by Inmon, Shawn
Charles took a moment to mull that over. He pictured himself living his life in his small condo, made even smaller by another human being, someone he didn’t know, staying there twelve hours a day. Then he tried to picture what this hospice might look like. Neither vision was satisfactory, but Charles knew that was what his life had boiled down to—a series of increasingly unpleasant choices.
“I guess hospice is the best choice. I can’t abide someone hovering over me in my home, but staying here is even worse.”
“I understand. Is there someone you’d like to talk this over with before you make a decision?”
Charles looked surprised. “No, it’s just me. There’s no one I need to consult with.”
“I see.” Dr. Masin averted his eyes, staring back at the charts, though not actually seeing them. “Let’s do this, then. Let’s keep you here for observation for twenty-four hours. The staff here are wonderful and they will take very good care of you. Meanwhile, I’ll see if they have a room open at hospice.”
“I’d like to have a chance to go home before I go there. Once I go into the hospice, I’ll never come out, right?”
Dr. Masin laid a hand gently on Charles’ shoulder. He ignored the question, but honored the request. “Of course. You shouldn’t be driving now. Is there anyone who can give you a ride home? I can arrange for a medical transport to pick you up there and take you to hospice.”
Charles started to say there was no one he could call when an idea popped into his head.
“I might. I’ll make a phone call.”
“Very good. We’ll keep you here today then and I’ll contact hospice for you. See you tomorrow, Charles.”
Charles reached for the tan rotary phone beside his bed. The receiver felt heavy in his hand. He held it to his ear and heard a reassuring dial tone. He dialed the number of Graystone Insurance. When the switchboard operator answered, he said, “Alice Harkens, please.”
THE NEXT MORNING CHARLES sat in a wheelchair under the overhang of Middle Falls hospital. A tall orderly named Mitch stood behind him, resting both hands on the grips of the chair.
“Good day to get out of the hospital, isn’t it?” He had a surprisingly deep voice for someone so thin. He squinted up into the steady rain and said, “But then, any day is a good day to get out of here, isn’t it?”
Charles didn’t answer, but bobbed his head slightly to his own interior rhythm.
Mitch didn’t mind his silence. He could talk enough for both of them.
“What kind of car is coming to pick you up?”
Charles tilted his head slightly to the right, considering. “I don’t know. I’ve never seen her car, at least that I know of.”
At that moment, an ’86 Mustang pulled up to the curb. Alice Harkens waved from behind the wheel.
“That her?”
Charles nodded, stood up with a little help from Mitch and walked slowly to the car. Alice didn’t get out in the rain, but she did lean across further and pushed the door open.
Charles climbed in and shut the door behind him. He didn’t think to acknowledge Mitch.
“What kind of gas mileage does this get?” Charles asked by way of a greeting.
Alice laughed a little, a happy tinkling laugh. “Not great. You’d think since they turned it from a muscle car to whatever it is now, it would get great gas mileage. But, nope,” she said with a shrug.
Charles’ mind spit out statistics. “This gets twenty-four miles per gallon on the open road, but only eighteen in the city. A more fuel-efficient car, like a Honda Civic Coupe, could save you thousands of dollars every year, depending on how much you drive.”
Alice kept her eyes straight ahead as she pulled out of the hospital parking lot. “When I was a kid, my older brother had a ’67. It was so cool that I promised I would get myself one when I grew up. By the time I did, though, they weren’t cool any more. I still kept my promise to myself, though.”
She glanced at Charles and saw he was unresponsive.
“Sorry, I talk too much when I get nervous. How are you feeling? Or, is that intrusive to ask? Never mind, I’ll just drive.”
The car radio was tuned to KMFR and Bobby McFerrin’s Don’t Worry, Be Happy was playing quietly. The windshield wipers squelched back and forth, providing a nice rhythmic accompaniment to the song.
When they approached his condo building, Charles pointed to the driveway that led to the parking garage. “If you’ll pull in there, I can get the elevator up.”
Alice steered the Mustang down into the lot and stopped beside the single elevator. “Here you go, sir. Door to door service.”
Charles realized that Alice had gone out of her way to help him, likely using her lunch break at work to taxi him home.
He turned toward her and stiffly said, “Thank you Alice, for giving me a ride.” A moment later, he was out of the car and disappeared into the elevator.
Chapter Nine
CHARLES OPENED THE door into his home and stepped into the comfortable familiarity of it. The unique combination of smells that made it home, the comfortingly bland sand-colored walls and taupe carpet, and the complete absence of decorations.
He automatically reached to put his keys on the small front table by the front door.
Charles had stopped actually seeing his apartment years before, but now he stopped and looked around. He knew this was the last time he would see it.
I have committed no crime, but I am sentenced to die.
He was not the type to feel sorry for himself, but he felt his throat thicken. He was about to step out into what he hated the most—the unknown. First, the unknown quality of the hospice, then the greater unknown—death and whatever lay beyond it.
Charles had never been a religious man. His mother had taken him to church every Sunday when he lived at home, but it hadn’t stuck. He spent his time in church running new equations through his head, not contemplating the divine.
