Early Departures: List 2

The hope was, with more time, family and friends could make it to the bedside of their dying loved one, exchange a few lucid words before they passed.

He’d make an excellent play-by-play announcer for the end of humanity.
I bet his I love yous sound like a eulogy.

A building of iridescent glass. A gleaming steel fortress.

That we're in a strange car, in the middle of night and nowhere, at some defunct dairy plant, and no one knows we’re here, or who we’re with.

I assure you I do not take your son’s untimely death lightly.

As for Whitney, Jamal, she has been fully apprised.

An expansive lobby filled with soft blue light that caroms off the concrete floor.

The work we are doing, Ms. Barrantes, we are reverse engineering death itself. Conquer death and every domino falls swiftly—pestilence, every senseless killing, every affliction.

“Ms. Barrantes, Jamal, these are our clinical modelers, Marcus and Kiana.”

This work, it’s simply a facade. Window dressing.

We take intermittent breaks, and at some point, they lead us to a room filled with enough food to feed all of Elytown.

Decided I wasn’t even worth a morbid, selfish thought?

The city also made a plaque, a vertical oak rectangle with a high-gloss bronze plate, like the ones in our school display case that read: Charles County Division II Softball Champs.

Never forget what? I asked Whit. That they’re gone? That Dad’s body was flung somewhere in those bushes? Not to mention, it’s ridiculously weird. Like, who immortalizes a tragedy with a tree plaque?

I spoon up the brown gruel, gulp it, lick my lips.

“Deeper. Dad’s voice was, like, way deeper. Almost guttural.”

We can’t keep sweeping things under rugs, Jamal. We can’t let the bad things fester inside.

The pain in Q’s face at once vivid and fleeting—like the pinch from a needle.

“An abnormally large head? A penchant for jacking up punch lines? A person who refuses to use plates but goes through seventy-four glasses every day?”

We both crack up. And it feels good. And no, not feel-better-about-Q good, obviously. But a tiny reprieve.

We used to resist it, ward them off.

We cling to each other like this kitchen’s a mountain face and we are dangling on its precipice.

Also, am I the only one who hates being told to relax? In the history of Homo sapiens, no one’s ever been told to relax and then actually relaxed. Plus, it’s hella condescending, no?

“Our initial reset target is no longer viable. We need to rewind Q a bit more.”

I slip into the seat and nostalgia floods me. It smells like Dad. How many times had he sat where I’m sitting now?

Suddenly, I’m in the passenger seat and I look over to my left and there is Mom, and she’s reaching across to pinch my cheek in that way that I absolutely hate, except she’s smiling her I love you no matter what even if you killed someone which I naturally wouldn’t condone but I’d certainly give you the benefit of the doubt I’d definitely hear you before rushing to judgment smile and who can resist that smile?

This is everything that ever was, anything that ever will be, swallowed by torrential downpour and knock-you-off-your-feet wind, and monstrous claim-everything waves, everything rushing, rushing.

And I’m glad it’s dark because my eyes start doing that thing that eyes are sometimes prone to do...you know, that go-blurry-because-whatever thing.

Normally, she would’ve bounded from the car when she saw me, and we’d race to meet in the middle of this street like it was some grassy knoll.

She gets out first, and I watch her walk toward the water so resolutely I half expect her to walk right in.

“For someone who claims he prefers spontaneity, you love talking about the future.”

Autumn’s hug is a kind of irresistible extraction that compels you to spill your whole guts.

“That the first undertakers were furniture makers. The casket game was a logical move. You already had the materials and the skill. You just needed the bodies, and God knows, there’s no shortage of those.”

I made a subtle move back toward her hand, but she pulled away, an apology on her face.

He nodded—and it was there, the perfect friendship cocktail, a finely shaken blend of reluctance, jealousy, and earnestness.