Purgatorium (19 page)

I am shocked as I stand there with my mouth half full of chocolate, open, saying nothing.

“Yeah, I heard this gum was only sold in one place. I thought I would surprise you for a change,” says Madi, smiling.

I swallow the rest of the chocolate down and can only think of one thing to say. “You’re late,” I reply, pretending a semblance of control. In that moment, everything I know about life and love comes to a complete halt. I am stuck not wanting to move. Not wanting this to be a dream. Not wanting her to leave. I want to freeze time for just a couple more seconds. I see her eyes start to water as she smiles, feeling embarrassed. This is when I knew...

Madi, out of excitement, drops the stocking on the floor outside my door, the packages of gum spilling out. I grab hold of her waist and pull her closer to me, craning her neck, moving her face in close to mine. This is when I knew that she was the best surprise I could ever ask for. Just when her lips are about to touch mine, I hear my watch alarm go off. Beep...Beep…Beep!

45 Minutes

I hear the scream of the subway and my watch alarm again. I open my eyes and find myself on the subway car floor. Questions run through my head from what all just happened. All of them lead up to one specific one.

Is Madi real?

I look over and find a butterfly knife sticking straight up from the floor beside my head.
Michael
’s camera is right next to it.

I sit up and slowly stand. I see in the mirror that I have the Jack of hearts mask on still. The subway is just starting to brake as the light from the station streams in. I reach down, pull the knife out of the flooring, and pick up the camera. The train comes to a stop, the doors slide open, and I walk out.

Back up on the street, I walk along the bridge. I have put the camera in my coat pocket and have the balisong knife in my right hand. I continue working on the trebuchet trick. I drop it again. I look down at the ground. Why not give up? And why am I even trying?

I sigh loudly, kicking the knife along the ground. I reach down to pick it up. As I rise, I see a familiar face through the girders—the billboard with Madi’s face on it. A warm wave of happiness washes over me. I reach into my pocket, take Michael’s Polaroid camera out, and take a photo of the billboard.

The photo slowly ejects. I pull it out the rest of the way and start blowing on it. Madi’s face begins to look clearer. She comes into focus and I realize I do have something to live for. I have to carry on, survive, live for Madi.

I wave the photo around a little and touch the surface to make sure it has dried. I reach into my inside jacket pocket, take out my wallet, and carefully put the photo inside the inner sleeve.

I start walking, now with more purpose and determination. I see my apartment building as I walk off the bridge and quicken my pace, looking down at my watch. As I move quickly, I remember to keep practicing the trebuchet trick. I go through the front doors, into the elevator, still flipping the knife around. The painting once again distracts me, making me drop the knife on the floor. I think back to when I saw this painting for the first time in the white hallway. How something so significant, so beautifully brutal, can mean so little and yet so much to the outlining of my life. As I go to pick up the knife, my watch beeps.

50 Minutes

The elevator doors open again at the rooftop. I look up and see
Michael
waiting. He seems relaxed and appears to be holding a book.

“So, are ye lion or lamb?” asks Michael again.

I walk out of the elevator and onto the roof, holding the knife out in front of him, just a few feet from Michael.

Where does the music come from?

Michael, reading my thoughts, says, “It goes through your ears, into your eardrum, which then sends the information to your brain. So if your question is where is the music coming from then your answer is everywhere!”

Everywhere? What are you trying to say? That I am locked inside my own brain or something?

“You are correct, sir! Your outside body can still feel, taste, and hear when things are happening or being done around it.”

That means someone is playing music on the outside.

“Correct again, sir! Don’t ask me who because I do not know.”

Or you do know but you won’t tell me.

“Either case, it doesn’t matter who is doing it or why. All that matters is that it is helping you remember.”

Remember what?

“Yourself,” he says softly to me.

Still holding the knife, I reach into my coat pocket with my left hand, pull out
Michael
’s camera, and toss it back to him.

I can see Michael
looking into my eyes, and after a few moments, starts laughing. “There was a reason I left this for you. A picture is worth a thousand words, remember? Taking a picture can tell the soul many things. It shows passion in whatever you decide that means something to you. So what kind of pictures did you take? Let me see what you are passionate about, so we can see where your hope lies. Show them to me, if you please?” Michael extends out his hands.

I take out the picture of Madi and hand it to him. Without looking at it he says, “Just one? This better be one hell of a masterpiece then.” He looks at it and hands me back the picture as if he already knew what it was going to be.

“Well that’s a shocker. So you make her your symbol of hope again. Ha! Look where that’s got you already? You think she will be your guiding light out of this darkness? You’re wrong. Take a good hard look at the world you live in now. Haven’t you noticed what it’s organized around?” Michael turns around looking at the city.

I begin to look out from the rooftop, not knowing what I am looking for. I begin to think for a moment as I start to see the coffee shop where Madi and I met, the subway station where I saw her again. This whole place is all structured around me. It’s all starting to make sense as I glance back to Michael overhearing my thoughts to myself.

Michael interrupts my thinking. “Do you know why I don’t give up on you? Because somewhere inside you there is still a good soul and I am fighting for it. Why don’t
you
?”

