The G. M. Os. - 15. Chapter 15 - The Self-Destructionists

Chapter 15
Ship Clock 262235
Edward (Eddy) 01-787o
The Self-Destructionists

The psych ward dayroom had a large screen vid adhered to a light green, cinder block wall. There was a whole collection of vids from the present to far back on Earth when the possibility of space travel was nothing more than a pipe dream, something of fictional speculation. There were enough recliners for all the patients confined to the ward, but only one, a schizo named Paula was crazy enough to control what vid the rest of the ward watched; and she chose only one, “Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House,” and it ran over and over for every waking hour in the ward. Most patients couldn’t care as they were so drugged up they barely noticed when the lights came on when it was time to get out of bed, eat breakfast, take their morning pills, and enter into the daily oblivion of euphoric stupor.

One patient, a boy named Eddy always seemed to be coming back, with bandages or bruising on various parts of his body from his many attempts at suicide. Today he was lying in his recliner asleep. It was plain to see, if anyone was sane enough to care, that he had another erection, which he thought was a side effect of one of the psych medicines he was taking. He slept most of the time, with empty dreams of black horror from his past, a past he couldn’t seem to get rid of no matter how hard he tried to erase his memories with a simple act of doing away with life.

The chair next to him was empty. It belonged to Dominic, a dementia patient, who was in the ward because the bots determined him to be a danger to humans around him. He came out of his room, sat down, bumped Eddy’s arm, and asked, “Hey, kid, you want a blow job to get rid of that erection?”

“Huh, wanda ya wan’?”

“Wake up! I’m going blow you,” Dominic said as he reached over and undid the boy’s pants.

“No! No! Stop that!” Eddy screamed. He jumped out of the chair and started to tear at the bandages on his wrists, trying to wrench them away from stitches hidden underneath, trying to make the wounds bleed. With his pants down around his knees, he stumbled around in front of his recliner ripping at the bandages.

Two psych nurses came out of the cage, wrestled Eddy to the floor, and turned him over onto his stomach. Another nurse, running behind them came up, knelt down beside the boy and using a long-needled syringe injected a sedative into his left hip. The other two nurses hauled the boy to his feet and put him in the quiet room, where he would sleep on the padded floor until he woke up sometime around suppertime.

The next morning Eddy was in a different light green room resting on the only recliner staring at the ceiling. There was a chair just behind his head, where the psychiatrist said, “So, Dominic tried to get you to do something that you didn’t want to do. What do you think about that?”

“It’s that pill I have to take, the one that gives me erections.”

“Eddy, none of the pills will give an erection,” the psychiatrist said in the calm voice of psych treatment.

“But, where do they come from?”

“Your dreams, Eddy, your dreams.”

“But all I dream about is my father doing me,” he said. He couldn’t imagine getting an erection from being raped by his father. That was unthinkable. That was an impossibility that he didn’t want to believe. “That’s all I ever dream about. That’s all I ever think about. All those years and, now, you say that I’m getting an erection from those memories?”

“Eddy, was there any time in your past that you had a good day?”

“Yes, I was at a clinic trying to find out why I didn’t have a beard, not even a trace of one. Then I was sent to a bot lab where they explained I had an induced mutation so that I would never have to shave. It was the calmest, most peaceful time of my childhood. The clinic told my father what the bots had done and he repeatedly raped me for a week.”

“How do you feel about that? Did you get an erection when he did that to you?”

“No! How could I do that? You can’t imagine the pain, the humiliation, the hate I had toward him.”

“So, you try to kill yourself to erase that memory and the others. Only, that won’t do you any good, will it?”

“No.”

“How many times has it been, now?”

“I can’t remember, there’ve been so many, so many scars. I suppose I could count them.”

“This is your fifteenth visit, Eddy. How many years has it been since that first try, when you tried to jump off that building at the university?”

“I don’t know. I can’t remember.”

“Sixty-eight years, Eddy, sixty-eight years and sixteen tries. You’re going to get it right one of these times and you won’t come back here so we can have one of these chats. Is that what you really want with your life?”

“No, I want to get married, but the bots won’t let us because I keep trying to kill myself. They said I have to go ten years without an attempt. Ten years is a long time. I don’t know if I can make it that far.”

He looked up at the ceiling, waiting for the next question, he knew it was coming, and there was no end to the questions. He noticed something up there in the textured white paint. A little sparkling thing, a nano bot sending data to a receiving station where bot systems would analyze the session, analyze whether he was ever going to be sane enough to get married and live a normal life, maybe adopt a set of twins. Would that ever be his future, could he ever be with Moli and live in peace?

“Eddy, it always boils down to what you want. What you really want. If you finally get it right and kill yourself, your father wins and you’ll never have a chance for a happy life. Do you want him to win? Do you want him to ensure that you never get married to that wonderful girl who stays beside you through all these attempts to kill yourself?”

“No, but Moli shouldn’t have to put up with me. I deserve to die from what I’ve done to her.”

“Eddy, that’s the wrong answer and you know that. You’ll never get better if you transfer the hurt your father put you through to the girl who loves you more than anyone ever has in your young life. If anything, you should focus on your future with her and all the possibilities she can give you. Do you think you could focus your thoughts on a happy future with her?”

“Maybe.” He didn’t want to think of Moli, not now, not with his wrists taped. He remembered her scream when she caught him, again, cutting himself, trying to draw out enough blood to put an end to the memories of his father. How could he focus on a happy future with those memories affecting whatever he did? “Doctor? How do I stop those memories?”

“You can’t, Eddy. You’ll have them for a long time yet. Maybe, just maybe when you’re in your seventies or later they’ll fade away, but they will always be a part of you. What you have to do, Eddy is learn to live with them, learn to put them to rest in the back of your mind.”

