you feel the wind wash over your face, the air plunging into your lungs—or in Sonny’s case, the air plunging out of his lungs as I smashed his esophagus with my foot. “Did this go the way you thought it was going to?” I said to him as he fell flat on his back, gasping for air.
“We can finish this up the easy way or the hard way—your call,” I said to him as I eyed his clothing. “My butt’s too shy to blast through the crowd in this gown.” I turned and showed him my bare ass.
Sonny got back onto his feet.
“Alrighty sweetheart, have it your way.”
We squared off, Sonny with a knife, and me… “All I got is mashed potatoes and gravy, while you’ve got yourself a knife.”
Sonny choked out some words, inaudible words. “Don’t worry, baby, I’m still in, all the way,” I said.
I used to love Christmas, but I didn’t really celebrate it too much anymore, on account of my whole family being - something I didn’t really like to spend too much time thinking about. Christmas was just a reminder, a call to the soul, as it were.
The carolers started singing “We wish you a merry Christmas.”
God, that brings back memories. My mother used to always sing that to me. “Did your mother sing to you when you were little?”
Sonny looked at me, confused.
“Was your family big on Christmas?” I asked. Sonny shook his head.
I grabbed my food tray. “I told you to help yourself to this shit right here.” I flung my dinner in his face.
Sonny lunged at me again with the knife.
I used the food tray to block multiple swings, shredding it and lining the walls with mashed potatoes and gravy. “What a waste,” I said as I started singing along with the carolers.
Something about the song just called to my soul, the same way air calls to the soul of a man who has been underwater for way too long. “We wish you a merry Christmassssssss.” I shoved the shredded food tray into his face and whispered into his ear, “Take a deep breath now; we’re about to go under,” as I knocked him out with a well-placed knuckle blow to his neck.
I caught his limp body as I kept singing, “And a happy new year” and dragged him over to the hospital bed. “It was so nice of you to stop by and keep her warm for me,” I said as I placed him in my bed.
I stripped him.
Swapped clothes with him.
Grabbed his broom and headed for the door.
On second thought, I doubled back and handcuffed him to the bed. Just a little insurance policy for my nurse’s safety.
II
Anger
Humility has a face; that face is me. Humiliation has a face; that face is me.
To be humble and to be humiliated are two very different things.
The day we can grasp that concept is the day we are finally ready to see that the stranger in the mirror is me.
Fuck Everything and Run
The hospital hallway was bustling with nurses, doctors, Christmas carolers and a small child navigating a hot wheel’s truck, as he wove it in and out of foot traffic. Nobody noticed as I casually pushed a broom down the hallway, face concealed by the bill of Sonny’s baseball cap.
What is a person’s true north? For me, I’d been running and gunning for so long I had a really hard time remembering. I enjoyed some drugs from time to time; I even enjoyed a little mainlining from time to time, but with the life that I lived, who could blame me? I am not an addict. I am not a junkie.
Nobody can ever compare me to the shit-stained bile that I worked tirelessly to clean up off my streets over the years. If a man needs a little reprieve now and again, but he can’t get away because of his thriving business, sometimes he’s gotta find another way to take a vacay. That’s the only reason I partook in the substances.
Right now, I could really use a little vacation time too. Thankfully, a distracted nurse manning the medication cart decided to sponsor my little vacation time, so I managed to swipe a whole pocketful of Percocet on my way out.
I found an unlocked truck, old enough to hotwire, and left the hospital in the rearview mirror.
I’ve always had an “oh shit” plan, the plan B for when plan A goes to hell in a hand basket, and this seemed to be hell in a hand basket territory. Luckily, I cut off ties with all family years ago, so all I needed to do was get to my old cabin, get my go-bag and hit the damn road.
I hadn’t been to my cabin in years. I got inside, got my bag and sat down in my old recliner for a minute to go through all of my tools.
“It should have everything needed for survival. Water, cash, a back- up phone, non-perishable food, a change of clothing, and a blanket,” Dad said, as he showed me the bag he liked to keep in the trunk of his patrol car.
I soaked up everything he told me like a sponge. “When are we going inside the shooting range?” I asked.
He laughed at me as he grabbed the weapons and closed the trunk of his patrol car. “Right now.”
I followed him inside. I loved these moments.
“One of the most important tools a police officer needs to possess is something you don’t have to reach for. It’s something you’re always be armed with; can you tell me what that is, Danny?”
“A gun?”
“A gun is something you have to reach for. What can you think of that’s always with you, no matter where you are, no matter when you need it?”
I shrugged. “Compassion,” he said. “Huh?” I said.
“The best weapon we have in life is compassion, empathy, the ability to walk a mile in another person’s shoes. I believe that with the right amount of those, we may never have to discharge a gun,” he said.
My survival bag was just like his except for a few extra perks: whiskey, dope, a new identity, and a few syringes. “It’s all about tools,” Dad said as he loaded his Glock 22. “This here Glock is an Austrian-made handgun that first hit the market in 1990.”
“Ooooooh,” I said, giving the Glock my rapt attention.
“This one right here, this is the Glock 19. It’s been around since 1988,” he said.
“Which one is your favorite?” I asked.
“I’d rather talk about your favorite tool,” he said.
My dad’s voice haunted me as it drifted away, back into the closet, where a skeleton should stay.
“I suppose that’s a rhetorical question?” I asked as I slid the needle into my arm.
The blood rushed into the barrel of the syringe like a crimson tidal wave, mixing with the Jack Daniels and turning black, along with the rest of the world, racing by like a subway in a long dark tunnel.
Light rips through the darkness in flashes with memories of my Emily, sitting by the creek.
She’s afraid to go in.
She’s holding my hand as we stand at the doorway to a funeral home. I’m afraid to go in.
“What’s wrong? Don’t you know how to swim?” Emily said as she rips away.
She rips away from me.
“HELP!” I scream as I try to hold onto her.
The tunnel slows down, finally. Everything is calm, as we softly land at the hospital. It is THE day. The day to end ALL days.
Emily