the next big earthquake is long overdue
Will left for Japan soon after the results came in. A whole bevy of doctors agreed: he’s going to die in 8 months. He’d had suspicions for some time; he could feel it in his heart when he pushed up hills, the thumping wasn't quite right. He started saying it soon after, it seemed like such a funny thing to say. "I ... am going to die." How could he tell people? Really he just started one day, told the woman bagging the groceries, to see what would happen. She snorted at him. At that moment, it was the perfect reaction. Nobody dies. And from then on, he started telling people like the plague. He told everyone he ran into. He told babies and dogs. He told bus drivers. He even started telling his friends. He liked seeing their eyes leap away from him, their hands plunge into their pockets. And when they told him whatever you tell someone who says that, if he never liked them, he spits in their faces.
Then, he met someone else who was going to die in 8 months. She was a goth girl, all this mascara on her face, super pale, big black UFO pants flopping around. He was in the diner with Licorice, waiting for the waitress to warm up his cherry pie, and he saw her paying her check and he knew. She had this sunken look, this vague distasteful aura. He knew they shared the same aura and that she knew his death was also impending, on account of his own aura. Licorice, he said, wait for the pie. I'll be a second.
He paid for her at the counter with a fifty. He'd recently collected on his own insurance money - the death was that sure of a sure thing. He walked her outside to a sagging Oldsmobile with an alkaline trio sticker, and gave her his number. I'm going to the bar in a few hours, he said. You should come.
Now she was obviously 17, tops, but what did he care. He was gonna die in 8 months and so was she. All those convenient social regulations, all that empathy and concern, that all more or less disappears when you realize that the whole gig is off. No happy ending, just 8 months of anger and fear. You don't really have enough time to afford tactfulness, either. He was sure that within the last month he’d be a raving fiend, putting it in anything that moved.
When Will got back in, Licorice was staring straight ahead, a piece of cherry pie steaming in front of him. He'd watched the whole affair through the window, Will knew. But who cares, right? Licorice was unpredictable and pretty oddball, a real moralist at times. All the same, he was a solid person. Will had eliminated all the chaff from his life by then, spitting in their faces one way or the other, so it was mostly just him and Licorice now. But Licorice looked up at him, this damn fury and calm in his walleyes. Will had forgotten that he had his own sixteen year-old sister.
Licorice slammed the car door shut and paused for a long second before unlocking Will’s. “Not a bad catch, huh?” Will asked, just to see what would happen. He was bored with the thought of riding home in silence. Licorice flexed his jaw but kept driving carefully, obviously reciting some little koan or something in his mind. He was still at university, taking religious studies, while Will had dropped out after the news struck. It seemed ridiculous to stay, spend another semester or two planning for a nonexistent future. “Yeah,” Will said after a few minutes’ pause. “Soon as I tell her you’re going to be underground in 8 months, she’ll be all over me.”
He went to Aggie’s that night alone, found the girl waiting for him by the door. He waved her in. Aggie’s didn’t have a bouncer stamping hands at the door. Even if they could afford it, Aggie, behind the bar, was the kind of woman who just laughed like a horse when cops came around pushing ID’ing programs. To her, cops these days were nothing, just annoying pencil pushers. She was a lot like Will, but without the expiration date. After fifty-odd years of bartending, she was done with the rules. “eye-dee?” she’d snort and cackle, spraying spit as she laughed. “You think I’m the kind of eye-dee-ot who can’t tell a kid from a mill-worker?” The cops, for whatever reason, would feel emasculated in her presence and find various excuses to keep from patrolling that block.
Will loved it, loved that everyone he ever brought to the bar looked uncomfortable. It made them cling to him. He told the girl, Stephanie, the whole story of the last month. She sank back from him a little - the biological imperative - before the civilized part of her took over. A tall, morose man who must have been at least twenty-two, and he was about to die? It was a dream for her. Unlike Will, she didn’t know of her own oncoming death, but he could feel it even harder there in the bar. It was like something pulsing from her, like when a fluorescent light is about to die and the inside starts to feel grainy.
The whole night was too easy, except for the very end. When he tried to sneak her into the house quietly, Will found Licorice sitting at the kitchen table, playing with a set of car keys. Will and the girl were drunk, and she giggled helplessly. “Kiddo,” Will said, “good to see you.”
Now, Licorice didn’t really care about the situation either. A while ago his world had started shimmering with the face of the Buddha, and he knew that the whole situation was pretty irrelevant in the long run, given that Will was pretty far down the road to rebirth as a worm or a tick. He was just chewing on the universe, choking down illusion after illusion without a care in the world. Will, Licorice had decided soon after the death came up, was like a moronic honeybee, totally unable to tell a real flower (namely, the Buddha) from one of those cloth-and-wire numbers cultists were always sticking under your windshield wiper.
