"And the winner…" the announcer says, and I hear my own breathing stop. "For the award of the best short story, 2025," just a short story, it didn't matter. There were… other, pressing matters. "Is…"
"Okay," my friend taps on the bench between us, and I give her my attention. "Your hands," she stretches her hand halfway across the bench, waiting to hold mine.
"This is stupid," I say, yet complying and giving her both my hands. "The future with just this?"
"You are the writer," she tells my palm, and then looks at me. "But, however you write it… fate is written. Set points. That some believe we can read in different ways."
"Right…"
"Believe this or not, Mr. Writer. But. Fate is yet true. And you won't know until the climax or the Epilogue," she says, and brings her attention back to my hands. "And at the prologue YOU are the one who asked ME to see."
I clear my throat. "Well… I guess I want to be ready or prepare for anything," I say and look into her eyes. "Anything I might wanna be ready for."
She doesn't speak, just nods. Staring at my hands, and going closer to them with wide open eyes.
"You should really get glasses, you know?"
"I know. I know. Now shush," she says, before dropping my hands to the bench. "You sure you want to hear it?"
"Sure… not like it matters."
She holds the bottom of my hands with one of her hand, and points at a line on them. "This… means that, you'll lose your partner before you. Your fate is to watch your lover die before you can go."
"That's… well that's sad," I say, and feel my chest heaving.
"OUTRO TO LOVE!" I hear, making me throw myself back into my seat.
I wipe sweat off my forehead, while covering the sides of my eyes. Trying to escape from here.
"If Writer is here, then we would like to hear from him."
I get up quickly while saying, "I'm here." My voice was incomprehensible, inaudible, even to me, in between the cheering of the thousands of people behind me. Yet… everyone was looking at me, even before I had gotten up.
My feet move without me deciding or asking them to. And I face the crowd which feels like a million people than a few thousands.
"Thank you," I say to them, and hear my own voice being so loud… so new. "This… this is a shock to me. But to my wife… it… she always wished for my-for such a thing. If she could have…" I breathe out shakily and smile with a little awkward laugh in my breath. "I have no words. I… am a man of less words. When I wrote Outro to Love… it was just, not about an end. Even if the title suggests it. Ends occur. But, love… I wanted to write about love. Just love! The ache… as someone who knows it… of how the fear of losing love is. It wasn't easy to write. But, I'm glad that I could. And I'm glad for the people who have only taken it as it was meant to be… and have brought me to this stage. All I can do is thank you. And even when I cannot share it with my wife… I'm glad I can share it with you."
…
"Will we ever get a new work?" the interviewer asks.
I just smile with a scoff. "Well, art never dies," I claim. "To an artist… their painting. To a poet, like I'd like to think of me than as a writer-well, even to a writer… their poem, their muse… is everything. And I think I would never stop writing until… until I have written enough on her. But that'd… it'd never be enough," I feel myself tremble but I breathe. "Sorry. The night… I'm not used to such a crowd."
"Please take your time. I'm sure you have already said enough to your fans, anyways. They understand that you must be stressed, with your wife in the hospital."
"Well, it… the doctors are good. They have helped with setting up her routine and everything, after her pregnancy. I even forced them to get her admitted for her last month," I laugh at my own idiocrasy. The interviewer prompts me to continue, while showing her teeth smiling skills. "But moving back to my next work… I was thinking of a script. Like for a stage drama. I just was wishing to take it the next level. It was one of the top comments I got on a few posts…"
"That is brilliant! And yes… I liked some of those comments myself to the top, hoping you'd see," she laughs shyly. "That makes me glad, personally. We see potential in it. Would you like to tell us what it'll be called?" the interviewer asks with a smile still lighting her face.
I just smile back and shake my head on the stupid title, but I finally form the courage to look at the camera, before saying with a straight face. "Undying Echoes."