Rene’s eyes narrowed. “Need it? Need what?”
“Death — not death, but those feelings. How a person feels when he dies. You need that, don’t you? You get off on it.”
“Man, you are poking into something that is none of your business.”
Rene began standing, but Erico placed his hand on the morgue orderly’s arm. “Wait. Hear me out.”
Rene settled back into his chair but withdrew his arm. “I’m listening.”
“Look, I guess I feel like I do owe you something. You helped me when I was so afraid I might’ve died from the fear alone. The deal was I’d share my death with you, and I haven’t come across.”
“You will someday.”
Erico sat back in his chair. “Is that some kind of threat?”
“No. Just a reminder of mortality. Everyone dies.”
“Okay. But look at you right now. It’s been twenty days since you’ve had your fix, right? No one’s died here in almost three weeks. It’s getting to you, isn’t it?”
“You’re calling me a junky?”
Erico nodded. “It’s true, isn’t it? Just like a late stage addict, you need it. You need it just to feel normal. And you haven’t had any for a long time.”
Rene moistened his lips again and looked down at the arms that were folded across his chest. “I helped you, man. I helped them all. What’s so bad about that?”
“Great for them. Great for me. But what about you? Look at yourself. You look like any strung out coke head getting ready to do something desperate to get his shit.”
Rene bit at the inner skin on his lower lip as he looked at a point in space. “Erico, man, it’s not like that with me. I can control it. I told you before, I always ask. I never took anyone’s feelings, and I never killed anyone to get my fix, as you call it. If I was willing to do that, then I’d be down on Skid Row prowling among the homeless. All I do is share what death feels like with those who need it and share their deaths when they happen —naturally . I don’t kill anyone.”
“Look, Rene, you need help. Besides, what you can do is real special. Maybe you can make some important contribution to science or medicine. With— ”
“What I do, Erico, everyone can do. You too.” Upon saying that, Rene Boniface stood and pushed back the chair, picked up his donut, and left the cafeteria.
Code blue, code blue.
Stat time. Lights flashing, crash wagon rolling, an ominous flat tone from Room 324, the ICU nurses quietly and efficiently hurrying through their well practiced routine: strip, drip, ventilation, clear the mouth of obstructions, insert the air passage, blow, pump, pump, pump, pump, blow —
“Wagon over here. Let’s move it. Clear.” Calm in the doctor’s voice. Old hand. The whump of multiple volts passing through still living tissue, the muscles contracting and relaxing, lifting a middle aged carpenter named Pete Midori from the bed, going on the ride he paid for with a lifetime of Winstons and saturated fats.
Some scrambled tones for a moment settling down to a steady bip, bip, bip.
“Sinus rhythm.”
“Well, that was easy.”
Orders for meds, a chest x-ray, this and that. Once the patient was stabilized and the others had left, Erico noticed that the man’s eyes were open. Open and wide. He stood next to the man’s side, took his hand, and looked down into the man’s face.
The death’s head was there, grinning back through the man’s fear.
“You’re all right for now, Pete,” said Erico.
The man’s hand gripped Erico’s with surprising strength. “Help me,” he whispered. “Oh please God help me.”
The ancient enemy: the fear of death. A strange feeling of need and power, of wealth and longing, came over Erico; a vision of dangerous paths through newly opened gates. Erico Ramos looked down at face of death and said, “Maybe I can help.” He closed his eyes and entered the deepest pools of his soul.
There was a glow, a hazy blue light high above them. Rachael could feel her arm reach up toward the light, although she could not see her own hand. She couldn’t see it, yet it was not strange to her, for she understood everything.
“What is this?” asked Pete Midori.
“It’s a death,” answered Erico. “The death of a woman named Rachael.”
They traveled Rachael’s path, understood all and defeated the fears of the universe. They possessed the answers to all of the questions ever asked. All that was unimportant fell away. Every cell of their bodies became aware and understood its place and worth to the organ, the body, the universe, the soul.
The light, the center, the power without name.
Love.
Eternity.
Glittering billows of down soft diamonds parted and folded them within as every particle of them joined with every particle of the universe and became both the mother and the child of existence.
Erico felt chilly and desolate as he opened his eyes and looked down upon the joyful face of Pete Midori. He released the man’s hand and felt even more forsaken. “Thank you,” said the carpenter. “You’re an angel. You came to me when I was afraid. I don’t understand it, but thank you. I was so scared. But I’m not frightened now. How can I ever thank you?”
The image of the carpenter swam before him as Erico looked through his tears. “Yes,” he whispered as fresh caverns of despair yawned beneath his feet. “There’s something you can do. If you should die, please share your death with me. Then I can pass it on to whoever needs it.”
What was the knowing look in the man’s face? Secret knowledge? Suspicion? Or only concern. Erico couldn’t get over the feeling that Pete Midori knew exactly what was happening. “Yes,” said Pete quietly. “Sure.” Erico looked up to see Rene Boniface standing in the room’s doorway. The man’s face was desperate, hungry. “This one,” said Erico through clenched teeth, “is mine !”
The morgue orderly studied Erico’s eyes for a moment, nodded, and headed back toward the elevators.
The Calling of Andy Rain
“Prisoner, stand on the line.”
Billy Stark came to a halt and put the toes of his shoes on the white painted line before the barred entrance to “C” block. In his manacled hands he carried a cardboard box containing the few possessions he had been allowed in his death row cell. The corpulent guard on “C” block’s entrance looked through the bars and grinned displaying large, crooked teeth. “Back in the general population, huh, killer? Welcome to Club Fed. My name’s Grubbs.” The guard shook his head. “Man, Stark, you gotta give me your lawyer’s name. Can’t ever tell when I might need a miracle worker.”
“C’mon, Grubbs,” urged Lt. Rain. “I don’t have all day.”
“Yessir. Open seventeen!” shouted Grubbs to the door keeper. A warning beep sounded, the bars rolled open, and the guard stepped aside and commanded, “Prisoner, step inside the door.” Billy, his eyes kept to the front, took two steps and came to a halt, his toes on the yellow line inside the door. “Close seventeen!”