“Yep, but that’s not what I’m getting at,” the priest continued. “They said that they were inoperable. They’re too deeply imbedded to be surgically removed. Basically, chemotherapy was your best and only option.”
“That’s right. That’s what he said.”
“Listen. You’ll never believe the number of people I’ve seen pass away through cancer. Hundreds. Maybe more in my lifetime. Chemotherapy is a slow death. A radiation. Blasting that at your brain is no way to treat a disease in the 21st century.”
The younger man nodded and swallowed his coffee. It was an impassioned speech he had heard back in Marrakesh.
“All it does is make the last months or at best a year of your life miserable and sickly. Low energy, swollen bodies, lethargy 24-7, hair loss not to mention the impact on friends and family who have to nurse you.”
“It’s a good job I don’t have any family,” he replied. “Last thing I would want to be is a burden.”
Father Docherty reached across the table and held the other man’s hand and pressed gently, looking into his eyes with all sincerity.
“Don’t ever think that. You’re a young man with many years ahead of you.”
The younger man returned the priest’s warm smile, a strange realisation dawning of how it would appear to others - the sudden role reversal of the pensioned priest comforting a dying man five decades his junior.
“Listen, we know doctors can’t cure you. They just don’t have the tools at the minute.”
“But, Dr. Lewin does. That’s why we’re here.”
The priest picked up his cup and winced. He twirled it around in his hands, trying to strain some coffee from the suds but found none. Instead, he smoothed a soft palm down his face, feeling the skin thin and ragged around his skull like a popped blister.
“Scott can’t cure you either.”
“I don’t understand. If he can’t get rid of the tumours, then why are we here?”
“Because he can freeze time for you.”
The younger man’s face was a picture of confusion. The priest smiled and the action triggered a coughing fit. The priest hunched over and, rushing to fill a glass of water, the younger man steadied the tumbler in his hand and helped raise it up to his lips. After he had taken a few measures, it finally receded and his breathing continued again with his face colour returning to normal.
“You OK?”
“Yeah,” he said. “They don’t get any easier.”
“What do you mean, ‘freeze time’?”
“Modern medicine can’t help. They’ve still got some catching up to do. But,” the priest said, leaning forward now, “that’s not to say that in the future they don’t already have the technology. Your cure could be only a few years away.”
THIRTY-TWO
“I still think you should go to a hospital.”
Despite the heat blasting at full power, Lazarus still shivered in the passenger seat. Molly looked across and saw the cold sweat bead on his face.
“I’ll be fine. Just take me home.”
The final embers of the sun’s rays peeked out from the tall buildings as she weaved the car through the streets. He corrected her course until they reached their destination and parked up on the kerb outside a block of apartments. Molly quickly left her seat and rounded the car. She unbuckled his seat belt and took his weight as his legs refused to obey orders. She shut the door behind him and they took baby steps to the door. His frozen fingers didn’t have the dexterity to slip inside his pocket and she reached into the trousers and searched for the key.
“To the left. A little more.”
“I already got it,” she said and pulled it from his pocket.
“I wasn’t talking about the key,” he said and she laughed with him. “I can do the rest from here.”
“No, you can barely stand on your own. I’ll take you inside.”
She unlocked and pushed the door open, allowing him to shuffle inside, leaning heavily on her shoulder. The little entrance had metal lockers pinned to the wall beside a lift. The box lids had all been opened like a Christmas calendar, locks broken and letters strewn on the floor, dirty footprints stamping them to the ground. On the face of the steel lift doors, someone had painted a fat man bending over, baring his ass. Trousers were spooled around his ankles. Each huge butt cheek, one on either door, was being pulled apart by an accompanying hand. Fat fingers that tore open a bloody red asshole.
“Charming,” she said. “I’m guessing the lift doesn’t work?”
Lazarus looked up at the dial above the lift and saw the lit numbers of 2 and 3 flick back forth and shook his head
“Shame. You should see what happens when he spreads those cheeks.” He said, pointing to a set of stairs on the right.
They moved slowly taking one step at a time, pausing for breath and she dabbed the sweat off his brow with the exertion. When they reached the third floor, he pointed to the hallway and they entered and stopped in front of a door, green like frog skin. Molly opened it and flicked a light nearest the door. The room was small, devoid of any furniture, with an unmade bed in the back corner acting as the only viable seat. She entered, half carrying, half stumbling with the weight. He directed her through a carpet of empty soft drink cans and takeaway cardboard boxes, to a door that faced the length of the bed. They passed a small kitchenette on the right, an open doorway where she could smell the grease there so thick it nearly clotted in her nostrils.
“Cleaners must be on strike,” Lazarus said. “Just my luck.”
When they reached the door, she opened it and helped him through to the bathroom. There was barely enough room for them to stand side by side and he reached out for the toilet seat and used it for support, before propping himself down on it. He took a deep breath and looked up at her.
“Always wanted a place where I could shower, shit, cook a breakfast and answer the door all at the same time. Welcome to my humble abode.”
