The Final Goodbye

This article has been submitted by Snehanshu Sadangi for the CLATGyan Blog Post Writing Competition. If you think this article is a good read, ‘Like’ this article on Facebook (the button is at the bottom of this piece) or post a comment using the ‘comments’ section below.

Chronos was 16 and he lived in New Delhi with his mother. His father was stationed at Jammu and Kashmir and served The Border Security Force. They lived in an two storied apartment in a government colony.

In Greek mythology Chronos was the God of Time and Rhea was the Mother of Gods.Chronos and his mother Rhea shared a very unique bond.  They loved each other and unlike many mother son duo’s, they never argued. Rhea cared about Chronos as a lioness cares about her cub. She never wanted her son to get into bad company and took many measures to see that her son remains untouched by the black sheep of the youth. Chronos also supported his mother. He never complained and knew that all  his mother did was for his best.Their relationship was forged into a strong chain a strong bond which was never to break.

Chronos studied at a nearby public school and Rhea was a Counselor at a Private School about 30 minutes from their house. Chronos went to school by the bus and Rhea drove to the school.Chronos studied in 11th class and was enjoying every moment of his school life. He used to have a lot of fun. Off late Chronos started liking a beautiful girl in his class and yearned to go to school every morning.

One morning Chronos got ready to go to school and sat in the Dining Table. He told Rhea that he did not want to have the porridge that she had made for him. Chronos started walking towards the door when Rhea called out told him to eat the porridge. This was the first time they were arguing. Chronos was at an irritable mood and back answered by saying that he will have half the porridge. Chronos sipped half the porridge and Rhea told that it was for his own good that he finished the porridge but now Chronos was angry retorted by telling his mother to shut up. Rhea stayed quiet as she saw Chronos leave the house.  She consoled herself by telling that it was the first and last time they argued. She left for school after some time.

Chronos, as he was walking towards the bus stop realized his mistake and wished to go back to his mother and apologize and say ” Goodbye, have a nice day..! ” but it was already too late as the bus approached the bus stop. He then forgot about his mother and thought about his beautiful classmate who he was going to meet in some time, thinking what he would say to her.

The day passed and Chronos came back home and was watching television. Rhea left her school eagerly wanting to tell her son about a school activity. She was driving her car and she took the final right turn towards her home thinking about Chronos when a Sumo skipping the red light banged into the driver side of her car. She died on the spot.

Chronos got the news by his relative and broke down and went unconscious. He regretted what he had done that morning, wanted to stab himself for that, called up his dad and said sorry and in every corner of his heart haunting him was regret, remorse and guilt. The last words that he had told his mother was Shut up, not even a smiling goodbye.

The Albatross hung around his neck for eternity.

As for Chronos, he could never his Final Goodbye

As for Rhea, her wish did come true. It indeed was their first and last argument.