I like the house, especially when it’s empty. The windows are open. And it’s clean. I remember trying to clean it. I remember everything, everything except the bird cage in the corner of the room. I step up to the metal cage and look inside. Where did this bird come from? Seeds and droppings are covering a newspaper at the bottom of the cage and I check to see if the bird has food. I touch the cage, and it’s not an illusion. It’s a canary. “Hi, Birdie,” I say. I don’t know the name of the bird so I call it Birdie. It’s yellow and green, and when the bird starts singing I wonder, Why did I never notice this bird before? Like an imaginary world, which is now my world. And I don’t mind. I sing along with the bird as best I can. If it is an imaginary world, at least, for a moment, it can be enjoyable.
I walk out of the house and down to the beach. I would say the walk to the beach is quiet, but it’s not the sounds that are quiet. I feel light in my shoes. I find the spot where the note said they would be. And there they are, the two of them, together with other people, gathered around a fire. It’s late afternoon. The sun is going down behind some clouds on the water.
I join the group and warm my hands at the fire. When I look at the fire, sometimes it seems to be a raging blaze and sometimes just the glowing of some embers. I don’t know exactly which is the real fire, the embers or the blaze, but since I prefer the idea of a raging blaze that’s what I see.
Linda is standing next to me. When she puts another log on I think, That’s not a good idea. The fire is almost out of control as it is and it doesn’t need another log. I try to tell her it doesn’t need anything, but she doesn’t hear me. She takes another log from the pile and sets it on what’s already burning. I watch the embers crackle and spark, and I can see how the fire can change depending on how I look at it, that anything can change, depending on the attitude behind my eyes, and since now, in my mind, I’m making a roaring bonfire, I take a step back. I look at the rest of the people. They’re wearing shorts and T-shirts, standing around the fire pit, focusing on the fire. Caught in the light of the fire they look animated, and although they don’t know it, I am with these people, and it’s nice to be with people.
Since they’ve brought marshmallows and coat hangers I find a coat hanger, straighten it out, and attach a marshmallow to the end of it. I dangle it over the fire. I may be dead, but I’m still going to roast a marshmallow. I hold it close to what I assume is the glowing heat. I’m bending over the fire pit when Linda walks over to me. I watch her hand reach out and gently take the coat hanger from my hand. As if my hand wasn’t even there. That’s how I see it. The coat hanger slips easily into her fingers.
I say something to her.
It doesn’t matter.
And that’s when I say goodbye.
I feel the fading now, and rather than fight it, I’m ready to fade. I’m ready now to fade away completely.
When I say the word “Goodbye,” more than actually saying it, I think it. To her. I think goodbye. I send some kind of feeling to her, and Linda senses that something is happening. She’s holding the marshmallow skewer in one hand, and she looks in my direction. One last time. I look at her face, the face of a person living in the world. And then she bends over the fire.
They say that the readiness is all, and when I leave the circle and walk to a deserted part of the beach, I’m ready. I can hear the ocean, the waves of the ocean, the gentle waves. I can hear the voices of the people at the campfire being replaced by the sounds of the ocean. I face the sky, which is filled with color.
I like the sunset, and not just because it’s the only time you can look directly at the sun. I like the light. I turn around and the side of the cliff is lit by the golden light. I see, near the base of the wooden stairs coming down the cliff, a shower, and someone washing sand off a boogie board.
They call it painful beauty because it’s only here so long, and then it’s over. Even when it’s here, even as we experience it, it’s over. And because I realize it’s over, I’m holding on to that beauty, and even the sense of beauty, as long as I can.
I walk down to where the sand is wet and firm, away from the fires and the light. I take off my shoes and socks. I roll up my borrowed pants and take a step toward the water. A small wave trickles over my foot and my toes can feel the cold.
I would have thought that, being dead, the temperature of the water wouldn’t affect me, but it does. So I stay where I am, ankle deep more or less, and just stand under the sky in the cold moving water.
Then I turn around. I face the cliff.
I see Anne, standing at the base of the cliff. She’s looking at me, holding her shoes in her hand. At first I don’t believe it’s her. But then she waves. I don’t wave, but I walk out of the water and go to her. And when I get to her, there she is. White pants, yellow shirt. And it is Anne. I follow her up the wooden steps along the side of the cliff.
She begins walking along the grass at the lip of the cliff until she comes to a railing. She stops. She puts one hand on the railing. Her face is reflecting the light of the sun that’s already set.
She’s looking at me.
“You made it out,” she says.
“I’ve been looking for you.”
“I’m here.”
“It’s warm here.”
“It’s summer,” she says.
You wouldn’t be able to hear her voice, but I can.
I take a deep breath.
“It’s funny,” I say, “seeing you here. It seems normal.”
“Why not?” she says. She smiles. “Look at the stars.”
I look up at the sky, neither dark nor light. “It’s too early to see any stars,” I say.
“Some,” she says, and she points to one, about halfway up. She was always good at finding stars.
She sits down on a cement bench overlooking the water. I wait while she puts her shoes on. I watch her tie the laces, and then we’re walking again, side by side, not looking at each other. Occasionally a sentence or a word comes out of one of us.
“The air feels good,” she says.
“I know,” I say, and I feel the air, around me and in me, and—
7
You probably can’t see us anymore, walking along the edge of the cliff. We’re invisible now, although we don’t quite know it.
We’re walking. We know that. Our footsteps are very quiet. Our voices are silent.
And it’s not a matter of accepting death. It doesn’t happen like that. “Accepting” is a word in a dictionary and what happens isn’t a word, just like clouds aren’t words, or the man driving by with his arm out the window isn’t a word.
But they happen. They all happen, and then they’re gone.
Clouds, people, buildings, laughter, darkness. It all happens, and then it’s gone. The piece of yellow paper in the street. The sounds of children in the distance. It fades away completely. The puddle in the sidewalk and the memory of the puddle.
And then it’s gone.
Additional Acclaim for American Purgatorio
“Haunting … It would have been easy for John Haskell to turn this novel into a mere literary trick, drawing in the reader with technical virtuosity. But the grace of it all is that he infuses this strange world with the sense of consequence, that as the novel progresses, we become more invested in the narrator’s life.”