Silent Echo (9 page)

Numi understands this. He is my closest friend and he understands that I am walking on the edge of a knife. He sees my dilemma as clearly as I do. I need to keep myself alive long enough to find the killer. I need the espressos, if not something stronger and perhaps illegal, to think clearly. I also need to treat my body—this body that has failed me—as a temple. It is a fine line.

No,
I think again.
I have failed my own body. You and you alone are the cause of this. The cause of everything.

I understand this. It has taken me some thirty-nine odd years to understand the lessons of taking responsibility. A good lesson to know, for sure, except I couldn’t do much with it. Not now.

“Rest, cowboy,” Numi says as he draws a blanket around me.

“Tell you what,” I say. “I’ll rest if you make a run to The Coffee Bean.” I try to make my voice strong but the words come out as a whisper.

“Or you will rest and do what I say, cowboy.”

“Please, Numi. Help a brother out.
Caffeine.
”

We are alone in my apartment. We might as well be alone in the world. It is just Numi and me. As I suspect it will be to the end. Numi’s palpable stare searches my face. As it does, the corners of his mouth begin to quiver, and then he breaks out into a wide smile, showing a lot of perfectly white teeth.

“I think I’ve helped this brother out above and beyond the call of duty.”

“Please, Numi. Coffee is life.”

He shakes his head once. Always once. Numi doesn’t waste his movements. “You need a few hours of rest, cowboy. Otherwise you won’t be help to anyone. Not Eddie, not Olivia. Not your brother.”

“If you don’t go for me, I’ll call a cab,” I threaten, but we both know this will never happen. I wouldn’t be able to walk down the stairs from my apartment to a cab without Numi’s help and he knows it. Numi leans against the wall with his strong arms crossed and one foot hiked up against the wall. He is my friend, the only friend I have left. He studies me as one studies a fine painting and I fight my discomfort.

He holds my gaze and I sense his great love for me. I am uncomfortable that a man loves me, even friendly love. Numi does not hold back his feelings. Yes, he is a man of few words, but he does not hide his emotions. They are there, on his face, in his eyes. In his touch. In his tenderness. In his sacrifice. He is his own passionate art, personified. I could learn from him. I need to learn from him.

Finally, he nods. “Okay, brother. I’ll go for you if you promise to rest while I’m gone.”

Numi doesn’t ask much of me, so when he does, I try to comply. “I promise. And I’ll drink all of this crap.” I gesture to the water and even the disgusting liquid cleanse he’s made for me again.

Numi simply nods and, with his eyes still lingering on me, finally lets himself out of the apartment.

I gave my word to Numi that I would sleep. Numi knows that I sometimes say what he wants to hear, although most of the time I try to comply. He has become more of a nurse than a friend these last couple of weeks. He doesn’t have to do it, of course. He can walk away and wish me luck, like my other friends.

Numi, of course, is not like my other friends. Numi is an angel, although I can never bring myself to tell him that.

He will be with me through to the bitter end, of this I have no doubt, and
I am fortunate to have such a friend. I am undeserving of such a friend. What did I ever do to deserve such loyalty and love?

I don’t know, but I have it and I know a part of me treasures it. The part of me that is comfortable with another man’s affection. A very, very small part of me.

I nearly smile as I turn over in bed. I cannot sleep. How could I sleep when my brother’s killer is still out there? Olivia’s killer, too. The same fucking killer.

As I close my eyes and try to sleep, the chaotic images come again. They are the surest proof I have that I am going to die insane. I don’t want to die insane. But I have no choice, no choice.…

Swirling images, coming fast. So fast and strange and beautiful and surreal. Incomprehensible, comprehensible. Bright and not so bright.

One such amorphous light scatters into a school of frightened fish. Swirling mist morphs into my mom, my friends, and then a face with a beard. I have no idea who the face belongs to. I don’t have time to ponder because my mind continues to spin out of control, spinning, scattering, fragmenting, disappearing into nothing. A lost mind… the ultimate death.

And then one such image appears from the sea of insanity. It is a face that I know well, although I rarely gaze upon it without the “8” carved in his chest and the slit along his tender throat.

My brother steps forward out of the flashing brilliance of a lost mind… he steps forward and seemingly into my bedroom, although my eyes are still closed. In this image, his neck is whole and his chest is unmarked. I would like to say it is as I remember him, but he is different now. Yes, he still looks young, but I see an ancient wisdom on his young face.

He is made of light. Beautiful, pulsating light. And his image holds. It doesn’t scatter or morph into something else. He smiles upon me kindly, loving, conveying a love that I do not deserve. I deserve no love. I can accept no love from him or Numi or anyone. I failed him. Failed him worse than any brother has failed a brother, ever.

I have seen the image of my brother before, stepping through the chaos of my nearly lost mind. These days, the image seems to be coming more
and more. As I have often done in the past, I try to apologize, but my mouth will not open. The words will not come. And, as I struggle for breath and will my mouth to work, for my voice to come, the image of my dead little brother fades, and Matt seems to step back into the chaos of my mind, back to wherever he came from.

I sit up now, weeping hard, although I don’t have the strength to weep. The tears and heaving wipe me out, and I do finally sleep, I think.

The sleep doesn’t last long.

I maneuver my bare feet to the soft carpet and into slippers. I don’t know why I care about slippers anymore. But I do. Slippers are civilized. I want to be civilized even in death. I rise, sway, find my balance, and move carefully to the kitchen table, where my notes are spread over the table, along with the grisly images of both police reports.

My dead brother and Olivia both stare back at me, both smiling, both carved with cryptic symbols.

The motherfucker.

The key is here somewhere. In my notes. In these photographs. In these nearly worthless witness statements. In here. Right here. Staring at me, like my brother is staring at me now.

