Issue 22 - 1992

Coe Review • Issue 22
takes them down in this little notebook of her’s. She’s great, she just
lets me talk on and on and she stays interested, like I was pulling
tricks out of a hat. It’s just wonderful, I guess. It’s like living the best
parts of my life over again. And she’s beautiful. She’s got these big
blue eyes the size of silver dollars and long, curly, hair that shines.
I’m young again when I’m with her. I’m alive. She is the only visitor
I ever get and it’s because of her that I don’t want to die anymore.”
The old man turned to Death. “I will not come with you.” Death was
quiet. The old man was gripping the neck of the bottle so tightly that
the joints in his fingers ached. Death was still looking out the
window.
Death reached into the small, wooden cigar box on the coffee
table next to the chair where he was seated. His finger bones made a
drawn out rattle as they slid under the lid and grasped a thick cigar.
Death clenched the cigar between his teeth and lit it by touching the
end with his index-finger bone. The smoke rose up into his skull and
permeated through his eye-sockets and the ear-holes. Death opened
his teeth a little and blew three perfect rings. “Life is a lot like these
rings,” Death inhaled and blew three more. “They hang in their form
for a second and then ‘out, out brief candle’ and they disappear. Life
is nothing to hold on to. It can’t offer you the pleasure that death can.
There is no peace in life, after a war you should know that. Man kills
man to preserve his life but then man must continue to kill each day,
every day. There is no rest from it. It is the vicious cycle of death that
makes life what it is. I don’t offer you anything to be afraid of, I
understand you, I know what you’ve been through. I am offering you
exactly what you have always wanted, always needed. I can give you
eternal peace. It’s what you deserve. Here, take my hand.” Death
stretched it out to the old man like the frame of a dead maple leaf.
“Don’t be afraid, just hold it.” A thin cloud of cigar smoke
encompassed Death’s skull. The old man felt a tiredness run through
his body; it was the kind that men feel in their bones. He placed the
Chivas Regal on the mantle next to the photo of his wife, walked to
Death, knelt, and took his hand.
“I... I just think that maybe, maybe now I can find something
that will make my years worth all the pain. Maybe I can find an
answer to who I am or maybe just, just be happy.” The old man
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