Hey Nostradamus! By Douglas Coupland

their badge. Another cop looked at me and said, "That's the guy."
So apparently I had now become "the guy."
I should describe at this point what it's like to hold a dying person in your arms. The first thing is how
quickly they cool off, like dinner on a plate. Second, you keep waiting for their face to come back to life,
their eyes to open. Even with Cheryl cooling in my arms, I didn't really believe she was dead. So when an
authority figure of proven uselessness told me to let go of the body of my wife, whose face I knew would
reanimate momentarily, my reaction was to stick with my wife. "Go to hell."
"No, really, son, stand up."
"You heard me."
The other cop asked, "Is he giving you trouble, John?"
"Lay off, Pete. Can't you see he's . . . ?"
"What I can see is that he's tampering with a crime scene. You - get up. Now."
Petewasn't worth responding to. I held Cheryl close. The world is an ugly ugly ugly place.
"Son, come on."
"Sir, I said no."
"Pete, I don't know what to do. She's dead. Let him hold her."
"No. And if he keeps it up, you know what to do."
"Actually, I don't."
I tuned them out. From my vantage point, soggy reddened lunch bags and backpacks lay everywhere;
the wounded were being removed with the same speed and efficiency that coliseum staff remove chairs
after a concert.
Underneath Cheryl I saw her notebook, festooned with its ballpoint scribbles:god is nowhere/god is now
here; god is nowhere/god is now here. I didn't give it any thought past that. A man's arm reached down
and tried to tug my arms away from her, but I flinched and held on. Then a dozen arms reached in. Pow,
I became a one-man supernova, firing my legs in all directions, refusing to let go of Cheryl, but they
managed to pull us apart, and that was the last time I touched her. Within forty-eight hours she was
embalmed, and for reasons that will follow, I wasn't permitted to attend her funeral.
Once they'd pulled me away from Cheryl, they shoved me into the foyer and then promptly forgot me.
And so I walked through the same shot-out empty window frame as before and onto the front plaza,
where it was sunny and bright. I remembered this thing Cheryl once said, how God sees no difference
between night and day, how God only sees the sun at the center and the greater plan, and that night and
day were merely human distinctions. I figured I now understood her point, except that for me, I didn't see
any greater plan.
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