Table of Contents

Copyright and conditions

Dedication

Author's Note

Stop

The Voice

The Life of the Party

Thank You Note

Stop

Hurt Someone

Almost Doesn't Count

White Wine

Steady

Red Ropes

Angel

Barge

Midway Down

One Shot

Gun Chant

Truck

Share Your Pain

Selfish

Target

Fall

Done

Hole in the Sky

Not Like Me

The Club

Confidante

The Beautiful Daughter

Foreclosed

The General

Dancer

Something Out There

Something Out There

The Rush

Wonderful

The Code

Lucky in the End

The Number

The Expert

Stop

The Voice

Why keep hanging around? No one wants you here. You'd be doing the world a service. Doing something useful for once.

Why bother to go on? Why keep trying to find a reason? Why keep convincing yourself that things aren't that bad?

They are, you know, and they're only going to get worse.

Look at you, trying all those tricks: the pills, the therapy, the “positive thoughts”. It's pitiful to watch. Depressing, if you want to know. So depressing to watch you.

Why don't you just be done with it? Stop annoying us all. It's so unseemly, I can't tell you. It's such a sickening spectacle.

Stop it, won't you? Just be done with it. Take yourself out of the picture, and let the world move on.

The Life of the Party

I was the life of the party. Even when there was no party. I made one happen. I made people laugh. I made myself laugh.

I worked good and hard to make myself laugh. Lord, you could hear my laugh from a block away.

“Isn't he something, that Lester?” people would say. “Always happy. Look at him. Always with the smile.”

Hell, even I thought I was happy. As long as I wasn't alone. I can't tell you how I hated that, being alone.

Oh, not everyone signed on. Sometimes I'd see people frown, or move to another table. Once I heard someone say, “God, I wish that jerk would keep it down.” But who cares, right? Party-poopers. You get 'em in every crowd.

Still, it wore me out sometimes, working like that, keeping the motor running, the horn honking, the smoke pouring out. Sometimes I just wanted to come to rest, you know? Stop. Like a shark.

Oh, that's right. Sharks don't stop. They can't. Or they'll die.

So today, I made a mistake. I stayed alone. And then I decided, that's what I'll do. I'll stop. I'll rest.

Oh yeah, and I took some pills. A lot of pills.

Any moment now.

Do you know? I feel great.

Just one thing. Please?

Don't laugh.

Thank You Note

Before I write another word, I must tell you: last night, you outdid yourself. The décor, as always, was superb; all those pastels, the pink and white roses. And that string quartet. However did you get them to come? They haven't played together for years. Or so I'm told. I don't follow such things these days. But your guests were suitably impressed. And, as always, suitably impressive. That Arab ambassador, the prince, insisted I go out on his yacht. It was very kind. I told him I'd love to. That I'd call him next week.

But I was lying.

I was lying because, dear friend, I'm done with next week. I'm done with tomorrow. Soon after I sign this, I'll be done with today.

I can't. I don't how how to say it more plainly than that. “Can't what, my darling?” I hear you say, and for a moment the warmth returns, the eagerness... but it fades. Even – how well I've hid this – even sometimes when I'm with you, it fades.

Columbus was wrong, you know: the world is flat. If you live long enough, and do enough wonderful things, and have enough money, but no purpose, never ever a purpose, it doesn't matter how many flights, how many cruises, how many jaunts you take. How many good causes you lend your name to. Bless me, it wouldn't matter if you took a string and wrapped it around the globe and stood with one end in each hand, you'd still have to accept it, the awful, unfashionable truth: the Earth is flat. There's nothing left to break the monotony, to suggest a sparkle beyond the horizon.

Yes, my dear, the Earth is flat. But I'm about to put a dent in it.

Goodbye, my heart. You almost made Life worth living. Please believe me, it's no fault of yours if you failed.

Stop

I just wanted it to stop.

You couldn’t hear it, could you? You thought I was fine.

But I wasn’t. It kept getting louder and louder, no matter what I did. No matter how much I blocked it out.

I did everything. I drank, I drugged, I slept around. Nothing worked.

It’s easy to say, “You should have held on. You should have been stronger.” You didn’t hear it. No one did. They heard music, talking. Birds singing. Different sounds. Good sounds.

Me, I only heard one thing. And it just kept getting louder.

Imagine a train coming right at you. Thunder. A hurricane. Your own personal hurricane. Imagine ten times that. And you still wouldn’t have it. It still wouldn’t be as bad.

