October

            His consciousness is restored at the same moment that a bubble made of blood and spit forms on his parted lips. It blooms and bursts quickly as he exhales, leaving a red mist on the dashboard below his mouth.
            His breath continues to come in short rushes. Before the shock of what has happened joins him, he spends a few seconds with an empty mind. His vision is blurred and he can’t tell if the windshield, inches from his face, is intact or completely broken out. He can see a glowing light to one side that points away from him into darkness. At random intervals insects cross the light created by the headlamp and they appear as strange meteors in his blurred vision.

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            Moments before, Alan had been traveling through the empty October night with forest on either side, alone in his seven year old Chevrolet sedan. He was making good time on the winding New England roads, driving while in thought. The pavement was still slick from a rainstorm, but he knew the hills and the roads well. He had left Hartford around eleven thirty, and was nearing his home outside Amherst, Massachusetts, when from beneath his car came the distinct sound of metal parting from metal.
            The car’s speedometer was hovering near 50 when he lost control, the car swinging quickly into the right shoulder, where the start of a steel barrier clipped the side of his Chevy’s trunk. This wrenched the car into a tight spin in the other direction, its tires screaming across both lanes. The vehicle’s skid was ended as the back end slammed into the southbound barricade, bending the steel towards the forest, the car grinding over the edge to drop backwards down the face of a steep hill. It was stopped hard by the trunk of a young maple tree. The tree splintered, its canopy crashing into the forest, but the remains of the tree trunk were caught precariously in the mangled back bumper of the car, keeping it from continuing down the embankment into the thick forest. The car shuddered, the front of it having settled a couple yards away from the pavement’s edge, the lonely dim light cocked at an odd angle with the slope. Once the car came to a rest, nothing moved and the quiet country night seemed a thousand times quieter than it had moments before, as if the sudden rupture in its routine had scared it into submission. The ticking of the dead motor sounded like gunshots in the silence.
            There was stillness in the darkened vehicle as well. The driver’s seat had come loose from the floor of the car as it had hit the second guardrail, snapping the seatbelt. As the rear of the car collided heavily with the tree, the weight of the engine lodged Alan’s torso against the steering column. As this occurred, the sixth and seventh cervical vertebrae of his spine were separated, bruising the spinal cord in the process and leaving him paralyzed. Had the separation been any higher up his neck he would have died from asphyxiation; if the bones had continued to part, his spinal cord would have been severed, killing him almost instantly. But the car had settled with his crushed body in a fetal position, his head outstretched towards the heavens with the seat and steering wheel embracing his neck, holding the separated vertebrae in place.

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            Suddenly, the realization of where he is and what has just taken place slams into his mind. His body is motionless in its bruised state but a visible terror enters his eyes as they take on something of a feral quality. The instinctive panic rises and peaks, leveling out right before the point that would have returned him to darkness. It lasts several seconds then begins to recede.
            Once the intensity fades, he finds himself able to account for the present. He realizes that he can move nothing, that he can feel nothing. The pain that should be there is not. His body is now an emptiness, something that he’s known forever, a feeling that he expects to be there, but is not. And here something strange happens. Perhaps in response to the drastic emotional contrasts that it has just experienced, his mind seems to hardly react when it is presented with this new information. He accepts his paralysis and reconciles himself to his fate without really considering it. His thoughts then leave the present, cycling back to earlier that day.