Perhaps, for Charles Waters, those equations were the divine.
He wandered into his bedroom and wondered if he should pack anything special to go to hospice. Toiletries, certainly. He wouldn’t be caught without his comb again. But what would he wear there? Casual clothes, or would they put him in one of the horrible gowns from the hospital? Would he be restricted to a single room, or would he have the run of the place, as though he was spending a few weeks in death’s waiting room?
He decided to pack a few clothes. He would hate to get there and have someone say, ‘Oh, didn’t you bring anything to wear? I guess we’ll have to put you in one of these gowns after all.’
He chose three pairs of khakis—his casual pants, as he had never owned a pair of shorts or jeans as an adult—three long-sleeved blue button-down shirts, five pairs of underwear and socks. Seeing the clothes neatly folded and sitting in the proper order in his suitcase brought him a certain peace.
He packed his toiletries in the small zippered leather case. His mother had bought it for him the last Christmas she had been alive. It was made of soft leather and had his initials engraved on the top.
He had never used it, as he had no interest in traveling.
He carried the suitcase out to the small entry and set it by the door.
I should have other things to attend to, shouldn’t I? I don’t have a will, but I can’t think who I would give anything to. Is there anything from home that I want to take with me?
He walked back the bedroom and sat on his bed. He opened the drawer of the night stand and took out a smooth black onyx stone. He had found it on his first-ever rockhounding trip with his mother and she’d had it tumbled smooth for him.
In social situations he’d been forced into when he was young, Charles had always carried it in his pocket and rubbed it to calm and reassure himself.
He had stopped carrying it after a few years at Graystone, but knew he would need it now.
He walked like a ghost through his own home, touching countertops, his dining room table, his couch.
&n
bsp; I need to call the number they gave me. I need to. But, I can’t.
He glanced in the kitchen and saw that he had forgotten to pack his medication.
They’ll need those.
He plucked them off the counter and took them to the living room. He sat on the couch and cradled the bottles.
He sat very still, running an idea through his head.
It might take him an hour to make a small decision, but as soon as this idea came to him, the answer seemed obvious.
Nonetheless, he tossed and tumbled the idea, looking for unseen negative impacts.
He could find none.
He set the pill bottles on the wooden coffee table.
He eyed the bottles, once again calculating, calculating.
He took two glasses down from the kitchen cupboard and filled them at the sink.
Charles felt so relieved that he had found a solution to what had seemed an unsolvable problem that he nearly wept.
He took the cap off the pain pills and scattered them across his coffee table. There were fifty-six pills. He did the same with the stomach medicine. Only twenty-seven of them.
Methodically, he put two of the pain pills in his mouth and swallowed them with a gulp from the first glass. He had always been good at taking pills.
Ten minutes later, he had swallowed the entire first group. He had intended to also take the second group of pills, just to be certain. His stomach sloshed dangerously, though, and he was afraid if he swallowed more, he would throw them all up.
He went to his bedroom, took his shoes off and slid them under the bed.
He lay down on the bed and began to run his favorite equations through his head.
Chapter Ten
Universal Life Center
SEMOLINA PUSHED HER long black hair off her shoulders and peered more closely into her pyxis. An image rose from the cylinder—a middle-aged man lying on a bed, mumbling something to himself. Semolina spun the pyxis clockwise, then gentled it to a stop.
She sensed someone was at her shoulder and leaned into them.
“Hello, Carrie.”
“Semolina. I haven’t taken the time to visit with you for too long. I will rectify that.”
The dark-haired Watcher shrugged her shoulders. “What is time?”
“A construct to help those who cannot understand the universe believe that they understand something.”
Carrie glanced at Semolina’s pyxis, then reached out and touched it, feathering it left, then right, then left again. She reached inside and pulled the image out so she could examine it more carefully.
“Oh, how sad for him. He already has so many burdens. Now, look,” Carrie said, spinning the picture ahead, “he’s going to be reset. But, only a few days back. How can he have time to find what he needs to do in so little time? He will be sick already each time he is restarted.”
“I would swear you just told me that time was nothing but a construct.”
“Of course, but those on Earth put such stock in it, it might as well be real. They make it so.”
“But The Machine never makes mistakes. It is impossible.”
Carrie nodded her acknowledgement of that universal truth.
“The Machine is infallible. But sometimes part of Its calculations are that someone will reach a hand out and help where needed.”
Carrie tapped one long finger against the pyxis. “I feel for him. I won’t be hasty, though. It will be all right in the end.”
“Of course,” Semolina said.
“I won’t forget about him, though. He touches me. Call me when he is through with his next life.”
Chapter Eleven
CHARLES WATERS OPENED his eyes.
Directly across from him, sitting at a polished desk, was Dr. Masin. The doctor was in mid-sentence.
“—if we had gotten to it sooner, we would have had more options. I believe in being as positive as possible, but I’ll also always be honest with you. In any case, those are our options. You certainly don’t have to choose right now. But, I’m sure you understand. Under the circumstances, time is of the essence.”
