Hey Nostradamus! By Douglas Coupland

existence. This is when I felt the chill. This is when I once more realized that Allison/Cecilia is basically
me - an older version of me, but a woman marooned, manless and geographically remote, contemplating
a life of iffy labor, a few thousand more microwaveable meals and then a coffin.
She had just removed her meal from the microwave when I heard a noise down in the carport, as did
Allison. I could see headlights through the branches of various species of evergreen; Allison dropped
(rather than put) her meal on the counter, reached into a drawer, found an amber-brown prescription
container and removed one or more pills, which she swallowed without water. The headlights went out; I
heard a door slam, and then watched as Allison stood in the center of her kitchen, the plastic membrane
not yet removed from her meal's surface.
A youngish woman entered. Twenty-five? I couldn't make out what they were saying, but from my
disastrous relationship with my own mother, the bingo zombie, I could tell that this young woman was
Cecilia's daughter and that hurtful words were being hurled back and forth. God, how nice to be on the
sidelines for this, and to not be the one hurling.
For a moment, my sympathies were with Allison, until I remembered that she was out to hose-clean my
bank account while pin balling my emotions to the max.
In any event, they went off into the living room, which was on the second floor, up front, not visible from
anywhere I could position myself. I circled the house a few times, decided it was time to quit the stalking
and skulked down the driveway to my car. I forgot to brush all of the dead leaves and insects and webs
from my outfit first, and discovered a spider crawling across my chest. I had a freakout, madly swiped
the thing away from me, and when I got back in the car I was breathing like a dying coal miner as the car
door's alarm went ding-ding-ding-ding-ding.
From there I drove to Reg's apartment. Reg was obviously surprised when I buzzed his intercom, but he
said come on in. The building's lobby smelled of disinfectant, cooking and dust. The elevator dropped me
off on the eighteenth floor, into a muggy, airless little hallway. Jason had once told me how claustrophobic
and killingly dark Reg's place was, but it's hard to imagine it being as bad as all that. He was standing at
the opened door. "Heather?"
Of course I blubbered, and Reg motioned me into his apartment. Even through the tears and the
emotional funk, I could see it was not at all the way Jason had described it. I guess it was Scandinavian
modern, interior decor not being something I usually notice. Reg could see my surprise above and
beyond what was already on my face: "Ruth made me sell everything years ago. Jason told you it was a
mausoleum in here, didn't he?"
I nodded.
"Well, it was. I think most of this stuff came from Dirndl or whatever those places are called. I kind of
like it - the removal of excess things from our lives is always a blessing. Let me get you a drink."
"Water."
"Water then."
He brought back a glass of water, a bottle of white wine and some glasses. "Tell me what happened."
"It was her"
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