And it never stopped. Never. No matter what I did. No matter how much I tried to stop up my ears. It was always there all the time.

Until I did what I did.

You don’t see. You think I was weak. That there was another way.

I'm telling you: there wasn't.

All I wanted was for it to stop.

Hurt Someone

He always wanted to hurt someone. That's what it felt like. Even when he laughed, there was something mean in it.

The amazing thing is, people liked him. He got to them somehow. Like they thought, given time, he'd grow out of it. Out of all that anger.

Only, he was forty. Not a kid. He'd had his time, his time to get over it. And he hadn't. Not at all. He'd cuddled up pretty close to it, if you ask me. But he did have that trick. That trick of seeming like he was basically a sweet guy, a guy who'd had some bad breaks.

So people made allowances.

“You're pretty angry,” I told him once, and he gave me this little grin. “Yeah, I guess I should work on that.” But that was just his way of not working on it. Of saying he'd get around to it. Like a smoker, you know? “I know I should quit,” they say, as they light up the next one.

Mostly, no one worried about it. But I did. I worried a lot. I worried he'd hurt someone. Hurt them bad. Maybe even kill them.

I just never figured, it never even crossed my mind, that when it finally happened, when the time came, that the person he would hurt would be himself.

Almost Doesn't Count

Ah yes. The pistol. Properly placed, it opens the back of the head, or puts a bullet neatly through your heart. You might factor in, however, the shaking of your hand, lack of practice or just plain poor aim, in which case, alternate outcomes occur: severing the spinal chord, for instance. The result of this would not be good, but it would not be death, either. And there you'd have gone and done it. Made yourself a burden to your friends.

Oh, I'm sorry. You don't have any friends, do you? Or family. Not in your own mind at least. Not right now. They don't factor in.

Say society, then. You'd become a burden to society.

You could take poison. That works well. Sometimes. When you don't vomit it up, or end your days gasping in awful pain.

How about the subway? A quick leap off the platform, just as the train arrives... No point in telling you about the conductor. Poor bastard will see your face, again and again. Whether or not you succeed. Which you might not want to count on. One woman messed herself up so badly, the next time she tried, she had to roll her wheelchair to the edge. And failed again. Not much left this time. But just enough to keep alive.

'Cause they will, you know. They'll keep you alive. They'll feel obliged. God forbid they should finish the job. They'll do everything they can. And there you'll be, as helpless as a rug. A really ugly, ripped up rug.

Honestly: sound like something worth checking out? Sound like something you're – excuse the expression – dying to try?

White Wine

One day we decided enough was enough. Or maybe she decided. I was past decisions by then. And stone broke. We'd both stopped working months ago. “Let's be done with this,” she said. She had some pills she'd saved up. And we had some wine. Cheap white wine.

“Do you want to write a note?” she asked. “No,” I said, “Why bother?” We each took a handful of pills, and washed them down with the wine. Then we sat back on the couch, and waited.

I woke up retching. Just puking my guts out. I figured the same thing must have happened to her. Only it hadn't. Nope.

She'd made it. She'd gone all the way.

When I called EMS, they brought the cops too. I got locked up for a little bit.

It's all worked out. I found another job, paid off all my debts. I'm fine now – positive attitude and all. What I figured out is, I was never that badly off. I was only unhappy because of her. So now, yeah, I'm good.

Except for one thing: I can't stand white wine.

Steady

Everybody in the building's been nice. They keep saying how glad they are to see me back at the front desk. And I'm doing rounds again. But only inside.

I'm not ready for outside.

Yesterday, I tried it. Walking around the building. When I got near that spot, my heart started beating. I kept flashing on that blur, whizzing past my eyes. And waiting for the thump...

I rushed back inside.

She could have killed me. She landed that close. But I didn't even think of that, not at the time. Not with the rest of it.

Yesterday my boss saw that look on my face, and he came right over. "You'll make it,” he said, “You've always been my best guard. Steady. Steady, and quick with a smile. If anyone can get past this, you can."

I tried to hold on to his words, to how he was trying to help me. But I kept seeing that girl on the sidewalk, with her eye hanging off her face...

It's just, it's gonna take a while, you know?

Red Ropes

If you're watching this on the evening news, the first thing I want you to know is, I didn't do this to get to Heaven. Least of all a Heaven filled with virgins.

I've been with a virgin or two, and let me tell you: not a good time.

Another thing I want to make clear is, I wasn't born poor. No way was I one of the oppressed. In fact, I was a spoiled little....

Oops. Never mind. Got to keep this media-friendly, you know?

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