It's Such a Beautiful Day Page #4

---

(passing traffic)

He pictures himself

having trouble breathing

and waking to a room

full of concerned faces.

He'd been terrified of dying

his entire life,

and as much as he tried

not to think about it,

death was always

in the back of his head,

around every corner,

and hovering on each horizon.

He'd brushed shoulders

with death on a few occasions,

but in his carefree youth,

it had almost seemed

like an abstract, impossible

thing to ever happen to him.

But with each passing decade,

he began to gauge the time

he probably had left,

and by his 40s,

what he considered

his halfway point, at best,

he had come to know

just one thing:

you will only get older.

The next thing you know,

you're looking back

instead of forward,

and now, at the climax

of all those years of worry,

sleepless nights,

and denials,

Bill finally finds himself

staring his death in the face

surrounded by people

he no longer recognizes

and feels

no closer attachment to

than the thousands of relatives

who'd come before.

And as the sun continues to set,

he finally comes to realize

the dumb irony

in how he'd been waiting

for this moment his entire life,

this stupid, awkward

moment of death

that had invaded

and distracted so many days

with stress

and wasted time.

If only he could travel back

and impart some wisdom

to his younger self;

if only he could at least tell

the young people in this room.

He lifts an arm to speak

but inexplicably says,

"It smells like dust

and moonlight."

He'd forgotten years ago

to replace the battery

in the cheap wall clock

in his kitchen,

and it was forever stuck

on 11:
57.

He couldn't remember why

he'd put a clock there

in the first place,

since it was sort of

in an awkward nook

around a corner where he'd never

wonder what time it was.

Near the bottom

of the storage box,

Bill found an old notebook

he'd never seen before.

Filling the pages inside,

his mother had repeatedly

practiced her handwriting

so she could send him off

to school

with the best-looking notes.

He calls his ex-girlfriend

and arranges to meet for lunch

after his checkup.

(opens and closes drawer)

This morning, he couldn't

remember where he'd put

the clinic's daily memory

quizzes.

(zapping)

(hum of vacuum)

He decides to make toast,

but for a long moment

can't think of how it's done.

There's only a brown stain now

where that bird had been.

His doctor has nothing

but good news.

Bill has continued to make

terrific progress,

and he can no longer find

anything out of the ordinary.

He tells Bill that if he'd not

known his medical history,

he would probably give him

a clean bill of health today.

(otherworldly ambient noise)

(birds chirping)

(wings flapping)

On his way to lunch,

Bill smiles

and thinks for the first time

that maybe everything

will be o--

(zap)

(zapping)

Bill was born

late Tuesday morning

into a world of orange

and red.

He likes the way the aquamarine

rug feels across his hands.

(wings flapping)

He likes sunbeams

and rockets

and the smell of the backyard

in the early morning.

(dog barking)

He likes tigers

and trees

and melted chocolate ice cream

and watching the lights

while falling asleep

in the backseat.

(cars rushing by)

(wind howling)

(zapping)

Someone sits on the shore

and tells him

how the waves have been there

long before Bill existed,

and that they'd still be there

long after he's gone.

Bill looks out at the water

and thinks of

all the wonderful things

he will do with his life.

(thunder rumbling)

(sharp inhale)

(zapping)

(thunder rumbling)

(zap)

(low buzzing sound)

Bill.

Can you hear me, Bill?

Look at me, Bill.

Look at me.

140/90.

Bill, can you hear me?

-Bill?

-Bill?

Can you hear me?

(static)

(roaring)

(wind blowing)

(bell ringing)

The last thing

Bill can remember

is speaking to

his ex-girlfriend...

(film exploding)

(whooshing sound)

...bird wings,

and the smell

of black licorice.

(water dripping)

He watches dust float across

the sunbeam above his head.

And then he goes

back to sleep.

His roommate's name

is Matthew,

a paralyzed young man

hidden by curtains

who communicates

to the nursing staff

through a row of buttons

that can play

five different

electronic sentences,

but more often than not,

he only presses one of them.

"I am in pain."

Every afternoon,

the reflections of sunlight

from the traffic below

cast colorful patterns

across their ceiling.

In the mornings,

the sunlight illuminates

Matthew's curtain

and makes it look beautiful

even though it's just gray.

His ex-girlfriend's

been visiting lately,

and they talk for hours

about current events.

Sometimes they eat

ice cream bars.

It's the happiest he's been

in a long time.

(thunder rumbling)

(rain falling)

Bill is introduced

to a new doctor

and given a short interview.

He doesn't know

what month it is,

but he's aware

he's in a hospital.

He can't remember his address,

so he supposes he must

have always lived here.

His vision's a little blurry

and he no longer has strength

in the grip of his left hand.

Bill is asked to describe

a series of photographs.

He's able to put words

to many of these objects

but is very confused

by some of the others.

(rain falling)

He also has difficulty

distinguishing the faces

of people he knows.

All of these people

really just look the same,

and though he can recognize

his ex-girlfriend

because of her long hair,

he can't remember

her name.

He tells the doctor

he has a fish

living inside of his head,

possibly a trout.

It'll be another night

before it dawns on him

that something seems missing.

All the memories the doctor

asked him to recall today

are suddenly out of his grasp.

So many years of faces

and moments

are mostly just a vague feeling

now.

The years are slipping

out of his head.

Yesterday,

a gardener with a hose

blasted all the sparrow nests

from the second story awning

of the building next door,

raining mud and little broken

eggs into the parking lot.

(medical equipment hissing)

Another test

has been arranged

and Bill is taken

to a white room.

A radiologist makes an incision

and pushes a catheter

into his femoral artery.

The catheter is

carefully pushed

through his stomach

to his heart,

up through his chest

and into his head,

where a special dye

is introduced

to flood the blood vessels

in his brain for x-rays.

Bill is then asked to raise

his arms and count to 20.

A powerful anesthetic

is introduced

to temporarily shut down the

left hemisphere of his brain,

and for the remaining half

of Bill, the test begi--

Bill, can you hear me?

Bill, can you look up

here for me?

Can you tell me

what these objects are?

Bill, can you tell me

what this is?

Bill, can you add up

these numbers for me?

You're doing great, Bill.

Okay, and what do these numbers

add up to?

Look at me, Bill.

Look at me.

Bill, look at me.

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