Kevin's Watch

Upon prompting from Tracie (Furls), I will be posting this bit by bit. It was written when I was 18 and is a novella about a man dying of AIDS in 1980s Czechoslovakia.



To Sacrifice the Gift

In Memory of Stephen C. McKinney
and Isaiah John Adderly


What is worse: a mental or physical death?

There are those who would tell you that a physical death is one that takes both, mind as well as the body. But whereas a physical bell tolls the bell only once, a mental death is a long chorus, an agonizing night. I would rather suffer a million deaths of body than one of mind. The mind’s death is living death, a waking dream. But the death of body is like diving for the first time: do it once and every time after is like walking through a door.

And so I sit alone every night, wondering where my life is headed: a mental or physical death. I ask that one question as a statement that frosts over my thoughts as icing on a cake: mental or physical, mental or physical . . . Until thoughts sputter out and I enter sleep. When I wake up, there will be one constant: that I have AIDS, that I am going to die.

My name is Julius Hacker, named for no one in particular. I have passed through life unnoticed and I will die in perhaps a few months.

Not many know about AIDS. It’s just came to a head, publicly. I am afraid to tell anyone, even members of my family. If I said I had AIDS, would the world care that I was dying or would they accuse me of being gay? I think I know which. It’s okay, though. It’s all going to be okay. I’ll live through this. Somehow.

‘Mr. Hacker?’

‘Yes?’ His voice was a small, wiry man’s Chechen accent. He looked at his cigarette, which had burnt down to nothing, and gently smashed it in an ash tray on the woman’s desk. The woman smiled.

‘Mr. Hacker, please answer these questions for me.’

He crossed his legs, folded his arms across the knee. ‘Yes.’

‘Date of birth?’

‘June 17th, 1944.’

‘Spouse?’

‘None.’

‘Parents?’

‘My mother’s name is Julia.’

‘Hacker?’

‘Yes.’

‘Maiden name?’

‘Cooper.’

‘Thank you. And your father?’

‘I never knew who my father was.’

‘Thank you, that’s all we needed. The doctor will see you now.’

‘All right.’

He got up, but the nurse had forgotten something.

‘Did you get your pressure checked?’

‘Yes, she did--at the front,’ he said, pointing down the hall.

‘All right.’

The doctor’s room. Examination table, white wallpaper. The door already open and someone had been sitting on the table, evident by the marks left on the paper. Julius closed the door behind and it abruptly opened again, knocking him off balance a moment.

‘Oh!’ It was the doctor. ‘I’m sorry; didn’t know you were in here. Julius, right?’

‘Yes.’

‘Have a seat please.’

He silently complied. The doctor took an otoscope from the table against the wall. Julius recognized it instantly, but had no idea what it was called. It felt cold against his ear. The doctor bent at his ear canal, checking.

After both ears were done, he picked up a stethoscope. Now, Julius knew the name of that one.

‘Unbutton please.’

He silently complied. Almost instantly after the third button came off the stethoscope felt cold against his chest.

‘Breathe.’

The coldness moved down his chest. He shuddered.

‘Breathe.’

One last time, it moved.

‘Breathe.’

The doctor put the stethoscope back and Julius buttoned back up. The doctor wheeled a stool to face Julius, and he sat down in front of him, eye to eye.

‘You’re all right, but stay in more. Don’t get near any dust. Keep yourself clean, washed. Take those antibiotics.’

His eyes stayed on Julius, serious hard little orbs they were. They held him until the doctor got up and moved to the table, filling out some papers on a clipboard.

Julius worked up his voice, then asked, ‘Should I get a new prescription?’

He looked away as the doctor silently turned, an ambiguous aura emanating. ‘No, I gave you enough.

‘You haven’t run out yet, have you?’

Julius looked at his feet hanging off the table, swinging them like a child would. ‘No. But I might soon.’

‘Come see me the day you do.’

‘All right.’

‘But not until then.’

‘All right.’

‘Good day Mr. Hacker.’

Julius got off the table, picked his jacket off the coat hangar, and walked down the hall slowly. The bell at the front door signaled his departure.

The doctor looked at his papers again and then stopped. He wiped sweat off his forehead. Damn it, he thought, I forgot to wear gloves.

chapter 1

Julius left the doctor’s office, bundled tightly in his soft brown jacket. He walked long strides, sucking a new cigarette.

He wondered how long a man with AIDS had. Not long. The doctor doesn’t know anything. I don’t know anything. This virus is new. New or old, it kills. That is the one maxim. And there is no cure.

Julius shifted his hand about in his deep left pocket, finally fishing out his toboggan. Shivering, he pulled it hard over his bald head. It was a cold day.

Julius watched the steam of his breath come up to meet his face. He was feeling more comfortable. Firm and set with the long frigid walk home, he shoved his hands back in their warm pockets. Enjoy it, he thought.

Yes, enjoy it. Enjoy every small iota of this awareness you have, even the pain. Make and shape what you will of it. Like you do with your paintbrush. You are an artist, are you not? That I am. I am a painter. I smile within. I am dying, yes, but am I dead now? No, I am still alive. And that is the greatest luck in the universe. I still have my hands, my eyes, these thoughts. Those will be known as Julius Hacker forever, no matter what happens to them.

Within his pockets he clenched his fists. His cigarette hung limp from his lips.

His apartment was only a few blocks down from the doctor’s office. He saw it at once, but had to wait for the traffic to pass before he could cross. A short space of road, he thought. That’s all that’s in my body--that’s AIDS. But the light never turns green. I am fated to wait until it decides--decides what to do with me. No choice.

He looked at the green light, waited for the last car to slip past. He made a few fast steps over the road and reached the door. The entire building was all his, his apartment. He was known in the area as an avant-garde, an artist. His work was in the local museum; his paintings were discussed.

The unforgiving air blew in momentarily, then Julius closed the door on it. He did it gently, but it made a slamming sound nonetheless. He sighed, his water-thick boots clogging his movement as he went up the stairs to his den. He felt the wetness, felt that his socks were soaked. He didn’t panic though. He was too tired. He was too--

The den was spacious, furniture all white and spread nicely apart for easy maneuvering. A fire place had been left burning; its light was low, naught else but embers. The ceiling fan swung leisurely, naught else but a dull breeze. Half-open windows overlooked the road Julius had come across. White, thin curtains.

Julius ignored it all, immediately espying the kitchen, thinking of its small pantry. But there was no food there--only paints, utensils--

The refrigerator, he thought numbly, was kept for food. Food. That made him forget about painting.

Opening the refrigerator, he pulled out a carton milk. It was a new carton, and he struggled for a moment to open it. He took a long drink, his Adam’s apple going up and down. His throat had been dry; he hadn’t had anything to drink all night and all that morning. No breakfast, either, he thought. Was hungry. He searched the refrigerator and pulled out a whole tomato.

One last thing, he thought. He turned to the pantry, swinging it open. There were five shelves of paints and various styles of brushes. Some pencils for sketching were on the bottom shelf. He considered it all, thinking a thousand ideas, countless methods. Then he looked at the tomato.

Shrugging, he equipped some random paints and a basic paintbrush. Nothing big tonight, he thought. He returned to the den.

In one corner, by the fireplace, there sat his empty easel and his empty stool and his empty coffee table.

He sat down to it, placed his tools on the table. Quickly, now, he thought. Nodding, he stared into the expressionless canvas before him, as if his eyes could wring something out of it. His tools--the paintbrush, easel--were blunt, inarticulate translators of his thought. How could he transfer his vision to reality with such rude cudgels? It would be a challenge, he knew; he would have to breathe a certain life into blank nothingness. What little life a dead man could breathe. His jaw tightened, stopped being slack. Not dead yet, he committed to himself, burned into his brain. He thought for a moment, don’t use the canvas yet.

Improvising, he picked up some crumpled white paper off the ground from another night. There was some tape hanging from the coffee table’s edge. He snatched it, used it to tape the paper over the canvas. He could practice first, then it’d be for real. He wondered if a dying man’s art changes from a living man’s.

His jaw clenched again, his appetite fading.

He immediately charged with paintbrush into paper. A red stroke started at the top. What is it going to be, what is it going to be. It looked like nothing more than a bloody-bright arch. There’s more to this, more to this. His mind raced. He cleaned the brush, dabbed some yellow. Clenching the brush tentatively, he made an upside down arch on the bottom of the paper, symmetrical with the red one. What is this, he thought? He always knew what he was doing before--

No. He shook his head. Paint.

He repeated the cleansing process, mixed until he got the right pink, and dabbed it onto the brush. He painted in the middle. The very middle, though, he left blank. He leaned back in his stool, appraising. It looked like a pink flower with rectangular, harsh petals, the inexplicable arcs crowing its top and bottom.

He didn’t know what it made him feel. Then before the painting could speak to him, before it could touch him, a thought floated past him in his stillness:

This is no statement.

This is no statement.

He unclenched his brush, let it fall to the floor. No statement. With his fist he clenched the paper, held it so tight he thought his fingernails would break the skin of his palm. When he released, there was red--but only red from the paint. He looked at the crumpled mass. He sat for a long time, holding it, near something: near madness, near a, near--

He didn’t know. He didn’t feel it--couldn’t say--

He didn’t want, didn’t need. It--

In one harsh gesture, he pushed himself up from the stool . It fell behind him to the ground.

He rushed to the kitchen, ripped the refrigerator door open, and took the milk out again, gulping it wildly. It splattered like a stream over his mouth and onto his shirt. He unfolded the paper, looked at it, on the verge of something. His eyes screamed, but he did nothing. He threw the paper away into his waste basket, stood the stool back up, and forgot to put the milk carton away and left the refrigerator door open. He slumped toward his bed.

chapter 2

The next morning came easily enough. It’s life that’s easy, he thought. It’s just this--this that’s killing me. What’s killing you, the devil in Julius Hacker whispered. You damn well know, he answered back, his mind boiling with a mounting rage.

He used the anger to push himself upright, tossing aside the covers. He stretched, felt a tickle in his nose, and tried not to sneeze. He thought he looked better, but he could never be sure. It felt like such a gray area, and he knew that how it felt was more important than how it looked. He sighed.

As he went to the bathroom, looking in the mirror and rubbing the five o’clock shadow, he had no idea what to do.

There was nothing, really, except painting, or reading, or going outside. Or--

No.

He meandered into his den, looked for a moment and felt something was different.

He gasped at his memory, cursed its flaws. The kitchen!

The milk was out and the refrigerator door was open. There was a whole tomato on the counter by the sink.

As always in these times, he paused. He looked at the food, ruined as it was. Breaking the pause, he took out a trash bag. He took each tray out of the refrigerator, emptying them into the bag. He shook his head, looking at what was left. Now I have to buy all new stuff.

Hefting the trash bag, he made his way down the steps and outside.

Outside, there was a large dumpster near the corner of his apartment. With some struggling, he managed to lift the lid and hold it open while at the same time chucking the bag in. Weary from the ordeal, he immediately let the heavy metal lid drop down and drop loud. He wiped his hands, sensing their dirtiness, their dinginess. He felt he needed to wash up, but then he realized he wanted a cigarette more. His jacket pocket still had a pack. Fingering his pocket blindly, he counted about five cigarettes left. Good, he thought, well; I’ll only have to buy food. This will last the day. He lit the first one, tucked his hands in the pockets, and made his way down the road.

As he walked along with the cold and overcast murmur of the morning, he thought of how tightly packed together the buildings were, each neighbor able to hear each other through the walls. That was not so with his home. There was only silence, for when his neighbors had heard that he had acquired AIDS they packed up--left. Such a controversial fucker, this disease, he thought. What a shame. He hunched his shoulders, feeling small and belittled by the new purposes heaped on him.

Try as he might, he couldn’t just ignore it, this disease. He couldn’t just go on living life as normal, all white knight and heroic and “it doesn’t change me”. Bullshit, he thought, rubbing his index finger and thumb. It changes everything. Can’t shrug it aside.

Julius walked on, his eyes on the little two lane road. Nothing coming, yet, but something will, he thought. A car, person. Who knows.

The road began to go slightly downhill. He modulated his pace to meet the change. Ah, there’s one, Julius thought, and he watched as a woman on the opposite sidewalk, to his left, struggled uphill. Her legs looked tired, calf muscles all bunched up like little frogs. She was bent forward, grocery bags all in her hands. She looked fit, he thought, but she had probably been shopping all day and was now sick of it--sick of being everything and being out.

Julius shook his head. Don’t be jealous. You can’t blame a disease. Just stop thinking and think about the convenient store.

He approached it, looking at its window. Open for business.

He walked through the glass door, the bell ringing as he came in. A heavyset man at the counter said nothing.

Casually as possible, slowly, he navigated the aisles of the small store, grabbing what he had spoiled over the night. He put all of it in a small plastic basket provided by the store and walked over to the counter, tapping it with his fingers and mumbling ‘I’ll check out.’

The man half-nodded and systematically rang up everything.

Julius paid the price, waved a good-by to no response, and walked out, the bell ringing again.

He looked in the bag once he was out, making sure he had everything. Yup, I do.

The sun was coming out now a bit, underneath the gray ceiling. He squinted his eyes. Good, he thought.

chapter 3

I dreamt last night. I don’t know what I dreamt but it’s clear. I think the reason it’s clear is because I just had it. Everybody dreams, every night. But the only dreams you remember are the ones you just woke up from. They sometimes disappear from your mind while you’re taking a shower. It’s easy for that to happen. It’s easy. But if there’s one that’s really important, really vivid, then you hold onto it, explore it, try to explain it.

It was a strange dream. I don’t know how to explain it. I remember having it, and then sitting up in bed, turning on the light, looking at my hands. I thought, my God, I’m still here, still alive!

I don’t know why I thought that. I guess I needed confirmation.

But the dream, dream. It was strange. I won’t try to explain half of what happened in it. It’s too horrible. I just remember thinking clearly, for no reason at all, that this dream was from a different period, before I was born-- Forties, maybe. I think it was the Forties.

It was in a small wooden cabin. There was no floor. There was one of those wooden beams going up from the floor to the roof. I don’t know why. There were men, all in gray. Identical. I think they were Nazis.

They seemed to have a leader, who was arguing. He was also the largest. He was shouting, gesturing with his hands back at, well, me I guess, where my eyes were looking at him. I was up against the wall, scared for my life. His finger came upon me, accusing me of something, though I couldn’t understand a word he said. His comrades became silent, just started eyeing me. I knew then that it was that fatal moment before the storm. And I knew that by realizing that, I had also triggered it. I betrayed myself.

He rushed me. I felt as if it were supposed to be happening to someone else, but I was taking their place. He pushed me to the floor. The pig raped me.

I think he did, or was going to, or at least I--

Then I woke up. The dream ended. I fear going back to sleep again.

Julius climbed out of his bed. It was 3 in the morning. He felt empty. He looked around and around, walking into his den. He had no television, didn’t believe in it.

No, you still do. You still do believe in things, he reaffirmed.

There was nothing stirring. No wind on the thin curtains, nothing.

He looked at the table in the middle of his den. It was a large table, a see-thru glass one. It was low to the ground. He remembered how much he fancied it when he bought it. There was a couch facing the table, where friends could sit and put their drinks on the table and talk. Or that was how he planned it. The couch was covered in white sheets.

He looked to his kitchen. He wanted to look at that paper again. It couldn’t have been that bad, he thought. It had to state something--something of a statement, no?

He shook his head. I don’t know, he thought. But we’ll find out.

He reached his hand into the whicker basket as if he were reaching into some kind of trap. He pulled out the paper and retired to the couch. As he opened the paper, he thought vaguely that he should have thrown it away with the other trash. Oh well, he muttered. He looked deep into the art of it, if there was any art. Here it is, he thought.

He flattened it on the glass table, looking at what he had painted. He rubbed his jaw, slackened it a bit. What? What are you looking for?

Something told him to turn the paper over, on the blank side.
There was nothing there, of course.

He snapped his fingers. Pen, pen. I need a pen!

He found a ballpoint pen in his pantry. He ran back to the couch.

What, what?

What now?

He looked, his hand holding the pen, poised over the paper, waiting.

What?

I’m ready, he felt himself saying to absolutely nothing, to all of his self. Tell me.

His hand shook. He let the pen fall toward the paper. He began to write in a small but sloppy hand:

When did you die?

What? What is this?

Suddenly, his hand answered the question. It scribbled:

44

Forty-four what? Nineteen forty-four? What, World War II?

I don’t get it.

He wrote:

How did you die?

His hand responded:

Rape. Murder.

Reeling in disbelief, he wordlessly dropped the pen and went back to bed.

chapter 4

The next morning he woke up, pulling up his pajama sleeve. The lesions were still there, yet the dream had been so vivid. He had dreamt of himself before--before--

No, don’t say it. Just think about the dream.

Beautiful: to be free, united with oneself. Now this. Breathe. You’re still here. Smile.

He couldn’t. Instead, he looked around the room.

On the floor, haloed around his bed, were his books--books he had read feverishly ever since the diagnosis. Ever since--

It was one of those things: “I’ll get around to it sometime.” But “sometime” was becoming never, and he decided to spend his last months reading and absorbing as much as he could. He still needed to go out and buy some Hemingway. He wasn’t sure which one, though. Which Hemingway book do you read, if you only have time to die? It’s a crazy thought, really. It’s one of those things where you say, if you have one day to live, what would you do?

Julius rubbed his bald head, sat up in bed, the covers draped around him

What should I do? Should I bungee jump, skydive, run a marathon? He cracked a sad smile. Why would I want to do something stupid like that? How typical. If I didn’t do those things while I was living, why would I want to do them dying? Stupid, Julius, stupid.

A cough racked his lungs, effacing the smile.

He bent over and covered his mouth with his white sheets. Something felt wrong inside him. Of course, that’s normal now, he thought feverishly, his brain working around his pain. Struggling to get up, he planted himself at the edge of the bed, sitting up and looking out the window.

Beautiful, he thought, his eyes watering from the cough. It was harsh daylight streaking across a fresh horizon. I haven’t noticed that in a long time. Maybe not since I was a child.

At last, he got up. The air was cool from the open windows, just how he liked it.

The Hemingway books were still boiling in his mind as he entered the den, his legs stiff. A new thought hit him, though--thought strong enough to make the sleep vanish from his eyes. There, on his glass table, sat the paper from last night. It screamed at him silently.

Rape. Murder.

Did I write that?

He walked now with no sleep over to the paper, picked it up. Had I? Truly?

This?

His eyes rested on the final words, as if they were something carved in a headstone:

Rape. Murder.

I thought this was a dream. But it’s real. Here it is, in my hand. What now? Do I continue?

Continue what? His mind stood still, split and torn with uncertainty.

He looked at the paper one last time, his eyes screaming long at it. This is madness, his loudest inner voice said at last, and he crumpled the paper back up. Madness.

He threw it back down, noticed the paints were still out from the other night, and gathered them up. As he made it for the kitchen, for the pantry, he stopped cold, his back tight and rigid and straight. Damn you, he thought. What now? You want that paper, don’t you? There’s something about it. Well forget it. Okay?

He opened the wooden pantry door, put the paints in their appropriate place, and closed it back. He turned and sighed relief. It’s forgotten. Gone. A new day.

His eyes looked distant as he stared through the empty space of his kitchen. What now?

Hemingway? No. I’m tired. No reading. I’ve read a lifetime’s worth. Isn’t it sad that there are so many books and not enough life to read them? Did they ever think of that, those authors?

I need a break. But from what? From this reality. This hell. Admit it. It’s a hell. You can’t go about your “life as usual” crap, your “stand tall” crap, your “I’m an artist crap, I’m a human being crap.”