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            He had spent it in Manhattan and had not left for home until eight o’clock, once it was dark and the traffic wasn’t as bad. At ten thirty, he was still a few minutes outside of Hartford and entering the beginning of a rainstorm. He had grown up in nearby Springfield, Massachusetts, and had decided not to venture much further for college, attending the University of Hartford for both undergraduate and graduate degrees. He was now thirty-six years old and living near Amherst. His day had been long and his thoughts were flat as it began to rain harder. He wanted badly to be home, but he was too hungry to continue. Once in the city, he took the Bushnell Park exit before the bridges and drove to a diner called Cole’s he had frequented while in college.
            He and his friends used to joke that it hadn’t closed once since it opened in the thirties. The cooks and the servers changed, but not by much. As he came in brushing water off of his shoulders, he noticed that the lone waitress working still looked patiently tired. Little had changed since he’d last seen the place. The floors were the same once-white linoleum, the countertops were the same faded Formica. The radio was playing at the same low volume. The only difference that caught his attention was that there were fewer customers than there would have been ten years ago. Neighborhoods had shifted, things had changed as they were bound to. A group of college kids sat in one of the booths. In another, an older couple sat across from each other hardly talking.
            The middle-aged waitress, on whose shirt the name “Jeanie” was embroidered, brought him a menu and took his drink order as he sat on one side of the L-shaped counter. He had in mind what he wanted, but looked over the menu anyways, trying to find changes. The prices had gone up, but not by much, and they no longer offered as many types of pie as they used to. Jeanie brought him his coffee and a water and he ordered the grilled-chicken sandwich platter.
            Alan sat drying off as he mixed cream into his coffee, involved with the recollections brought on by being back at Cole’s. His attention was elsewhere, until a man wearing a poncho made from a garbage bag situated a pair of duffle bags at the foot of the stool two seats down. He lowered the hood of a sweatshirt that was somewhere within the bulk beneath the black garbage bag and passed behind Alan, headed for the restroom.
            “He’s harmless,” Jeanie said as she poured a glass of water and put it at the man’s place.
            Alan realized he must have been staring and was embarrassed for himself.
            “It’s okay, hon, I know what he looks like. He’s been coming in every couple of days for a while now. He always pays. He’s not a bother and usually doesn’t smell too bad. It’s not like he’s driving anyone off,” she added, gesturing around the room. “He actually seems real smart. Sometimes he has some interesting wisdom to share with us. We like to call him Zeus, but not to his face,” she finished with a slight smile, as if sharing a secret. She seemed content with her rundown on the man and leaned against the counter behind her.
            Alan took this all in and found himself curious about the stranger. “He’s never told you his name?” he asked.
            “No. We don’t really ask him questions, he generally speaks if he wants to.”
            She put the pot of coffee back onto the coffee maker and went to bus the table of the students, who had paid and left. She carried the dishes through the door into the kitchen. Zeus reentered the room, now stripped of the trash bag.
            Alan looked in his direction long enough to take him in, nodding a polite greeting. The man looked into Alan’s eyes but did not respond otherwise. This was wholly unsettling, as his wide eyes had irises that were a very dark brown, close to black. Alan thought he recognized a slight insanity in them. They contrasted with the matted beard and straw-like blonde hair that surrounded his bald head. Living without a roof had helped make his age indeterminable, but he wasn’t young. He seemed to be wearing all of the clothes he owned, which added to the uncertainty. What Alan noticed most of all, though, was the amount of presence commanded by the homeless man.
            With his eyes, Alan followed Zeus as he went back to the front door and looked outside at the street. After a second, he realized that the man was checking to see if it was still raining, which it was not. He came back and sat at the seat above his bags. Jeanie returned from the kitchen with a plate of food for one man and a mug of coffee for the other.
