I was listening to Triptych last night and well...this happened.
Promises
It was today, and all would go well. He knew that for a certainty; he had been told that by...a friend. He thought Cecil was a friend. Yes, he was a friend. A good man, from a good town. (Though, not as good a town as Desert Bluffs, of course.)
Good friends didn't lie. Kevin trusted Cecil. Why wouldn't he? He had promised happiness, and the future, and community radio. And he wouldn't lie. Not about something like this. Not a kindred spirit like good old Cecil.
The standoff was today. All would go well. Strex Corp would leave Desert Bluffs, and then...and then...
Well, and then.
Promises, promises. Kevin loved promises. He loved lots of things. Everything. Well, most things. He didn't love it when people were unproductive, or lazy. Or maybe he did. He sure loved to reeducate those people, to feel their skin and their blood and their bones as they changed and were molded into better, hardworking citizens.
He smiled and smiled and smiled. This was a better now than he ever could have imagined. He loved promises. Promises that were empty and broken and not promises at all, but lies! He loved those the best. Those promises were the most interesting, the most exciting. His memories were fuzzy, but they were good. He remembered struggling, fighting, believing...oh, but those were unhappy times. Kevin was much happier now.
He remembered a promise that all would go well. That he would succeed. That he would be happy. He smiled, just thinking of it. That was a good promise, from a good man. What was his name again? Oh yes...Cecil. From...Night Vale.
Cecil kept his promises. His lies were truths! Cold truths, truths of what happened. Good truths. Kevin had succeeded, in a far more profound way than he ever could have imagined back when he was such a grump. And he was so happy...the Smiling God had made him so happy. All had gone well.
Kevin was so grateful to Cecil for that promise. He loved Cecil so much...so very much. He wanted to share his happiness with Cecil. He wanted to go to Night Vale and hug this man whom he had never before seen, and hug and hug until Cecil's arms broke and his flesh melted away and his eyes became as clear and distant and beautiful as Kevin's own. He wanted to show Cecil how happy he was...he wanted to smile and smile and smile and smile.
He promised himself he would find Cecil one day, and bring him his own truth. It was only fair.
He was an old man now. He saw far back into the past, his memories fractured. Distant. He knew now...now that his bones were turning to ash, his skin still blazing with the heat of the Smiling God's unholy light. He felt fractured, himself. Split into three. His past, his present, his future—they were all the same now. He was three in one, but one in three.
He remembered a voice. A man. A name. Cecil. His lips trembled, twisting into a smile. Good old Cecil. His promises were the best. What a good man! He remembered how jolly old Cecil had promised victory over Strex, happiness in radio... Or maybe Kevin was misremembering. Victory with Strex, happiness after radio...
The smile trembled; disappeared. He remembered pain. He remembered betrayal. He remembered hatred...he remembered false love.
Kevin didn't trust memory. Memory was lies. Promises were lies. Cecil was the king of lies; no, the narrator of lies. Of memory. Was there a difference?
Kevin felt himself crumbling, dissipating...he was an old man. What did that make Cecil? An old friend? Was he ever a friend? What even was a friend?
He trusted truth. Truth was cold and painful and lovely. He was a collage of personality, of memory, of emotion. Fragmented into three nows, crouching in one bloodstained radio booth.
It had been so long...so long...
Ought he to reach out, to reach back, to reach forward? Ought he to warn Cecil of what came, before it was too late?
Ought he to promise him the cold truth, as Cecil had done for him?
Kevin's face twisted and twitched in a spastic smile. He did love promises.