Damn the devil within me, he thought. Damn him and damn me for my weakness. I should be stronger. I need someone, though.

My sister. I must talk to her. I want to tell her. I want to hug her and tell her it’ll be all right, even if I myself am questioning that. I just want some part of my world to turn normally, instead of spinning out of control. God help me. God help me. I feel a tightness in my stomach, a sickness. It’s hard to breathe, as if there’s sulfur in my nose. I guess it’s adrenaline. I’m scared. I’m moving fast on adrenaline, trying to dodge a predator. I didn’t expect this chapter in my life.

I--

I can’t dodge this one. It’s coming right for me.

Then call her. Call your sister!

Okay.

The phone was right by the kitchen door, on the wall. He picked it up and punched her number nervously. The phone rang four times. There was the sound of the receiver being picked up, and a long time before somebody said “hello.” The pleasantries of brother and sister raced over the telephone lines, and then the real conversation began.
‘I’m sorry I couldn’t answer fast. I was carrying my kid and the laundry at the same time. That Polly, she’s a mess.’

He offered a small smile and a genial chuckle, then, ‘Yes, I remember her being this little,’ he said. ‘She’s grown, I’ll bet.’

‘Oh yeah, she’s really big. I can hardly carry her anymore. You should come by and see her Julius.’

It was then he began to cry. Maybe it was that his sister used his name. Maybe it was something else.

‘Julius? Are you okay?’

Quickly, he suppressed his tears with silence, but the sobbing refused to stall.

‘Is something wrong?’

‘Yeah,’ he said through his voice, a quaking semblance of its old clarity. ‘I--uh--yeah. Uh, yeah. Something’s wrong. I want to talk--to you--’

‘Okay.’

‘In person,’ he blurted.

‘Okay.’

Down on the road it was near-silent. A car rushed by speedily, the sound of it meshing with the wind as rain puddles observed.

‘I’ll talk to you later. I love you sis. I love you.’

‘I--I love you too. Goodbye.’

He let the receiver fall. He wasn’t crying anymore, but his lips were still trembling.

What are you? Why are you crying? Stop it, you’re done crying. Stop it.

chapter 5

Julius left his apartment and walked south this time. The sky still hadn’t cleared, gray as ever. It was cool and windy, and he pulled his collar up to his chin and felt his whole self tucking in, to combat the chill. He had room for his thoughts, though. He thought about the phone call, but he thought more about that paper he had thrown away. He refused to call it a painting. He bit his lip at that thought. Painting!

The roads seemed empty. Every now and then a car or two would come down and pass on, but that would be it. And there was nobody at all on the streets. Maybe everybody had gone to work. Probably.

There just seems to be less people out than old days. Probably.

Maybe it’s all in your head. Probably. You can’t tell until you’re dead. Probably. Do you think that when you die all the world’s truths become evident and the lies exposed? And all the questions answered? Why die, then? Why live a meaningless life and then suddenly, inexplicably ascend to a place where everything--the universe--is lessened in scope? Because that is what happens; when something is explained intricately enough, it’s no longer big or mysterious or even lovely. It shrinks. It lessens. The scope lessens. What kind of reward is an afterlife with all the answers, then? What fun is it to know all, to be on top? There’s no where to go from there. No up no down. Suspended. Forever.

Julius hoped the afterlife would be as much an adventure as mortal life would. He hoped there’d be no answers, and that he’d be given no answer to life or have to receive judgment before a God he’d never met or known. Well, it’s true, he thought. I don’t know Him. I wish I did, but--

Forget it, he said quickly, harshly.

I don’t know, he said, pressing on. It all seems too draconian an afterlife. There’s more freedom here than up there, if we’re to be judged, he thought.

Forget it.

He looked behind his shoulder. He was surprised to see how far away the apartment was now. He’d walked a long way, too drowned in thoughts to even know or notice.

What a boring life, he thought. What a depressing life, he further thought. Truly, if reality were put to a book it’d be boring. That’s why authors always have to embellish or add a new, dramatic factor to the reality to make it--

Make it what?

Julius grasped and then found something:

Movie-like in quality--you know, to make it stimulating, interesting. Nobody would sell life in general to a publisher if he tried a thousand different people. Sad but true.

Ah, I forgot. The painting! His mind ran hot with it. No, it’s a piece of paper. It’s a piece of paper with something I wrote on the back of it. I think I was sleepwalking when I wrote it. Maybe I didn’t even write it all. Maybe it was all a dream. No, this morning you woke up and the writing was there. It was real. You had an idea--an idea like for a painting--but it came out as a question. And then you answered it. You didn’t just make it up. You answered your question. Remember what you asked? You asked, “How did you die?” No, not that. I correct myself. I asked, “When did you die?” That’s when I answered “44.” But did I really answer? Or make it up? I answered. But that’s not what I meant. Was it really ME that answered? Was there something in me answering, making my hand write for me?

Are you nuts? Why are you asking such stupid questions? Of course if it came from your hand if it came from your brain! Something didn’t just MOVE it for you! Moron!

I’m not being a moron. I’m being serious. It’s not everyday you pick up the back of a painting and write “When did you die.” There’s got to be a fucking reason for it.

Stop. Then what’s the reason?

Julius stopped. He honestly didn’t know.

You’re a dying man, Julius told himself. Maybe it means about you dying. Every moment means something now that you’re dying. Does it, truly? How is a moment dying anymore important than a moment living? Just because. Okay, then tell me, Julius Hacker, how does a bunch of scrawling on the back of a crumpled piece of painting amount to shit? Maybe you were drunk. You can’t even hardly explain how you did it. No, I know just how I did it! I know--

I did it and that’s what counts. Now I have to explain why.
Just forget about it. Go on and forget about. Life’s too short, especially for you. What a mean thing to say. It’s mean but it’s true. Make the best of it and stop giving yourself a headache. The headache’s from a cold, not my thoughts. You don’t have a cold. Well, either way, it’s not helping. You’re right. I need some coffee.

Julius was slowly making his way uphill, his legs beginning to tire. His apartment was far out of sight, lost amidst a network of interlocking roads and corners that integrated over and over again until it became a city.

Julius thought he would need a taxi to make it all the way to the coffee shop. He couldn’t even remember if he knew where it was, exactly. It’s bad enough if it’s far away, but to look the town over for it? A goose chase.

Finally, the top of the hill, he thought. I’ve reached it. The road leveled off to a wide street, lined with side by side two-story buildings, each one crammed next to its neighbor. They were shops, countless shops. This was the hovel of activity in this part of town. He would find a taxi here. Had to.

His legs hurt unbearably now. He needed to find a place to sit. He started to want that more than coffee. There was a small, gated-off park square to his left. He made a bet to himself that there was a bench in there, but he further reasoned that there would be no taxi there. He grimaced at that, torturing himself by accepting more walk. It was really a short distance, but he wanted to stop and sit on the damn bench. Well you’re not going to, you baby, he said inwardly. Not much longer and you’ll be on the main street. Look at all those damn shops. Just look at them. Maybe I’ll buy something. But you only have enough for a taxi drive and coffee. Not true; I have a lot. I have plenty. Come on, let’s move.

A couple minutes later he was walking under the shadow of the looming buildings on the main street. Cars were parked on the side of the road and more than one sign read “employees only.”

The road still felt deserted, despite the line-up of cars. There was just something about the pure gray slate of the sky meeting with the gray buildings and the strips of road that made the whole world feel like one windless box. Julius kept walking past, rejecting it brusquely. He needed to find an eatery or a restaurant or something like that.

He stopped, a sign directly over him catching his eye:

Le Entente

The bell rung as Julius entered.

The interior was startling: a bar table and drinks against the wall, tons of drinks. Lots of them. But Julius only wanted to sit down. Everything was wooden, he noted. From the dark panels of the floor, the tables, the bar, the stools, the ceiling, the everything. Aside from the glasses, and the people, it looked like a wooden toy, a quaint novelty. It was quite a change of scenery, as the outside was covered in brick and plaster, belying the contents.

Julius let a wracked breath sigh out of his chest, as if he’d been holding it during the whole walk. He immediately went to a tall stool at the bar, crashing down into it softly. As he sat there and let the warmth of rest bleach his dark fatigue, he forgot about everything else.

Ah . . .

He decided he did indeed want a drink. He ordered for some milk. The bartender looked let down by that. Julius didn’t care. He looked around and saw nobody he knew. He knew a lot of people in the town. There was an old man two stools away from him, down the bar. The man was heavyset, wearing a toboggan over his ears and his hair sticking out like white goose feathers.

Julius ignored it and turned slightly in the stool, revolving once around the room. Nobody was paying attention to him. There was a small table in the middle of the room, five people sitting at it. It was only big enough to accommodate four, though, so the fifth man was forced to sit at an odd angle. Julius smirked dryly at the arrangement. The man had nowhere to place his elbows, whilst his four friend leaned on the table and talked freely. They looked youngish. Maybe students? No, Julius thought, they’re very young but not students. Maybe they’re in college. You can just tell.

‘Sir?’

Julius turned about face in his stool, faced the bartender and instantly recognized the drink in front of him. He thought for a moment that it was a shot of white Russian. He smiled at that thought, thinking the bartender wasn’t prepared with milk glasses at a pub. He silently chuckled within and pulled the glass toward him, examining.

Ugh, he thought, ice. He looked up at the bartender, who’d turned his huge back and was polishing a glass that had been hanging from the ceiling.

‘Sir?’ he said.

The bartender, his back still turned, seemed deaf. He polished on. He was a huge man with a fat block head and a crew cut streaked with gray and white.

‘Sir!’

The man turned around, his pug nose and mustache looking down with a pair of eyes.

‘Oh I’m sorry. Yes?’

‘I’m sorry, sir,’ said Julius, ‘but this milk has ice in it and I can’t drink it like that.’

The bartender furrowed his brow queerly. ‘What’s wrong with ice?’ he asked, as if something could possibly be wrong with it.

Julius reworded himself. ‘I mean, the ice--in the milk--I don’t like ice. I’m sorry if it’s an--’

‘No no,’ said the man, his voice a quiet bellow, ‘think nothing of it. Here, let me pour that out.’

Julius turned around on his stool again, feeling the man would not be back for some time. He wondered why he thought that. It was just a glass of milk, right? Pour out ice, refill. Pour out the ice and refill.

He watched a new person come, a woman. The only woman in here. She must feel awkward, he thought. Maybe she’ll see me and notice me. I’m a famous painter, you know. No, something inside him rumbled, you’re a faggot dying of AIDS. Julius fumed. I acquired AIDS from a blood transfusion, he whispered to himself. You know that.

The wooden door by the wall of drinks flew open. The bartender apologized for the delay and gave Julius two glasses of milk. Julius wanted to say “no thank you, I just asked for the one glass of milk without ice, thanks,” but he couldn’t bear it. He hung his head over the small glasses. That’s right, he thought. They are small. I could finish them off like that. They’re nothing. He picked one up, sloshed the contents of them around slowly, and then downed it, as if he were shotgunning a beer.

Bah, he thought. Beer. I hate beer. I hate the taste of beer. I only aspire to acquire its effects: the loss of inhibition. That is simple. This is human impulse. It amazes me, though, that humans actually drink something not for the taste but for the tasteless aftereffects. A rush of thoughts supporting that idea came, but he let them slip. Instead, he clung to one thought: there’s fun in getting drunk, but being drunk wasn’t all that wondrous. It was in fact the worst part, next to the hangover. He hadn’t been drunk in years, not since the painting began. The painting replaced it. He hoped he didn’t smell like a drunk anymore. Of course I don’t, he thought. I’ve not touched alcohol in years. Why would I?

My sister used to comment on the smell regularly. No longer, though. So it’s settled. I don’t stink.

He smiled stiffly at that and sat down the empty glass and began on the second. He downed it in one gulp and slapped it on the table. His feet dangled inches from the ground. This is a tall stool, he thought. Very tall. He looked around the bar one more time. That woman was nowhere to be seen.

Julius turned around to the bartender one last time, watching him collect the two empty milk glasses. He gave the man his money and slid off the stool. He straightened out his jacket, patting down the ruffles in it systematically and looking past the exit door’s window, to the cold outside. He cursed himself for forgetting to ask about the taxi, but he didn’t think these people were the type you’d bother to ask . He thought they seemed insular.

He made sure he held himself erect. His high school friends once told him that, when he was getting up to receive an award in front of the whole auditorium (perfect attendance) he looked like he was hunching his back. Maybe it was nervousness. So many eyes, he thought. I detest them. I can’t breathe under so many stares. I can only give a speech when I’m behind a podium, or if I put my hands in my pockets. I remember, once, when I gave a speech and didn’t feel nervous at all. But my hands shook anyway. I was holding my paper, giving that damn speech, my voice clear as day, but my damned hands shook. I don’t trust my own skin, do I? I can’t control my hands. I’m the one who’s insular, not them. You mean insecure, Julius snapped, correcting himself. Right. Okay, here we go.

Before going, something compelled him to look for that woman one last time. He turned his head back to the bar table. Nothing. She’s not there, he thought.

The old man with the white hair straightened and got up. Ah, there she is.

The woman had been sitting beside the man, her form obscured. Julius looked at her. He wasn’t attracted to her. Exactly why he looked at her he could not say. He motioned his hand toward his pocket for a cigarette. At the maw of his pocket he stopped his hand cold, cursing silently in realization. Empty! All used up! I need to buy some more. Oh well. No better a time than now to ask. A good excuse, anyway. What could be better?

He squared his shoulders, thinking they were slumped, and walked toward the woman. She had a white face with no tan at all, which was good. Julius detested tans. He thought they were mere trinkets of passing culture that had no statements to make. Art was his life, and if it didn’t make a statement it didn’t matter.

He was before her now. He breathed back, knowing the next breath would push past words. He hoped his voice wouldn’t crack, or that the words would falter.

The woman, feeling she was being noticed, looked up. Everything slowed down.

‘Sir?’

It was the voice of the bartender.

‘Is there something more you need?’

Everything rushed back to normal speed. Julius felt the answer painfully obvious. ‘Need? I’m talking to this woman here.’

‘What woman?’ the bartender asked, his mustache moving quickly with his mouth. There was a look of alarm in the man’s eyes.

Julius looked at the empty stool. ‘I--’

My God, he thought, what is happening to me.

Sweating in embarrassment, he turned to the bartender awkwardly, feeling frozen in the man’s stare. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said, laughing through the words to break the ice, ‘but would you happen to have a cigarette?’
‘No,’ said the man, still staring hard at him, ‘no, I wouldn’t.’

‘That’s all right. Thank you.’

Julius turned to leave. He didn’t need to look, but he felt the hot stares of the five kids at the table on his back, crawling up him in silence.

chapter 6

Now things are coming to a head Julius Hacker. Now things have happened that you can’t forget. Things you can’t ignore.

Julius silenced himself. Then a fury rose in him like a twisting finger of fire through his body. No! My God, I’m dying of AIDS! What matters anymore?

This matters, Julius. Illness or no, you need to recognize what is happening around you. Things—

Not things! Two things! And that’s it, nothing more. Julius pounded a mental fist in his mind, but his body was taut and still as his legs moved him up the sidewalk.

Look, both sides of his inner conflict finally said, just go get some cigarettes.

There was calm in his mind, but he knew it was only the eye of the storm.

All right, I’ll get some.

So on he went. This was the main street. There was bound to be a convenience store on the horizon soon. So on he went.

He thought about last night. He’d awoken in the middle of the night to his stomach, churning as it was in painful circles, the organ squealing endlessly. He had felt his forehead and a cold sweat was over him, his body shaking under his pajamas, as if he were wearing nothing. It was hard to get back to sleep again, much less turn the lights back off with his hand shaking.

He went on down the sidewalk, forgetting that awful memory, that experience. It was such a mesh of pain and sweat and the lower dungeons of humanity. He tried to tell himself it was a dream. But that became almost as hard as telling himself AIDS was a passing phase. But it was not. If anything, it was too real for words. True nightmare. Julius was glad, though, that the shaking spell was long past. He might go the whole day this way, if he were lucky. But he never felt such luck. He felt his feet going forward were enough to challenge his luck. But I can’t stop walking.

So he walked on and he asked himself some questions:

Why did you call yourself a faggot back there? Because. Because why? What’s it matter? It matters to me. It doesn’t! I can’t explain it. I’m sorry.

Julius bit his lip, and then philosophized:

You know, I could tell the whole world I acquired AIDS from a blood transfusion (which I did), but the world would call me a faggot. Up and down every corner of the globe, their voices would bleed accusation. That’s the nature of the beast. They don’t trust the disease yet, much less the people carrying it. They probably never will. It’s sick, isn’t it? Tell me, what’s worse: getting it from a lover or getting it because you were driving drunk, got yourself in a nasty car accident, and were given HIV-infected blood? What’s worse, huh? I say that making love is more honorable than driving drunk. It just is. But that’s what I did, wasn’t it? Drove drunk, I mean. I drove drunk.

And yet the world would say--would say

Ah, it’s sick, isn’t it? It’s sicker than this--this creature under my skin. Ah, I give up.
He hung his head, pressing on, the sidewalk going downhill just a bit. He wondered what to do next, where he was going, and why he even went outside today.

Beautiful; it’s beautiful, he thought. I’m noticing it all again, you know? I forgot it when I became busy. I’m going to notice it now, though. That’s all I can really do. It’s all that matters at a time like this. Maybe it’s all that ever really mattered. I shouldn’t have tied myself down like I had, before the disease. Before I had nothing but material possessions, now all I have is this soul, the “material” dying.

He turned off the sidewalk, walked to the end of an alley, and made sure nobody was looking. Once sure, he raised up his jacket sleeve. Trailing up and down his arm were lesions. He sighed, half in horror, half in fascination.

It felt good in the alley. He enjoyed this shaded cube of warmth, the narrowness secured and cloistered. He put the sleeve back down and thought about what had happened in the Entente, at the pub. There had been a woman there, right in front of him, or so he thought. He wondered why this was happening to a man dying--why he had to suffer such illusions. He couldn’t explain if it was his brain shutting down or if it was something totally separate of himself. He wondered if it was life itself calling to him, telling him that he should drink and drink until he passed out. Fuck it all, get drunk.

No, he thought, shaking his head. Life doesn’t tell you those things. Life has no voice.
Julius shook his head, concentrating. Who was that woman? What did it mean when you wrote on that painting?

His mind rolled over itself trying to answer.

I—

I don’t know.

Maybe I should give up.

No, don’t do that. Then what? What should I do? You can’t just wait. Not much waiting left.

Still, he thought, something else might happen. We can’t make it happen. We can only wait.

You’re right, you know. You can’t just piece together the whole puzzle with only two pieces.

Okay, it’s settled. We’ll wait.

Quite right.

chapter 7

A bell rung as Julius entered the convenience store. He’d been in it before, but more often than not he passed it by. He felt he knew the town like the back of his hand, and this place he deliberately avoided. He was never sure why, though. He couldn’t put a finger on what he didn’t like about it, when compared to the convenient store he frequented. Perhaps it looked poorer. There had always been a wooden board where he thought a window should be. He felt disgusted whenever he saw it, thinking, what kind of statement is that? The lazy ass in there should get it replaced!

Such flood of disgust washed around Hacker’s humming brain as he navigated the place. It was a tad bigger than he remembered. He noted other changes: short vertical aisles and long horizontal ones and a freezer, full of beer, along the northern wall.

Julius looked at it. Disgusting, he thought, without effort.

Good. Good.

