He woke in the middle of the night in a burning fever, his brain boiling and his sheets soaked in sweat. He rose from his bed and staggered to the bathroom, then collapsed. His last thought before he passed out was that he would die alone.
At sunrise, he crawled to his knees, wedged his head under the tap of the sink, and ran cold water over the top of his head and along the side of his face. There was no one there to help. Everyone had given up on him a long time ago. He returned to bed and lay there off and on for a week. For a while, he read Camus and Shakespeare. Then he read Houellebecq and Carver. Finally, he read Homer, who at least gave him a shallow sense of hope.
But none of it mattered much. Every fantasy, assumption, and belief he had been exposed to over the course of his life meant nothing at all. Most people seemed generally decent. Not all, but most. Still, few cared about anything beyond their own day-to-day survival. Everyone was self-absorbed. Their attention toward others was just an extention of their own obsessions. He had watched his mother glare at him resentfully in the last moments of her life. His father’s last words were, “I don’t want to do this anymore.” Each untimely death he witnessed had been a terrible mistake, especially the violent ones. And now it was his turn.
Everyone suffered inexpressable pain. Getting through each day was an act of courage, and few dared to pull back the curtain. Speaking truth usually resulted in harrowing consequences. He doubted if anyone would ever intuit his loneliness, but others had their own concerns. No one knew why all this happened or whether or not any of it was worthwhile. All he knew how to do was love abstractly and, every so often, specifically. At least that struck a pleasant note.
