LOST IN TRANSLATION
By Gord Rollo

WASHINGTON , D.C., USA
AUGUST 28, 8:20 P.M.
17 HOURS BEFORE THE END OF THE WORLD

 1

Outside, it was bedlam.

The survivors screamed. The city burned.

It was quieter within apartment 1705 of Sterling Tower on 9 th Street North, but no less chaotic. In the cluttered living room, two people were lying on the bare mattress of a pull out couch: a young man, an old woman – both on their backs, eyes open wide, silently staring at the mildew-stained ceiling. Only one of them was alive. For a moment neither moved, neither breathed, and at a glance it was impossible to tell the living from the recent dead, but the need for oxygen ended the ruse, eventually forcing the man to sit up and swallow a mouthful of stale, smoky air.

John Taylor, a man who desperately wanted to die.

It wasn’t fair. He’d been drinking tequila for hours, washing down twice as many Clonazepam sedative pills as the dead woman beside him probably had, but still he lived on – drunk, nauseous, splitting headache, blurry vision speckled with tiny white spots, but alive all the same. At 5’8” tall and only 150 pounds, the drugs and booze should have taken their toll, but obviously suicide wasn’t as easy as he’d thought.

Feeling sluggish, top-heavy, as if carrying a fifty-pound weight strapped to his shoulders, John struggled to his feet. His legs had the strength of broken rubber bands, and on his first step they gave out, sending him sprawling forward to crash onto a scarred-up wooden coffee table. Made of solid oak, it easily withstood the weight of his small body. Head spinning, John knew he should get up, get out of the apartment, but decided he’d rather stay right there, collapsed in that spot until death came walking through the door to claim him. It was as good a spot to die as any.

Come outside , a male voice whispered. It was coming from inside his head; yet another in the long line of phantoms who’d occupied his mind since he was a boy – Translators, he called them. The doctors used another name, a medical term to describe the voices: Schizophrenia. Maybe it was neither; maybe this time it was full-blown madness, his mind so filled with terrible information it had finally decided to shut down and stop dealing with the wickedness of reality.

Come out here , the voice urged again.

John ignored it. Started to at least, but then another idea occurred to him, one too perfect to disregard. Come outside and play? Why the hell not? Sounded like a grand idea.

Back on his feet, John stumbled over to the television. There’d been nothing broadcast on any of the networks for days now and its screen was dark, busted, a gaping hole the size of a softball in the dead center of it. That’s okay, he only wanted the half-filled bottle of Tequila he’d left sitting on top, grabbing it and taking another large gulp on his way to the sliding glass patio door.

Before opening it, John paused long enough to be appalled at his nearly unrecognizable reflection in the glass. The man staring back at him had thinning gray hair – gray for God’s sake! He was only 36 years old and less than a week ago his hair had been thick and black. He looked much older now. It wasn’t just the hair; it was everything – his gaunt face, his haunted brown eyes, his thin haggard body still wearing the same oversized blue Air Force jogging suit he’d worn for several days. Even his slump-shouldered, despondent posture was unfamiliar, poles apart from the way the confident young man used to be.

John slid open the patio door, having seen enough. It didn’t matter what he looked like anymore, best to just forget about it and get on with things. It was already dark outside. The last hint of the sun just disappearing on the western horizon and he only had a moment to wonder if it would ever rise again before it winked out and was gone. He missed it already.

The dying world spoke to him; more tortured whispers in the night calling him outside. Join us, they said. He was losing it big time but just didn’t care anymore. He felt powerless to refuse. Compelled to obey.

Tequila bottle firmly in hand, John stepped out onto the balcony, the smooth tiled floor cold as ice beneath his bare feet. Sterling Towers was seven city blocks north of the famous parkland known as the Mall, and from the balcony’s vantage point John could usually see the majestic dome of the Capital building to his left and the towering pinnacle of the Washington Monument on his right. The Capital building looked untouched, although shrouded in darkness for the first time in his memory, but John was shocked to discover the Monument was gone. Rioters, militants, terrorists, crazies – someone – had taken on the enormous task of either blowing it up, knocking it over, or in some other way crumbled it to the ground in the week he’d been out of state. Unbelievable. More than anything else, that act convinced John the nation was in ruins and the world truly was coming to an end. He wondered if the White House still stood, or if the terrorist’s bomb or the arsonist’s match had found a way to bring down its hallowed walls as well. The thought made him shudder, and he was thankful he couldn’t see Pennsylvania Avenue from where he stood.

Leaning over the metal-strut railing he looked straight down seventeen floors to the numerous fires that raged on the street below. Some were big, others small - buildings, cars, garbage, people – the hungry flames not at all fussy what or who they consumed. It was almost beautiful from this height: pretty orange, yellow, and red hues like the twinkling lights on a distant Christmas tree.

A deafening rumble echoed in the night sky, John’s eyes searching the heavens as he took another pull from the bottle, frightened but at the same time awed by the strange flashing lights hidden within the dark swirling clouds. He wondered if there were still people out there naïve enough to think it was only thunder and lightning? Major league denial, of course, or perhaps just wishful thinking? Didn’t matter. You’d have to be feeble-minded or stark raving mad to not know the truth by now.

John certainly knew the truth. More than most, anyway. There just wasn’t anything he, or anyone else, could do about it. Except maybe get down on their knees and pray.

Or do what John had come out here to do.

Climbing over the metal railing was harder than he’d expected, his legs rubbery again, fumbling and dropping the tequila bottle half way over. He listened for the sound of the glass shattering below, but amidst the chaotic howls from the hidden shapes above, the steadily building roar of the fires below, and the frantic screams of the dying everywhere, he heard nothing.

He thought that was a good sign. At least he wouldn’t be disturbing anyone tonight. With a smile on his face and utter despair in his heart, John closed his weary eyes, let go of the railing, and stepped off into space.

NYX Publications - March 2007