I'm not quite dead yet. I think I might pull through!
There were some funny things about dying, or about realizing that you were going to die at any rate. Daisya had heard that impending death was supposed to consolidate the mind's focus (though whether that meant it consolidated its focus on some grand truth of its condition or simply on the fact that it was soon to be dead, or whether indeed there was any difference between the two at that point anyway, he'd never quite been clear).
Somehow, in his mind, the fiction of impending death had made him imagine that things like last words would all weave themselves together flawlessly, so that when the time came a person just knew, the way they knew their own name or what they'd had for lunch and whether or not it had been any good. (Daisya's lunch on the day that he died had been gazpacho, and it had been quite good at the time, but not very filling, and as far as last meals went, in retrospect, didn't quite hit the mark. On the other hand, it had been distinctly gazpacho-like, and thus not in the least bit sweet or cinnamon, which begged the question as to source of the taste he thought he might have in his mouth at the moment-if there was, after all, any such thing as this moment considering he was pretty sure that the state he was currently in a state was a state of dead-since if anyone had asked him, he would have said that death shouldn't taste like either cinnamon or gazpacho.)
At any rate, what he found to be the biggest surprise of impending death-the actuality, not the fiction-was that when he was asked for last words (a strange kind of courtesy from an evil SOB who was about to chew through you with a deceptively dainty butterfly) he couldn't think of a damn thing to say. He fancied, in fleeting, that this was because he was, after all, hanging upside down from a lamppost and all of his remaining blood, which he supposed was not much at any rate, was pooling in his head, which obviously wasn't very conducive to thinking particularly well, however you reckoned it.
The last thing Daisya Barry saw was the sharp-toothed upside down grin of the Noah by whom he'd been defeated (his posture made the upturned mouth appear twisted into a grimace of pain-funny, that). The last thing he thought was Ah well. It's been a fun li--
…
"-fe."
He sat up, looked around, and thought, Wow, that was a pretty weird dream. Then he spotted the roll of red tape and a decaying hand reaching up from under the bed, and decided that yes, he must indeed be dead.
Somehow, in his mind, the fiction of impending death had made him imagine that things like last words would all weave themselves together flawlessly, so that when the time came a person just knew, the way they knew their own name or what they'd had for lunch and whether or not it had been any good. (Daisya's lunch on the day that he died had been gazpacho, and it had been quite good at the time, but not very filling, and as far as last meals went, in retrospect, didn't quite hit the mark. On the other hand, it had been distinctly gazpacho-like, and thus not in the least bit sweet or cinnamon, which begged the question as to source of the taste he thought he might have in his mouth at the moment-if there was, after all, any such thing as this moment considering he was pretty sure that the state he was currently in a state was a state of dead-since if anyone had asked him, he would have said that death shouldn't taste like either cinnamon or gazpacho.)
At any rate, what he found to be the biggest surprise of impending death-the actuality, not the fiction-was that when he was asked for last words (a strange kind of courtesy from an evil SOB who was about to chew through you with a deceptively dainty butterfly) he couldn't think of a damn thing to say. He fancied, in fleeting, that this was because he was, after all, hanging upside down from a lamppost and all of his remaining blood, which he supposed was not much at any rate, was pooling in his head, which obviously wasn't very conducive to thinking particularly well, however you reckoned it.
The last thing Daisya Barry saw was the sharp-toothed upside down grin of the Noah by whom he'd been defeated (his posture made the upturned mouth appear twisted into a grimace of pain-funny, that). The last thing he thought was Ah well. It's been a fun li--
…
"-fe."
He sat up, looked around, and thought, Wow, that was a pretty weird dream. Then he spotted the roll of red tape and a decaying hand reaching up from under the bed, and decided that yes, he must indeed be dead.