by Brandyce Ingram
“I am dying.” His comically obvious words were punctuated by syllables like the title of a film, perhaps in an effort to convince himself that it was all a show. Just another climax to just another movie. He worshipped outlaws, the broad-shouldered with hidden holsters, Bogarts and Waynes, high rollers and sharpshooters, silver-tongued bluffers in gator skin boots, and all those heroes and tropes he’d espoused into his identity. But there is nothing heroic about dying from addiction. Like any addict, his mastery of denial was almost charming, despite his having gone through nasty injuries and nastier withdrawals several times in the past decade. I had to hand it to him—any other seventy-something year-old would have folded the first time.
His hands looked diseased, with big purple splotches seeping outward like wet ink on satin, the bones sprawled and taut. I caressed the insides of his wrist with my thumb, as if DT shivers might freeze him alive.
“You’re okay,” I whispered, not so much to him but to the space. “I’m here, Daddy.”
“No, I’m not okay. Not okay. Not okay.” The voice of an obstinate child.
He gripped my arms, pulling me close, and blinked wide. I noticed pale blue rings around his brown irises and pushed away the intrusive question I wanted to Google: Do irises change at Death?
At is a funny preposition to apply, as if Death is a location. Why not by or for Death? I amended my mental note to read: “Do irises change for Death?” Like an offering, aimed for the nicest view in whatever afterlife castle you dreamt of. Do irises change between Deaths? Under Death? Above Death? Where does Death rest in the body, assuming it stays for a brief visit to clean up? What a lovely guest Death must be, leaving the body so silent and tidy.
“Help me, help me, I’ll be a good boy,” he pleaded. “A good boy.”
He gripped my arms harder and pulled me toward him to pull himself up. I felt like a flimsy tree branch, bowing under the weight of ice.
Does Death weigh anything? Or does it hit a gravitational pause button? Does Death work out? Surely, Death must be in good shape; the inverse of birth seems equally taxing.
My copper bracelets dug into my skin under the pressure of his palms. I tried to free one of my arms, and his hand obliged for a second but was soon locked around me again like a frenzied octopus.
Does Death place bets with Birth? Who’s the better player? Do they bet money, souls, or Time? No, Time must be the dealer, the kind with sharp hands and sharper grudges.
“Help me, B. I need help. Noooobody’s helping!” He trumpeted, prompting a nurse to poke their head into the room and give a nonchalant nod.
“I’m here, Daddy,” I offered, his hands still around my arms, and I wondered if he could feel my pulse. What is Death’s resting heart rate? Does it increase when he’s bluffing? Was I really there for him—ever?
“What time is it? The time! The time, B!” He was agitated, and the nurse came in and punched a few buttons. The screen above read: FtnL, then a dash with numbers, likely enough fentanyl to kill a kraken.
Is Death ever helpless? Broke? The most powerful and feared thing on the planet (besides Time)? Or maybe Time and Death are estranged siblings, distanced by duty and love of different games.
My dad didn’t die that day. Death let Time win the round, albeit with fine print: bleached spaces in his mind, what the neurologist called “gray matter,” erasing bits of himself and me. He became a child, a carefree joker at times, a petulant, pissy king at others. All the dementia stories I’d come across in my lifetime couldn’t prepare me for his erasure. A silver lining: he forgot he loved bourbon.
Within a year, he’d be back in urgent care, having gained several machines, wires, and nodes around his head, body, face, and hands. This time, unconscious. My dad would have been humiliated, hog-tied with wires and beeps. He wouldn't have wanted me to see it. Now I can’t stop.
Beeps punctuated the whoosh of artificial lungs, and Death rolled in, a hotshot with holsters of stillness and silence on each arm and aces in hand. An ancient hero, here to clean house. Time folded.
Brandyce Ingram is a writer, tutor, and jazz-head currently living in Seattle, WA. She earned a BA in Communication from USC and an MA in Humanities and Creative Writing from St. Edward’s University. Her work has appeared in High Shelf Press, Willowdown Books, Sand Hills Lit Mag, Wildroof Journal, An Evening with Emily Dickinson (via Wingless Dreamer), Beyond Queer Words, and elsewhere. She once sketched a new self-portrait every day for forty days straight.