There's a quote that opens Remy Boydell's graphic novel 920London that has stuck with me heavily since I first read it.

"Happy people don't start believing in the end of the world."

I've always found the end of the world easy to believe in. I feel like a lot of women like me have experience with that. Even if I don't show it, I pretty much always have a gnawing fear of the possibility that my life could be cut short at any time. I'm not sure if it's just a prolonged case of depressive hopelessness, me cracking under the pressure of being a publicly perceivable trans woman, some sort of generalized anxiety disorder, or maybe just a fucked up combination of all three. It's exhausting even trying to pick it apart. I was terrified of 2012. COVID-19 basically barricaded a year or two of my life into an irrevocable void. I'm essentially in constant fear of losing access to my hormones, as my current access to care is ticking down on the clock. My body is falling apart in new ways every day. It's hard to get away from fear when there's so much that feeds it.

Death haunts you from the moment you first experience it. I had an online friend that was shot and murdered in 2017. A casual friend of mine I knew all throughout high school, who I was just starting to become closer with, committed suicide during exam season in our senior year. My father's mom passed away from bone cancer last year. I remember reading the Florida news on my phone after a shower. I remember my friend telling me in a whisper during the middle of our end-of-year Co-op presentations. I remember my friend's parents saying their eulogy, and my friends silently crying in the pews during the service. I remember the exact songs I listened to in the car directly before and after. I remember how the casket was closed. I remember the last time I saw my Nana in the hospital. I remember how she could barely speak to me anymore. I remember getting Dairy Queen with my Dad afterwards. I remember hearing his voice breaking the day after New Years during a family dinner. It's hard not to dwell on death. It rips something away from your heart, and it will always arrive again at some point to take more.

I always fear that, if I were to die suddenly, would I have left enough behind? Would I have satisfied my time on earth to the fullest, would I be proud of what I achieved, would my loved ones have enough good memories to last the rest of their lifetime? Would I have told my girlfriend how much I love them enough? Would my parents know that they didn't mess it up? Would my friends know how thankful I was to have them? I can't know the answers to these questions, it's an irrational thought to begin with, but it persists. I'm always terrified that something will go wrong inside my body, or I'll end up in the wrong place at the wrong time, or that maybe one day I'll just grow too tired of fighting to keep going. I've gotten painfully aware of the fact that no matter how much I try to console myself and keep it together, I will just honestly, truly, painfully never know what will happen. Maybe an asteroid will hit and wipe out the planet.

It's goes without saying that Goodbye Volcano High hit some pressure points for me, if that wasn't obvious enough. I really admire what this game has to give. I feel so much for these characters, who's lives are undeservingly put on the chopping block, who will never get to live out the big dreams they strived for. The way this narrative progresses as the situation gradually becomes clearer shattered my heart, with the casual, fun normalcy gradually wearing away until all that's left is making peace with the little time you have left, and accepting with joy the time you've already spent. It's crushing, but it isn't all doom and gloom. There's a real, beating heart behind all of this bleakness, there's compassion and comradery and the undying hope that, just maybe, we can all share these last few seconds together and turn it into eternity.

The storyline between Fang and Naomi actually made me cry from how sweet their mystery texts are, how even in the face of certain doom there is so much capacity to care. To take the leap of faith. To be in love. Trish and Fang have great nuance in the tests of their friendship, where both parties are constantly in strife to achieve what they want, but fail to see how the other is essential to accomplish either goal. Naser is the best little brother to ever exist. The original score is absolutely incredible. I want them to live forever. I want them all to live forever.

To tie back to my introduction, I don't think I would consider myself a happy person in the general sense. It's hard to break out of that lingering feeling of impending doom, but I don't want to accept it. I don't want to become it. I want to love, to feel free, to take my life by the horns and really live it the way I want. I want my time to be worth it. I want to make it worth it, even if it's hard. I want to laugh and cry and fight and fight. I don't want to take it lying down. I need to survive. We all do. I refuse to go out quietly, even if the asteroid is coming. One day I'll get there. Hopefully there'll still be time left when I do.

There's a part from Reed at the end of the group's D&D session, where he describes the party's victory, but subsequent demise. Everything else stops while he says this, no pictures, no music, just the words.

"I wish I could tell you where you end up, but I don't know. I like to think it's somewhere nice, though. What I do know is that the world you left behind was saved. People will live and die happy lives, in peace, because of what you all did. They won't remember you, or even know you existed, but they'll be there because of you. Beyond that, though, I'm not sure. My guess is as good as yours."

I hope its somewhere nice too.