            Zeus quietly asked her for the cheeseburger platter. As she was walking away, he stopped her and asked for it to go. She added this to her pad and went into the kitchen. The elderly couple had finished eating and gone, and there was money on their table but no check. The two men found themselves alone in the dining area, but both remained quiet. Alan was considering the man in his mind as he ate his sandwich. Jeanie came back out and collected the money and the dishes and returned through the swinging kitchen door.
            Alan was in the middle of chewing a bite of his sandwich when Zeus turned on his stool to face him. Alan looked back at him and smiled hesitantly, still holding the sandwich with two hands. He had no idea what to expect, but Jeanie was right in that he felt no animosity from him, perhaps just a minor instability. Zeus appeared to be waiting for something, so Alan put his sandwich down and turned to face him. He had a very solemn look on his face and was again looking directly into Alan’s eyes. He seemed to wait just long enough for Alan to feel uncomfortable before speaking to him calmly.
            “Sometimes, we invite death into our own lives. Sometimes we invite it into the lives of others.”
            “What?”
            Instead of repeating himself, Zeus remained looking at the younger man and waited for it to register. It did, and it unnerved Alan. He was unsure how to respond. Before he could, Zeus looked around the diner and launched into a short oration in the same grave voice.
            He spoke of death; he listed names that sounded old to Alan. He recounted the fates of individuals, of ships, of armies, of towns and empires, histories in single sentences. He spoke of nature, referring to it as a She. Alan learned of a species of tropical bird, which responds to a threat by feigning its own death, yet often the impact of the forest floor kills it anyways. Of a desert lizard that can spit blood from a gland behind its eyes, in an attempt to deter the predator. He learned that it almost never works. Zeus shared with him a story of wolves.
            “In the Northern climes, it is rare for the native peoples to hunt wolves. They hold a certain amount of respect for the animal, a respect that dates back many generations. During the winter when food is scarce, the people must compete with the wolf for food. Sometimes, the lack of food makes men despair and it is at these times that the wolf is hunted. The easiest and most wicked way takes only a knife with a double-edged blade and a few ounces of blood. A spot is chosen and the snow is cleared away to reach the hard ice beneath it. The knife is then heated and used to make a hole, in which the handle is placed up to the hilt. The blade is then covered in blood and the men leave the knife.
            “Soon, a wolf will come, following the scent of the blood. The desperate animal will then lick the blade, and as it cuts his tongue he will taste the fresh blood and believe he is feeding. He will lick it more, cutting himself further. He will continue licking it until the blood and the injury leads to his death. And the hunters are not even present,” finished Zeus. He paused briefly, before saying, “And in our own lives…” but was cut short, as the waitress returned from the kitchen, holding a pitcher of water.
            Both men swiveled forward as she entered, and there was a noticeable tension in the air, as though something important had been interrupted. She refilled their waters and looked at the two of them before returning to the kitchen.
            Alan looked to Zeus. He was looking down at his coffee, apparently done speaking. Alan had many questions but no words for them. He sat there motionless and dumb, until he remembered to start eating again. The silence between them had grown awkward, as though perhaps what had been interrupted by Jeanie’s presence wasn’t entirely proper. Alan was about to ask a hundred different questions, when she returned bearing a Styrofoam container and cup. She put these down on the counter in front of Zeus and retrieved the coffee pot. When she turned around the man was halfway towards the door with his bags and the food. She stopped and stood there, confused, since he had not paid. Alan was about to speak up, when the homeless man paused and returned to the counter, setting his things down again. He took a bill from his pocket and put it on the counter, gathered his items once more and walked out into the cool autumn night.