Navigating some more, he finally found a pack of cigarettes. He hated this place, oh, how he hated it. At his store, for Christ’s sake, they at LEAST kept the cigarettes at the checkout counter, NOT in some fucking aisle forty miles away! He fumed. He liked it, though. He needed a good fume every now and then.

He walked up to the checkout counter. The man there had been watching him the whole time.

‘Hey,’ he said, a prolonged “Hey” that came out thick and syrupy. ‘I recognize you!’

‘Do you?’ said Julius, putting down the cigarettes on the table. This was annoying, thought Julius. The man was eyeing him intently with that fresh look of recognition on him. And he wasn’t even motioning to check out the cigarettes! He just kept staring.

Time seemed to pass like a thousand years as Julius looked at that man’s face. He could feel the future, as if the building would tear down in a few seconds and cobwebs would gather around and the sea would wash back over the land.

Then everything rushed back, his daydream broken by, ‘Yeah, I know you!’

Julius put on a smile. ‘Do you now?’

‘Yeah,’ he said, the “Yeah” prolonged just like the “Hey” had been.

The checkout clerk stuck his chubby finger out, letting it hover as his face scrunched a bit, searching for dangling memories. His eyes locked on something.

‘Yeah! You’re that painter, Julius Hacker!’

His eyes, unlocked and free, came back to Julius. He picked up the cigarettes and motioned to ring them up. Ah. At last! Julius cleared his throat nervously.

‘Yes, I’m he.’

Dropping the cigarettes, the clerk reached out with an empty hand to shake the painter’s.

‘Sir, it’s an honor.’

Impatiently, Julius shook the man’s hands.

They let go of the embrace, and the man began to tell him how two of his favorite paintings were by none other than Julius Hacker. Julius remembered painting them, too. Of course, he hated to think about his own stuff. He couldn’t think about his own stuff objectively. It was boring, too. If anything, he’d like to talk about another painter’s painting, not his paintings. He couldn’t stand it. And by “couldn’t stand”, he hated it--not that he was modest. He plain hated it. His work was not about recognition; it was about—

The clerk asked Julius what his favorite painting was.

‘Thatched Cottages at Cordeville,’ he replied.

‘No’, said the clerk, ‘I meant which of YOURS.’

You’ve got to be joking.

Silence.

Julius couldn’t stand it anymore. His brow wrinkled.

‘Just ring up my stuff, will ya?’

Silence.

‘I’m--I’m sorry. I talk on and on, you know. Here, let me ring that up for you.’

‘Please.’

In a moment it was over. Julius felt a warm relief sigh over him, and he turned his back to leave.

‘Oh!’

Damn it!

‘I wanted to show you this!’

Oh fuck a pig!

The clerk reached under his table and pulled out a canvas wrapped in cloth. Julius cringed.

The man pulled off the cloth.

‘What do you think, Julius?’

Julius rubbed his chin. A smart comment, a true appraisal, or a lie? A smart comment.

‘First name--’

Julius covered his mouth, deciding abruptly not to go through with it. He focused his eyes on the painting. A lie.

‘It looks good. Keep it up.’

The man seemed displeased with this, his body sagging at the shoulders a bit. Had he expected—

Julius shook his head before the sentence finished. No, enough. Let’s leave.

‘Well, good bye Mr. Hacker. Julius. Good bye.’

‘You too.’

He walked out the door, the bell chiming as he did.

chapter 8

Julius felt like the past week up until now had been one long single day. Maybe it was because the weather hadn’t changed a bit during the whole time. Seven days ago rain had come, and then, ever since, weather remained the same: a long gray. It wasn’t too bad, he thought. He wasn’t sure if he liked the cold or abhorred it. Half of him needed the crisp coolness.

He sucked on his new cigarette, letting the smoke out in nervous puffs.

He was tired and bored and he felt a headache coming on. There was a meandering aimlessness in his walk as he looked up at the buildings.

Where to now? What the hell am I doing? Why don’t I go home and wait? For what? For death? Yeah, I guess. I’m not afraid. Really? Are you truly not afraid? I guess. I mean, I know I have to do it, and I pretty much know when. Soon, yes? I guess for others it can be worse. Some people are ripped from their lives in accidents. Actually, Julius, now that you think of it, being killed in an accident is better than AIDS. The accident-victim doesn’t see it coming, usually. It takes one second for a truck to wipe your awareness away. I’m wandering in the desert here, you know. One long panorama.

Death. If death’s so important we’d know what it was already. Apparently it’s just a big joke. I think that, when I die, my mind will have something very similar to a “near-death” experience. Yeah, I’ll have that. You know what I think that is? I think that near-death thing is the mind having a kind of “waking dream”--the mind telling itself “it’s okay”. But it’s not. The “near-death” experience is just the message a dying mind sends out. It’s coercion; a soothing lie. Even your mind is in on the joke. What happens then? I don’t know. I guess the near-death experience ends--fades--like a mirage. And then what?

Nothing?

Nothing. Atoms disperse and go into other things and other planets and other people millions of years from now. Eternity, no? It’s just ugly because I’ll no longer be around to know it or see it or feel it. My awareness will be gone. That’s what life is: a vacation from death. Once the vacation is over, we slip back into non-existence. Just think about it! Just try and think about the nothingness before you were born. That’s right. You can’t. You have an idea of empty black airless space, but aside from that? Nothing. So there. You’ve got non-existence before birth, and then there’s a spurt of awareness we call “life”, and then it bleeds or dies or gets maimed, eventually. And then we die and return to black.

If it rises, it falls. If you rose from the black, you will return to the black. So there’s my thesis statement. Pretty shitty.

But it’s all the sense I can make, or what I WANT to accept. A lovely afterlife feels too easy. Sugar-coated! Oh well. Why should we know what happens after death if we don’t know shit about before birth? Because they’re both the same, both connected. I may be wrong, but that’s what I want to believe.

What I want is what I am.

Julius sighed, puffing out a trail smoke.

I’m ready to die, but I’m not willingly going to do it. My body is going to betray me. It has sided with the demon, the disease, the fucker.

He pulled his collar up. It wasn’t getting colder, but the wind was starting to kick in. He walked into the brunt of it, head slightly down, hands in his pockets tightly. Good thing I have no hair, now. The wind would mess it up.

Well, he thought, his brain now easing off and giving itself a rest. Where to now? Forget all this stuff. Let’s forget it. Okay. Let’s just walk around.

His next statement began as a statement but the silent voice of the thought curled into an obtuse question. It made him stop cold.

Surely there’s something you can do besides walk around?

I guess. I’m bored.

Right.

Let’s do something, anything.

I want to, believe me. Oh please believe me! But I have no idea what to—

It’s funny, Julius Hacker, how nothing matters to you when you’re dying.

Things do matter to me! I’m not emotionless, damn it. I’ve not “lost feeling”. I still touch, I still taste, still see!

Liar. You’re losing. You’re losing everything. You’ll no longer touch, you’ll no longer taste, you’ll no longer see. You never got married. You never had kids--never held them in your arms! Fucking loser!

I’m going home. This is too much.

He turned around and headed home.

chapter 9

The body had already abandoned its fort, and now the system of life within was up for control. The barbarians were at the gat, and they would reach the control panels, steer the cockpit into the ground and let the inferno begin.

Inside his house it was warm. He had turned the heat all the way up before he left. It was real toasty now, he thought. He rubbed his cold hands and marched up the stairs, to the den.

He walked stiffly, the cold air from outside still in his bones a bit, and then he stopped dead still.

On the table laid a slip of paper. For a brief fleeting moment he thought it was the crumpled up painting, but he had thrown that away. Right? Right?

His brow stiffened. It’s not crumpled, he thought. Not the painting. Right, he sighed.

He bent down a bit to pick it up. He held the slip up, examined it. It had his sister’s handwriting. Oh!

The note said:

“I came by
but you weren’t here.
Please call”

A “love ya” and a smiley face had been put at the bottom, as a signature. Ah, my sister, he thought. I shouldn’t have left the house today. Now for that phone call.

He went to the kitchen.

The note made him think of something. Ah, that note. I need to see my old note. No, it’ll make you cry. No it won’t make me cry, I swear. I’m going to just stand up and read it. It’s been a while. It’s a funny note, really. Come on, go find it in the bedroom.

He turned to the bedroom, then he turned back to the kitchen, stalling.

No, I don’t want that note. Let me make a phone call. Man, you want to read that note. Just read it and then make the call. Come on, get organized. You need this. Go get it, read it. It’s right in the bedroom, folded up where it’s always been inside that dresser you never used. It’s the only thing in there. Come on. It’ll be easy. Come on.

Silence for a moment, and then a feral scream pierced his mind:

Go walk in there right now and pick it up!

Fine. I’ll go, I’ll go, I’ll go.

He stalked away from the kitchen and across the den to his bedroom.

It only took him a few moments to procure the note. It was where his mind remembered.

My god, he thought, as he held it folded up in his left hand, walking back into the den. He got behind the couch, still standing, and unfolded it. His eyes were all over it, but he didn’t read it. My god, he thought again. It’s been years since--

“Hey Baby,

What’s up? nothing much here, just sitting here thinking
of you, well how are you doing I hope you are ok.
I really enjoy talking and seeing you all the time,
I wish I could run off with you but I
know that wont happen, but you have a beautiful smile
I’m gonna take some pictures of you this weekend,
so be ready ok. lets keep doing what we are doing ok please, after
you read this come out back and see me real soon and
Write me back tare this letter up ok. I really do like you
a lot so letts keep this a real secret. Well sorry so short but
I will write you a longer one real soon

Love
You

Smile
I
Love
You”

He folded the letter back up, tears already budding around his eyes. Nobody would know how the letter never got destroyed. Nobody would know the person he was, the girl he had loved, the school he went to. Nobody. Nobody.

chapter 10

‘Sorry I wasn’t there sis.’

‘No, no, it’s okay,’ she said, softly placating.

His voice sounded hollow, his eyes still wet.

‘No, I’m all right. It’s okay. I just want to see you and talk to you.’

‘Okay,’ she said. ‘We’ll meet.’

Hacker nodded, as if he were talking to her face to face, and then he remembered.

‘Oh! When would you like to?’

‘Anytime you want. Where--’

‘There’s a good place to eat. I’ve seen it. We’ll walk there. It’s close. Just drop by my house.’

‘Right now?’

‘Uh,’ he thought, ‘no not right now. I’m gonna paint first’

‘Okay,’ she said, her voice a little uneasy.

She’s anxious, he thought. She’s wondering when I’ll give her a time. He snapped his fingers. Tension!

‘We’ll meet,’ he said, contemplating with deliberate slowness, ‘at seven?’

She exhaled a breath, and, ‘Yeah, seven sounds fine. Okay then. Bye-bye!’

Julius felt a smile come across his face. ‘Goodbye.’

He heard the line click. He always--always--hung up last, no matter if he were giving or receiving a call.

Still standing by the phone, he decided to just wait around the house until his sister came. He looked at a small clock on the wall over the refrigerator.

His mind drew a serene blank, and he almost forgot he wanted to paint.

He went to the pantry, retrieving the same paints and brush from the other night. He stopped and tried to remember if it had been indeed been from the “other night” or the “other day”. He sniffed, his memory not serving him well, his answers indefinite and shot wide. I was never bad at remembering things before, he thought. Shrugging his shoulders, he put the paints and brush in the den by the easel and taped down a new paper over the canvas. He sat down.

Blank, nothing. He looked at it more. Nothing, he thought. Nothing’s coming. I used to be excited. I wanted to DO this! I used to—

I used to—

Something felt—

He looked across the den and at his open bedroom door.

Adrenaline spiked through his skull, his nose breathing harsh stingy nervous breaths.

Someone was in the house.

He held himself erect, motionless. Slowly, with all care not to make a noise, he put down the brush he was holding and got up. He stood glued on his feet, looking toward the bedroom the entire time. It’s in there. With that thought, he regained control.

He tiptoed until his feet met the stairs. He rushed down and out the door and stumbled outside.

Once outside in the cold air he bent over and vomited on the road right by the sidewalk. The same woman he’d seen the other day with groceries was there, and she stopped at the scene, looking at him.

‘Are you all right?’

Julius, remaining bent in the cold air, raised his hand and motioned for her to go on about her business. Spittle was still running around the rim of his mouth. He let his head hang, but it was a sticky fluid that refused to drop on its own. He spat furiously, but that didn’t get it all. Finally he raised a hand up, brushing it all off. Cursing, he wiped his wet hand on his brown jacket sleeve and then subsequently patted it down.

He looked at the ground, stained with vomit.

There was blood in it.

chapter 11

He straightened his stance in front of his house and rubbed his pale bald head.

He felt the bile raise in his mouth again, that unmistakable pressure before the vomit.

It felt inevitable.

He bent over and opened his mouth but nothing came out.

He straightened back up.

I can’t go, he thought wildly, instantly. I can’t go like this. I’m calling. I’m calling.

He looked up at the house. Nobody’s in there, he assured himself. Now go.

He didn’t go, though. He had to ask himself one last question. Was I sick from nervousness back there or was I sick from--from the disease? Maybe both, he answered. No, he thought. People just don’t throw up blood. They just don’t. It’s not even normal with sick people.

The headache’s coming back. God, he moaned. I was never like this. I was a completely different before—

I was—

Then he knew what it would be:

A mental death.

No! No!

But that’s what it’s coming to! You probably even have—

NO. Just shut up.

It must be a physical death, Julius thought. Must. Take the body, please, not my mind. Let me KNOW when I’m dying. Don’t let me not know. Don’t make me crazy. How could I live and be--and be—

I’d already be dead!

He looked up at his two-story house.

Go in there, he thought. It’s warm in there. The phone’s in there. Go in there you animal. Okay.

He went inside his own house like a thief.

He looked up the steps. Go up there, stupid, he said. Nothing’s up there! Just an empty fucking house with a phone call to your sister waiting. GO!

He ran up the stairs, spitting in the face of anything that could have heard him.

At the top he looked around. Nothing, see? Nothing! Now walk across to the phone and make the call. Okay.

He went into the kitchen. There it was: the phone! It looked like something he had traversed endless plains to get to and finally found. He picked it up, the treasure that it was. He dialed the number to his sister’s house.

It ringed once and someone picked up. Strange, Julius thought.

‘Hello?’

It was Polly, the child. Julius hadn’t seen her since she was a baby.

‘Uh, Polly?’

‘Yes?’

Julius quietly laughed at the realization he was talking to a three-year-old. He heightened the pitch of his voice.

‘Hey! This is your uncle Julius!’

‘Hi.’

‘Is your mommy around?’

‘No, she left.’

‘Oh. Well can you do me a favor?’

‘Okay.’

‘Tell her uncle Julius will have to cancel. Tell her that. Okay?’

‘Okay.’

‘She’ll understand.’

‘Okay.’

‘Bye.’

‘Bye bye.’

No click. The child wouldn’t hang up! Julius was not used to doing it first. ‘Hang up now,’ he said, his voice still light.

There was a click on the child’s end and he sighed, relived. Mentally and physically spent, he summoned what was left to the couch and laid down. He fought to think instead of closing his eyes.

chapter 12

In his dream he stood upon black shores as waves leapt high, smashing against crags. He stood there, wrapped in a brown cloth to keep warm, oblivious as water fell over him.

Beneath him was the hard ground, the jagged rocks he balanced his bare feet on.

Beyond the immediate shore was a gulf of endless ocean--or so it seemed.

He looked out, strained his eyesight. He espied a bar of light in the sky turning and disappearing--only to turn back around and show itself again.

Julius recognized the motion instantly.

A lighthouse.

He hugged the warming cloth tighter to his body, shielding his cold thoughts. How will I get up there? How will I pass the waters?

You will have to swim.

But I’m dying. I can’t do anything. That lighthouse could be miles—

Look up.

He looked up at the high ceiling above.

The sky was a black swath of heavy rain clouds that belched thunder.

Julius shook as flashes lit over his bald head.

This is only a dream, his intuition told him. It was one of the few times when he knew he was having a dream. In most of his dreams he would go through them, thinking they were so real and vivid, only to be sucked into true reality. He would awake then, sweating sometimes, and gasping happily in the darkness.

And this was a rare occasion. He knew it to be a dream. He looked around, wondering why and what for.

Why find the lighthouse? It’s only in my mind. My mind could send me there right now, instead of swimming miles to get to it. But that might be dangerous, Julius thought. That kind of control in a dream just doesn’t seem right.

You’re right.

All right. We’ll swim then. He walked to the edge.

No, wait. He pulled back.

If it’s only a dream, he began, then why find something that’s not real?

I don’t know, but I’m going to find out why.

He flung the brown cloth off his back. It had felt warm against his skin, but, strangely, as he looked down on it, he realized how thin and lightweight it had been. He didn’t know what that meant.

He stood, shivering in the cold. Why do I shiver? It’s only a dream!

Standing naked against the dark outline of the shore, he dove with that thought in mind. It’s only a dream!

The water rushed over him, biting cold, but as he plunged deeper and deeper he instantly became used to it. His buoyancy pushed him up to the top, and he twisted his head around. The clouds swayed in mad circles, thunder and lightning toppling down high above head.

The rain began to pour. It poured in fat heavy drops, just the way Julius liked it. He began to make slow breaststrokes; thought of how long it had been since he’d swam. He hadn’t had a good swim since he’d visited his grandparents at the lake. Amazing. I technically still haven’t had a good swim since then, he thought, this dream feels—

He felt encased in the water, as if he were in a bubble almost. The sky was too dark to discern anything else except the rain over his head and the ocean around him. It gave him a feeling of endlessness. He didn’t want it to stop. Too easy, he thought. Too easy to stay content.

He swam on. Through the curtain of rain he could still espy the beam of light. He knew he was on the right path. Something told him it wouldn’t be long.

It was then that the water seemed to pull rapidly, as if before a fall. Julius responded instantly, stopped stroking forward, and kept himself still as he floated above the waterline. He remained calm, but he couldn’t deny that he wasn’t in control.

And then the lightning flashed just bright and long enough for him to see it:

As far as he could see, the ocean was bubbling madly and gurgling in one, singular stream. This is impossible—

Undertow jerked Julius. It felt natural at first, but then he couldn’t mistake there was a hand upon his ankle. Before he could scream, he was upside down and completely submerged, totally directionless and disoriented. The abyss sucked at him from below, and above the hollow roar of thunder cascaded down. He twisted and turned, trying to figure out which way was the surface. He listened to the thunder, thinking it might be the answer.

Before he could think anything else he felt a rush of bubbles and then his head was back above water.

‘What!’ he yelled, his voice hardly discernable amidst the bedlam of the wind, which had began to howl. The thunder totally drowned him out. Julius opened his mouth, wondering if he was even speaking. He couldn’t hear.

He looked up. The clouds opened like a flower blossom, and a clear blue sky was revealed, as if the whole thing had been a joke.

All sound went out. The waters became absolutely still.

Everything stopped.

Julius looked up at the hole in the clouds as if something were supposed to come through any moment.

He waited in perfect silence, his heart beating against his chest so loud he could hear it.

And then it happened.

chapter 13

Like a fish out of water Julius shook.

His body rolled off the couch and he let out an incensed yelp, a cushion falling with him as he clung to it. His body met the floor. For a moment he did nothing.

Breaking the stillness, he raised his right hand up and felt his brow. It was profuse with sweat.

From his prone position, he took a short glance at his three half-open windows. They faced the skyline, and above that an orange horizon. It was late afternoon.

As his full senses swarmed up to greet him he finally heard it: a knock at the door.

He wondered groggily who it was.

chapter 14

The sister of Julius Hacker stood outside as ] sun was going down, the remnants of the day an orange haze in the sky.