But beyond anything about eternal souls, Licorice had a sister. And no matter how much deep meditation he did, he still passionately hated every dirty, sniveling teenager that ever took her to a school dance or tried to get her to go out to the lake. He’d been one of them once, and he knew how their minds worked. They were hammerhead sharks sniffing for blood. And this girl obviously had parents, maybe even an older brother, all worried about her. She looked like an idiot, a girl that would be just as comfortable in a cheerleader’s uniform but had decided to throw together a few poems about death and a nice, safe alternate identity to play with in high school. With Will, she was in way over her head.
Then, he met someone else who was going to die in 8 months. She was a goth girl, all this mascara on her face, super pale, big black UFO pants flopping around. He was in the diner with Licorice, waiting for the waitress to warm up his cherry pie, and he saw her paying her check and he knew. She had this sunken look, this vague distasteful aura. He knew they shared the same aura and that she knew his death was also impending, on account of his own aura. Licorice, he said, wait for the pie. I'll be a second.
He paid for her at the counter with a fifty. He'd recently collected on his own insurance money - the death was that sure of a sure thing. He walked her outside to a sagging Oldsmobile with an alkaline trio sticker, and gave her his number. I'm going to the bar in a few hours, he said. You should come.
Now she was obviously 17, tops, but what did he care. He was gonna die in 8 months and so was she. All those convenient social regulations, all that empathy and concern, that all more or less disappears when you realize that the whole gig is off. No happy ending, just 8 months of anger and fear. You don't really have enough time to afford tactfulness, either. He was sure that within the last month he’d be a raving fiend, putting it in anything that moved.
When Will got back in, Licorice was staring straight ahead, a piece of cherry pie steaming in front of him. He'd watched the whole affair through the window, Will knew. But who cares, right? Licorice was unpredictable and pretty oddball, a real moralist at times. All the same, he was a solid person. Will had eliminated all the chaff from his life by then, spitting in their faces one way or the other, so it was mostly just him and Licorice now. But Licorice looked up at him, this damn fury and calm in his walleyes. Will had forgotten that he had his own sixteen year-old sister.
Licorice slammed the car door shut and paused for a long second before unlocking Will’s. “Not a bad catch, huh?” Will asked, just to see what would happen. He was bored with the thought of riding home in silence. Licorice flexed his jaw but kept driving carefully, obviously reciting some little koan or something in his mind. He was still at university, taking religious studies, while Will had dropped out after the news struck. It seemed ridiculous to stay, spend another semester or two planning for a nonexistent future. “Yeah,” Will said after a few minutes’ pause. “Soon as I tell her you’re going to be underground in 8 months, she’ll be all over me.”
He went to Aggie’s that night alone, found the girl waiting for him by the door. He waved her in. Aggie’s didn’t have a bouncer stamping hands at the door. Even if they could afford it, Aggie, behind the bar, was the kind of woman who just laughed like a horse when cops came around pushing ID’ing programs. To her, cops these days were nothing, just annoying pencil pushers. She was a lot like Will, but without the expiration date. After fifty-odd years of bartending, she was done with the rules. “eye-dee?” she’d snort and cackle, spraying spit as she laughed. “You think I’m the kind of eye-dee-ot who can’t tell a kid from a mill-worker?” The cops, for whatever reason, would feel emasculated in her presence and find various excuses to keep from patrolling that block.
Will loved it, loved that everyone he ever brought to the bar looked uncomfortable. It made them cling to him. He told the girl, Stephanie, the whole story of the last month. She sank back from him a little - the biological imperative - before the civilized part of her took over. A tall, morose man who must have been at least twenty-two, and he was about to die? It was a dream for her. Unlike Will, she didn’t know of her own oncoming death, but he could feel it even harder there in the bar. It was like something pulsing from her, like when a fluorescent light is about to die and the inside starts to feel grainy.
The whole night was too easy, except for the very end. When he tried to sneak her into the house quietly, Will found Licorice sitting at the kitchen table, playing with a set of car keys. Will and the girl were drunk, and she giggled helplessly. “Kiddo,” Will said, “good to see you.”
Now, Licorice didn’t really care about the situation either. A while ago his world had started shimmering with the face of the Buddha, and he knew that the whole situation was pretty irrelevant in the long run, given that Will was pretty far down the road to rebirth as a worm or a tick. He was just chewing on the universe, choking down illusion after illusion without a care in the world. Will, Licorice had decided soon after the death came up, was like a moronic honeybee, totally unable to tell a real flower (namely, the Buddha) from one of those cloth-and-wire numbers cultists were always sticking under your windshield wiper.
But beyond anything about eternal souls, Licorice had a sister. And no matter how much deep meditation he did, he still passionately hated every dirty, sniveling teenager that ever took her to a school dance or tried to get her to go out to the lake. He’d been one of them once, and he knew how their minds worked. They were hammerhead sharks sniffing for blood. And this girl obviously had parents, maybe even an older brother, all worried about her. She looked like an idiot, a girl that would be just as comfortable in a cheerleader’s uniform but had decided to throw together a few poems about death and a nice, safe alternate identity to play with in high school. With Will, she was in way over her head.