A Map of Everything: a novel by Elizabeth Earley

Author:Elizabeth Earley
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: BookBaby
Published: 2014-03-15T00:00:00+00:00

56. Barium (Alkali Earth Metal; Primordial; Solid)

In the fall of 1996, Jonas dropped out of medical school. I lived in the dorms at Winona State University and he moved back into his old room at Mom’s house. When I went there to visit, he looked awful–a bloated, pale sphere for a head with a beard like moss stopping just shy of his Adam’s apple. The skin that showed through the hair and stretched around his bloodshot eyes was impossibly pale, a kind of tissuey pink: the color of what it feels like to touch the tip of your tongue to the inside of your cheek. Coarse hairs from his top lip strayed into his mouth, stuck to his lip. He looked like he hadn’t showered or brushed his teeth or changed his clothes in days.

We sat on the floor in that back bedroom he used to share with Mark. He’d only been there three days and the room was already a mess–clothes everywhere, food wrappers, dirty dishes, a dirty ashtray filled with butts. The smell was worse toward the floor, so I sat on the bed, looking down at him.

“What’s going on with you?”

“I just can’t do it, I had to get out of there.”

“Why?”

“Because all I could think about was dying.” My instinct was to frown or gasp, maybe climb on the floor and hug him. That’s what he would have expected and probably what he wanted. But it wasn’t what I felt. Instead, I felt curious. He tried to look apathetic. I could tell that he cared because his eyes were wet and red. He looked so fragile, so on the edge, I was afraid to say anything. He was a dome of thin glass in my hands–any word, any move and he would shatter. He lit a cigarette.

“I think about death everyday,” I said.

I thought I saw a slight furrowing of his brow, but he went back to expressionless so quickly, I couldn’t be sure. He sucked on his cigarette, took a big gulp of smoke and expelled it with a gasp. He brushed the hair from his lips.

“Cool,” he said.

But I knew he hadn’t understood. I didn’t think about death with despair or even glumness, but rather with something more like appetite. Not appetite to die, but to explore the complex and multifarious passageways of thought and association attending the subject. That made me remember Andy and something he’d said about time. I remembered the hours I spent alone with him exploring completely uncharted thought landscapes. He had gone away when I found alcohol. I realized that I missed him.

“Being born is a sentence to death,” Jonas said. I thought about that and frowned.

“It’s more like a sentence to life. Death is just built into it.”

Jonas smiled almost imperceptibly and said, “You’re right. And life feels like a nightmare I can’t wake up from. Maybe dying will be the waking up.”

My frown deepened and I felt something dark and tidal start to rise in me. I sat up straight and stiffened to hold it down.

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