Written by
Cosmo Smith & Ashm Walters
..
“Shakespearean Sonnet Ex-Ex-Vee-Eye-Eye, you’ll like this one. Shall I read it to you?”
That was me, Oliver McIntyre, reading to the closest thing I might have to a girlfriend, Carlotta Kiid. We lay on her hospital bed, me thinking about Shakespeare and his hackneyed nature and Carlotta thinking about whatever comatose people think about. If you think it’s terrible that I’m sharing a bed with a comatose person then I shall point out that the coma is how we met.
It had been a long day at school with Mikayla making it clear that she never wanted to see me again as she had something better and her name was Courtney and getting mugged walking home. At the home, I had to endure a stern lecture from Pater over where all the vodka in his cabinet was going. I still maintain he drank the spirits himself, if I want booze I can easily lift a couple of bottles of wine from the supermarket. As soon as I was in my room I quickly packed a suitcase and a backpack. I was unsure over what a high school student with a grand total of sixty-three dollars and slim pickings of friends could do in the world but still, with all the teenage bravado of the world I slipped out of the window and onto the sidewalk. Humans always aspire upwards and one of my few friends, Jeffrey, was working as an orderly for Standaloft Hospital, a short ten minute walk from my former residence. While waiting for him in the lobby I went for a bit of a wander, ending up in Carlotta Kiid’s room. In a fit of annoyance and frustration I sort of wept by her bed.
“Oh, sorry”
An Indian doctor with thick spectacles and a rather official clipboard stood by the door, looking at me.
“I didn’t know Miss Kiid got any visitors, I can come back”
The doctor hopped away out of the rabbit hole. Ignited with ingenuity, I looked at the chart on the foot of the bed and read that Carlotta Kiid was pretty much braindead and had been for the past eight months. This gave me an idea. This was the start of my vagrancy.
With the little money I had I bought a roll of aluminum foil and made a thick lining in my backpack. I would shoplift five or six books from well-established bookstores and then sell them to outlet stores. Twenty dollars a day for ten minutes work. On weekends I would go to video stores, shoe emporiums and electronic shops. It’s surprising how much you can stretch living off twenty dollars a day. If ever I was hungry I could go behind to dumpsters outside supermarkets; about sixty percent of what was being thrown away was only twelve hours passed the expiry date. With the residue of my earnings I was able to smoke three cigarettes a day, catch the bus to school, get new clothes and pay for any alcohol I could want and give me my freedom. It was my two obols.
It was idyllic, if not bohemian, which suited me down to the ground. Any time I needed a bed I shared with Carlotta and all of my possessions were kept with her. She was my landlord, my girlfriend and my therapist all rolled into one and slipped under sterile white covers. I think I was in love.
My day began with the familiar bright light of Carlotta’s room. I got up at five o’clock so as not attract too much attention when I use Carlotta’s bathroom. I think a comatose girl using the facilities would be too much, especially as her room bordered on the psych ward. After a quick shower, brushing of the teeth and combing of the hair I got dressed and ready for school.
I arrived at the newsagent at six-thirty. Mr. Pedanski was a hobbled gentleman with dusty glasses and a head devoid of hair.
“What would you be needing today Sir?” he leant over the counter and leered at me suspiciously.
“Walters cigarettes” I said cheerfully. He turned his back to look at his cache of cancer sticks.
“Red or blue?”
“Ah…” as I pretended to think, several candy bars fell into my jacket pockets and even a can of soda, “red please”
I placed my coins to pay for the cigarettes on the counter and walked out briskly. I entered school around seven o’clock to use the computers. Typing up my essay on the state of economy during the French Revolution I ate two of my candy bars and most of my soda. By nine o’clock I was in class and ready for action.
I sat through school, paying less attention to my studies than I paid for food and board. After six mundane hours I was allowed to leave. Lighting my second cigarette of the day, I walked home with my satchel slung around my shoulders. I had saved up enough for a bottle of tequila, which Jeffrey would happily buy for me if he got a share. I fiddled with my transistor radio I’d found in the trash while dumpster diving a few weeks ago. If you want to prove that a monkey shares the same ancestors as a human, just put a broken transistor radio in front of each and they’ll do the same fiddling about.
I returned o Carlotta’s room and studied for my Classics exam in the following week. After two hours I felt too tired to stay awake. I leant beside Carlotta and relaxed every muscle in my body.
“Sialon” she whispered into my ear. My hair prickled as she said that. She had not just said it nonchalantly but grabbed me and sat up slightly.
