The First Cut

The past comes in pieces now.

It used to be so clear. I could close my eyes and feel it—every detail, every sensation. The way their breath hitched in their throats, the way their bodies tensed before the end, the moment I decided to take.

Now, things slip. Faces blur. Names disappear. But the hunger remains. I’m in this care facility. Waiting to die. Stuck in this wheelchair bound by the sands of time. I feel the loss so often now. The loss of my freedom. The loss of my memories. “Dementia,” they say. Call it what you will. It’s almost worse than death itself.

And then there’s the itch.

God, the itch. The indescribable and continuous itch.