I think I died sometime around 2019 (1)

Please excuse the dramatic title. I needed to grab your attention. Something is going on with me and I could use some help. Really.

I graduated college in 2018. They say they’re supposed to be the best years of your life. For me, it was alright. I wasn’t popular or anything, but I had my little group of friends. Something about experiencing the horrors of studying thermodynamics made us stick together, if only for a little bit.

I was more worried about what came next. The 9 to 5 monster would come for me as soon as I had my diploma in my hands, and it would claim me for the next forty years of my life. And so, I tried to enjoy college as much as I could, understanding it was just a brief interlude to the cosmic horror awaiting me.

Graduating was a little anticlimactic. An impersonal letter congratulating me for not failing my classes, followed shortly by a piece of paper that made me eligible for employment. My parents were quite pleased by this whole ordeal. They weren’t as pleased when I announced I would be taking some time for myself before attaching that collar to my neck. I remember my disappointed father saying something about avoiding responsibility. My responsibility to whom?

I had seen the Tiktoks of people in my situation traveling the world for a year before finally settling down, forever shaped by the wonders they saw during their journey. My slim savings from random part-time jobs allowed for three days.

There was this Icelandic punk-rock band that I had listened to since I was a young teen, and I was dying to hear them live. So I just booked a flight and off I went. A few hours later, I was in another continent. Isn’t that crazy, when you think about it?

My warm and pleasant Mediterranean sky was replaced by a cold, grey one. It had been heavily snowing recently, and I could see from the plane the harsh, magnificent landscapes of icy mountains stretching as far as the eye could see.

I checked into a random hostel not far from the airport, and immediately went to sleep, lulled by dreams of ice and snow.

I took a bunch of buses the next day, and arrived a few hours early to the venue. I was really glad I had the sense of packing a warm jacket: The concert was supposed to be open air, and it was raining quite a lot.

The venue was bustling with activity as more and more people arrived. A random guy saw me sitting alone and offered me a slice of his pizza. A group of clearly intoxicated dudes circled around me and started singing and laughing, one of them putting a cup of beer in my hands.

All in all, I think there were about a hundred people in that pit. Old couples clad in black leather jackets and young teenagers happily screaming. Their excitement was intoxicating, and soon enough I was screaming along with them, just as the band finally arrived on stage.

I don’t remember much of how exactly it happened. One moment I was as happy as I could be, bobbing on my feet and repeating the lyrics along with the crowd, and then something caught my complete and undivided attention.  

A young woman had lightly brushed my shoulder. She was dancing like she was possessed by the music, just like I was instantly possessed by her eyes. Charcoal black with long eyelashes. I was physically unable to look away from her.

Of course, she eventually noticed me staring at her like a baboon. She just glanced at me, and let out a loud, childlike laugh while she danced harder.

It is impossible for me to describe the amount of affection I felt for her in that moment. It’s equally impossible to explain why I would feel that way about a stranger I had never seen before.

I felt oceans rise and fall within my heart. Time stopped and her eyes were infinite. Timeless. Something out of this world.

I only snapped slightly back toward reality when I heard my all-time favorite song playing, and the euphoria made me jump and scream and sing and dance. In that brief moment, suspended in time, I forgot all about my surroundings, all about thermodynamic exams and golden collars destined to be installed around my neck. All that existed was the music, and the vague awareness that the girl with the pretty eyes was dancing right next to me.

I had never felt so alive. Which is why I know for a fact that I died shortly after that.