The wind kicked up. She bundled her fur coat tight about her. She hated the cold. She was shaking in it.

She stood in front of the door of her brother, who she hadn’t seen all year. She remembered with some spite that Julius had always been the type you initiate the conversation with, not the other way around. He was a recluse. The man had left his mother at age seventeen and bought an apartment the second he acquired enough money. After that the phone calls were few and far between.

But when Julius made that last call--when she heard him cry--it sounded like a return to the old brother she knew. It was a brother who had laughed at the same movies, shared the same dinner table--had had spats as any siblings did. She missed that; any glimmer of it was a ray of light.

She no longer felt like a sister anymore; she was a single mother now, like her mother before her.

Shaking some more, she bounced back from her memories and knocked on the door again. Three knocks this time.

A frantic voice came from the other side of the door, and there was a shuffle of descending feet.

She looked through the glass panels in the door, trying to discern inside.

Then something shocked her.

Is that my—

Brother?

Her mind blazed as she peered harder, pressing her face a bit closer.

He looked like a ghost. His face was gaunt, and his head had lost all its hair. Not that he had had a lot when last she saw him, but there was a noticeable difference.

Too much difference.

I hope he can’t see me. No, he can’t.

And he couldn’t. He was standing there at the bottom of the staircase, but he kept still and had his head oddly turned. She realized he was looking at something on his collar. Maybe a stain, she thought. No, you don’t wipe off stains.

Indeed, Julius was wiping off something on his collar. He was having trouble getting it off. She couldn’t make out what it was.

She thought an instant later that maybe she didn’t want to know. She knocked again. Three soft raps.

With each word his voice became more present. ‘Okay, okay; I’m coming.’

The glass-panels flung back, and she stood face to face with her brother. He took a step back, his left hand leaning on the door pane. He looked caught off guard. This was an unexpected visit, she surmised quickly. But how?

She stood in silence, looking at him. Julius became acutely aware of it, and he turned his head.

He looked terrible, she thought, wanting to voice it aloud. “You look terrible!” But no, she didn’t say it. Couldn’t.

His chin was coated in something white--something crusty. There was a bit of it on his collar, too. The pallor on his thin face hadn’t receded either. Maybe gotten worse. She peered hard at his forehead. Was he sweating?

Dear god!

Julius spoke first, a flurry of uncertainty. ‘I--uh--’

He paused, unable to find a clear line of speech. Finally he latched onto something:

‘Did Polly speak to you?’

She was dumbfounded.

‘Uh,’ her voice softly reciprocating, ‘no. I just got off from work. I went straight to the grocery. I couldn’t find time to come home. Why?’

He wondered for one second if he should tell her about the phone call to Polly. His mind raced to make a response before his hesitation was apparent.

‘Nothing.’

She had decided not to say anything, but that strange question of his finally broke her.

‘Julius you look terrible!’

‘Oh, I--’ he wiped his chin quickly and looked at the back of his hand. There were some dried flakes of vomit. He shuddered.

‘I’m sorry I’ve not been feeling well,’ he managed.

‘Let’s get you inside,’ she said, her voice peppered with healing and understanding.

Back in the house Julius went. He wiped his forehead. Slick, glossy with sweat. Still sweating? God, he thought. He didn’t feel dizzy though. He was lucky. It had been a good day so far. Thank God, he reminded himself, if it ends like this.

His sister went ahead of him. As she went upstairs he closed and locked the door. He held the doorknob for a moment, his chest heaving with a sigh. Letting go, he slowly climbed up the stairs.

‘Lay down on the couch’ she said, her back turned to him, looking down through the open door to his bedroom.

‘Is there any medicine in there?’

He looked at her for a moment. She looked the same to him. Thick red hair in a ponytail. She was beautiful, he thought. Why was she still single?

‘Yeah, the medicine’s in the bathroom.’

She knew where that was. There was an adjoining door between the bedroom and the bathroom. Julius watched her open it. He looked away. He heard the flick of a light switch as she entered the bathroom, her high heels clicking on the tile floor. Any moment now, he knew, and she would be opening it.

chapter 15

She could clearly remember the one night she and Polly had stayed over with Julius. Julius had let her use his bed, and he had taken the couch. She remembered late at night getting up from the bed and going to the restroom using the adjoining door.

Nothing’s changed, she thought.

It was a Spartan but large bathroom. She noticed there were stacks of unopened soap bars. Strange, she thought; that was a new addition. Why did he need so many? Oh well, everybody needs soap.

She looked at the large tub, the shower beside it, and then turned back to the sink against the wall. There were no carpets on the hard floor. She didn’t like that; someone might slip.

There was a medicine cabinet on the wall, above the sink.

She opened the cabinet.

Oh my god.

She’d never seen so many pill bottles. Some were fat white ones and the rest were the clear smaller ones, most of them half-full with pills. She was aghast. She had no idea her brother required this much medicine. She knew him to be healthy all his life.

What could have happened?

She wondered that and examined a random bottle, turning it to see the label. She didn’t ask.

Using a nearby towel she pulled everything out of the medicine cabinet. Cradling the towel, she walked back to the den.

She found Julius on his back, prostrate. Beside him lay a puddle of manila colored vomit and some blood in the middle.

My god, screw these pills, she thought. I need a hospital.

Julius, as if he heard her, opened his eyes wide. A sheen of sweat on his forehead glared in the harsh overhead light as he tried to sit up next to the vomit puddle.

‘No’, he said, outreaching with his right hand. ‘I’m fine.’

Her back was turned to him as she entered the kitchen and immediately saw the phone. ‘Like hell you are!’

Despite the words, Julius could tell she wasn’t mad. She sounded on the verge of tears.

He stood up and balanced himself.

‘Look, sis, let me see what you’ve got in the bundle.’

She looked up. Julius was too late. He could hear the phone ringing as it sat wedged between her shoulder and ear. Her hands, free of everything else, held the bundle of pills.

‘Sis,’ Julius said, his voice a thin wire, ‘I’m all right. Hang up the phone.’

She stared hard at him, much the same way the doctor at the office had. A voice was on the other end of the phone. She hesitated, reacting to it, her mouth opening to speak.

‘Please, sis.’

She froze and there was nervous static silence on the phone line.

‘Hello?’

She said nothing back.

Her eyes on him the whole time, she hung up the phone.

She strode back into the den and almost shoved the towel into his chest, looking at him still with those hard eyes, hot with emotion.

She sat down at the couch and looked mutely past the puddle of vomit, lost in thought.

Julius stood, his back at her, and looked down as he unwrapped the towel slowly.

His eyes fell upon its contents.

‘Oh sis,’ he whispered, his head shaking slowly. ‘I’m so sorry you had to see this.’

‘I’ll get another towel for this.’

‘I just wanted to see you.’

But his voice was distant now as she went back to the bathroom.

chapter 16

Julius went to bed but didn’t get up in the morning. He lay under his sheets, wide awake, staring at the ceiling. He thought about death.

He remembered a conversation he had had with his granddad about World War I.

His grandfather had said, “You’ll never forget it.”

Julius looked up, a child’s face. “Forget what?”

His grandfather sounded detached as he said, “The smell.”

“What smell?”

“The smell of death. I remember it like yesterday.”

“What’s it smell like?”

“It’s impossible to describe. It smells like steel and high explosive and--and rotting. I don’t know how to describe.”

Laying in bed, staring at the blank, expressionless ceiling, he thought about death.

What will it be like? Go into the ground and that’ll be it? I won’t feel anything or be aware ever again?

That’s too horrible. But Julius felt it was true somehow.

I mean, it’s too easy. It’s too easy to say we’re put on this earth to struggle for a few years and then bask in an eternal afterlife. That’s not even a fair tradeoff, even if your life is one torture after another. A few years for an eternity? A smart man on the eternity-half of the bargain would say “no deal”. Even a dumb one would. It’s so simple.

He sat still and closed his eyes, imagining himself dead.

What will it be like?

He told himself not to think of anything. He relaxed his eye lids, held his breath, and loosened all his muscles--or at least felt like he was loosening up. Then he thought of nothing. Nothing. Nothing.


Wait. This is it. This is death. It’s nothing but deep, deep sleep without waking. It’s going to be all right. Everything’s going to be okay.

But I still probably don’t have it right. No, this isn’t death. This is consolation. The real thing isn’t even rest or sleep. If it were sleep you’d eventually wake back up. No, death is just stopping--everything stopping completely and without warning. Grating halt.

God, I can’t imagine that. I can’t sit here and imagine being non-existent. Why not? Because all my life I have been aware of existence and nothing but it. I’ve immersed myself in sight and sound and smell and sex. And that’s all I know, all I am. So of course it’s impossible to imagine not being able to have those things. It’s so deeply ingrained. It’s so there.

Maybe that’s it, he thought. Maybe death is like the smell of death, in that you just can’t know about it till you experience it. But, if I’m dead and my brain is gone, how will I be able to know what it’s like? I’ll just die and have my last breath and my last glimmer of sight and then everything will go--forever. Forever. Forever. Oh that’s so depressing. Oh that’s so depressing.

Why? Why does it have to happen to me? Well, it has to happen to everybody, but at least they don’t usually have to die so early, like I do. It’s right in my face. Death is immediate and breathing before me. It’s the master of ceremonies now and I’m the main attraction.

This is why, he thought, so many religions existed. There was a need to believe that the afterlife wasn’t just non-existence and that there was a wonderful fairytale to it.

But Julius felt the opposite. Leastwise, he felt it didn’t make sense.

His mind stirred relentlessly now, humming. He opened his eyes.

The ceiling.

On his pillow, he turned his head to the right. The windows. Curtains draped over them. Thin little white beautiful curtains. Why do I have to leave it? Why?

Why give all this? Why give so much and bring one into so much and then take it? Man works so hard. Man builds his education up, his job up, gets money, buys a house, raises a family, has kids, and then what? He gets to watch them decay and eventually die.

I will fall. This building will fall. Everything’s decaying. But we’re a protest against it. A weak protest.

Julius looked to his left. There was the side-door to the bathroom. He felt exhausted from yesterday, the vomiting and sweating and the unexpected meeting with his sister combining into one great exclamation of overwhelming fatigue. He lay naked under the covers.

It got very quiet. The wind from outside came through the opened windows in his bedroom. It was a cool wind, and it lapped against his forehead. It was a good time to sleep, he thought. If I were sleepy, that is.

He wasn’t, though.

You know what? If only it were raining, then it would be the perfect time to—

Death is literally nothing. Nothing. Can you fathom nothing? Can you fathom everything?

Oh god, fuck you AIDS. You fucking bastard. Look what you are. Look what you are. Oh god.

chapter 17

It was nearing noon and he was still in bed. He felt restless, wanted to get up, but his thoughts kept him locked down.

So, that’s what life is. That’s what life is. One hurdle after another. And then when you cross them all? Death. Nothing. Why even work? Why even make money? Before death, what is money? And what is honor? What is reputation?

What then? What is there?

Wait. I—

Thrusting the sheets aside, he got out of bed.

I need to call her back.

chapter 18

His feet felt uncertain as he walked across the threshold of the kitchen. Well, there’s the phone. As always. Everything. As always. He wiped a sheen of sweat off his forehead. It was cold sweat. It was back again.

He sighed. Oh god, he thought, something’s coming. Something—

He clutched his stomach, find the source of the pain. What is that? Is that you, AIDS? Fuck you. I’m calling my sister. You can’t stop me. Ah—

He gritted his teeth, beads of sweat dropping straight off his forehead. What the hell?

He rushed to the bathroom, half bent over.

He looked in the mirror. Oh god. Is that me? He hardly recognized his face. He was wasted. Wasted.

His eyelids looked almost purple. He looked like a pale long glass of milk as he stood up straight, trying to compose himself.

No, no. I can’t call her like this. Not like this.

chapter 19

Julius reclined back into the soft downy of his mind, the pain in his stomach elapsing.

He thought about that one fight he lost in high school. He could go a day, a week, a month with it forgotten. But like a ritual he couldn’t stop, there would always come a day when the bad memories would return. And on that day he would stew and stew until he considered suicide.

Love cannot heal this wound, he thought.

Ah, that fight. In the lunchroom. At school. Embarrassing. Disgusting.

I can’t even stand up for myself, he moaned inwardly. I never did. I’m not, I’m not—

His thoughts sneered at him. Your lifelong cynicism has paid off. You are alone. You are dying. Yes. In the end, the world was indeed out to get you. Yes. In the end, everything was as bad as it seemed.

I’m not real.

Julius felt the adrenaline come as his eyes burned.

He screamed.

Shrieking, he fell on his knees on the floor in his den. He wanted to pass out. But nothing came. He was still there. He wanted to die. Now. Now.

Come on you fucking arrogant shit! Come on you coward! Cry!

His eyes felt too dry and hot to cry.

He coughed and then swallowed. You can’t even gag yourself. You can’t even choke yourself to death. Just live on, you failure! Fucking waste of life—

His fingernails raked his throat, the inside of his mouth a grainy soreness. Ah—

He let out a prolonged breath.

Ah, he thought sardonically, what a fine discordant symphony that was. And O, the crescendo!

He sucked in some new air through his nose.

Over.

It was over.

chapter 20

I can’t see my sister like this. What if I remain pale and ugly and sick just like this till I die? Then, he slowly answered back, you can never see her again. I—

Quiet! She can’t see you. No, not like this. Just look at you. Your body will be a closed-casket funeral.

Get off the floor.

He got off the floor.

Look around you, man.

He looked at his house.

He looked at the kitchen, and then he knew what he had to do. Biting his lip, silently cursing, he strode toward the whicker waste basket.

All these days, he knew he had been rambling and lost. He had only one last purpose and he had chosen to ignore it all along. He had paid for that.

This is what I will do on this planet, with this temporary life.

My purpose.

Let it imprison me. Let the purpose carry me against my will. Isn’t that what all purposes do? They shape us. From the beginning, as children, purpose is heaped and heaped upon us. At school, in the Church, on the orderly streets. And then we become that purpose. God, I’m a madman.

He was back in his kitchen now, his deep thoughts evaporating to nothing. He picked up the basket, and, unheeding, dumped it on the floor. Fuck it, he thought. What does it matter anymore? Yes, trash the house. He put his hand over the contents of the basket and felt it like a blind man would, until he ran his hand over a hard crumpled up ball.

He paused, squeezing the ball.

Yes.

There you are.

Lifting it up, he unfolded it and flattened it out.

He looked at the words upon it, remembering them gravely and clearly--more clear than anything he had ever recalled in his life. That fact startled him and yet compelled him. He looked at it, trying to strain a thousand meanings out:

“When did you die?

44

How did you die?

Rape. Murder.”

He gasped, his mind screaming revulsion. Oh, tear it up! Throw it away! Rip it to shreds! The child in him pleaded much like a child would ask their parents to stop fighting. Please, please, please!

The eyes of Julius Hacker widened in response. He was on the verge of—

Of—

He snapped his fingers. Pen, I need a pen! Where is it!

The pen he had gotten from the pantry and dropped on his table was still there, right in front of the sofa. He sat down, made sure the paper was straight as possible on the table, and hovered his hand over the paper, ready for anything.

What am I doing?

No more questions, he thought he heard himself say, but he was too distant now. Just wait. Just—

There!

Julius looked up from the paper, turned his head to the staircase at his right.

He dropped the pen instantly.

The orbs of his eyes, like little glass balls, held a reflection in them.

It was a little girl.

I'm so happy you posted it!!! This is such a sad and wonderful story, I love every word.

Bravo!!

And the dedication...well, you know how I feel about that

Oh, I've not posted half of it yet... I've been slacking! Onward we go:

chapter 21

Too stunned to speak, the psychiatrist looked across his desk.

The man in his office now, standing before the threshold of his door, looked like a ghost.

It didn’t move.

The shock washed over quickly. Resting his chin lightly on his left hand, he smiled warmly.

‘Are you Mr. Hacker?’

The figure nodded.

‘Please sit down.’

Julius moved to the room’s centerpiece, which was a brown sofa. As he did, the psychiatrist got up from behind his desk, taking up a small, pre-positioned chair to the sofa’s right.

Laying down slowly, ever so reclining, Julius accepted the cliché. He clenched his teeth, his eyes meeting the ceiling.

‘So, Mr. Hacker, you called me. What’s troubling you?’

Lamely, Hacker shook his head a bit.

‘Now don’t be reluctant.’

Julius ripped his gaze from the ceiling, eyeing the man with a hard, searching conviction.

‘You won’t think I’m crazy?’

The psychiatrist gave a wan smile, and then said, ‘Mr. Hacker, you called me. You sought help. You’re a man with a problem, not a psychosis.’

Julius grimaced at that. What if I am? You’re a psychiatrist, aren’t you? He fidgeted for one hesitant moment, a sigh erupting. In the same breath, he blurted:

‘I think I’m seeing things.’

Once more, Julius had to look at the ceiling. He could hear the psychiatrist leaning forward, the small chair.

‘Do you, now?’

Julius groped for words. He felt he would suffocate on the psychiatrist’s disappointment, thick as it was on his tongue. Maybe it was a psychosis.

‘Um yes. Just today, I--’

‘Let’s begin at the beginning, shall we?’

‘All right. Okay. This is complicated. It, uh, began with--’

Julius gripped the air with empty hands.

‘Yes?’

‘I sat down, okay? I picked up a pencil, and I started writing.’

Julius could hear the chair moving, but he went on.

‘I started writing--’

‘And what did you write?’

‘It’s! It’s not important. I felt like I wasn’t the one doing it--writing--like I was watching someone else--doing it.’

There was a silence, and then, ‘I see. Tell me the next instance.’

‘I can’t remember when off the top of my head,’ said Julius, ‘but I remember going into a bar, seeing this woman. I approached her.’

‘And then?’

‘She was gone.’

‘She just disappeared?’

Julius shook his head. ‘No,’ and he paused for a moment before gathering, ‘I turned my head, and when I looked back she wasn’t there.’

‘So she disappeared.’

‘Well, no. Yeah, I guess. I mean, she was there and then gone. I don’t know, you know; I didn’t actually see her go. I turned my head one moment--’

‘So, she could have easily left very quickly and quietly, yes?’

Julius winced. ‘No. When I turned my head, it was because the bartender asked me who I was talking to.’

‘So you spoke to this person who wasn’t there.’

‘Yeah, I guess. I can’t remember.’

‘You look very tired, Mr. Hacker. Did you get much sleep?’

‘What? Yes. I slept.’

‘I’m sorry. You just seem, well, unwell.’

Julius nodded at the ceiling, his eyes distant and yet urgently aware. He wanted someone to know.

Thickly, he said, ‘I’m not very well at all.’

‘Are you sick?’

‘Yes.’

‘What is it?’

‘AIDS.’

‘What?’

‘AIDS. It’s a--that new disease.’

Julius felt his bottom lip quiver.

‘Why did you come here, Mr. Hacker?’

‘I don’t know. I don’t know why I came here.’

‘Mr. Hacker, is your disease fatal?’

‘Yes.’

‘I see. I’m sorry.’

Silence, except for an exhaled breath and a car rushing by outside.

Then the psychiatrist resumed, his voice fresh with new tact.

‘Mr. Hacker. Did you ever think, because your disease is fatal, that you are trying to reach out?’

‘What?’

The psychiatrist folded his hands.

‘These things you see, these experiences. They never occurred before the disease, did they?’

‘No.’

‘Maybe it’s a manifestation. A gestation that--’

Julius sat up.

‘Are you trying to explain away my--’

‘Why no. I’m saying, ah, you are experiencing these things to, ah, comfort yourself.’

