Ken Goldman
- Sine Qua Non -
si.ne qua non (sini kwa non’ ) Latin.
Something essential; an indispensable condition; an absolute prerequisite (lit., without which not)
-Webster’s Encyclopedic Unabridged Dictionary of the English Language
On Tuesday at Le Bon Fin, after completing an excellent steak dinner soaked in a red mushroom sauce accompanied by a fine Bordeaux, I pushed myself contentedly from my table. Having made certain to leave an especially handsome tip for Christophe, I decided that tonight was as good a time as any to put a bullet into my head.My affairs were in order, my debts paid, and proper goodbyes expressed. Earlier I had mailed a generous check to Madeline, my elder sister, a stipend sufficient to see her through her recent divorce from that weasel with whom she had wasted half her life. I had provided Bartholomew, my faithful and loving basset, enough of his favourite gravy-soaked chow to last him well into the weekend. A small .22 revolver inside my sports coat pocket supplied the most expeditious means for my demise. Once I had solidly resolved this agenda, the evening’s anticipated denouement interfered not a whit with my appetite.
"An exceptional meal, as always, my friend," I informed Samuel, maitre d’ of Le Bon Fin for as long as I have been a patron. Fastening my waistcoat to the top buttonhole in preparation for the cold walk back to my apartment, I set out for the street firm in my resolution that this hour must be my last.
I will not weary you with long-winded details regarding my justification for what might otherwise seem such an audacious and ignoble act. Suffice to say that I have accomplished whatever pedestrian goals I had set out to accomplish in this life, and that the tedious pursuit of more of them seemed at best futile and at worst tiresome.
Madeline would provide a good home for Bartholomew, and in turn he would furnish the companionship my sister would require in my absence, particularly since Henry, that bastard, had packed his bags and absconded to God-knows-where. Because I hoped to minimise the discomfort of those most precious to me, the correct timing of my death assumed paramount importance.
The night felt colder than the forecast had indicated, and there seemed a threat of more snow. Erratic weather conditions are bothersome to people manoeuvring this city’s streets past dark, and I preferred my death not create further nuisance to perfect strangers nor officers of the law. Feeling it best to commit the act at home, I resolved to make my death both quick and minimally sloven. The revolver’s muzzle placed firmly inside my mouth would do the trick.
Of course, I worried myself concerning Bartholomew’s reaction. He has always been a skittish creature, and perhaps it might have been preferable to take him first to Madeline. However, I knew doing so would arouse my sister’s immediate suspicions. She would quickly realise that I had never once spent a night apart from my beloved basset, and questions would inevitably follow. Still, I could not erase the image of my canine companion yowling into the wee hours when I did not answer him, awakening neighbours who would arrive to find me ingloriously slumped in an expanding pool of my own blood.
An undignified death, and messy. Worse than that, bothersome and inconsiderate of my neighbours, ill-mannered behaviours utterly unworthy of me.
These considerations necessitated a slight alteration of plan. I am, above all else, an eminently rational man, and once resolved I rarely vacillate. I distrusted the uncertainty and slowness of pills and had early on dismissed forthwith that method of dying. A single bullet was quick, and while certainly bloody, it was efficient. There seemed no compelling reason why I could not simply slip into a nearby alleyway. The act would require only a minute’s time, and if I were fortunate enough to coincide the shot with the rumble of a bus or passing subway I might easily avoid making an annoyance of myself until my remains turned up at a more convenient hour the following morning.
I found the required dark passageway alongside a dimly lit bistro called The Alibi Tavern, and without a moment’s hesitation slipped into its shadows, somewhat self-conscious, I confess, at my stealth. From within the cocktail lounge the melancholy strains of a jazz saxophonist provided the appropriate soundtrack for what I had to do.
Once confident of my seclusion, I inserted the cold metal of the gun’s muzzle into my mouth, ridiculously concerned, I admit, because I had nearly chipped a tooth doing so. I still wore my gloves, and while they were made of a rather thin lamb skin, I did not wish to misdirect the bullet at such a crucial moment. Removing the glove from my right hand I repeated the entire cumbersome process. The metal of the .22 had gone frigid, and I feared it might stick to my tongue during this god awful chill.
It occurred to me that my body would be discovered wearing the remaining glove as if I’d had the ludicrous apprehension of freezing an exposed hand prior to blowing my brains out. I pictured some onlooker smiling at such idiocy, then sharing this information with another. The laughter would spread among those assembled until the entire crowd chortled themselves hoarse over the absurd sight of my prostrate bleeding corpse with one gloved hand.
I removed the companion glove as well. Satisfied, I reinserted the revolver into my mouth. But now my right hand had gone somewhat numb owing to the bone chilling cold.