Michael
looks at the
ledge of the roof. He takes a photo of it and adds it in with the others he has collected throughout the day. “
It’s time. The end all, be all question has come: Why sixty?

Frustrated and angry, I cannot make sense of what Michael’s saying, or why sixty should mean something to me.

“You know this! You just need to feel it. Leave Madi out of this. This is about you. It has always been about you,” Michael yells.

He looks at me waiting for a response that doesn’t come. Not a thought or even a sign of me knowing what it could mean. “Well I guess you have chosen to quit once again. I really don’t see what Madi ever saw in a quitter like you. Maybe she just felt sorry for you.”

Michael’s taunting pushes me past being able to think. Rage surges powerfully through me. I lunge and thrust the knife through the air towards Michael.
Michael
adeptly steps out of the way, snapping a photo of me with his Polaroid. The flash blinds me momentarily. I feel a hand on my wrist, twisting it around. The sharp pain causes me to lose grip of the knife. It drops out of my hand.
Michael
picks it up and kicks me down onto my front.

As Michael walks past me, I look up to see his necklace for the first time. It is the same coin necklace I saw in my dreams.

“What drives you? Is it hope? The hope to see Madi once again? Is that it?”
Michael
says as he strolls across the rooftop to the telescope. He gently places his hand on it and looks back at me.

“Hope will not set you free from this place. You remember me talking about that other troubled soul from this morning, right? He was a fool who couldn’t understand the difference between want and need. He didn’t see a past, present, or future for himself. He never took the time to find something better from within. He became comfortable, stuck in a place where his wife existed only in the form of his past memories. He accepted a beautiful lie—that he was somehow with her still—even though the ugly truth was that he had lost her through his own sinful choices. But! I never gave up on him and he knew that. He put all his cards on hope. The same kinda hope you are spellbound too. A hope that if he just stayed to relive his memories over and over again, that she would never leave him. He wanted the fairy tale. So, he made his choice. He didn’t need or want us. Each time we thought we almost had him, he would sacrifice his memories to the reapers. He could never know what he had done, or what he had lost. He believed in the false hope, the fairy tale of what they once were. Hope is for people who do not already live in grace.”

Michael
does the trebuchet trick with my knife and, walking past me again, drops it so it sticks in the rooftop surface.

“No one should be destined to be a prisoner of their own soul. I am over this. I have helped you too many times and each time we run through this race it just gets harder when it should have gotten easier. Maybe you just want to stay a walking mannequin. Maybe feeling anything else besides pain is just too hard for you to comprehend. Maybe it would be easier for you to stay…how you put it? Content.”

That single word alone now brings a sharp pain down my side.

“God be with you,” Michael says as he walks away from me.

I look at him, knowing what he is up to. He is trying to break me. He doesn’t understand what it was like living in a world without humanity. How could he? The only feeling I had towards anything was pain. The pain I felt every time I heard that loud noise ring in my ear on the subway train everyday. I almost in a way welcomed it. Feeling something was better than feeling nothing at all is how I justified it. It was as close as I came to feeling like a normal human. I only found out later that the loud noises were merely sonic qualities of timbre and texture. The elements of rhythm and dynamics that my brain couldn’t register because it was too pure. My brain couldn’t comprehend what music was!

I grasp the balisong knife into my hand, holding it in tight.

And now he is just gonna give up on me?! He is just gonna leave me here?! After everything I come to know?!

Watching him leave makes me think back to being on that grassy field on the inside of the track, just watching the runners go by, leaving me behind. I suddenly feel my heart start to pound. I begin to feel anger burning up inside of me. Something warm begins burrowing out of my chest. I feel a part of my numbness wash away from me. A different kind of pain rushes through me now. Not a mental or physical kind of pain but something else. Something new. It overcomes me like a wildfire.

Looking up at Michael, I jolt up. I throw the bite handle up while rotating the blade out, performing over and over the trebuchet. Michael turns around. The knife flips up above me as he follows it with his eyes. The blade falls back down to me and through my right hand.

I don’t feel it.

I can hear Michael laughing. Taunting me.

I welcome it.

The blade comes out with one quick jerk from my left hand. Taking hold of the handle, I throw the knife straight towards his head. He continues to laugh at my attempt as the knife gets ever closer to his face.

My extreme emotions consume every part of me. Time seems to slow down. I feel as though I am about to black out from the anger. My thoughts crawl into the shadows of my mind. My eyes become blind with rage. I am no longer me. I have no control and I like it.

I find myself running with supernatural speed, passing the knife in midair. As the blade gets close to
Michael
’s mouth, I swing my hand up and catch it, forcing the sharp end into his mouth.

When it’s just inches away from his uvula, I stop myself.

Michael doesn’t even flinch.
He
almost looks surprised as he tries to force a smile with the the blade still inside his mouth.

I take out the knife, flipping the blade back in and handing it to him.

I reach up to my own face, take off the Jack of hearts mask, and throw it on the ground beside Michael.

I take a breath and can feel myself back in control. Confused, not understanding of what just happened, I stand there in silence.