While Dr. Masin spoke, Charles’ jaw dropped open and he cast his eyes around the room, taking in the diplomas, the tri-fold picture on the desk and Dr. Masin himself.
“What—what are you talking about?”
Dr. Masin opened his mouth to go over the information again. Patients who are hearing news this upsetting often need to hear it a second time.
Before Masin could speak, Charles held his hand up.
“No, don’t answer. I know what you’re talking about. I have late stage pancreatic adenocarcinoma. That’s not what I mean.” Charles dropped his head forward and held it in his hands. He rubbed his eyes and looked around Dr. Masin’s office. “I’m not sure what I do mean. I already died. Or, at least I think I did. I took all the pain pills you wrote for me. I’m pretty sure that would have killed me.”
It was Dr. Masin’s turn to look confused. “Charles, what are you talking about?”
“I’m saying that we already had this conversation. It’s not the type of thing I would forget, although I’ll admit I was a little fuzzy on the details at the time. Still, you told me all this. I didn’t know what to do, so I avoided you for a week. Then I got sick. You told me I should go into something called Hospice of Middle Falls. I couldn’t take that idea—dying around a bunch of strangers—so I took all the pills.”
“I’m not sure what to say, Mr. Waters. We’ve certainly never had this conversation before. Everything you’re saying—avoiding treatment, taking too many pain pills—is a truly terrible idea. Are you having suicidal thoughts?”
“Not at this moment, no. I thought it was a good solution, but I closed my eyes, drifted off, and opened my eyes here in your office.”
“You realize that can’t be, don’t you Mr. Waters?”
“Of course. It’s impossible that I died in my condo then opened my eyes here. Absolutely impossible.”
“Good,” Dr. Masin started, “I was—”
“Impossible, but it just happened.” Charles stood suddenly. “I’ve got to find out what’s going on.” He turned and fled the office. He rushed by the secretary’s desk, then turned and laid his hands flat on the counter. “What day is it?”
The middle-aged woman smiled kindly. She had often seen patients emerge confused from a consultation.
“It’s Thursday.”
“No, what is the date?”
She glanced at a small desk calendar to confirm. “October sixth.”
Charles slapped the counter while a small sob came from his lips. He put his knuckle against his mouth to stop it.
I’ve lost my mind.
Charles hurried to the stairs and ran down to the street. Everything was as it should be. People coming in and out of the clinic. A car alarm blaring in the distance. The October sunshine still slightly warm on his face.
What am I supposed to do? Where am I supposed to go? I am lost.
Looking at it from this new perspective, Charles could see he had been in a daze, unable to think clearly that day.
I’ve got to get home.
The bus stop was a block away from the clinic. Instead of walking to the crosswalk to cross, Charles cut directly across the street, which was a very un-Charles thing to do.
The man driving the late-model XJ-12 had just spilled his drink from Burger King all over his lap, his suit and his leather seats. He instinctively looked down to assess the damage. When he looked up, Charles was there.
Charles glanced to his right and saw the oncoming Jag. He willed his legs to move, but there was no time left.
The man in the Jag didn’t even have time to touch his brakes. The car hammered into Charles, sending him up in the air, off the hood, the windshield, then onto the street.
Chapter Twelve
Universal Life Center
“CARRIE,” SEMOLINA SAID. She said the name quietly, as there was no need to raise your voice in this reality.
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Where there had been nothing but empty space a moment before, Carrie appeared.
“You asked me to tell you when Charles reset the next time.”
Carrie bent over Semolina’s pyxis and tilted it forward, then backward. She watched the totality of Charles Waters’ second life in one go.
“I don’t know if I’ve ever seen a reset so difficult,” she said softly. “He has so much work to do, so little time to do it in each life, and he’s so sick on top of everything.”
“What are you going to do?”
“I’m not sure yet. A unique problem requires a unique solution. I will think about it. Let’s give him a few more lives to work things out on his own.”
Chapter Thirteen
CHARLES WATERS OPENED his eyes with a gasp.
Dr. Masin sat directly across from him. He was in mid-sentence and when he saw Charles’ reaction, he said, “Mr. Waters? Are you all right?”
Charles tossed his head left and right as if in the grip of a fever dream he couldn’t escape.
“Mr. Waters, I know how hard it is to receive news like this, but—”
“Do you? Do you know what it’s like to receive news like this not once, not twice, but three times? Do you know what that’s like?”
Charles eyes were wild, looking for an escape.
“I know this is incredibly difficult news, but you’ll need to calm down.”
“I’m not sure I need to do anything, Dr. Masin. The world has stopped making sense. I can handle being sick, but not this.”
Charles stood up and bolted from the room. He didn’t bother to ask the receptionist what day it was. He knew.
He ran down the stairs as fast as his legs would take him, then burst out onto the street.
Everything was exactly the same. The same people coming in and out of the clinic. The same car alarm in the distance. Curious, Charles walked to the edge of the sidewalk and looked to his right. He had to wait a moment, but then he saw it—a silver-blue Jaguar coming down the street at him. As it passed in front of him, it swerved a bit, as though the driver was distracted.