‘If I wanted to comfort myself I’d go to sleep or listen to some soft music. Why would I imagine seeing things?’

‘To let others know.’

‘Know what?’

‘Your pain.’

‘I’m sorry,’ and Julius spoke fast, his words hot, ‘but I can’t understand how the fuck seeing things is an expression of pain.’

‘I know you believe this really happened.’

‘It did.’

‘I know you believe that.’

‘It did!’

‘But it can never happen.’

Rigidly, Julius reclined back down. ‘Explain this all to me one more time.’

‘Am I the first person to know about your disease?’

‘The first real person, yes.’

The psychiatrist untangled his crossed legs. ‘What does that mean?’

‘It means a doctor knows--and maybe his employees. They had to know. They found out.’

‘I see. So I’m the only person you’ve truly told?’

‘Yes.’

‘Perhaps, Mr. Hacker, your experiences are a slipping away.’

‘What?’

‘You are releasing your ties from life. By accepting these illusions, you allow the notion that life is a dream, that your disease is a mere ruse.’

Julius said nothing, but he listened and looked at the ceiling.

‘By observing such phenomenon as a vanishing woman in public, you are opening a window for others to look into. The bartender you spoke of. He saw your strangeness. For one moment, your incident allowed a ray of light to crack through your secret exterior. You know the world is indifferent to AIDS. These sightings, these ghosts; they are your silent cry for the world to notice you, notice your affliction. It is a masked cry, a coded cry. You say, “look at these ghosts! Look at this hell I am going through!”

‘You wish only to feel pity, even if it’s pity not because of AIDS. So you manifested in your imagination the torture of being haunted by spirits.’

Julius, still lying prostrate, turned his head to the man and asked, ‘Do you have a cigarette?’

chapter 22

Everyone has a weapon against the reality. Some people get drunk. Some people kill themselves. Some people have children.

I think. I introspect. From the wellspring of pretension, I paint.

Yes, I know. I understand, but please don’t give me your pity. It’s hard enough hanging my own head without someone hanging with me.

chapter 23

No one understands me. Maybe he’s right, though. Maybe he’s right. Perhaps I am making all this stuff up, just so people will notice me--notice me, in a society where they’d otherwise condemn. Is that it? Is that the key?

Am I crying out in helpless indignation? I don’t know, I don’t know. He made me feel so worthless, as if my problem were a write-off. He didn’t want to help me. He wanted to dissect me and get his money from me.

I don’t need him. He doesn’t understand.

My sister would. She’d comfort me, if I told her. She’d hold me through the night, her Polly by my side on my huge bed. I’d die in peace, my mouth open and full of the air of familiar family and love. Sweet grapes.

Ah, to die like that. It would be the sweetest of reprieves. Truly, death is waiting in the wings not as a demon in the night but as a mercy-beggar. It does hurt, doesn’t it? The disease gnaws deeper; I feel it running out of food. It’s getting hungry, but there’s nothing left. I’m empty. It’s angry that’s there’s nothing. It’s going to begin. I feel any minute that a switch in me will flip, and then the assault will begin. Blackness will seep through my chest and wash against my ribcage like an exploding heart.

Please, not like that. I can’t die like that. A death so horrible, even if surrounded by friends, would not be hoped for.

Please let me die in my sleep. Let the rain put me to sleep. Let me feel nothing. That’s all I wish for. I don’t even want an afterlife. Just let me ease into nothingness. Sweet reprieve. Tasteless. Scentless. Senseless.

chapter 24

Yesterday I saw a psychiatrist. But today I felt like writing a poem. It’s fitting, I think. It’s not about my disease, though. I’m not that selfish. This is about Alzheimer’s. I hope that’s fitting.

Song-less, I
Feel alone;
I can’t even find the tune.
Things I felt the other day
Stale into deep maroon.

Every memory dies, anyway,
So what’s to say they’re right?
Can I pick up and go,
Or must I relinquish more light?

I
Can’t tell anyone apart.
I
Can’t tell any sun apart.

Faceless seems this nameless crowd
That was once family,
Congealing songs I wrote myself--
What a travesty.

When I’m gone, they’ll move on, muttering “what a fool.”
Son, you’d not exist this day had a father not been cruel.

I
Can’t tell any love apart.
I
Can’t feel throughout my heart.

chapter 25

I did some good things in my life, I guess. I saw a few great things. I went to a Beatles concert.

Julius stood before the mirror in his bathroom, chest heaving. He felt numb and yet nauseous, flushed with harsh blades of adrenaline. He felt as if some dog were chasing him and his legs were turned to jelly with fear. And he knew his running was in vain, his nightmare morphing into tactile reality. Stop hiding it, he thought.

Julius unbuttoned his shirt all the way down. He slowly opened it, as if it were a huge, unwieldy door.

Before him was his altar: the watermark of his greatest fear, his shambling, puppet-like mortality.

Purplish lesions dotted his exposed, white chest and naked belly.

His mouth felt dry.

No.

No.

I don’t believe this.

This is someone else.

I don’t remember looking like this. This is some other body—

Teeth clenched and eyes snapped shut, he punched the mirror.

He felt the satisfying crunch, the release he craved. And then pain replied.

Snapping his eyes open, he groaned loud. His left hand felt impaled, wreathed in broken glass. He tried to pull it back, but agony only burrowed deeper.

Groaning again, he slowed the process, peeling as if it were a sticker. Loose fragments of mirror fell into the sink.

Once free, he cradled his hand, pain arcing. He tried in vain to count the miniscule shards of glass in his knuckles.

He looked up at the mirror.

The impact point was a circle of crushed glass, bathed in a vibrant red. It looked like a rose.

He moved away from the scene, walking toward the door, to his bedroom.

He stopped at the threshold, took one last look at the mirror. He didn’t feel all that bad, really. He felt nowhere near as bad as when he made that lousy piece of art.

No, he thought. That hadn’t been a statement.

chapter 26

Buttoning his shirt, he walked briskly to the kitchen. He didn’t care that blood got on his shirt or that it dripped on the carpet. But O, the pain; pain.

He pulled down paper towels, let them soak a second. He saw it was doing no good. Another paper towel. No good.

He balled them up and quickly threw them away.

He looked at his left hand. It was shaking. I’ve got to pull this out. There was one big one wedged between his middle finger and his ring finger. At least it felt big.

With a grunt it was out and on the table. He stared at it. It was about the size of his thumb’s fingernail.

The rest were harder. They weren’t slick slices of glass in his flesh, sticking out; they were tiny granules, hard and sticky with blood. He didn’t know what to do.

Maybe it’d be easier for me to staunch the bleeding first. And then pull them out?

I’m no doctor, Julius Hacker, but if you don’t pull these out, you’re going to keep bleeding. Pull them out, then stop the bleeding. Then close the wound with something.

With what? I never have these problems. I don’t carry band aids.

His mind raced.

Funny: you carry a medicine cabinet full of 30 different kinds of pills but you don’t have a simple bandage.

I’m sorry.

Don’t be sorry. Do something! Use a rag. Just use it. You’ve got a rag, don’t you?

Nervously, he twisted his head about until he located a rag. It was hanging off the handle of his refrigerator, and he cursed himself for overlooking the obviousness of it.

He snatched it up with his good hand.

Stop that. Just because of some glass you think this hand is no longer good?

I’m sorry, but, honestly! It’s pretty bad. It hurts to flex it.

I feel like the glass is under my skin. I gotta get it out. I can’t do this standing up. I need to sit down. Can‘t concentrate.

He exited the kitchen and sat down at his white couch, his face scrunching in the day’s dim light. He looked at the fist’s knuckles. It felt like a thousand granules were under his skin. It felt too late to get them out.

He poked and prodded. It stung.

He looked up from the couch, to his windows, considering the outside world. I need to get to a hospital, a doctor.

Calm down. Eventually, it’ll come out. You’ll be okay.

You’re saying this glass bed underneath my skin is just going to pop out?

Yes. It’s real small. It’ll be out.

I don’t trust you. I’m going to see a doctor right now.

Fine.

chapter 27

I have so many bad memories. I’ve cheated people. I stole fools gold once from a teacher. I remember bending over it in the back of mom’s car, looking at it. She asked me where I got it. I devised one of those simple, childish lies: “a friend gave it to me”. She was a teacher, too. She worked there. They knew. I was just so infatuated with it. I never got in trouble over it. I remember my heart pounding when I grabbed it, though. I knew it wasn’t real gold, but it was beautiful.

I wish I could go back. I have so many regrets. If I could go back, I’d change everything. I’d be good. I wouldn’t say a word. I wouldn’t touch or harm anything.

I deserve this glass in my fist. I deserve this disease in my body. It’s my punishment. I’ll never be able to exorcise these ghosts in me-- inside and out. They’ll haunt me until they’re sure I’m dead. I don’t want to know what will happen to my body after I die. Hopefully it’ll gain some semblance of peace that life never had, but, knowing my luck, it’ll get looted. Who would loot such a corpse, though? It’s worthless.

I deserve all this and more. I turned my back on my mother. I don’t call her anymore. I betrayed old friends, refuse to make new ones. I was selfish, am selfish. I don’t want to talk about it. What’s the use of talking of all these ghosts if I can’t exorcise them?

Everything about me is haunted. My mind is haunted by my thoughts. My existence is haunted. I think I’m seeing things. I swear it. I saw a little girl in my den for a flash of a second. She was wearing an old white dress. There were no eyes in her face. No eyes. Black.

Maybe it’s just my imagination, like they all say. Maybe it’s just my mind going insane from all my sick thoughts and premonitions of death. I can’t help it, though. Nobody in my situation could help it. They’d be just like this. Well, maybe not. I’ll bet some people face this with integrity. But I can’t. I’m just not that kind of person. I thought I’d be a famous painter and die of old age, respected by my peers. That’s all I wanted. But not even that is given to me. I’m going to drown in these awful thoughts, I just know it. This is horrible. Not even a psychiatrist wants to help me.

Julius Hacker walked down the road, his hand tightly wrapped in a white rag, spots of blood on it. Sweat darkened his shirt, polished his brow to a high gleam. He walked with an awkward, uneven gait, his body white. He stopped a moment as he passed by a building, looking at his bent reflection in a window. He wondered quietly: where am I in that face?

He ran a hand over his gaunt cheeks. He felt afraid to smile at his reflection, fearing his countenance might crack and break like brittle clay.

I don’t have much longer. I feel it. I’ve always felt it.

He looked at his hand. So who cares if I get this fixed? Why not go back home right now?

What if it’s infected, Julius? What if—

Forget it. It’s not for you to think about.

But it’ll speed the death process.

What, you think I want that? I told you, I’m going to see a doctor. Let’s go.

He looked once more at his reflection and then looked up the sidewalk. The doctor’s office was a few blocks off. He grimaced.

This isn’t right. Or it doesn’t feel right. I need to stop.

We’ll stop when we get to the office. For now, just grit it out.

Grit it out? He expelled a rough, labored breath. Despite that it was a cloudy day, he felt as if his forehead were baking under direct sunlight.

This isn’t right. I need to stop.

He turned northeast, turned back toward the direction of his house. No!

A flush of dizziness hit him, almost caused him to stumble. He caught his footing, but it was too late; a wave of red and blue spots devoured his eyesight. He tried to shake his vision free; he shook his head violently.

No! Sit down!

Suddenly—

He wanted to rip his lungs out of his chest and let them cool in the wind. He gagged on hot air. Everything inside him burned.

You win. You--win. Slowly, he crumbled.

chapter 28

Julius felt deathly cold as he awoke.

He opened his left eye, scanned the area with his eyeball. He opened his right eye.

He raised his head up slightly, startled by a strange moistness. He raked his cheek with the fingers of his left hand. Mud.

Mud?

He staggered to his feet quickly, surprise jolting him up.

What?

Before him branched brown forest floor caked in dead leaves, smell fresh with rain. Overhead, a canopy of dull green whispered against itself, scraped dryly. Shadow drenched.

Shaking sleep and straining for sight he navigated slowly, fearing he’d slip in the wetness.

At length, he reached what felt like the edge.

He brushed past a wall of foliage. He poked his head out.

An ocean; ocean of fog and swirling mists met his eyes. It was thick and preternaturally expansive, flowing on and on until horizon swallowed it. Bathed as it was in melancholy moonlight, he hesitated. He feared setting foot into it, feared that nothing would lie below.

Staring at that dip into unknown, Julius felt dizzy. He grasped the bark of a nearby tree and held on, swaying. He felt speechless, thoughtless.

This is a dream.

As if in answer, an angry wind came down. Howling, it picked up the fog, dissolved it like sugar into desert.

Julius gasped, but his voice was drowned out by the howls. Despondently, he watched on.

The last mists ascended, unfurling a vast plain, incalculable in its majesty. It seemed perfectly straight and boundless, paralleling the starless, cold sky above.

Thoughtless, Julius looked back. He ached to leave all this, but he felt powerless.

Knowing no other escape, he sighed and let his foot fall from the forest and onto the plain.

chapter 29

Earth rushed up to meet his foot. Chunks of debris and human screams exploded about his body like a huge splash of water. His eyes saw nothing but a wall of dirt, then as it receded the curtain fell and—

Snow!

Gunfire.

Snow.

Gunfire echoed. Men were shouting in a language he did not know. He was on his knees, colder than ever. He heard whistling. It came closer and closer. He felt the hair stand up on the back of his neck. It passed and he shivered in relief.

Numbly, his hands stroked the ground, senses crowing for reality. Wet, thick snow answered back. The ground was dirty with woodchips and dirt clumps.

Voices came at him from the back of his head, calling his name. It was the only familiar sound. He feared responding to it. Don’t. Don’t let them know.

Madness. Mutely, he lowered his gaze at the white ground. I want to drink from the cup of madness.

He felt like he wanted to lie down. He felt like he wanted to stay on his knees and stare forever. He felt like nothing.

Madness.

The guns picked up in their wild exchange.

Julius breathed in the cold, clean air. It felt nothing like a dream. It felt as intimate as real as—

He wanted to—

Get up. No, it’s impossible. You’re in control! Get up! I need direction. Give me—

Another whistle came. He felt a ball of dread grow in him.

His breathing quickened. He heard his name again, the urgency in the voices more palpable.

Julius!

Hacker!

He heard his name screamed once more, louder than ever, but it was cut off halfway. The tree next to his left cheek exploded.

chapter 30

Four men kneeled over his body. One of them called out for a medic. Another grasped Hacker’s face, moving it to one side, another. It looked horrible, bloody. Pieces of wood were in it and the skin lay in limp flakes.

Footsteps came. Crush of snow. The men looked up, and a medic was standing.

‘Tote?’

‘Tote.’

chapter 31

I want to kill myself. I want to fucking kill myself. I just want to.

Sometimes—

Everything feels wrong in me. Everything is out of place, askew. No matter how hard I try, it will all fall apart.

Sometimes, I can’t tell if I’m laughing--

chapter 32

Julius awoke. He could not move.

My god, am I paralyzed? He opened his eyes. Nothing.

Blind, too? Has it finally—

Is this it? Oh god.

Something was still there, though. He felt the return of feeling, numbness evaporating. He was acutely aware of the painful return of blood, of feeling.

He still couldn’t move his body, but he felt like it could move on its own. There just seemed to be some great weight keeping him down.

O, feeling! He flexed his fingers. Inadvertently, his fingertips stroked flesh that wasn’t his own.

His last senses came back to him, and as everything reeled into focus, he heard a loud chorus of voices. They sounded hollow, bouncing off walls.

Julius ignored the sound for a moment, shirked it aside, and returned to the feeling in his fingertips. Flesh.

He pinched it. Nothing. Maybe asleep. He pinched again. He thought blood would ooze out if he pinched any harder.

Nothing.

Julius felt his breath quicken.

God no. I’m under a corpse.

They buried me alive.

Julius opened his mouth, but he was mute. No screams. Too weak.

Please God tell me this is dream. Is this still a dream!

No answer.

Let me die now. I’ll take anything but this.

I’ll starve. I’ll go mad. I’ll slash my wrists right now if—

You’ll wait.

What?

Wait. Hear that?

Laughter. Muffled laughter.

‘Ja, eine Hure!’

More laughter.

‘Komm her, Hure!’

Footsteps. Someone running in circles. Julius couldn’t mistake it.

The footsteps stopped, cornered. A high-pitched screech. More laughter.

Julius pushed at the corpse above him. It felt wobbly. He pushed harder.

Like a stack of logs, bodies fell off of him. He turned his head to look.

It was an old, dilapidated wooden floor. A small, one-room cabin. Four walls. A thatched roof. It was abandoned, absent of life. There were old boxes and hay and no furniture.

Dazed, Julius stared at the floor. Please let it end. Bring me back. Or did I die? Is this it; is this the—

Another screech. Julius looked up from the floor, his eyes distant.

Before him was a struggle. Four men in gray uniform with shaved heads were holding a little girl as she kicked and screamed.

Numbly, Julius lowered his head. He didn’t know what to feel. He raised up on his elbows. He felt part of the scenery--as if he weren’t there and they didn’t notice.

Julius heard clothes tear. He heard the rip of fabric.

‘Hure!’

He looked up, and a blur arced down at the little girl’s face. A loud slap. She cried, her face red. Her dress was torn in the middle.

Julius lowered his head again. He felt like he crying too, but his eyes were too dry for tears to come. This is wrong. This isn’t even funny. What kind of fucking nightmare—

‘Hure!’

Another slap. The girl moaned in pain.

‘Halt's Maul!’

Another tear of fabric. He could hear her body being lowered to the floor like some sacrificial object.

‘Hure!’

chapter 33

Julius awoke.

From out of the darkness he opened his eyes.

Light voices. Busy voices. A workday.

Julius blinked. It was a normal light but it hurt his eyes. He opened and closed his mouth. His skin felt tight and crisp. He felt like baked clay that could never be molded again.

His eyes and ears were reeling when a blurry, black shape approached him.

The nurse took one look. She didn’t even need to feel his forehead.

‘Why hasn’t this man been seen to?’

Her voice, though quiet, sounded loud to Julius. Maybe it was because—

He tried to speak, but, like in the dream, no voice came. He felt like he could taste the smell of his sunburned skin and he wanted to gag. He clamped his jaw.

New voices wafted over him, but his neck was already slack and his head was against the wall. Ignoring it all he closed his eyes.

chapter 34

Julius awoke. He was in a hospital bed, a pillow propped under his head. His neck felt awkward and sore.

‘Ah, there you are.’

Julius looked to the direction of the voice, to his right.

A different nurse. She was small and thin, and she was standing with her back to a wide open window. Julius could only see her silhouette, framed as it was in bars of daylight. He could only squint at it, too weak to raise his hand over his eyes.

The nurse responded, drawing the curtains over the glass. The room grew dim.

Julius opened his mouth, but a cracked squeak came out. He felt embarrassed.

Softly, her voice came to his ears. ‘It’s okay, Mr. Hacker. You were very sick. You need to rest. You’ve had a blood transfusion.’

His voice finally came, disused and scratchy as it was.

‘When do I get out?’ he asked thickly.

‘Just rest for now. You’ll feel better. I left a cup of orange juice beside your bed.’

Julius looked to his left, at the small table next to the bed. The nursed walked out and closed the door softly.

For the first time in the longest time, he took in one, long breath. It felt clean and relaxing as it flowed through him. His chest heaved once, air dancing in his lungs. He settled, a genuine peace croaking in his bones.

He felt like he’d been asleep for three years. He felt like an insomniac, on the verge of both restlessness and tired weakness. It was a middle ground.

He thought for a moment. Blood transfusion? They gave me a transfusion? Why?

