THE ULTIMATE SACRIFICE

![FRIEND3.jpg](https://steemitimages.com/DQmS1Jo1XbCNjoigpqQz8faJTGq1GNTw1qMdk19bmEZBMFg/FRIEND3.jpg) [Picture Credits](https://pixabay.com/en/ficus-benghalensis-banyan-tree-2357795/)

**Please check the previous Parts [1](https://steemit.com/fiction/@vinyprop/me-and-my-friend-or-vinyprop-or-original) & [2](https://steemit.com/fiction/@vinyprop/me-and-my-friend-or-part-2-or-vinyprop-or-original-fiction) here.**

**I**n the previous two parts, I spoke to you about my soulful connection with **Woody** and how we stood there for each other, in the need of the hour. How I always felt protected and sheltered in his presence. But now, I think the time has come for me to reveal who this saint like creature and my friend “Woody” was. **W**oody was a Banyan tree which was planted by my father the very same day I was born. *I can already see that frown on your face. If you have already started thinking that this is crazy and nonsense, then you are exactly thinking the way every other person has till now.* **H**ow can someone love a tree?! Have feeling for a piece of log! How can a human and a tree be friends? Yes, I have lived my entire life, hearing these taunts and so there is nothing left that can really offend me anymore. Let me ask you a quick question. Haven’t you ever had this one special thing in your possession, which made you think that you would not be able to live without? It could have been anything, from your favorite pen to your beloved pet. Don't you get attached to your first car, your father gifted you on your 18th birthday? Din't you feel the pain when it got scratched or bumped? Haven’t you ever lost a cat or a dog? If you have then you would understand the pain of losing a being you loved so much. I guess, by now you would have got the point I am trying to make. Getting affectionately attached to things is inherently embedded in human nature and consciously or subconsciously we all love things around us. Some do it more than others, like myself, who was more comfortable and at ease with my tree friend Woody, than the other moving creatures on earth. **P**eople say, during the last few moments of a man’s life, he relives all those fond memories he would've accumulated over his lifetime. They say, it feels like watching a movie, starring yourself as the main protagonist in your own biopic. He wants to carry along, only the best moments, the best people who touched his life and the memories, to the other world. *And this was holding true with myself*, as here I was, at the age of 68, lying in my bed, counting my last remaining breaths and reliving all my fond memories I made with my buddy, my “Woody”. My last wish was to leave this world, in the presence of Woody, but I didn’t know that this is how Woody will fulfill my last wish. **F**or a human being 68 years might be an old age, but for a *Banyan Tree*, it’s only an age of adolescence. Woody was a flourishing and healthy tree, until my medical reports came in last month, in which was diagnosed with *the final stage of tumor*. The moment I heard the news I ran towards my pillar of strength and said to him something which I regret now that shouldn’t have. I said, “*my end is near now my friend. You have been my best buddy, my inspiration, my protector and my guide, all these years, and now that the time has come to say good bye, I only want to thank you for being there for me, when I needed someone to support me. Everything and everyone has moved out of my life, but you have been the one constant thing in my life that never left me for anything. How much I wish to be with you, even after my time on this planet comes to an end.*” **O**nly if I had a clue that to fulfill my last wish, *my friend, my brother, my Woody*, would give up on his life, I wouldn’t have dared to share my feelings with him. The very next morning, Woody was found lying flat, uprooted, dead & dry, with no signs of any life left in him. We hadn’t had any storm or winds as strong to uproot a tree of Woody’s might. Everyone was only surprised to see a thing like that, but I was sulking from within, knowing that Woody gave up his life to be with me in our afterlives. **A**ll my family members & relatives knew about my connection with Woody and also they knew about the inevitable that was about to happen with me in a few days from then, so they decided to make a coffin for me with Woody’s body. **I** think my last moments are here as I can see Woody waiting for me on the other side. But I am happy that even after my death, I will be resting in the lap of Woody, in the form of a coffin.

The End

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