Second-to-last chapter...
I'm so close! (yet so far...)
Well, my A/Ns are always so short! Thanks to everyone whose reviewed this, and please enjoy this update.
Dear Arthur,
If there is a God, let him hear my plea.
I want to see you again. I want to hear your voice. I want to see your green eyes smiling at me. I want to know that you are alive.
Until then, I'll keep sending these letters to you.
Hopefully you can see them where you are now.
Alfred clutches the paper like a lifeline as he slowly falls asleep.
"Alfred. It's time to wake up."
"Go away. You're dead. This is just a dream. When I wake up, you'll be gone."
And he is alone in his room.
"Have you tried reasoning with the voice?"
"Huh?"
She looks over her glasses at him. "Reasoning with the voice. Telling the voice that he should move on."
"No… I can try it."
"Alfred."
He tenses. The voice is back.
"You know, Artie, I'd like you to realize something."
"Alfred?"
"You're dead, you know, Artie. No matter how much I want you to be alive, you're not."
"Alfred, wake up."
"I can't! I am awake! You're the one who will never wake up again."
"Open your eyes, poppet."
"But my eyes are open!"
He argues long hours with the voice, but it seems not to notice him.
"It didn't work."
"Describe."
"The voice either ignored me or just didn't seem to hear me at all."
"Hm… Here, you can try this." She hands him a simple business card with a name and a number on it. "This is my friend, Sakura Honda. She and her older sister are professional exorcists. If all else fails, try them."
He reluctantly pockets it.
"Hello, this is the Panda Exorcism Agency, aru. How may I help you today, aru?"
"There is a voice haunting me. I think it's the voice of my dead boyfriend."
"Your name, aru?"
"Alfred F. Jones."
"And when can we schedule an appointment?"
"Uh… next Wednesday?"
"Good, aru. I will see you at the St*rbucks on the corner of 20th and Main then."
Sakura Honda turns out to be a small, slender Asian girl accompanied by her older sister, Chun-Yan Wang. They both are excessively polite and move with such grace that Alfred feels like a clumsy fool compared to them.
Both order green tea; Alfred orders a coffee.
"So, aru, you hear a voice that no one else can hear?"
Alfred nods.
"And you were referred to us by Monica – Dr. Beilschmidt, that is?"
"Yes."
"So your boyfriend, Mr. Arthur Kirkland, died in a car accident about a year ago?"
He nods again.
"And let's see… how long ago did you start hearing the voice?"
"A few weeks ago."
"Does he have any blood relatives?"
"Not that I know of…"
"Well, aru, we can't really help with this. He probably isn't a ghost, because if he was you'd be physically harmed by now, and he is definitely not alive."
His cowlick droops.
"Just take these talismans; they should be able to block out the voice."
He takes the yellow talismans written in blood red and ebony ink.
The voice does not appear for two weeks.
Two quiet, oppressive weeks.
He almost welcomes it when it returns.
"Good evening, Alfred."
He sticks one hand into the pouch in which he has stored the talismans the exorcists gave him.
"How are you today?"
"I'm fine. And you?"
The voice continues on, ignoring his response. "I brought you some flowers today, and the doctor says that hopefully you'll wake up soon."
"The doctor? What doctor? I'm awake." He slowly pulls out one talisman, and sticks it on his door like Chun-Yan instructed him to.
"I wasn't here for two weeks since we had a World Meeting, in Moscow of all places. It was rather scary, seeing such a happy Russia every morning. If you were there, you'd probably pick a fight with him inside of two minutes."
"Russia? Who's that?"
The talisman begins to work, and the voice becomes crackly with static.
"Please –kkkkhckkkkk – Alfred."
The voice fades. Finally, he is truly alone.
He remembers the words Matthew spoke to him: The key's taped in that album of photos of you and Arthur from a while ago.
He searches everywhere for the album; it is hidden under his bed, dusty and worn. He brushes his hand across it, cherishing the feel of the smooth leather on his fingertips, before steeling himself and opening it.
All the photos are gone.
He gapes at the now-empty album and flips through it, desperately searching for a picture (any, one, at least one must have survived!)
He finds a single cutout of a newspaper article, stuck between the last two pages of the album. There are no pictures.
He pulls it out slowly, the paper crinkling at his touch.
Car Accident Injures One
In a lucky stroke last night, a car accident involving a Honda Accord with two people and a stray dog killed none and injured only one. The stray dog escaped unharmed. The injured man was immediately sent to the hospital and is now in the intensive care ward. There has been no news as of yet.
He breathes in. That was a possibility he had never considered. Maybe Arthur wasn't dead but merely got amnesia from the crash and was now gone.
The therapist must have been mistaken. It cannot be. And maybe that's why he keeps hearing Arthur's voice in his dreams.
It is a sign.
He sets down the paper and runs out of the house.
A screech of tires, a blinding light.
A warm wetness.
Red.
White.
Black...
The windows of the room are open, and the curtains fluttering gently in the breeze. A man walks in and sits on the chair beside the bed. He picks up the patient's hand and gently squeezes it.
"Fight on… please."
A single pinprick of consciousness in a pitch-black environment.
Who am I?
Where am I?
A name appears to him – two, in fact. America, Alfred F. Jones.
It is oddly comforting, this darkness. He sees nothing, hears nothing, feels nothing.
A detached soul floating in the darkness of the universe.
A light, as if from far, far away. He is curiously drawn to it, like a moth to the flame, but he feels resistance as he approaches.
A voice.
His own?
No, he is just a floating ball of light. He has no voice.
"Fight on…"
Next update will be the last, hopefully... unless I want to write an epilogue.
And ohoho... you can see the ending, right?
Hehehe~