Untitled (Flash Fiction Pt 2)

It has something to do with perspective. It has something to do with being at the very end of things, about cleaning house, about readying for death. If you're young you'll think that is awfully dark. Perspective. Remember?

I push the touchpad buttons until the clock reads 10:20. I push start to set it. It doesn't matter whether it's really 10:32 or actually 10:06. I have no appointments tomorrow. I have no reason to get it right. Time doesn't matter anymore.

The clock reads steady now. The green numerals sit still and outside the car alarm falls silent. Then there's that space, that negative space, which comes in to fill the space of noise now absent. It's an acute silence—like the silence of the grave—that most people don't ever notice: Things are quieter after they've been loud.

It's 10:21 when I decide to leave the kitchen. The apartment is dark except for my reading lamp in the corner illuminating a copy of Harper's. Around me—on either side, just past a few layers of drywall and wallpaper—another forgotten elder is dying. Usually one a week.

Last week Mrs. Fletcher and Mr. Groby both died on Tuesday night, and then Peter from Bingo died Wednesday morning. It was some kind of record. We talked about it during lunch, over pea soup with ham and cheese finger sandwiches, crusts cut off. Over flat Pepsi. Over starched, white table linens. Over walkers and colostomy bags.

But I've forgotten my point. I've forgotten my point.

Around me, someone else dies.

Somehow, all of this is my fault.