The whole exasperating situation demanded I get a grip on myself. Certain occasions command absolute precision, and I had hoped my meticulous preparation to the last detail would provide the sine qua non of a good death. Shivering in the darkened alleyway while pondering the logic of removing the lamb skin from my bare flesh, I acknowledged my own foolishness, half smiling at my childish indecision with the pistol’s frosty muzzle still between my lips.
Newly invigorated and with both hands uncovered, once more I prepared to die a proper death. The Alibi’s saxophonist had been joined by a pianist who knew a thing or two about ragtime, and the rhythm’s tempo now had gone considerably upbeat, not at all conducive to what I had in mind. But I’d dallied long enough with trifles and felt a fresh determination to complete what I had begun. Clamping my teeth around the barrel of the .22 I shut my eyes, my finger set firmly on the trigger.
Something skittered across my Italian wing tip! I reopened my eyes in time to witness a large rat on its way to the trash bin just beyond where I stood. A second rodent and then a third arrived from nowhere to join the first. In the following moments the alleyway filled with a successive legion of them, perhaps over a dozen of the filthy creatures crawling from secret crevices as if a silent dinner alarm had sounded, calling them to their banquet of garbage.
During that moment the pianist broke into a solo rendition of "Sweet Georgia Brown," and several of the tavern’s patrons felt the need to burst into song.
You can easily construe the images my mind conjured. I envisioned my carcass during the remaining night-time hours devoured by hoards of voracious rodents bloated with my flesh and gnawing at my innards, their clandestine feasting accompanied by the strains of some Dixieland medley, while scant yards from my spilled brains dozens of beer swilling slugs clinked their mugs together in drunken revelry, as if any saints would waste their time marching into such a chintzy bar room. These disquieting thoughts prompted a sour aftertaste of the red mushroom sauce.
"This won’t do at all," I muttered to my audience of rats who fed while oblivious to my presence, a circumstance I saw no advantage in modifying. Tonight I would fire no bullets into my frontal lobe, at least not among the shadows of this particular alcove. Moments later I wandered again among the avenue’s night strollers.
The sidewalks had noticeably thinned of pedestrians. Those sober enough had headed for the comfort of their homes while the howling gusts of an approaching storm churned the air. On any other night I would have been inside warming up a cup of hot buttered rum myself.
Not tonight . . .
Although a good half hour’s walk, the park seemed the most sensible alternative choice. A light snow swirled every which way, and it appeared unlikely anyone in his right mind would venture the winding paths at this late hour. If I walked the promenade a half mile beyond the duck pond and if luck remained with me, perhaps the shot would go unnoticed. My pace quickened with the thought.
Excepting a young couple huddled on a bench, I saw no one at the pond. The two remained blissfully unaware of my presence, not bothering to look up despite the pronounced click of my footsteps. I might have put a bullet into my brain standing right before them without interrupting their embrace. Still, I walked more briskly not wishing to chance any new interference.
The wind’s howling increased as I travelled the path for another quarter hour until the lights from the pond disappeared completely. Tonight seemed unfit for wanderlust, and I passed not a soul along the dark promenade.
Dollops of snow moistened my face, and an icy discomfort caused me to select the poorly lit spot where I stopped. Again I reached into my pocket for the .22. No fumbling this time. I inserted the muzzle into my mouth, although my hand felt unsteady due to the blustery cold. No matter. I allowed no time for indecision.
I never heard the footsteps, and I felt rather than saw someone moving behind me.
"A little late to be takin’ a walk, don’t you think?" a voice spoke in the darkness close to the back of my neck, so close I could see the vapours of his breath.
I turned slowly, my gun shrouded by the darkness and concealed at my side now. Confronting the stranger I noticed he held a gun of his own, a revolver easily dwarfing mine and pointed directly at my heart. He seemed a youth of perhaps twenty, although the collar pulled up close to his face permitted me to see nothing of his features in the shadows. But there was no ignoring his gun.
"I beg your--"
The stranger shifted his feet in an absurd little dance to brace himself against the chill.
"It’s too cold for small talk tonight, hey? So what say we start with your wallet so’s I don’t have to blow your fuckin’ brains out right here and now. Keep your hands up where I can see them, hey?"
Busying himself with my back pocket, my assailant overlooked the gun held partially hidden inside my raised palm. This bumbling heist betrayed him as a novice at armed theft.
"It isn’t in that pocket," I informed him. "Here . . . my wallet is here inside my coat, inside the left pocket." I helpfully nudged myself toward him to facilitate his thievery. "I’m afraid there isn’t very much, as I had a rather large meal earlier this eve--"
"Shut up!"
He found my wallet and rifling through it removed what little paper currency remained, tossing the rest aside into the snow.
"Fuck! Fuck!"
"I told you there isn’t very--"
"Your watch!" he interrupted, trying to hasten my actions by snapping his wet fingers in the cold but failing to make a sound. "Fancy-assed guys like you got to be wearin’ a damned good watch. A Rolex maybe? Let’s see it!"
