“And you still believe in Heaven?”
“I believe in humans.”
The girl on the chair whips out a cigarette, lights it up, and puffs on it to see the smoke swirling in the air. Neither of them says anything but all of them understand. The girl on the bed falls back and burrows her head in the pillow, thinking, “If he invites me to a dinner,” thinking, “I bet he’s way sweeter with his girlfriend, they speak the same language,” thinking, “I want to touch his fingers, feel the tenderness that was meant for her, feel the warmth that was meant for another, feel the skin, feel the curling of the knuckles as they intertwine with mine, I can see his smile, shy and timid, but just see how he thrust the knife into my vital points, the way he kills, the way he shines with blood on his palms without a guilty look on his lips,” thinking, “I’m falling, falling, falling.”
“And he sat there after you left?” The girl on the chair asked.
“I don’t know. What other business does he have with me?”
“You let him in.”
“I let myself be an option amongst the sea of options, that’s all.”
“You let him in, you let him win, you let yourself be Atlas and he was the world –“
“He still is the world.”
“Haven’t you learned from the last time Atlas shrugged?”
“Fuck Atlas. I’d rather be dead than be Atlas.”
“But you don’t think so. You only need him to be there from the moment you step inside and boom – you are already Atlas.”
“I’d rather be dead.”
“Do you still believe that you’re alive?”
“I’d rather be Sisyphus.”
“You’d rather be nothing. You are already nothing. No one is going to be anything. If death is worth that much, why would we still be here, living?”
“I’d rather be in an asylum.”
“People don’t take lovesick people into the asylum.”
“Then who do they take?”
“Sane humans.”
“What do you know about sane humans?”
“That they want to be dead.”
“But I said I’d rather be dead.”
“You’d rather be dead because you have options. Sane humans know they have no option. See, all of us reach the same ending, but the sane humans know they can choose their own ending. That’s why they’re in the asylum. Choosing your own way out, that’s addicting.”
“So you are sane?”
“No, I am nothing. Same as you. Same as everybody else. I’ll remain nothing until there are enough of us to move the Earth and the wheel of history deems us worthy enough of a name.”
The window lights on the opposite building flicker on the asphalt street like a dying flame. A voice is whispering through the leaves. It says, “Kill the flame, kill the flame, kill the flame.” But how can one kill the flame when one hardly has it in the beginning? The girl on the bed twists her fingers around the cup’s handle, thinking, “God knows how I want her to go,” thinking, “But what else do I have? Who else do I have?,” thinking, “Must one kill the flame? Why? What did the flame ever do?,” saying, “I think you should leave.”
“Must I, then?”
“Suit yourself.”
“See, you say I should leave. Why ‘should’? If you had said I must leave, then leave I must, alright?”
“You are not talking sense.”