I call silently to Olivia, willing her back onto my shoulder, but she does not come. I am on my own now.

A soft knock on the door pulls me out of my lonely thoughts. No one comes to visit me these days, except one person. One beautiful person.

I rise, pull my slender fingers through my thinning hair, and open the door for Mary.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Mary stands there, smiling.

I silently thank Numi for insisting I brush my teeth and wash my face before promising to get some shut-eye. Forgotten are the ugly photos and the police reports on the table. So very, very ugly, but never forgotten for long. I think I must have my days mixed up—Mary isn’t due here today, is she?

“Well, are you going to invite me in or not, Mr. Detective Man?”

I realize I have been staring. My brain is still in the sea of light with my brother. I force myself back to the present, back to reality. A shitty reality, to be sure.

“Of course.” I smile. I try to appear normal, affable. But not cool. Never cool. I gave up looking cool the moment I discovered I had AIDS. These days, I strive for looking sane. I don’t think I’m doing a very good job of it.

It is unusual for Mary to appear anything but calm and collected but she fusses with the indigo blue scarf wrapped around her delicate neck as we move into the living room. She is dressed in jeans and a cardigan sweater—also a first. Mary has no folders or notebooks today. She seats herself on the couch instead of her usual spot in the chair.

I distantly hear myself asking if she would like anything to drink. Coffee, soda, wine?

I am now astounded that she gazes up at me and asks if a glass of wine would be too much trouble.

“Of course not.” I am equally delighted and disheartened that she wants wine. Delighted because this appears to be a social visit. Disheartened because I doubt that I have the strength to uncork a bottle of wine. Despite my low blood pressure, I feel the pulse drumming in my temples in excitement.

In the kitchen, I fumble with the corkscrew. I curse myself for my weakened state. Perspiration beads my forehead as I try desperately to gain some traction into the soft cork. Soft or not, I just don’t have the strength. I inhale a little too sharply as a gentle hand falls upon my shoulder.

I turn, defeated, sweating, shaking. Mary smiles up at me. I feel like weeping, to let loose. To collapse. I don’t do any of those things. I smile weakly.

“Can I help, sweetie?”

I only nod and smile. Her smile does not contain sympathy or pity, as most other smiles do these days. Her smile conveys…

I swallow.

Hard.

Her smile, I’m certain, conveys
love
. Real love. Romantic love.

Jesus,
I think.
The woman is crazier than me.

She takes the corkscrew from me and proceeds to open the bottle. Her hands are strong, lithe, dexterous. I want to do something, to help even in a small way, and so I reach for two wine glasses. My shaking hands nearly drop them as I set/slam them before her. Surely she sees my shaking hands, sees me struggling, but she says nothing. She simply purrs and smiles. I sense raw sexuality coming off her in pulsating waves. She does not comment that I shouldn’t be drinking. She pours and smiles and radiates…
love.

We take our drinks back into the living room. I’m feeling more alive than I have in a long, long time. A dead part of me is awakening, too. I’m astounded at that stirring of my body. We sit closer to each other than we ever have before. I’m in love with her and I’m living on borrowed time. I am euphoric that Mary is here with her too-long nose and her straight blond hair
and rose-petal lips. She’s here with me drinking wine and caring for me and loving me. There is nothing else in this moment that I want. Nothing but Mary.

Her delicate skin is flushed as she glances away shyly. “Perhaps I shouldn’t have come,” she says. “I… I wanted to see how you were doing.”

I don’t buy it. I think she wants something else. I say, “I can’t tell you how glad I am that you did. Mary…” My voice trails off. Not because I don’t have the strength, but because I don’t want to waste time with blather. I just want to take in her fragrance. Interestingly, even as my strength wanes, my senses seemed to have heightened. Her sweet perfume awakens within me a hunger that I had shut down months ago, seemingly years ago. Mary has stepped out of her professional role and into my life, my personal life, and I am not sure what to do with her. It had been so long. So very, very long.

I swallow. I’m suddenly not sure what do with my hands. My aches and exhaustion disappear into the background. But they are still there, always there.

I wrap my brain around the situation again. Mary has come to me. Mary has come to my home when she wasn’t required to. Nobody does that anymore. Nobody except Numi. And Numi is the furthest thing from my mind right now.

“Mary,” I say again as I finally decide to lay my hand on hers. I decide to open with a joke. “What brings you here?”

Mary’s blush deepens slightly. She is not the case worker now and I like her self-consciousness even more than I like her professionalism. “I was in the neighborhood.…” She trails off and I actually laugh. She laughs, too. Two normal people enjoying wine, laughing, life. No one facing imminent death.

Except I am facing imminent death, and with each passing breath, it’s coming closer and closer. No time to play coy. No time to court her. Only us, now, in the moment.

“You wanted to see me.”

Mary downs a little too much wine. She’s nervous, but not unsure of herself. I sense that her feelings for me are real. “Yes, Jimmy. I came to see you, and only you.” Mary looks down at our now-entwined hands and I look, too. I am surprised to see—and feel—her own hand shaking slightly. This isn’t easy on her, either. How is it easy to fall in love with a dead man walking? I cannot afford sorrow, especially not from Mary. I don’t have time for sorrow.

I reach for her face with my other hand and draw her chin up and she looks deep into my eyes. We do not speak because there are no words that will change anything. Not my disease or the fragile state of my body. Words will not change the love I have for this beautiful woman who had the courage to accept her feelings for a dying man. And come to me without her notebooks or any pretense. She was here. For me.

I gently wipe away a tear that has beaded in the corner of her eye. Surprisingly, my hand is not shaking as I make the gesture. She gives me strength. As I do so, Mary leans in and her extraordinarily soft lips brush my own.