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Twenty-four hours earlier, Andy was watching a certain Woody Allen movie. Paul was with him, but wasn’t really with him. They were both watching the same movie, but they weren’t seeing the same things. You could tell by the laughter. This was the day that Andy started hating Paul. Because when someone can’t laugh at something that you find so obviously funny, that’s just what happens. It’s something that even six years from now, no one will be able to control. You hate someone when they don’t love what you love. It’s just the way it has always worked, and will continue to work. And when Andy let loose a guffaw, and happened to catch a glimpse of Paul’s serious expression, that darkest of emotions, that devil of the human soul that we call hate found a door into Andy’s heart.
So much so that 24 hours later, as the five friends gather to hear about Ned’s peculiar run-in with the friendly canine, Andy can’t help but think how he’ll kill Paul off in the story he’ll write when he gets home. First, he thinks about decapitation- because there’s nothing quite as brutal. Then he thinks about a wooden stake through the heart- because there’s nothing quite as effective. But he wants an original way to do it. So, he racks his brains and finally comes up with this:
The narrator of his story, all-knowing and all-powerful will kill off Paul not by actually killing him, nor by describing his death. Paul will die in the cruelest of ways: he will just be forgotten. He’ll be born, introduced as a character- a main one at that. He’ll be given a little taste of life in a story, and then he’ll never be mentioned again. Vanished into oblivion, cast off into the realm of the forgotten.
So much so that 24 hours later, as the five friends gather to hear about Ned’s peculiar run-in with the friendly canine, Andy can’t help but think how he’ll kill Paul off in the story he’ll write when he gets home. First, he thinks about decapitation- because there’s nothing quite as brutal. Then he thinks about a wooden stake through the heart- because there’s nothing quite as effective. But he wants an original way to do it. So, he racks his brains and finally comes up with this:
The narrator of his story, all-knowing and all-powerful will kill off Paul not by actually killing him, nor by describing his death. Paul will die in the cruelest of ways: he will just be forgotten. He’ll be born, introduced as a character- a main one at that. He’ll be given a little taste of life in a story, and then he’ll never be mentioned again. Vanished into oblivion, cast off into the realm of the forgotten.