Julius stared at the ceiling. He was surprised to see his face staring back. A mirror?

He peered at the reflection. It looked as though the color had returned. There was no more white skin.

Restored.

Julius looked down at his left hand. There was a new, clean bandage over it.

Then, like thin threads coming slowly together, the memories of his dreams weaved back. His eyes widened.

He sat up in his bed, his breath heavy.

The girl. The girl was raped. That little girl. Her eyes. No eyes. She had the same--!

He made the connection. The girl in his den and the girl in his dream.

Oh no. No, no, no. He wanted to cradle his head, but his weakness prevented it.

She was raped. She’s still here, trying to tell me—

What? What does she want? What can I do, of all people!

chapter 35

The next day, Julius told the nurse that he felt well enough to get up and leave.

She checked his temperature and agreed. He asked her about his hand.

‘Some were in pretty deep. The doctor had to go in and take them out. Keep the bandage on for a while. Come back to us in a few days. The doctor wants to check the stitches, see if it’s infected.’

A few days? If I’m alive by then.

‘I need to change.’

She nodded and left. He could hear her high heels tapping down the hall and fade away.

His body was ready. In one tense movement, he got out of bed. He felt great.

It won’t last, though, he thought. It’s just a transfusion.

Make the most of it, Hacker! Get changed and get the hell out of this shithole.

He sniffed. It’s not that bad, though. It’s white, just like my den. Not much difference. In fact, there’s more light. It’s brighter in here.

But more homely.

Eh, I guess you’re right. Julius rubbed his bald head and walked over to the chair where his clothes sat. They were folded neatly. He quickly shed his hospital robe and put on his underwear first. He always did that first. Then he put on his shirt and then his pants. Buttoning it up, he saw the old bloodstains, as if this were the first time he’d ever laid eyes on them. They were a stark reminder of what was to come. He knew that this transfusion was another lapse, a calm, and those drops of blood would not be the last.

Julius stuck his neck up, looking at his face reflecting in a mirror above the chair. The color was back. His eyes had bags, yes, and he looked dangerously thin and frail, but he wasn’t a ghost anymore.

Still, he was afraid to smile.

He sniffed. You know, this hurts more than helps. It gets my hopes up. Shields me and makes me numb to inevitability. Life is beginning to become a very expensive drink. It used to be on tap for me.

Looking at the mirror, Julius reflected on the girl in his dream and the girl he saw in the den. The same? Their eyes were vacant holes. I saw that. The dress and the size of the body were the same. I used to think that dreams meant nothing. Maybe this was more than a dream. It had to be. How could I have seen her in real life and a dream, too? Maybe my dreams are spilling out into reality. I am a cracking, breaking thing, anyway.

He shook his head, wincing at his thoughts, trying to dodge them in futility. He sighed, absent-mindedly struggling with the collar button. It was always a bitch for him.

His thoughts kept him from being frustrated, though. He’d never thought this much.

I guess I believe. I guess it wasn’t really a dream. A vision? Yes, a vision of the past. It really happened. She was really raped. I saw her eyes. She’s not at peace. Nobody who died like that could rest at peace. To be ripped from innocence like that so violently. Even if you survive it, you’ll be—

He searched for a word.

Scarred.

Julius, amidst his thoughts, sardonically realized that he wasn’t going to church; he didn’t need a damn tie. He smirked and unbuttoned the collar button.

He sat down in the chair, his thoughts weighing him down. They were thoughts too strong to stay bottled up. He whispered to himself:

‘She’s not much different from me, you know. She was afflicted. I’m afflicted. Victims. It attacked her physically, mentally. I’m not sure if it’s true, but if the physical part dies, the mental can still go on suffering. She reaching out. Just like me. She wants someone to comfort her. She died decades ago, maybe. Nobody’s comforted her. She died so horribly.

‘So horribly. No, no peace can be found there. I feel so sorry for her. She and I are quite alike. Quite alike.’

He clasped his hands together and stared dejectedly through them.

I must do something for her.

chapter 36

Fully dressed, Julius departed the room. The nurse was outside in the hall, her back turned to him. She was looking down its long length, as if studying it.

Where do I go?

‘Um, nurse?’

She turned around, instantly recognizing his need.

‘Oh! I’ll show you the way out. We brought you up here while you were asleep, didn’t we?’

Julius nodded vacantly as she walked past him quickly. He followed her lead to the end of the hall and past a set of wide doors.

The nurse talked as they went down a spiral staircase, her voice between breaths.

‘We’d take the elevator,’ she breathed, her high heels clacking metal, ‘but it’s undergoing maintenance.’

Julius was silent, his mind bent on the terse rhythm of her heels. Despite his concentration, he could not deny the staircase; it was a too tall for his liking; the floor looked too far away.

They reached the bottom soon enough. The nurse’s breathing was labored.

‘Are you alright?’

‘Yes, I’m fine. I just stayed up all night working. I’m getting off right now, in fact--’

She paused her speech as she pushed open the door to the waiting room.

‘So I’m glad you showed up when you did.’

Julius stopped. White rectangle room. Chairs lined the walls.

He remembered it now, but he couldn’t put a finger on which chair he’d sat in.

Standing at the threshold of the waiting room in blank contemplation, he felt a body brush past him. A tall man in a brown coat and bowler hat. The man walked up to the desk. Julius looked at his profile out of the corner of his eye. He turned back to the nurse, whispering in her ear, ‘What’s wrong with him?’

She whispered back, ‘Cancer. The right side of his face is paralyzed; his right ear is completely deaf. We thought the cancer was gone, but it showed up again.’

She shook her head.

‘Where?’

‘His spine,’ she answered, voice low. ‘It went to his spine. He comes here periodically for treatment, but there’s little we can do.’

Julius swallowed, his glare wide on the man’s departing back.

I’m lucky. Lucky.

chapter 37

When I was a child, I used to dread going to the “old age home”, as they call it.

My grandmother was kept there. I remember her eyes the most: hard, black little beady orbs that stare perpetually at me like polished stones.

Never spoke. Whenever my family came to visit her, she’d be lying down, but when that door opened and we came in, she’d spring straight up, as if she’d been inanimate, waiting for our arrival to give her life.

She’d just sit there, like some doll. Only when we left would she eat the fruit we left. We had to watch without her knowing. But we caught her a few times.

Sometimes I made a game of it. So childish. I regret.

But I was afraid of her, really. It’s a phobia I have.

I’m afraid of seeing people marred by disease or decay. That man in the hospital today. People in wheelchairs. People like my grandmother, decrepit with age.

And now—I—

chapter 38

Julius stood alone in his den once again.

He walked up to one of the windows facing the road, opening it. He felt the air rush over him with new awareness.

I feel better. Everything better. I wish this would last.

But it can’t. Won’t.

Nothing good can.

This is cruel, isn’t it? They pulled me out of my rut but I know I’ll fall right back in. And harder than ever before.

He sighed, shook his head.

Well, he thought, looking at the sky, the clouds have cleared a bit. A patch of blue caught his eyes, glimmering with yellow sunlight. He thought he’d never see such light again.

He breathed it in, putting his hand over his eyes to shade them.

Well, he thought again, looking into that patch of fresh blue, I might as well make the most of this.

He walked away from the window. Closed it.

He stretched his arms. Touched his toes. He felt silly, whimsical.

What should I do with this, while I have it? The next time they give me a blood transfusion, I might be passed out. After that, new blood won’t do much good. It might help ease the passage of death, but that’s it. But I’m not to that point yet.

Still, this feels worse than death. Why? Because this is the best I’ll ever feel.

So make the most of it.

Why do anything different? Simply living is making the most of it.

No, that’s wrong.

He stretched again. He had felt so stiff with his sickness. He touched his toes again, straining.

Well, he thought, then what?

He felt like pacing the den in thought.

Maybe that’s what I need. Clear thought. Clear, crystalline solitude. Quiet.

He shook his head. No. Something’s nagging me.

I’ve forgotten something. I know I have.

There’s something far better I could do.

God, what is it?

He began pacing, looking every now and then at the kitchen.

The phone is in there, he thought quietly.

Then he knew.

My sister.

I can see her again! His joy pushed his feet forward, to the phone, to the outside world.

This is my last window. I turn my back on this, and—

His shoulders turned rigid. No, this is it. I’m going to see her one last time.

But first, Julius Hacker, eat something. Add some flesh to that color.

It’s sad, though, isn’t it? To put on a charade like this--this fake liveliness? It’s not really me anymore, is it?

Oh well. Fake or not, let’s use it. One drop of genuine, untouched life is all we might need.

Okay then. All right.

Call her. Call your sister.

He nodded. Okay.

chapter 39

Julius heard the phone ring three times. Usually, a phone only rang twice, if someone was near it. Even if they were standing over it the first time it rang, they’d wait for that special second ring.

There was a brink of tension. It was that moment before the fourth ring.

But it never came.

‘Hello?’

‘Hey.’

His sister knew the voice instantly, and her voice, in turn, was excited.

‘Hey! Are you better now?’

Julius smiled knowingly, clutching the phone. ‘Yeah, I’m better now.’

And then Julius felt playful. ‘Put Polly on.’

He could hear the phone being lowered. He heard the child’s name being called. The child asked who it was before picking up the phone. Julius grinned.

‘Hello?’

She sounded just like her mother.

‘Hi, Polly!’

‘Hi uncle Julius. Are you feeling better?’

‘Oh yes. A lot better. I’ll see you soon sometime.’

‘Okay.’

He could tell her voice was preoccupied.

‘Were you watching TV?’

‘Yes.’

‘What show?’

‘Kermit.’

Julius laughed. ‘All right then. Put your mother back on.’

The phone lowered again. Polly called for her mommy to take it.

‘Julius?’

‘Yeah, I’m still here.’

‘So you feel a lot better, huh?’

‘Oh yeah! I wanted to tell you something.’

‘What is it?’

‘I wanted to tell you at dinner, maybe?’

Silence. Julius could tell she was in planning mode.

Finally, she spoke.

‘Oh, all right. I’ll get the babysitter. What time?’

Julius rubbed his chin in thought. What time, what time? A funny thought graced him:

How long will this transfusion last?

He decided to take a risk.

‘Tomorrow at seven.’

‘Seven thirty sound okay?’

‘Yeah.’

‘All right. See you then!’

‘Bye!’

‘Bye bye.’

chapter 40

Julius walked away from the telephone feeling amused.

Kids and their TV, he chuckled lightly, his heart aloof.

I don’t have a TV. No need for such a thing. I’m one of the few, I guess. It feels like such a waste of time.

He crossed his arms stiffly, contemplating.

Well. Tomorrow at seven, then.

You know, that’s one thing you can’t do when you’re sick: look at it objectively.

It’s so painful that you just go through it. You don’t try and think.

Now that I’m out of it, I can look back on it. I can think of what I felt then.

I locked myself in. I felt distant. I felt—

He sighed, feeling inadequate for such musings. He looked around his bare den.

No words, Hacker.

He moved toward the white couch and sat on it.

Why didn’t I go with her tonight? Why tomorrow? Why delay?

I don’t know. Maybe I wanted one real, good night of sleep, before the sickness came again. One clear night. Please.

I need that. I need one unclouded night.

He sighed. But I’m losing. This is a retreat. I’m hiding from battle. I’m one man fighting an army with my fists, thrashing like a madman.

I know it’s hopeless.

They’ll tear me down, limb from limb.

I’ll never—

I’ll never—

Never mistake yourself as a veteran, Julius Hacker. You are a survivor. You ran. You did not fight.

But what could I fight with? I’m a caveman before this. Sticks and stones.

Julius Hacker, there is one thing AIDS cannot take.

Julius scoffed openly.

What? A soul? Or a spirit? Bullshit.

What if this mind is it and that’s all there’ll ever be? Huh?

Huh?

Don’t you get it? My mind is at stake, just as the rest of my flesh is. The disease will take it. And if it goes, I go. We go.

chapter 41

Outside his window the sky was a deep swirl of orange and red. The sun was lowering.

The wind swept in, and Julius was asleep on the couch.

A car passed by outside, its wheels running over a shallow puddle, sloshing in the aftermath.

Julius cracked his eyes open, the sound waking him. He raised on his elbows, forcefully craning his neck up.

He could see past the couch, beyond the open window.

The day is ending, he thought. I almost missed it.

Slowly, he put his feet on the floor and sat up, staring mutely at the empty fireplace.

The logs were no longer logs but crumbled, ashen mounds.

Julius yawned long, his eyes watering.

He stood up, flexing his toes.

His ears heard quiet rasps outside, broken only by silence.

Julius could smell the dew rising from the open window. It had rained long while he was asleep. He plodded to the window pane, resting his palms on it and leaning his head outside.

The cold air curled around his head and the wind silently lapped upon him. He felt at any moment he would turn into a stack of dust and be swept away. He grinned warmly in the ambience of feeling.

This is the last good wind I feel.

Julius looked up at the sky.

Those are the last good clouds.

His eyes squinted, his face bathed in orange.

And that is the last good sun.

He watched it.

It was easy to watch. It was one of those suns that was perfectly round and deep, fathomless orange. He didn’t need to shade his eyes.

This is the last taste. I know it. I know it. I’m leaving.

It’s funny, he thought, staring at the sun. It’s funny. You never notice how slowly it goes down. I’ve never really watched a sun go down all the way. Or come up. It was either there or gone before I knew it. I’ve never really, really watched.

Julius looked up. Puffs of clouds were slowly moving in the sky.

He looked down. Shadows reached out from tall lampposts in the sidewalk.

It’s beautiful, he admitted. I love it.

chapter 42

At length, Julius receded from the window pane.

He looked toward his bedroom.

The sun had just left him, and the light over his bed was a meek dull withdrawing into pitch-black.

He pulled the covers back.

Let me dream well. Let me have one final, long voyage.

He sniffed. Oh stop it, Hacker. You’re not dead--not quite yet. And who knows how many days you have left? So why act like this is your last one?

Because I’m dying.

Julius became silent inside.

What now? He looked at his bed. His eyes lingered, and then a new thought came:

Not yet.

chapter 43

An empty canvas.

A paintbrush.

A single, long stroke. Luxurious black.

Julius looked at his first brushstroke. He leaned toward it, his eyes drowning in it. It felt right. It looked like an ocean of nighttime waters.

In that one, single stroke.

Julius was calm. He had to do this. His hands were shaking, but he had to do this.

Another stroke. Black, again.

He looked out across his den, to the open window.

He sighed in the air. Night air.

With the night air in his lungs, he applied another black stroke.

In time, the top half of the canvas became one with evening outside.

Moving to the bottom half, he picked up a smaller brush. He mixed some colors, rendering light gray.

He worked attentively, slowly, precisely. Before he knew it, he had traced the outline of a lighthouse, transposed black against a nighttime sea.

Good, he thought. Absently, he thought, I’ll detail it tomorrow.

He put it back on the easel.

Yes. Tomorrow.

chapter 44

Julius scrunched his face up at the light.

His hand rose to aid him. He’d left the window open.

The city was awake again. The city was busy. Cars were rolling out.

He sat up, swung his feet to the side of the bed, and hopped down.

He slammed the window shut, the ambience of the city irritating.

He felt a sudden rush of thought: my god! I’m seeing her today!

Don’t fret. You said seven-o-clock, remember? You’ve got plenty of time. The whole day, practically. You’ll finish that painting and then you’ll take a shower.

I forgot, though: did she say where we’ll meet?

She’ll probably just come here, like last time.

Oh, all right, then.

To the den, then. Let’s check up on our work.

Right.

He looked across the old, white den. Home, he acknowledged with wordless longing. And then he saw his canvas.

Yep. There it is old bean. There it is. I’ll finish it. It’s a small snack. No challenge at all.

He walked the short breadth and took a seat in the stool before the easel.

He craned his neck over the selection of colors, mixing them. His eyes worked and his fingers swirled and mashed and patted the gray his mind wanted.

Satisfied, he dipped the brush in the paint.

He turned.

The painting was already finished.

The paintbrush fell from his limp hand.

His mind, once full of waves, frenetic of thought, turned into static silence.

The lighthouse. It was done. Detailed and everything.

He looked around the den, his eyes flat and his lip quivering. He looked on the verge of either complete hysteria or unrelenting tears.

Sucking in the dry morning air, Julius eyed his easel. His hands shook, as if they were attempting to escape their wrists.

Finished? Finished?

He looked at the lighthouse. It was how his mind had wanted it. It was how his hands would have painted it. But he had never done it. I have never—

Exhaling the bated air, Julius stood up and gripped the easel with both hands. He slung it to the ground in one movement.

In his weakness, he lost his balance; he crashed.

He remained on the floor, as if his legs had decided to die before their time. His chest heaved, words crawling up his spine to be spat out; his gritted teeth pushed them back. Silence poured out of his skull. Finally, he moaned.

Tersely, he raised up. He did not stand, though. He was on his knees, his eyes transfixed on the canvas on the floor beside him.

‘What the fuck do you want from me?

‘I’m fucking dying! I can’t help you!’

His words were cut off harshly as he raised his shaking fist up. It had stitches in it.

‘No!’

He let his arm slacken; his fist fell. His breathing subsided.

‘Fuck off!

‘Get the hell out of my house!’

From the den’s open window, a wind rushed in. On the back of the wind rode a sound.

It, too, was silent at first, but Julius seemed to know it was coming, just like he knew a symphony’s pending crescendo was near when the music began to cluster together.

And then at last, the buildup exploded into a moan. Julius shuddered at the sound of it.

Without truly knowing, he knew it was from the dream, from that raped child.

All his thoughts of boiled rage, his own struggles, his long and arduous thoughts—

They melted away. They were shattered before that child’s cry, that wrenched pain.

He was left empty, shredded of all great doom and purpose that his disease bound him in.

The moan trickled out into nothing.

He looked behind him. From over his shoulder was the upturned easel and canvas, lying strewn. He walked to the edge of the stairs, looking down the flight of steps. The entrance to his home was flung open, the door kicking in the wind.

chapter 45

I’m sorry. I want to apologize. I’m not a good person, you see. I’ve tried to be one, but I’ve failed. One moment I want to help, and then like a tide my mood falls back into a black horizon.

I feel so tired.

It’s a strange tiredness. I feel like I’m staring long into some blankness, thoughtlessness. Endless void. No matter how hard I turn my head or where I look or how interested I feel, it’s there.

I tried to be a good person. I was worse in my older days, before the disease. Well, I was about the same--except, harsher. I hurt some friends. I fought a friend.

It’s memories like that that eat away. I can’t keep them subdued. Maybe for a little while. Maybe a burst of laughter or some profound music will keep it at bay, but, after awhile, it all just spills over. Sometimes my skin grows tight all the way down to my balls and my breathing grows numb. That’s when I feel like walking across my room, picking up the gun, and--I want release and I want painless peace. Is that too much?

If I knew there was a peaceful afterlife ahead of me, I’d do it. I wouldn’t wait. I wouldn’t be doing what I’m doing right now. I’d end it in a second.

But I don’t know. I don’t know what lies ahead. Frankly, I’m more afraid of uncertainty than the current sentence placed upon me.

I feel like I’m in waiting. My days used to be full of events, but now everything is in slow, morose detail. It’s drawing out long now, and I’m just nibbling away at what little is left. It’s quite pathetic. Hording life. I should do something with what I have left. But what can I do? Who can I help? Why help anybody? I’m a man dying of AIDS and nobody helps me.

So what do they deserve from me? Nothing. They deserve to see me die. They deserve to know my pain. No. I’m sorry. I apologize, again. Nobody wants to see that. I wouldn’t wish it on the worst of enemies.

