Author's Note: Just started writing itself…
;';
There are words for this, but he doesn't know them—he doesn't remember. They're primal and carnal and built into one's system, but he can't remember. Doesn't know. Refuses to accept. Psychiatrists and psychologists babbling into his ear. She's standing there and he's falling with her hand…
And cut to a few months later…
…When he sits by himself (no, not by himself, with his Vicodin, scotch, and cane—more loyal than any dog) and drowns in softly played Pachelbel and loudly sung Paper Lace songs. It's her face he sees and it's her face that he throws the bottle at when Pachelbel dies and Paper Lace wails. He curses himself when the scotch shatters and he's left sitting there…
To be forgotten only weeks later…
…When he hears (never sees—she hides things well) about her emotional descent. She shatters like the scotch's bottle, but she's more delicate and buying a new Cameron fixes nothing. He contemplates sending a strand of her hair off to some remote location in France where they claimed to have cloned a human, but he decides that she'll get over it. People always do. Because…
Minutes pass…
…And it's silence in the room. Patients die, but patients do not die like this. Patients do not die like this. Patients die because they screw up; they don't die because vengeful morons pull damn plugs. DNR's and proxies mean nothing to him. Signatures are superfluous. But this too shall pass…
To find them all years removed…
…He's forgetting things he shouldn't and she's disappearing into his age. He can pray, but he won't because praying doesn't change the fact that time moves forward and that next year his body'll be full of another year's wear. Wilson talks to him, but his retorts aren't witty. It's a forgotten word that makes the sting disappear. It's the lack of inflection. General Hospital's plots fade into confusing complication. Foreman's on the phone and he forgets the man's first name. Soon he'll forget her face, Cuddy's, Wilson's, Stacy's…
Please don't go…
…But he'll disappear one day into nothing. Fade away into small pieces and time and history…and will anyone even remember him? She will, but she's gone. She's somewhere…(where? He can't remember…it's there…he knows it is…what's the damn word?)...
When everything ends…
…There's a beautiful face staring at him. It's gorgeous. Perfect skin, slightly graying hair. And a man's face next to hers. His gray hair is steel. And the woman looking at him with a glance…he can't describe. He can't describe anything. Another woman. A black man. Another man. He can barely distinguish genders. Or are they colors? What day is it? And what does this metal think with sharp spikes do? Sentences escape him. Words catch in tangles of plaque in his mind. He doesn't know this, though. He is losing himself to his mind. Slowly falling, blackness. Goodnight.