Old People Travel North
We are driving north, Chelsea and I. We sold the house,
we gave to our neighbours the things we didn’t need any more
and then spat out the window as we left the city.
Our fingers are still sticky from the goodbye cake.
We are now driving through the desolate prairie. God obviously
wasn’t interested in living there.
‘Look at all the raccoons killed on the road,’ I say to Chelsea. ‘What’s so magical on the other side of the road? What attracts them so much that they ignored the roaring cars and glaring lights?’
‘I’m glad we never had children,’ Chelsea says and closes her eyes.
I see her falling into sleep. I notice the moment when she crosses the
line. Behind that line there are blooming fields, maybe children happily playing on the porch. In her dream maybe she goes to live in another house and celebrates Christmas with somebody who is not me. Just like that, she leaves me alone with my question and my sticky fingers on the steering wheel. She never did anything like that before.
Please don’t die here and now on the road, I beg you,don’t die the same way those careless raccoons did, running to something promising on the other side. In just a few hours we will be at the door of our Nursing Home. Smiling nurses await us. Blooming roses on the table of our small room are waiting for us. A kind attendant will take our suitcases to our room. They are light because the only things we took with us are doctor’s prescriptions and receipts from the funeral home proving that we have already paid for our death. Soon the nursing home manager will come with a bottle of watered champagne to welcome us.
Then we will have a couple of hours to hang up the pictures of the
pets we gave to the neighbours. After that we will be ready to relax,
enjoy the sunset and watch the dying sun warming up the coffins in our hearts.
But you don’t wake up. With my hands on the wheel, I feel the need to drive over the dead bodies of the raccoons. Trying to wake you up.
we gave to our neighbours the things we didn’t need any more
and then spat out the window as we left the city.
Our fingers are still sticky from the goodbye cake.
We are now driving through the desolate prairie. God obviously
wasn’t interested in living there.
‘Look at all the raccoons killed on the road,’ I say to Chelsea. ‘What’s so magical on the other side of the road? What attracts them so much that they ignored the roaring cars and glaring lights?’
‘I’m glad we never had children,’ Chelsea says and closes her eyes.
I see her falling into sleep. I notice the moment when she crosses the
line. Behind that line there are blooming fields, maybe children happily playing on the porch. In her dream maybe she goes to live in another house and celebrates Christmas with somebody who is not me. Just like that, she leaves me alone with my question and my sticky fingers on the steering wheel. She never did anything like that before.
Please don’t die here and now on the road, I beg you,don’t die the same way those careless raccoons did, running to something promising on the other side. In just a few hours we will be at the door of our Nursing Home. Smiling nurses await us. Blooming roses on the table of our small room are waiting for us. A kind attendant will take our suitcases to our room. They are light because the only things we took with us are doctor’s prescriptions and receipts from the funeral home proving that we have already paid for our death. Soon the nursing home manager will come with a bottle of watered champagne to welcome us.
Then we will have a couple of hours to hang up the pictures of the
pets we gave to the neighbours. After that we will be ready to relax,
enjoy the sunset and watch the dying sun warming up the coffins in our hearts.
But you don’t wake up. With my hands on the wheel, I feel the need to drive over the dead bodies of the raccoons. Trying to wake you up.
Page(s) 18
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