If I could go back I would. I would change so much. Please, god. Please. I know that I’ve asked before, but—

Stop it. This is stupid. No more games. Just die, Julius Hacker. Just wait to die. Wait and die. No more worrying about going back. Just no more.

Watch the wheels turn and then watch them go black. Watch everything go black. What a fucking pathetic existence. You’re going to pass on with nothing to show for it. Empty hands.

How does that make you feel? How does it feel to know the sum of your life is before you and there’s nothing you can say or do or sing to change it? It makes me helpless. It makes me feel like fate—

And I can’t stop it.

Fate is coming. It’s huge; it’s barreling straight down a road. It’s going right by my house and then it turns a corner and misses me completely. It’s playing. It’s waiting in the wings. It’ll come out, eventually. It’ll come out and steal the show. It’ll stamp out life. The audience will cheer. Standing ovation.

Fate bows.

The curtains close.

chapter 46

I guess this is it. She’s coming soon. It’s almost seven. The lights are going out again. No more sun.

I didn’t do much today. Just sorta loped around and sat and watched and drained the milk carton. Milk is good.

Julius felt nervous. He looked in the mirror at his face, holding his nose as not to sneeze. If I could just—

There was no “if” anymore. His nasal cavity had a cold in it, and the top of his throat felt sore. It was nothing. It was one of those “wake up and have a sore throat”, a cough drop or two and forgotten. Washed.

Not for me. I don’t get off so easy. This cold is written in my blood forever now; I know it.

He felt tight all over. His back ached. He wondered how long this crazy ritual would last. He wanted release of death, wanted embrace of life. He wanted to see his sister soon. His nose was breathing adrenaline again. He was scared. His stomach was a tight ball.

I just want release, but I don’t want to die. Why is it that I feel like I’m going to die but not receive release?

He rubbed his chin. There was a little stubble but nothing noticeable. He put on a fake smile. It didn’t look too bad, he thought. His sister knew him to be sick, anyway. It wasn’t so long ago that she was in this very apartment, cleaning up his blood and vomit. She wouldn’t expect a full recovery in a few days, now would she? No, thought Julius.

He put on another smile and then left the bathroom, passed the bedroom, and began to pace the den as soon as he entered it. He felt his stomach growl. He was hungry; he hadn’t eaten anything all day.

He walked over to the easel and the painting on the ground. Numbly, he picked them up, setting them aright. He walked over to the window, opening it. The afternoon air was cool. He didn’t look long at any of it. He felt like his last day of real, real looking had passed last night. That had been the last good day, he thought. Everything else is downhill.

And if I can ride it downhill with my sister’s hand in mine—

If I can go to the end with her love beside me—

I’ll make it. I’ll be okay. I need her, though. I need the warmth of her familiarity, her glow. Ah, it’s only been a few days, and I feel like she’s a character in a story. I hardly remember her face. Well, I do. It’s not that I don’t remember it. She just feels so distant. I need her to come soon.

A slosh of water hitting the wall of his house sounded off; a car stopped, its wheels almost sliding in the slickness of the black road.

Julius knew the sound.

Briskly, he walked downstairs, opened the door.

His sister opened the door of her car. One foot was sticking out, but the rest of her body seemed preoccupied with her pocketbook, which was in the passenger seat. The car’s exhaust fumes were white and billowed in cold air.

Finally, she clasped her pocketbook shut, put her other foot out. They were red high heels. Julius watched as she got out. For a moment, as she stood erect and straightening her coat, she didn’t see him, but for a moment.

‘Julius!’

Smiling, she walked up to him, her feet in perfect balance in those cumbersome heels.

He marveled at her, smiling back. My sister. The only thing left to me. The only thing that comes back and is real.

‘You look better,’ she said.

He nodded, looking at her. ‘Care for a bite to eat?’

‘Inside?’

Julius was silent for a moment, smiling knowingly.

She finally realized.

‘Oh! You said you wanted to go out, didn’t you?’

‘Yeah. It’s not often I get beyond two blocks anymore.’

She laughed lightly. ‘Yes. No car. You should learn to drive!’

Julius gave a light negative as he smirked and waved his hand.

‘Oh come on. It’s easy. You could drive.’

His heart pounded a bit.

‘No, I’d be too afraid.’

‘Afraid of what?’

His brow furrowed. ‘Of wrecking!’

She repeated herself, this time louder and pulling at his sleeve:

‘Oh come on! I’ll be there. You won’t crash. It’s so easy.’

She smiled that smile and he knew she was irrevocably his sister.

Leaving this life is hard enough, he thought. Leaving her behind, though, is the pits.

Finally ceding, he lowered all resistance. She let go of his sleeve and he willingly took the driver’s seat.

I feel strange in this seat. He had always been a passenger. No, no, wait. That’s not true. You did drive once—

It was a bitter memory.

He smirked to hide the bitterness and she saw it.

‘What? I know that grin.’

‘The only thing I’ve ever driven is a golf cart,’ he lied.

She laughed.

‘It’s easy,’ she said. ‘Just put your foot on the pedal.’

‘The long one, right?’

‘Yes.’

He did, and the car jumped. He switched his foot over to the brakes.

‘That didn’t feel right.’

‘It’s okay,’ she said. ‘You just have to get the feel of it.’

A horn honked behind their heads.

Julius looked at the rearview mirror. A waiting car. It had its headlights on and its windshield wipers were wiping frantically.

Julius hit the gas.

It was exhilarating. He had no choice but to keep going. The car tailed his bumper.

I have to drive. Have to.

His sister, vexed, watched him. She looked at his hands on the wheels, and it reminded her to say, ‘Um, don’t steer hard. Just, you know, get the feel.’

His eyes were far away; his head was bent in concentration.

‘Right,’ he said.

He reached the end of the road, turned, and the trailing car and his house went out of sight. New buildings waved past him like a marquee, his foot tight on the gas.

This isn’t so hard, he thought.

He looked in the review mirror. Nothing.

Julius let his foot off the pedal and hit the breaks. Relieved, he sagged in his seat.

‘Well, that’s enough driving for me today, sis.’

‘Hey, you did good.’

‘Thanks. It was that car, you know.’

‘What car?’

Oh no, he thought. Once again, he hid his trepidation. Letting out a dry laugh, he turned to his sister. ‘Don’t worry about it. Want the wheel?’

‘Yeah, I’ll drive. You did good,’ she repeated.

‘Thanks.’

They switched roles quickly. The rain was falling lightly, and Julius noted once again how fast she could move with those high heels. He sniffed, bemused at such practiced dexterity.

The car started up quickly. Julius, now in the passenger side, lightly rested his chin in his right hand. He turned his head to the window and watched.

You know, he thought, this might be the last car ride I ever take.

‘So what ya been up to, brother?’

‘Nothing much.’

chapter 47

It was dark by the time they got to the restaurant.

Julius looked for a parking place as they entered the packed lot.

The backlights of one car came to life, illuminated.

‘There.’

He pointed at it and she saw it.

We’re lucky, he thought.

They waited and watched as the car pulled slowly out and then off.

Julius watched his sister take the spot.

Lucky. We’re parked close, and I’m never going to walk a long distance again in my life. I’m so tired.

They departed from the car, walked toward the diner. His sister finally noticed, and she grabbed his sleeve.

‘Oh my. What’s wrong with that?’

He stared at the back of his left hand, dark black stitches etched on it like tiny spider legs.

He twisted the fist in the moonlight, reflecting on it. ‘Oh, this. A little accident with the--’

He thought, and his mind stuttered, faltered. Scrambling for a thread of plausibility, he muttered:

‘It was the strangest thing. I was in the kitchen. And I slipped.’

‘And?’

He smirked, knowing now. ‘I had a glass of milk in my hand.’

She sounded astonished. ‘Just like that?’

He nodded quickly. ‘I went to the hospital and they fixed it up.’

Wishing to no longer prolong the facade, he signaled the diner’s front door with his hand, offering it to her. He held it back as she passed.

She should be holding it open for me, he thought. She’s probably stronger than me now.

The restaurant was sparse and dimly lit. There was a small drinking bar. Very small. Julius passed it by without even noticing.

There were more tables and chairs than anything; the place was empty.

He wondered for a moment until he couldn’t contain it any longer.

‘Are they closing?’

‘No,’ said a voice, and Julius turned, surprised to see a bar and a waiter. ‘Two more hours.’

Two hours, thought Julius.

‘Okay. We won’t be long.’

The tables were rather small, with four chairs to each of them. Julius counted about ten tables in the middle of the floor and tables with benches lining the wall. Lamps hung overhead. It was all very personal and non-intrusive. You felt like you could talk aloud without being heard.

The room felt warm, too, Julius noted, as he sat down. He didn’t like sitting at the tables against the wall. He looked across at his sister and then looked as the waiter brought a small menu.

‘You pick for me,’ he said to his sister.

‘Okay’, she said, and Julius, reprieved of having to make a choice, looked mutely past the large glass window, his eyes drinking in the parking lot. The street lights were just coming on, and there were glare spots on cars.

Looking at them, Julius wondered: why were there so many cars in front of the restaurant and nobody here?

He thought about it a little longer and then realized he didn’t want to know.

Looking back at his sister, he met her downward face staring at the menu.

‘It’s kind of dark here, don’t you think?’

‘A little. What did you pick for me?’

‘Oh I haven’t figured out yet. There’s so much stuff, and the print is--’

She picked her purse from off the floor and scrounged around for a couple seconds. She picked her reading glasses out. They were cumbersome, like the high heels, except that they didn’t wear well on her.

‘Ah, better,’ she said. As if the glasses improved her choice, too, she instantly said, ‘Oh, I’ll get us that one.’

‘Let me see.’

She turned the menu around to him and put a fingernail over the selection.

He squinted, just then realizing how bad his own eyesight was. Strange.

‘Do you need my glasses?’

He smirked, peering. ‘No, I think I can—

‘Ah, pasta.’ He looked up. ‘Yes. That would be good.’

The waiter was already there. He silently collected up the menu. He looked at Julius.

‘Mutton or broth?’

Julius thought for a moment, and then, ‘Broth.’

His sister said, ‘The same.’

The waiter nodded. ‘To drink?’

Julius rubbed his stubbly jaw. He couldn’t think of anything, and he was just plain thirsty, so he said, ‘Water.’

His sister said, ‘The same.’

The waiter nodded. ‘One moment please.’

Julius, free of the man’s presence, returned to the window. Night. Once again, noting out there but dark form of the cars and the spots of light on the streets.

‘What you been up to, brother?’

Julius looked back. ‘Oh? I thought you asked that before.’

‘I mean, what have you been painting.’

Julius cringed inside. He wanted to avoid it, but, ‘Oh, a couple things.’

She seemed surprised. ‘Just two? You’re very prolific.’

There was silence for some time, and then she said, ‘What do they look like?’

Julius groped for thought, flexing his fingers. ‘The paintings, you mean? Oh, they’re rather simple. I got mad at one and threw it away.’

She seemed even more surprised. ‘Mad at one? Your paintings are beautiful!’

Julius sniffed. He’d had to explain this to one ignorant fan before, and the fact that he was doing the same to his sister did not rub well. ‘Art’s not all about being flashy,’ he said firmly. He had sounded sarcastic when he told the nameless fan that, but now, before his sister, his sarcasm was mutated into an informative, sure tone.

‘Art’s about statement,’ he continued, his hands molding about an imaginary ball of clay in the air. ‘Meaning is paramount. For me, there is nothing else. If it happens to come across as beautiful, then that’s just what happened. It wasn’t deliberate.’

‘Well,’ she said, ‘I don’t see how. I mean, your work is beautiful. I can’t see how a person can’t make it like that without meaning to.’

Julius shrugged. He knew that the true art could never truly be explained, because there was no way to replicate it or knowingly fabricate it. It just happened. He wished he could articulate that thought to his sister, but it felt too taxing.

He smiled a bit, though. ‘Well thank you. It’s difficult to explain.’

She seemed to accept that.

Changing tact, he took the offensive. ‘So what have you been up to?’

‘Oh, nothing much. Here and there. Got the babysitter to watch Polly, you know. I kept--’

The waiter was back, sitting down two tall glasses of water. He left.

‘I kept,’ she took a sip, ‘watching this stupid program on TV before I left. I wasn’t late, was I?’

‘No.’

Julius picked up his drink. It was cold on his skin. It felt good. He sipped it, put it back down, and stared at the lipstick mark his sister had left on her glass. Her voice broke his concentration.

‘Have you been feeling better? You--’

His voice jumped up to assure her, ‘Oh yes! A lot better. I went to the hospital and they gave me something.’ He knew what it was they gave him, but he didn’t want to cause any complications. ‘I feel a lot better now.’

‘You still look a little thin, though.’

Julius gave a small grin. ‘Nothing a little pasta won’t cure.’

Julius looked past his sister’s shoulder, at the door behind the bar.

His sister stared at him for an odd moment, and then laughed. ‘What are you doing?’

He pointed and she turned to look. ‘Three, two, one--’

The door opened and it was the waiter with a tray, carrying two identical dishes.

Julius reprised the grin, only bigger this time.

The waiter foiled his sister’s reply, though. He sat down two plates of pasta and two bowls of broth.

‘Enjoy,’ he said and was gone.

Julius felt famished, but habit induced him into sampling each selection.

It was rough, wheaten pasta. He put the formless stuff to his mouth. Quite bland. He tasted the broth. Beefy.

The ritual over, he got down to business. Taking the pasta off the plate, he soaked it in the bowl of broth.

His sister did the same.

She ate slower, though. Every once in a while she looked up, amazed to see him with such feverish abandon.

‘How long has it been since you ate?’ she finally inquired.

‘Feels like months,’ he said, almost laughing at his own statement.

‘Well don’t do it again; you’re scaring me!’

Julius laughed at that one. ‘I don’t mean to. I can’t recall the last time I ate, honestly. The days have been slow, and all I’ve had to drink is milk.’

‘You usually keep your refrigerator full.’

Julius nodded, his head bent over the bowl of broth as he sucked up the pasta. Regaining normal posture, he said:

‘Yes, but I limit myself to milk, as far as drinks go. You know how I used to be. If I don’t regiment myself--’

He took another quick bite.

‘I’ll lose my will. Painting and milk. It’s what keeps me together, I guess.’

She smiled. ‘Whatever gets you through the night.’

Julius smiled back. ‘I love that song.’

She seemed piqued by curiosity. ‘What’s your favorite song?’

Still preoccupied by his appetite, he quickly said, ‘Starless,’ and resumed eating.

‘What?’

‘Oh. It’s a song,’ he said, wiping his mouth and picking up his glass of water, ‘by King Crimson.’

‘Ah,’ she said, obviously uninterested in such music.

Julius noticed his bowl was empty. Damn, he thought. I still don’t feel full. He looked up at his sister, and she already knew.

‘You can have some of mine. Dear lord, I can’t eat it all.’

‘Oh, thanks,’ he said. She handed the bowl over to him and he dipped with a fork. ‘I just need a bit more.’

Satisfied, he handed the bowl back to her. She got up, and Julius watched her. ‘I have to find a bathroom.’

‘Oh. All right.’

He returned to the bowl. Long moments passed.

‘Julius,’ she said, called him from where the restaurant’s exit.

Hacker looked up.

‘They said the bathroom’s not working here. I’ve got to go next door.’

He nodded. ‘Alright.’

He heard the glass door open and close. Alone, Julius looked at his bowl of pasta, his fork working at it.

She’s right, he thought. This is scary. I’ve never been this hungry.

He quickly devoured the bit of pasta he had left. He looked at her bowl.

Well, she’s not here, so—

He dipped a bit more out. Some fell from his fork on the way over, and he quickly wiped it up with some napkins.

Now, this pasta.

chapter 48

His sister sat back down. She looked at her brother, Julius Hacker. His bowl was empty, and he was resting his chin in his left hand. As he spoke, she noticed his eyes stay fixed on a window looking out into the night.

‘Sis?’

‘Yeah?’

‘Do you remember when we were kids--when we used to go back to that hideout?’

‘Yeah, that was a good time.’

‘Yeah,’ he echoed. ‘We used to go up there and make trails. I remember one time you were afraid to follow me into the woods.’

‘Yeah,’ she said. ‘That was a little too far for me. I miss those times.’

‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘Me too. We built a little hut around the trees, and there was an old blue car from the Forties that sat parked up there. I remember when I bought my first BB gun. That was really something.’

‘Yeah,’ she said. ‘I remember that, too.’

Julius nodded, his eyes distant and still locked on that window. ‘You were the first person I showed it off to. I took you up to the hideout with me, I had that old BB gun. It was new then. Now it’s all old and rusty.’

‘You still have it?’

‘No,’ he said, ‘but I bet it is. I lost it a long time ago. Anyway, I remember when I took you up there. You must’ve been around seven years old. I can’t remember what I was thinking, but I pointed that old rifle right at the back window of that old blue car. Bam. Poof, like that. I was surprised: there were about a thousand cracks in that glass. So much damage from so little. The second that happened, we took off. We were so afraid; we thought we were in so much trouble.

‘What’s your favorite memory, sis?’

He looked at her now, and it jarred her.

‘Well I--I don’t know.’

‘Oh come on.’

‘It’s hard to think of one off the top of my head.’

‘You can’t think of one good memory between us?’

‘Sure I can,’ she said, ‘but it’s hard.’

She was quiet for a while. Julius leaned in his chair.

He looked back at the window.

‘I remember now.’

‘Yeah?’

‘Yes. We were walking the dog one time and--’

‘Oh,’ Julius said suddenly. ‘The one where it got loose?’

‘Yeah; it came off the leash and just took off. You started running like crazy to catch him, and I couldn’t stop laughing. The dog got to the end of the road and was going to be gone, but then you dove for it. You dove with your whole body.’

Julius nodded. ‘I was thinking of what mother would do if I lost him. I was so mad at that dog afterwards. I forget how he got free.’

‘Probably the collar was too big,’ she offered.

‘Yeah, maybe.

‘Sis?’

‘Yeah?’

‘I have AIDS.’
Julius turned around. His sister was picking up her pocketbook.

‘Sis?’

She didn’t look at her brother. She put some money down on the table and clasped the pocketbook shut and got up.

‘Sis?’

She put her chair up and walked toward the door.

‘Sis?’

She opened the door and walked out. It closed behind her.

chapter 49

Julius lowered his head on the table. His head remained there, his right arm limp and stretched across the table. His fingers clasped in and out, as if he were expecting his sister’s hand to fall into his emptiness at any moment

His eyes saw nothing but the featureless black of the table. After a clear, empty moment that not even emotion could define, he began to think.

I guess she left me.

I guess she took off.

I’ll have to walk.

chapter 50

I know the way. I can make it to my own home. I’ve been here before.

How many miles, do you think? It was still late afternoon when we left, and it was near dark when we got here. I don’t know.

It’s funny. She left me, and I feel nothing. Maybe I don’t realize it yet. I don’t get it, though. Do I have no heart, no soul? I should have cried. I should have balled like a baby. I should have screamed her name, for her to come back. What the hell’s wrong with me?

I need a drink.

Milk?

No, a real drink.

chapter 51

The door to the home of Julius Hacker swayed open, his hand on it. He walked past it and went upstairs. There was a heavy brown bag in his hand.

He sat down on the couch.

This is what it all fucking comes down to, he thought.

Nothing left. Family walked out. Only answer is—

He pulled a long bottle of red wine out.

‘Hello there.’

How many years has it been?

He didn’t think anymore. The cork popped.

He put it to his mouth and turned it up.

His eyes closed as he felt it lance down, utterly strong and refreshing.

chapter 52

I don’t know why I do this to myself.

