You and I do, too."
As if this was how she won the Glad Game: by finding beauty even here.
And in that moment,
She grew wings—
Or maybe I just closed my eyes.