“Doesn’t seem like two thousand years taught you anything about cleanliness,” Molly said and she inspected the mirror above him, which was pocked with stray toothpaste.
“Well,” he said, grabbing a handful of jean around his knee bringing his foot up onto his leg, “when you’re immune to disease and death, you can afford to take some risks when it comes to your health.”
“Is that what you were doing today?”
He struggled with the laces of the shoe and tried to slot a thumb under the heel but found his digits useless. She untied them for him and slipped them off, before bending onto one knee and lifting his other foot; she did the same.
“You could say that,” he said and looked into her eyes as she stood back up. “I’ve been poked, prodded, burnt, suffocated, starved, cut, drowned… and any other verb you can think of and its always the same. I. Can’t. Die.”
“Because you’re cursed.”
“Right.”
“So why are you freezing to death?”
“I said I can’t die. I didn’t say I can’t feel pain.”
Molly slid open the shower door and turned the dial, stepping out quickly, anticipating the showerhead’s spray. She needn’t have bothered, as the pipes behind the walls moaned like whales, a delayed reaction until they were finally in agreement to siphon some of the water their way. When it cleared its throat, and spat out clots of something with the colour and substance of phlegm, she watched as water finally streamed. Holding out a hand she tested its temperature with outstretched fingertips. It began to warm. He looked up at her and then motioned to the shower, a smile curling on his lips despite his shivers. She shook her head and stepped back outside the bathroom. The door closed as Lazarus suddenly found the strength to stand, and wiggled his hips with the jeans sliding off his trim waist.
“I’ll just make myself comfortable and…”
“You do that,” came the voice behind the door and she heard the cries of delicious pain that leapt from his voice as the shower hit his cold body.
She br
ushed some of the rubbish to one side with her foot and glanced around the small room. She sat down on the edge of the bed and began to rub the back of her neck. It was tense and sore from the afternoon’s exertion. There was a singing voice from the shower and she laughed, shaking her head. Beside the bed was a little chest of drawers, a fine layer of dust on it its surface. There was a little plastic pocket with an image printed on a card. She picked it up and saw the priest on its front and turning it read the prayer to Padre Pio. A little microchip dot of fabric, a holy square was inside and she traced her thumb over it, before returning it to the table.
Pawing at the rubbish in front of her she saw crumpled paper balls. She reached down and picked one up. Unwrapping it, Molly tried to iron out the crinkles on her thighs before lifting it up. It was a printout of dates and venues, all listed chronologically. At the bottom of the page she read that it was the last of twenty and she looked at the first few entries which had all been scored through with a pen line. The top one was dated 2003. The venue was Madrid. As she looked down the following entries she stopped at the final one which was highlighted in yellow. It was the only one that hadn’t been crossed off.
2018. Ballygorm.
The water stopped, snapping her attention back. She crumpled the sheet, shoved it in her pocket and stood just as Lazarus opened the door. He had a towel wrapped around his waist, an exposed hairless chest still wet. He panted hard from the heat which trailed behind him in a mist. His frame was slight, a teenager’s body, concave with ribs that protruded, brittle as egg shells. But on his face, there was an assured confidence, eyes that didn’t simply look but held stares until the other person was forced to look away, afraid of what those searching eyes would find as they pierced thoughts. His hair was wet and he tousled it with a smaller towel. Molly stood and watched his lean body, flawless and coloured like polished wood. She swallowed the air and felt the crack in her throat. He dropped the small towel to the ground and watched her silently. There was no expression on his face as he stared into her eyes. She moved closer, holding his stare and felt his eyes bore into her own. A little smile touched his eyes, noticing the falter in her step, a nervousness that found itself in her heart, feeling its beat on her chest every inch she drew near.
She undid a button in her shirt and read his face for a response but found none. He was a bronzed waxwork intent to see her play her hand, reveal her cards. She unbuttoned a second one and stood before him, trembling hands reaching out to hold his waist, an unsteady breath betraying her false confidence.
He halted the direction of her hands and guided them upward, holding them to his chest as they pulled close. She lifted her head a few inches to guide her lips onto a kiss, but his mouth was shut tight and the eyes were still staring at her.
“We can’t.”
“What?”
“I can’t.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Molly, you know who I am. You know what I am.”
“So what?” she said, her hurt finding expression on her face, looking into his eyes which no longer had the same hold or authority.
“You’re a bright girl,” he said. “I’m a prostitute. The people I mix with are not nice people. My lifestyle isn’t a healthy one. You have no idea what you’d be getting yourself into.”
She pulled away from him, second time of asking, tearing her arms from his hands.
“This never works out well. I can’t get involved with people. It’s too painful.”
“Would you change the bloody record!?” she said, eyes searching around the room for an argument or weapon. “You’re full of shit.”
“Come on,” he said and stepped forward, reaching out a hand to her.
She gave it her best tennis swing, knocking it back with a forehand and sending it stinging back to its owner. Molly quickly buttoned up her top, cursing under her breath.
“Can’t believe I could be so stupid,” she said, storming over to the door despite his pleading. “Leading me on like that, you absolute bastard.”