Oh fuck. I’m tired of talking. I can’t feel anymore.

My sister left me.

It’s this and this. This only. I’m gone. There’s nothing left.

Why am I not crying? Why don’t I feel anything? It hasn’t hit me like a ton of bricks yet. My sister left me. It’s over. I’m just me and I’m going to die alone. My sister left me. I’m it and this is it.

Maybe I just don’t realize it.

chapter 53

Julius awoke to darkness. It was still night.

Ah, he thought. What is that?

He stood up. Three empty bottles were on the ground.

He moaned. What is that? Is that—

He clutched the back of his head. Oh god. Jesus!

A dog barked and Julius flinched.

What is that?

He took a step forward, and then he flopped back in the couch.

He clutched his head again. My god.

My god, I’m dying. Dying.

He felt the dull pain in his chest like a wave, unbearable.

Oh fuck!

Thinking of no way to combat it he raised up slowly, spitting in the face of any falling sensation he felt. Stumbling across the den he made his way to the kitchen.

He flipped the light switch on.

Ah!

Sheltering his eyes with his hand, he moaned in pain and slapped the switch off.

What’s wrong with me?

He turned around. Darkness to his left, right.

This is too much.

He wanted to sit down but he felt like he needed to keep walking.

I need to keep moving or I’ll die. I’ve got to stay on my feet.

Numbly, he padded his hands along the walls and navigated.

He felt like he was in the den again. Okay, he thought. Okay. Make it down the stairs. We have to get out of here. We have to go to the doctor.

Is this it? Or is this—

Am I—

No, I don’t drink anymore. I’m clean, goddammit. I don’t fucking drink! That’s the one promise I never fucking broke you sonsofbitches!

He felt like punching something but when he looked there was nothing. He couldn’t even see his fist, curled up as it was. Where! Where! Where do I go?

Putting his feet down slowly, he found what he thought was the top step.

Slowly, now. Slowly.

The next step.

Good.

He reached out with his foot but he felt only air.

Shit!

Swaying forward he reeled.

He embraced the fall, head upending. He felt like he was deaf and blind as he crashed toward the ground. He felt like he was an atom spinning out of control, returning to the universe.

Then everything became still; he knew it was over.

There was dark all around him; he felt the warmness of urine under his pants. Disgusting, he could only moan.

The door to the outside world was looming. He lay quiet for a minute, feeling the icy cold touch of the wooden floor on his face. He wanted to sneeze. Anything to break his concentration. The more he thought, the more the pain welled up.

He was no longer afraid he’d die; he was afraid he wouldn’t die.

chapter 54

I don’t want this, but it looks like it’s about to happen.

Come on. Come on.

Julius plodded down the sidewalk, his door wide open. He didn’t care.

He stopped. Wait, I’m going down. I’ve got to go up for doctor.

No, the hospital is up. The doctor is down.

I don’t feel sick, but I think I’m dying. So I’ll go to the hospital.

He turned around and went up the sidewalk.

It was abysmally cold, and he could see his breath turn to steam in the air. He shuddered, hugging his arms. This is all I have on? Just a T-shirt? Christ, where am I? I should go back and put on a jacket.

His feet kept walking, though. I need to get to a hospital. I don’t want to die.

From out of the darkness came a car, its headlights on bright. Julius shielded his eyes and waded past the light. Come on.

He felt the sidewalk as it crested to; the hill began to level. He felt no sensation of sight or sound. It was dark and amorphous, and there were only scant clues at best. His knees wanted to buckle. He wanted to scream. He wanted to pass out. He wanted to stop. But he didn’t.

The sidewalk felt a thousand times long as he looked down its length. It had been a short strip. In his sister’s car the sidewalk had been nothing. But now he had no sister. He had no car, no body. It was over. He had nothing else to do but to fall into the arms of the hospital or give up here on the road. Choose now.

Swallowing hard, he finally admitted it:

You won. You won the battle. I’m out for good. I’m going to give my body to the hospital. You can take me then. I’ll leave my mind, though. I’ll force myself to go insane so I won’t know when you’re ravaging me. I’ll feel no pain.

He stopped and looked back. I haven’t moved an inch.

God, please don’t let me pass out like last time. I’m so weak. It’s coming to a head at last. Just a week ago I was in that damn doctor’s office and now this fucking mess. Bastard should give me a refund.

He noticed as he looked down that he had resumed walking without even really knowing it.

Just keep thinking. Don’t think. Get to the hospital, find that bed, and lie down and die.

He remembered, then.

I’m sorry girl, but I can’t help you. Go haunt someone else. Look at me. I can hardly lift my hand anymore. I’m a drunken AIDS victim and you’re asking for me to save your soul? Hell--I don’t know what you’re asking me. You don’t speak my language, that’s for sure.

Julius looked back. The place where he had stood was distant, swallowed by a wall of black. The night wheeled, stars few but harshly bright. The moon sat behind a cloud.

Julius looked for the moon but couldn’t find it. He wiped his forehead. He felt sweat, but it wasn’t hot. It was cold.

Oh Jesus. Not this again. Not now. Why me? Why can’t I live like every—

Oh fuck it. Just keep walking. You’re too deep in this now to think about it. Just do it and get it over with.

And when you’re done?

What do you mean? You’re done. You’ll be dead. That’s it.

Don’t you get it? I’m walking to my death. I’m leaving. Everything’s behind me. Sister gone. Home gone. Painting.

It’s just me now and I’ll cut myself from that too. I once heard that insanity is “alienation from one’s self.” So be it. If that’s what I have to do. I’ll take my mind before AIDS ever touches it. I will. I swear to God I will.

Maybe AIDS doesn’t attack the mind, he thought. Maybe I don’t know shit. I wish I did. It’s funny. I’m being boiled alive and I don’t even know what’s doing it, how it works. It’s invisible. Odorless. It’s not even alive. They say diseases aren’t living, don’t they? I don’t see how it can’t know what’s doing it. It has to know. It’s killing me. Doesn’t it know? I wonder if it knew that and if it had a conscience, then maybe it’d stop. Maybe it’d talk to me.

No. That’s how it survives. Survival of the fittest. I’m the weakest, and it’s the strongest. And that’s that. I’ve got to sit out. It’s new. I’m out, I’m out.

chapter 55

The doors flung open, two attendants racing down the hall with the body of Julius Hacker on a hospital stretcher. He was encased in sweat. His eyes, rolled behind deep sockets, flickered with sporadic activity. His fingers reached up like arms trying to touch the sky, but he was strapped down.

‘Move, move,’ a voice barked, and a large wooden door flew open. The stretcher wheeled past the waiting room, astonished patients followed it with eyes.

‘Elevator,’ said the same voice. The sound of a large metal door sliding closed.

chapter 56

‘Hure!’

Ah, no.

Julius was standing, his body shaking with cold. He watched the scene.

The girl was on the floor now, her arms held down by two large men. Another was holding her feet. The girl, as if she wasn’t the one it was being done to, slowly turned her head and looked at Julius. Her eyes were empty and there were streaks of blood on her face. Her hair was missing in patches.

No, not this.

A slap flew down across her face, and she jerked her head back at her assailants.

‘Mach auf, oder du stirbst.’

The girl bit her lip until Julius thought he saw blood. Her gaze was distant, as if she were removing her mind from what was about to come. She opened her legs.

No, thought Julius. No, no, no.

The three men watched as the fourth kneeled down before the girl, his fingers clutching his pants.

‘Sei still und nimm es.’

The man unbuttoned.

Julius rushed him.

The men holding the girl stood up. The girl sprung to her feet and fled through the door and out into the snow.

Julius was left alone. He looked at the man he was on top of; he was bald with wild, brown eyes. Julius had only a few seconds to notice before he felt a hand clutch his arms.

A great force yanked him up, as if he were being pulled out of water and into safety. But it wasn’t safety; he knew it. Holding him in the air, they flung him against the wall. He almost bounced off it and fell forward, but he gained his footing. The moment he did, they were upon him.

Huge arms and chests surrounded Julius, pressing him.

Julius felt their collective breath on him, and then it fell away. He breathed in the moment of fresh air, and then, like a reminder of where he was, what he had done, a fist struck his face. His nose felt numb. He reached his trembling hand up, but before he could even touch, there were drops of blood landing in his palm. He whimpered and staggered forward. The arms surged forward again, pinning him up against the wall.

‘Ich werde mich um ihn kümmern.’

It was the man on the ground. He grunted as he got up.

The three men holding Julius stepped back, giving him ample room to run. Julius looked at the small wooden door, his eyes on the snow. He could see it outside, fresh as it was. Run. He tried, but nothing happened. He didn’t know if it was fear or if it was just because it was a dream. He shook as he realized this was the first dream he’d ever felt real pain in.

As if to impress that fact upon him, the man with the wild eyes was now before him. With a grimace, the man gripped the shirt of Hacker and yanked. Julius felt his body being propelled forward. He tried to look away.

And then Julius heard it. One of the men behind his head called out:

‘Erschiess' den Narren, Hacker!’

chapter 57

Julius opened his eyes. He remembered nothing.

The room was empty and it was night. It seemed like a different day.

My god, have I slept through a whole day?

He tried to sit up, but it was impossible. He found that he could hardly move his neck.

Ah, so this is it. This is truly it.

He noticed how drowsy he was, despite how awake he was. He knew without looking that his face was pale and that his eyes were sunken and cavernous. Slowly, he blinked.

So, this is it. This really is it. I’ll never paint again. I’ll never go home.

You can never go home.

He tried to raise his arm but couldn’t.

Well, I’m ready. Take me.

Softly, he closed his eyes.

Chapter 58

Julius opened his eyes.

The door was cracking open, the light from the hall coming in.

‘Mr. Hacker?’

‘What? Are you here to take me?’

‘Sir?’

‘You’ll probably take me anyway, but I won’t go easy. I swear to God.’

His eyes focused; it was a nurse. Perhaps the one who had helped him out, but he couldn’t tell yet.

He cleared his throat.

‘Come in,’ he whispered.

Tentatively, she poked her head past the door.

‘Come in,’ Julius repeated, his throat sobbing forcibly against the effort of speech.

She entered silently, her dark form at the foot of the bed.

‘We gave you some antibiotics,’ she said, her voice barely above a whisper.

‘Hopefully,’ she went on, ‘your body will react.’

Julius wanted to sit up. His fingers clutched the air. ‘Is there noting else? I’m very--’

His words trailed off; he found that he could no longer speak.

The nurse was quiet for a moment, and then she said, ‘Just rest, Mr. Hacker.’

chapter 59

Julius awoke. It was still dark. Once again, he didn’t know what time it was or if it was the same day.

And then he felt a strange sensation.

He felt like he could sit up.

Without much effort, he did. Surprised, he raised his arms up and down. They worked.

Julius looked around the hospital room with regained, uninhibited awareness. He realized exactly what it meant to die. He would be immobile again. He knew that. And he knew that while he was mobile, he had this one space of time to do something.

What he had to do, aside from die, was pure speculation.

He wanted to lie back down, but his mind was stiff as a board. It upheld him.

Glancing past the room’s window, he espied the night. He realized his room overlooked a roof. He was several stories up. This was a different room from the last one he’d stayed in, but it looked exactly the same. Same size, same bed, same damn curtains even.

Sighing, Julius swung his feet over the side of the bed. He looked down at the floor, thinking hopefully that he could still walk, that the antibiotics had worked. They killed whatever was eating me. No, that’s not right. It can’t be killed; it can only be stopped--momentarily. Salvation happened this time, but what happens next?

Julius shook his head slowly, his mind too deep a recess to answer questions. He looked at the glossiness of the tile floor, noting his formless reflection.

Sighing aside his fear, he came off the bed, his feet landing where the reflection had been. He flexed his toes and ever slowly began to pace. His legs were numb from inactivity. They moved as if the joints were rusted. But his alertness made him ignore it, made him creak forward.

I need to get out of here, he thought. I’ve got to.

He looked sidelong at the window.

It’s a good time for it, he thought.

Escape? The triviality of the thought and the excitement of doing it made his breath quicken.

Looking at the door, he made his decision.

chapter 60

Julius walked down the hall in his hospital gown, making his way to the elevator.

All the doors to the other rooms were closed. There was no sound, aside from his bare feet as it slapped against the tile.

I should have got dressed, he thought.

No, you wanted to leave. Let’s just go.

Alright.

I wonder what they’ll think when they see me gone and my clothes still there.

Maybe they’ll think I’m kidnapped.

He stepped past the opening elevator. He pushed the button for the first floor. The door rang as it opened, and he walked in.

The elevator jumped and then made its way down. Julius had always had a lingering fear of elevators, ever since he’d been stuck in one for an hour. He had been a child, then.

He wondered if there would be a person at the checkout to stop him and tell him to go back to his room and get some sleep. With my luck? Probably.

Damn it, why didn’t I get dressed? Good god, I’m like a sore thumb sticking out here. They’ll either find me or I’ll look like an asshole out on the streets. Jesus Christ, what was I thinking? They really do come out at night, don’t they?

Julius felt the elevator jerk again as it came to a halt. The door rang and it opened. He passed through it.

Fuck, he thought. I don’t remember being taken here. What the hell? Where am I?
He looked and saw a hall his memory had never been down, though his body had passed it by in a stretcher.

The lights were all out.

Carefully, he walked toward the other end of the hall. When he reached the door, he put his palms against it and pushed ever so slightly, holding his breath in anticipation. The hinges emitted several creaks, and he paused for a moment. Expelling his breath, he resumed. When it was cracked open just enough, he squirmed through.

He looked around and saw that he was in the waiting room.

Empty!

He expelled another bated breath and pushed his feet forward, shirking aside all trepidations. He came near the checkout desk, craning his neck at it, as if merely staring at it would set off some invisible alarm. Behind the desk was an open door with light shining out. Julius looked at the light as it lay across the floor. It reminded him to move on.

Swallowing, he summoned the courage and briskly passed the desk. He was at the exit, and yet he stopped. He took a moment to look past the glass, to look outside. The sidewalk. There were no stars--only a black ceiling. Clouds. He pushed the door open. A cold air. For the first time he felt the sensation that he was naked out there. He looked at his hospital gown, hesitated, and then stepped outside.

So this is what it’s like, he thought, looking once more at the hospital gown. I’m out here for all the world to see what a weirdo I am. This is what it feels like if AIDS were stamped on my forehead for all to see. Oh god, at least it’s not like that. I’m glad I went through it in privacy. I’m glad I’m not that man who was eaten alive by cancer.

Julius shuddered. He didn’t know if it was from the cold or his thoughts.

I’ve got to get out of sight.

He walked up the sidewalk. It was empty and totally quiet. What time is it?

He kept going. Where am I going?

It began to rain.

Oh god.

But Julius did not seek shelter. His legs were getting weaker, but he kept walking.

How close am I to death?

He could see nothing except the dim outline of buildings to either side. He followed the streetlights.

Will I ever see day again? Or is this it? Is this my last chapter? Somewhere out there, some kid is having his fifth chapter, some baby his prologue. I’m—

He heard the sound of a car engine coming up the road. Julius couldn’t see the end of the road; it was too dark. He rushed toward the nearest streetlight, making sure he was on the sidewalk. The car was speeding. It rushed by him and kicked up a wind and left the stink of exhaust fumes. Julius coughed at it.

As the gasoline smell lingered and he stood shivering and wet, he cried.

He felt the salt of his tears mix with the rain and pass over his face.

And then he remembered.

My god, he thought, they raped her.

Wait, that’s not it. There’s something more.

Erschiess' den Narren, Hacker!

Chills washed down his spine, colder than the rain.

Erschiess' den Narren, Hacker!

Julius clenched his jaw and looked past the rain and the streetlights. The road ran long and straight and curved behind the last building.

chapter 61

Julius reached the last building and turned the corner. He was surprised.

It looked like a dead end.

There was a long brick wall, a gate in the center of it. Trees loomed beyond the wall, their limbs shaking in the building wind. Julius shivered and he heard a thunderclap, and the sky flashed with lightning.

Let’s go in here, he thought, as he looked at the small gate door.

Putting his tired hand against the gate, he gave it a little push and shuffled through.

The trees rained leaves down on him, and he heard the wind howl. The rain began to fall harder.

Julius followed a long, straight path of grass, sandwiched as it was between two columns of trees. At the mouth of the pass, it branched out into—

He squinted. I can’t see.

The thunder barked again and the lightning came.

Under the momentary flash of light, Julius saw headstones.

He moved forward blindly, his hands grasping thin air. The ground was wet under his bare feet, the thick grass his only comfort.

Still blinded by the night, he forged up the graveyard.

I’m lucky, he thought. I haven’t stumped my toe on a tombstone yet.

And then he felt the ground change. It was going uphill.

He strained his legs and he bent down a bit.

The lightning came again, and he looked around in the short instant of sight. He could see he was in the middle of a hill, tombstones all around him. He was almost at the top of it, and he could see the Cross.

He reached the top.

Gasping for breath, he sat down on the top of the hill, at the base of the Cross.

He looked down at the long slope below him. He looked down at the myriad tombstones.

Better get used to it, he thought.

He laughed aloud. He laughed until tears of sorrow and sweet joy came to his eyes.

I’m so alive, he thought. I’m here now. This is all that ever mattered. Why didn’t I see it? Why didn’t I—

The lightning flashed again. It was then that he saw the tombstone to his left.

He looked at it. It said:

ANTON HACKER
9. 1. 1910 - 25. 12. 1958

Julius knew then that that was his father.

He stood up straight, gathering all his strength.

The rain poured all the harder, as if to keep him down, but he kept his shoulders high.

Julius felt his whole face quiver as the tears raced.

‘You raped her,’ he said, his throat balling up with emotion. ‘You raped her.’

He fell to his knees and ground up the earth in his palms.

‘You fucking bastard! You raped her!’

He looked up at the sky, and he felt as if he’d just died and his soul had already lifted up. He knew then why the little girl had contacted him. She had been okay the whole time. It was him that needed this. He felt the rain reaching down, touching his chest like a consoling finger.

Julius peered hard into that sky, his sunken eyes melding with its limitless breadth. He felt his whole body transfixed, every measure of humanity expulsed out unto the earth. He felt one with everything. He felt free.

‘Thank you,’ he screamed, his words lifting off into the rain. ‘Thank you!’

Epilogue

If I could go back, I would leave the city.

I’d go to some place where there was water. A lake, an ocean. Anywhere where I could forget.

I’d take someone I loved with me. Someone to share the patio with, the swinging bench.

I wouldn’t think about the past, about the guilt or the innocence.

I’d just swing, my heart swaying in the wind with the trees, my mind honed to the fine tune of love. My body would lilt as it scanned the ripples in the lake, my eyes drowning out and into nothing. I would forget everything.

The tombstone read:

JULIUS HACKER
17. 6. 1944 - 16. 2. 1985

It was a fresh tombstone, no wear apparent on it yet. The letters looked new and they were carved boldly and deeply. Tall trees were right behind it, and a level field of grass spanned before it.

I thought I had commented here when I read it the other day.

David, this story is amazing. It is so full of heartache and despair. It captures the grief of AIDS so profoundly. My family has lived with the the devastation of this disease, it has taken dear loved one from us. You have successfully captured that anger, the fear and the pain of it in this story.

I hope you get it published.

And, thank you so much for the dedication. My uncles must be smiling

Hugs! Brooke

Thanks. Highest praise, coming from your mom and you. I will work to get it published.

The book really was inspired as I read about Stephen's struggle. His writings confront you with much more reality and clarity than any movie can. And when I met Isaiah I added him to the dedication, right before Runes came out.