May We Be Forgiven

not going anywhere,” I say, putting the foreign currency back in his pants.
    We bet on how long it will take each of the delivery boys to find us. I am the winner at thirty-eight minutes, and the roommate gives me a hundred bucks in “bonus points” when the cheeseburgers arrive. The pizza is a close second. “I’ve never delivered to a patient before, it’s cool,” the guy says. “I mean, as long as you’re not contagious.” The deli guy is the last to arrive. “Sorry it took me so long, I had to find someone to cover the register.” He hands over the bag of goodies along with the Scotch. My roommate peels off another hundred to cover the debt and offers him a drink.
    “I’m gonna pass,” the guy says. “I have to get back to work. But I’m curious what’s wrong with you, that you’re lying in bed ordering rice pudding and Scotch.”
    “I’m dying,” the man says, “and you know what’s amazing? Today I really did almost die once, they were about to let me go, and now that I lived, I feel great, not like I’ll live forever, but I’m okay with dying.” He pauses. “I’m dying,” he says. “I’ve said it more today than ever before, and suddenly it’s a fact, something that’s out there, like a coming attraction at the movies.”
    “I guess we’re all dying,” the deli guy says. “I mean, sooner or later we gotta go.”
    The woman who delivered the hospital meals comes to collect my tray. She stays for a slice of pizza and a few fries.
    I’m enjoying the cheeseburger; it’s a perfectly gummy, gristly combination, cut by the salty fries and the sour snap of the pickles. I am well past my fill line when I take a tumbler of rice pudding and fill both of our hospital-issue blue plastic cups with Scotch.
    “You want me to get some ice?” I ask.
    “A straw,” he says, “a straw would be good.”
    We’ve propped up the head of his bed, and now he’s happily sucking down the Scotch.
    “I wouldn’t mind a square of chocolate,” he says.
    I give him a whole bar. “Live it up.”
    Bloated, belching French fries and pickle juice, and trailing the IV pole behind me, I take the trash down the hall and stuff it in a can on the other side of the floor. The nurses seem pleased at how well I’m getting around, dragging my sluggish side, sporting one gown worn forward, another worn in reverse, the chic way of shielding the butt.
    We watch one of the cop shows on TV, and sometime between ten and eleven, he feels restless, uncomfortable, and buzzes the nurse asking for Maalox. They tell him there’s no order for Maalox on his chart. He asks if his papers have otherwise been updated.
    “Yes,” she says.
    “Good,” he says.
    “Just because I lived earlier doesn’t mean I’m not dying now,” he reminds me.

    S ometime after midnight, a frightful sound wakes me up. The roommate is pitched forward, eyes bugged out as if a terrifying nightmare has grabbed him. I buzz the nurse. “Hurry” is all I can say. Before they get there, he’s already slumped back in the bed, limp.
    First one nurse comes and then a roomful and the red crash cart. They’re rushing, shouting, cracking vials of drugs, shooting him full of this and that. It’s brutal and terrifying, and at some point it’s clear that, despite how hard they’re trying, it’s not going to turn out for the best. After they’ve shocked him twice and his body literally bounced up off the bed—and while they’re still upon him like vultures—I walk out of the room. I pace, dragging my weak leg behind me, up and down the hall and finally back into the room, where I’m standing pressed into a corner when they “call it” at twelve-forty-eight. They cover him with a clean sheet and leave, taking their magic cart with them. There is debris everywhere, syringe parts, gauze, plastic bits. He lies under the sheet. I come closer, never having seen a body not breathing. The creases of the fresh sheet relax over him. I hold his hand, touch his face, his leg. His body is still warm, human, but vacant, the muscles dropping away from the bone, all tension dissipated. They leave us alone, and about an hour later, two security guards come with a gurney and take him away. Something about it, the here and gone of it all, is too strange.
    The room still smells like French fries.

    I need to talk. If I call the house, what will happen? Will the machine with Jane’s voice pick up? If I speak, if I beg, if I prattle on long enough, the dog