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            His reverie is cut short by a series of sharp hooting sounds coming from above and behind him. After a few intermittent calls, the winged creature silently glides through the light’s glow, but his vision and his mind are too blurred to distinguish the swift moving shape. The night’s silence returns.

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            “He didn’t bother you, did he?” asked Jeanie, as she cleared his plate. “You seem upset.”
            “No, it’s fine. He just got me thinking,” Alan said, trying to smile.
            “Well, he left enough money here to pay for three dinners, so I’m going to take that as though he wanted to buy you yours. I’ll give him what’s left next time I see him,” she said. “You’re good to go,” she added. He tried to talk her out of it, but gave up and left Cole’s Diner feeling troubled and full of emotion.
            As he walked to his car, Alan decided that he needed to put Zeus’ delivery out of his head. He needed to forget what had taken place, so he started focusing on his surroundings, looking at the buildings on the block. The familiar architecture was made up of a number of different styles, and they began to help him forget about what he had just experienced. The buildings were all similar only in that they were old, their yellow and red brick façades taking on a different kind of beauty over the years, various homegrown shops making up their first floors, with apartments above them. The streets were not well lighted and cars passed but were not regular.
            He was parked under the trees of a small urban square not far from the diner. He brushed some leaves off of his windshield before getting into his car. Some of the trees had already started dropping leaves, while others were still mostly green. The rain had left everything fresh and it was cool, but not yet cold.
            Alan was thinking of the seasons as he got back on the highway, headed north towards Amherst. Fall had always been his favorite time of the year. He liked to think he not only understood, but also truly felt the importance of the New England autumn. The transition from summer into winter was short, but he felt that the length could be ignored once all of the beauty, meaning and nostalgia involved were added up. The colors, the sunlight, the purity of the air. The way that memories set in October seemed to come through the years so much clearer.
            He tried not to think of the hard northern winter that was destined to arrive. As he settled into his seat and drove towards his home, he also attempted to ignore the somber mood he had been put in by the man at the diner.

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            The headlight starts to dim. It winks twice before going out completely, pitching his world into darkness. He begins to panic again, but his fears are tempered by a glow that strengthens steadily. The clouds have moved on leaving a moon in their wake, which appears as a hole in the middle of his otherwise black and unfocused world.

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            Alan had crossed the border into Massachusetts and was passing the exits that led to his old home of Springfield. He had no family there any more and the knowledge of this returned his thoughts to the diner. He wanted to know why the man had chosen to share the information with him, or what he had meant by sharing it, if he had meant anything. As he exited the highway near Amherst, Alan wished and wanted to believe that the man he had so readily accepted as “Zeus” was nothing other than a crazy derelict. And there had been some insanity in the man’s eyes, but not enough to truly convince him.
            While trying to figure out why the man had chosen the theme of death, the image that he most readily associated with the subject entered his mind. He had been nine years old when his grandfather, Graham, was diagnosed with malignant lymphoma. He had lived in South Deerfield, an hour drive north on 91, and was a man strongly opposed to doctors. Graham had been sick for quite a while by the time Alan’s parents discovered the severity of his illness and took him to the doctors that were able to diagnose him with the cancer. When Alan remembered the holidays they shared and the special trips they took north to visit his grandparents, he remembered Graham as a white haired man who, in spite of his age, was still full of joy.
             This was starkly different from the image that Alan kept with him from the last time he had seen his grandfather. His parents had taken him north to let their child say goodbye. When they arrived, his father explained to him that his Grandpa was very sick and that he might not live much longer. He told young Alan that the visit didn’t need to be long.
            Alan’s grandfather was in bed with a quilt covering his body. When Alan came into the room holding his mother’s hand, Graham insisted that he be helped to sit up. As his grandmother and father helped him to do this, Alan looked at the man struggling to rise. He had lost so much weight that his skeleton was all too visible beneath his skin. He spoke to his grandson, but Alan didn’t know who this man was. His voice had grown high and had a new timbre to it that he did not recognize. He felt nothing but an urgent wish to leave. Graham had died three days later. As he relived this memory in his mind and questioned the emotions he had felt so long ago, a loud wrenching sound came from beneath his car.

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            He is brought back to the present a final time by the noise of an approaching car, slowing to a stop on the shoulder. The headlights point out into the forest over the front of the car. A door shuts and he hears the crunch of glass, then a woman’s voice calling out. It is clear that she cannot see into the wrecked car and when no one responds he hears the glass again and the car door open and close.
            The woman returns with a small flashlight and begins to descend the steep embankment. It is covered in rain-slicked leaves and when she is close enough to see his face she slips and reaches out with a hand to steady herself on the front of the car. The extra weight on the car causes the bumper to loosen itself from the splinters of the tree trunk, which in turn causes the car to continue quickly down the decline. Before it can enter the woods, the car hits a granite boulder, protruding just enough from the steep ground to flip the vehicle over lengthwise, onto its roof in the forest.