Over and Over

By MJ Whelan

The room spun around Pome; they had dreaded this inevitable fate of theirs. Yet again, they found themselves falling to the ground. The red seeds of that accursed fruit, the last memory for this cycle.

The cycle that started it all, well, they could hardly remember it. All that existed at that time in memory was slowly fading as more and more cycles commenced. More and more, that was their fate. Why? Anyone who knew was long dead. Except them, forever cursed to live and die, and then do it over again until time ends. Sometimes, they saw flashes of a dark red coat and a basket of spilled pomegranates, some broken with their seeds spilling out or exposed, glistening in the moonlight. But now, that was only in dreams.

They opened their eyes to another cycle, this time a princess of some long-forgotten land. It was better than some of the past ones, they had to admit. At least this time they were able to live comfortably before their inevitable ending. The only question—how long would they live? Years? Decades? It didn’t matter anyway, but that was the only thing that ever changed, other than living conditions.

They were ten now; they had enjoyed the past decade of lavish living and being pampered. But it was getting harder to enjoy the cycles when their death and the start of a new cycle were always hanging over their head—it kept them awake sometimes. Often they wished for some sort of companionship through this all, but they didn’t think they wanted anyone else to suffer this endless cycle of life and death.

Their fifteenth birthday came around, and they lived through it. They had gotten quite good at disguising the constant anxiety about their inevitable demise after all these cycles. No one could even sense their constant unease or they blamed it on something happening in the cycle. 

More birthdays passed, and they still lived; rather than comfort them, they gained a deeper feeling of dread. Often, the longer they lived, the worse their death. Unless they lived to old age, then mostly it was passing in sleep.

Little did they know, the kingdom had a deep unrest that the king and queen hid from them. So, on the eve of their twenty-fifth birthday, a revolution struck. The people stormed the castle and started attacking and killing any nobles or royalty they came across. Pome fled into the deep reaches of the castle, to a series of caves underneath, but they still followed. Eventually, they were cornered, and the rebellion caught up to them. They died at the end of the cave system—the exit to the cave guarded by the tree of that loathsome fruit.

They opened their eyes as the middle child of a servant family. It wasn’t anything new to them, they had been in this position before. It was alright; they did as they were told and went through the motions.

As their sixteenth birthday approached, it seemed that this cycle would be a peaceful one. This seemed to be the case as time went on. In this cycle, they got married and had children. They lived until their hair was grey.

They lay in their bed, dying from age and not because someone had deemed them as unworthy of living anymore. This cycle had been nice; it was peaceful and full of time to simply forget about their inevitable fate. Their children and grandchildren were gathered around, so they wouldn’t die alone this time, like they had so many times before. On the bedside table was a basket of fruit, including the one they despised the most.

When had Pome started hating that red fruit? They couldn’t remember, but they could remember that it had been their favorite a long time ago. That’s what this did to one, it made you slowly start to hate that which you once loved and sometimes love what you once hated.

They had a strange flash of memory. They had met someone similar to them once, but they had been cursed never to die, instead of their curse to die and come back in endless cycles. They thought that it didn’t matter how, but it seemed that this endless living wasn’t kind to anyone, no matter how one achieves it. How they longed for one final death, to leave this world and see their loved ones in any possible afterlife. It occurred to them that there may not be an afterlife—even that was better than this, they thought to themselves. Just ceasing to exist was more welcoming than these endless cycles.

Another time they opened their eyes as a beggar boy on the street. It was a hard life, full of nights spent awake wondering if the pain in their belly would kill them. Spending day in and day out asking for spare change or anything a passerby would spare them, it was always a blessing when someone granted them a small kindness. Something they never failed to appreciate, no matter the cycle.

War came to their world when they were sixteen. Two years later they were drafted into the military—a sword forced into one hand and a shield into the other. They didn’t expect much was in store for them, even though in past cycles they had been a great hero who was sung about for generations after. 

It went as they expected, where they had been put rarely saw action. It was days spent mostly looking out and trying to keep themselves entertained. The war was mostly fought far away from them. Sometimes they saw smoke from the fires rising high into the sky, then dissipating like everything eventually does. Except for them, the cycles, and a few others they supposed.

A thought that crossed their mind a few times was the possibility of finding the grave of a past cycle. It wasn’t a common thought, but it happened. Or even hearing about a past cycle from a history book or just the tales. That had happened once, someone telling them about this amazing hero that was a past cycle of theirs.

There are too many cycles, too many monotonous tales for them to ever tell. They’re never the same, and yet they are—beautiful and annoying contradictions. They always ended with that terrible fruit as their last memory. 

What could anyone do to deserve this? Endlessly living and dying, never having any peace except when fate smiled upon them. Always waiting for Death’s scythe to hit their neck, for as long as they can remember. Never being fully able to enjoy anything because they know it could end right there and then.

In how many cycles did they reach old age? How many did they not even make it past infancy? Why were they cursed like this? To live and die, and never know when it will end, when they will finally die for the last time. How fast will the flashing have to be when they finally die to see all they have lived through and experienced? Will it start hours, maybe even days, maybe even months before they actually died? They wouldn’t be surprised if it was even years before.

How the endless questioning keeps them awake at night! Always asking questions and almost never getting any answers! It’s maddening! And it’s their life, yet there’s a comfort to it as well. These unanswered questions are almost as old as the cycles themselves.

So they keep living and dying over and over and over and over and over over and over and over and over and over over and over and over and over and over over and over and over and over and over over and over and over and over and over over and over and over and over and over over and over and over and over and over…

When will it end?