She whispered it again, “Sialon” before her heart monitor began to flatline. I had thought about that particular scenario months in advance. I quickly packed away all of my possessions and slipped out before the crash cart and the doctors arrived. From outside the room I heard Carlotta continually flatline until finally the plug was pulled.
I waited in the hospital lobby for Jeffrey, sitting in one of the comfy chairs. He had a hot pie to comfort me which was nice. He took the chair beside me and showed off a golden liquid in a plastic bottle.
“What is it?”
“Jet fuel” he grinned, setting it on the table, “it’s a cocktail with a bit of… well, everything”
“Why is it called Jet fuel?”
“About the same alcohol content. Sorry to hear about your landlady”
“These things do happen” I shrugged.
“What will you do now?”
“I don’t really know”
“You can keep your things in my work locker until you find a place to stay” Jeffrey said, “I just locked them up now”
“Thanks”
“I’d offer you my place but I’m already behind on rent”
“Of course”
“Anything you want to talk about?”
“Yes…” I thought of Carlotta’s first, and in my case, only, words before thinking better of it, “actually no”
“Well, I’m off” Jeffrey stood up, “hope you find nicer lodgings”
“You forgot your Jet fuel”
Jeffrey stood at the door but didn’t turn around, “no I didn’t” and then he left the building.
I sat on the roof of the hospital and fiddled with my transistor radio as the sun set. It was silver in design, with one of those really old grates on the speakers. I expected it must have made a tinny sound when turned up to full volume. As I played with the radio I sipped on the Jet fuel. I am no novice when it comes to drinking but that concoction was enough to bring a lesser drinker to their knees.
“Hello everyone!” said a cheery Estuary English voice from the radio, “this was DJ Delirious and welcome to the Sialon Hour”
My surprise that the Sialon Hour was what Carlotta was talking about was nothing compared to my surprise that the radio itself worked. I turned up the radio and listened in.
“To all our Oliver McIntyres out there, this is for you” the DJ Delirious began to play some smooth jazz. At the time, it didn’t sound so crazy. I unscrewed the lid and took a large mouthful of Jet fuel. It wasn’t tasting so bad at one third consumed.
“Actually” the DJ stopped the song, “Oliver McIntyre, we need you to do something”
“What?” I said into the radio grill, “what do you want me to do?”
“Stop talking into the radio?”
“Why’s that?”
“Because I’m not in the radio; I’m in your head”
“Oh. How are you in my head”
“It’s complicated”
“Really?”
“No. Go to the carpark”
“Why?”
“Just do it”
So I did. The carpark was reasonably full with almost every space filled. I wandered around the sixth floor until DJ Delirious spoke again.
“Go push that guy over”
“Who?”
“The man in the white coat leaning over the balcony smoking a cigarette”
“Why? I can’t kill a fellow smoker. We’re endangered”
“You’d better because I say so”
“And who are you?”
“Listen to me- in ten years, that man will work out the cure for cancer. I’ve seen it but we can stop it right here, right now, if you just push him over”
“I can’t”
“No?” DJ Delirious was surprised, “let me show you something in eight years time”
In the reflection of one car’s windscreen I could see a little hospital room where Pater was lying meekly in one of those hospital gowns, looking at the doctor.
“In eight years, your father will develop lung cancer and in two years, he will be the first person to be saved by the Ivan-Hao technique but you can kill him by killing this man now. No one will see you Oliver McIntyre, not for another thirty-four seconds and counting”
Ever notice how a ticking clock will make you do things you wouldn’t normally do? I swallowed the last of the Jet fuel and quickly bounced over to this doctor. He was standing on the balls of his feet, leaning as far over as he could to avoid getting smoke on his clothes. In less than a second, my palm slapped him hard on the back and he fell to his death. I heard the wondrous crack of his bones.
“Congratulations” the DJ said, “here’s your reward”
I stepped backwards and was hit by a drunk driver.
I never dream, it’s a waste of imagination. I awoke to a familiar bright light as a girl’s voice whispered something to me.
“Weary with toil, I haste me to my bed/ The dear repose for limbs with travel tired- hello”
“Hello” I was lying on my old bed in the hospital. A willowy girl with brown hair and the most gorgeous face you could ever see smiled at me which lit the wick in my heart. I tried desperately to think up something to say but she cut me off.
“You’ve been in here for three months, the car hit you pretty bad. Your head’s been a bit damaged in three places but you should make a full recovery. Also, they had to take off your left foot. Oh, and your parents are coming in tomorrow”
Though that was a lot of stimulus to take in, I did indeed accept it all into my psyche. I then realized that I didn’t want to come up with soliloquies to this Angel, just one clarification:
“Carlotta?”
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