“I wasn’t leading you on,” he said and she stopped in the doorway with a back turned to him. “Honest.”
She turned to face him again. Her face had cooled but hardened into a tight knot, a hard fist drumming a thigh by her side.
“Honest? OK, let’s be honest then,” she said. “I like you. God only knows why. That’s honest. There’s something about you. I don’t know what it is. But I’m just telling you the truth.”
Lazarus nodded and stepped forward. She held up her palm to stop his coming closer. He tightened the towel around his waist and conceded ground.
“Now your turn.”
“I like you too.”
“Tell me the truth!”
“That is the truth!” he said.
“And the bullshit story?”
He looked down at his feet, shook his head and took a heavy sigh. When he looked again at her there were a sheen of tears in his eyes.
“It’s all true,” he said. “I’m telling the truth.”
“Liar,” she said and slammed the door behind her.
THIRTY-THREE
When they walked into the lab, Dr. Lewin looked first at the priest. The younger man detected the small nod from Father Docherty on his left. The signal made Lewin hurry forward and greet them both with a smile that he tried to compress, although the puppeteer yanked at the corners until finally it beamed from his face.
“Come on. I’ll give you a tour.”
Lewin put an arm around the man’s shoulder and guided him firstly to the foot of the high bed in the centre. He pointed to the machines on either side, chest height.
“These funky looking boxes that look like wrong way up ghetto blasters are used to measure your heartrate, blood pressure and other vital signs. Just to make sure everything is normal.”
“When would that be used, Scott?” the priest said behind them.
“We would take your measurements throughout to make sure you’re stable, but we’d like to get a gauge on you before and immediately after your treatment to make sure everything’s the way it should be.”
The younger man studied the face of the boxes, and thought he detected a layer of dust on their surface, but the doctor veered him away before he had a chance to inspect further.
“This is what you were asking me about last night? Or was it two nights ago? It’s been a funny few days,” the doctor joked.
“What is it?”
The white sheet that covered the oblong box was taken off and tucked under the trestle at one end. Lewin rubbed his hand along the opaque window at the top and wiped the palm on his trouser leg. The younger man approached its creamy, curved exterior with caution, as if it were a dragon egg, and looked inside the opening.
“Da da! This is the LCC. It’s not built for comfort, but for functionality. You would be asleep inside. A real, modern day Snow White.”
There was a mumble from the priest behind which punctured Lewin’s mood, who coughed away the enthusiasm that had tinted his voice.
“You see these wires?” Both men looked at the leads winding from the box to a thicket of sockets in the wall corner. “That’s basically your life line. I’d be pumping liquid nitrogen inside to maintain your temperature of -87 Kelvin. Your body would be sensored up to give me accurate readings in real time, and this little hollow here?”
Lewin was bending down now, kneeling and looking at the underside of the chamber. The others crouched with him, although the priest only made it halfway before pulling back. The doctor tapped a spot with his finger point.
“That’s a little dart which I load up with a cocktail of medication to make sure your body has the right fuel to go into hibernation. Do you have any allergies?”
“No.”
“OK, good,” Lewin said. He rose off his knee and dusted it down.
He looked into the patient’s expressionless face and then to Father Docherty’s to provoke another question, but found nothing there.
“Is it safe?”
“100%. If there were any sign of danger at any stage, I’d pull you right out.”
“How long can someone stay inside?”
“I have the capacity and resources to allow five years. Seven, tops.”
“Five years!”
There were tears now welling in the younger man’s face and his eyes found compassion in the priest who shared his thought and smiled weakly.
“You need to focus on getting to the end of that,” Father Docherty said. “That’s the most important thing. Five or even seven years might feel like a long time, but the advances in medical treatment could be huge by then. At the very least, we’ll have stopped the tumour’s growth. Scott?”
“Correct. It won’t get any worse, that’s for sure and what it will do is buy more time.”
The younger man shook his head and felt their stares on him. A heavy silence filled the room, waiting for him to fill it.
“So, let’s say I enter today. I go in for five years. I come out….”
“You come out, five years older, but you’ll look exactly the same. The LCC will preserve you and…”
“The LCC? What does that stand for?” the priest asked.
“Yeah, sorry. I should have said. The ‘Lewin Cryogenic Camber’. What do you think?”
Father Docherty lifted his weak arm and gave a so-so sign, which drew a smile from the doctor who shrugged.
“Anyway, it acts like a giant freezer. I would already have brought your heartbeat down to a level, so as not to provide anaphylactic shock, and so that the temperature of the chamber won’t be too harsh when I start to pump the air inside.”
“Is there any way to communicate when he’s in there?” the priest asked.
“Sure. See the little speaker against the inside?”
They crowded around the little window where the doctor’s finger was pointed. There was a small black disc against the white surface, raised like a roadside tar bubble.
“It’s a two-way speaker. The other one is…”
The doctor looked around suddenly, eyes darting around the room until they came to rest on the bench on the far side and across from the bed.
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