My .22 remained shielded, and initially I felt no desire for my attacker to discover it. The ambush had caught me so completely off guard I failed to discern the fortuitous happenstance of this would-be mugger encountering me the precise moment he did. When clear thinking returned, one deeply rooted dark instinct persisted.
When death came on this night it was going to be on my terms.
"I have a gun," I informed him, unable to repress a bitter smile while looking directly into his eyes, or what I could see of them. "I have a small .22 revolver in my hand this very moment. And I have no intention of giving you my watch, which, as you suspected, is indeed a Rolex. But you’re going to have to shoot me right now if you intend to take it. Because if you don’t, then I’m going to shoot you."
"What the fuck--?"
"Too late. Sorry."
I wasted not another second bothering to aim. Instead I dropped my arm and, with one hand steadying the other in marine-style, I pulled the trigger. The young man clutched his chest, dropping his weapon. By sheer luck I must have sent the bullet directly into his heart because he hit the ground like a sack without uttering a sound. Until that moment I had not fired my .22, and I must confess amazement at its efficiency. The youth twitched and kicked for a few seconds, then lay crumpled at my feet. Death had been swift, more instantaneous than I could have imagined.
This thought intrigued me. The larger revolver lay in slush, but I visualised it performing quite well inside my mouth. It appeared a higher calibre than my small .22. Perhaps it was a .38, although I concede that what I know of ballistics you could stick inside a pea.
Wiping the dripping handgun on my coat, I spun about to confirm that no well-meaning samaritan had heard my revolver’s report and come running to investigate. Pausing to determine any unfamiliar sounds in the night, I heard only the wind.
Satisfied, I retrieved my wallet and resumed what I had begun before the assault, taking the young man’s firearm and placing the barrel’s cold steel between my teeth. There was a very good possibility that a gun of this magnitude might easily blow a sizeable portion from the back of my head. Nevertheless, my more practical concern regarding its effectiveness far outweighed considerations of blood spilled. Besides, by morning the snow would have absorbed enough of the gore to mitigate the task of clean-up almost entirely. Circumstances had finally conspired to provide the opportunity for the proper death I sought. I had only to squeeze this trigger . . .
Do it! Do it now!
The gun clicked dully. I pulled the trigger again. Nothing.
I selected a bench. My insight took a moment to register.
I had been assaulted by a man with an unloaded weapon!
For a full five minutes I could not stop laughing.
When finally exhaustion stopped me, a strange and powerful sensation overcame every fibre of my flesh. My heart raced and, despite the bitter chill, I felt newly invigorated and completely alive. I needed a moment to savour this unanticipated awareness before I could attempt to understand it. Near-by lay the man murdered by my own hand. My money remained in his pocket and I did not care one high-flying damn about it. I had killed him, and I cared even less about that.
But the thrill of that moment! I had spent my entire life in preparation for such a moment . . . Christ, the sheer electricity of it! I had forgotten passion like this!
I considered crouching over the corpse of my victim to send a second bullet slamming directly into his ear just to watch his brains explode in the snow. But there was something I needed to do first. I reached into my sports coat for my cellular and dialed my sister’s number. Her phone rang several times before she picked up.
"Madeline, Are you awake?"
"Timothy . . .? Timothy, is that you? Jesus, do you know what time it is? Where are you?"
I smiled at the sight of the Rolex still on my wrist.
"It’s going on 1:10. I’m in the park with a gun in my hand."
The expected pause followed.
"Christ, Timothy. You haven’t been out trying to kill yourself again, have you? This is the third time this month--"
"Something better. Something much better. Madeline, I killed a man tonight. I shot him dead and I feel wonderful. I want to do it again!"
Another pause, longer this time. Then, "Timothy, I'm getting very tired of your games. You're a grown man now. You can't go on doing this sort of thing whenever you feel like - - "
"I'll shoot myself, Madeline! I will! I will! You'll be sorry if you hang up on me. Just you wait and see!" For a moment I considered shouting, maybe even crying. But I didn't think I needed to, because my sister sounded pretty tired. "I really did kill someone tonight, you know."
Madeline sighed. "It’s snowing out, Timothy. Will you promise me you’ll go home now? Will you do that for me?"
"In a moment. But first you have to, well, you know. . ."
"Christ, Timothy, not tonight. It’s so late."
"Will you do it? Please?"
I heard Madeline sigh again, but I knew I had only to wait a moment. Finally, my sister recited the familiar words I loved to hear her repeat every night.
"Patty cake, patty cake, baker’s man . . ."
*
Ken Goldman is a previous high school English and Film Studies teacher (Horror and Science Fiction in Film and Literature) at George Washington High School in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He is currently a member of the former GWA, the Genre Writers Association and of the HWA (Horror Writers Association).
Ken has had published over 365 short stories since 1993, and has appeared in numerous anthologies.