“How do I do that? All I do is remember the horror of it, the humiliation of having my father’s erection thrusting into me. How do I put away that memory? How can I learn to live with it? For three hundred and fifty-some years I’ve lived with that horror in my memories and now you say I have to learn how to live with them forever. I don’t think I can do that.”

“Well, Eddy, you’ve got to try. You can’t do anything unless you try to do it. I want you to trying doing that for the next two days. Just for an hour, just for ten minutes, just for a single minute, try to think of Moli and your future with her. Think of being able to marry her and get a residence at that farm. Think of having kids after you reach majority. Focus your mind on something other than what your father made you do. We’ll meet the day after tomorrow and I want you to tell me how long you’ve been able to think about things with Moli, other than your father. Do you think you can try doing that?”

“Okay, I’ll try, but I won’t promise. They’re buried too deep.”

“I want you to try something else, too. Whenever a memory of your father comes to mind I want you to replace it with a good thought. Every time that horrible man comes up out of that hole you’ve put him in consciously throw a little dirt on top of him and think of Moli. Every time replace your father with Moli and keep thinking of Moli. Think only of Moli and what she means to you. Do you think you can try doing that?

“You know, Doctor, that might just work. Maybe that will work.”

“Good, that’s all I ask, Eddy, just try to focus all of your thoughts on Moli. Now, let’s get out of here so you can go watch a vid.”

“Well, that certainly isn’t something to do. Paula hogs the vid player and all she plays is one vid from way back on Earth. I’ve watched it so many times; I’ve practically got it memorized.”

********

The unremarkable thing about Hercules III was the weather. The solar lights, many kilometers above ground level, made sure it was always sunny. It never rained; all moisture needed by plants was provided by irrigation plumbed into bot provided water sources. Water for human consumption came from a different plumbing system. No one asked where the water came from. On the farm where Eddy and Moli helped Lee and Willy, the irrigation was provided via a drip process. It was Eddy’s job to tend to the piping to the rows and the tubing down each row. It was a job he enjoyed mostly because it kept him away from the females who tended to joke a lot, jokes where he was always the butt. The only times he encountered them on the one hundred thirty hectare farm was when they harvested a crop and that field needed to be plowed. He would pull out the tubing from the rows and one of the girls would run the tractor leveling the rows, then form new rows where new seedlings were set out and Eddy would lay out the tubing, again. At the end of every day, he and Moli would get in their speeder and she would drive them back to their residences because due to the numerous attempts at suicide by cutting his wrists and forearms Eddy had nerve damage and most of his fingers were so numb he couldn’t operate the controls. Working on the piping and tubing didn’t require fine work so the damage he’d done to his nerves didn’t affect his job, but Eddy was happy to still have a job and not have to stay home with Roger, who spent most of his days at the residence because he couldn’t work as he wanted.

About a little over four months after being released from the psych ward, Eddy was walking down the hall after taking a shower. He heard something in the kitchen so he went in to investigate and saw Roger holding a butcher knife with the blade pointing at his bare abdomen. He stopped, went in, and said, “Roger, drop the knife.”

“Eddy, you don’t understand,” Roger said.

“Yes, I do. Look at me, look at my hands; they don’t work very well any more. You know I have trouble doing things. I can’t even tie a knot to put around my neck. I’ve tried so many times I’ve ruined my body.”

“Then why don’t you finish it. Why don’t you do this? It should work.”

“Roger, the last time I tried that you caught me before I had a chance to do more damage than I’d already done.”

“But, you tried before. That was the third time you tried this.”

He was weeping now. Tears ran down his cheeks as he pressed the point of the blade against the smooth brown skin causing a small bud of blood to form. Eddy hurried over and grabbed Roger’s hand with fingers that worked, but couldn’t feel.

“Stop!” Eddy exclaimed.

“No, you stop, I want to do this,” Roger said through trembling lips.

Eddy felt Roger’s hand move away from him, but with whatever strength he had left, he pulled back against the force of Roger’s only working hand as the blade slowly sank into flesh. He pulled harder and was finally able to wrench the knife out of Roger’s hand and pulled it out of the older man’s abdomen.

“No, give it back, I have to finish this,” Roger cried. “You don’t understand, I’m useless, I can’t help out with anything. Let me go, let me die.”

“No, I’m not going to let you,” Eddy said. He turned and threw the knife into the dining room. Only a few steps away there was a towel, but he was worried about leaving Roger, thinking he might try to get away and grab another knife from the rack. He needed to get that towel to staunch the blood dribbling down Roger’s abdomen. He took a chance and stepped away from the man bent on suicide. He was back in a flash, but Roger had already turned and grabbed a chef’s knife and Eddy watched in horror as Roger shoved that knife full into his abdomen and began to move it around. Not knowing what else to do, Eddy punched Roger full in the face, momentarily distracting him enough that he was able to pull the knife out of the abdomen and throw it into the dining room, too. Roger collapsed to the floor. Eddy knelt down and pressed the towel against the bloody wound. He wondered where Abe was, why he wasn’t here. He usually came back from the farms about this time, but Eddy knew he couldn’t leave Roger.

There was a knock at the door and Eddy yelled, “Come in!”

It was Moli. She stood there at the entrance of the kitchen looking at the scene and asked, “What’s wrong with Roger?”

“He tried to kill himself. Go get help! Roger needs to get to the clinic in town right now.”

“I’ll be right back.”

“Hey, what’s going on in here?” Abe asked as he walked into the kitchen.

“Roger’s tried to commit suicide. We need to get him to the clinic or he’ll succeed.”

“Let me die,” Roger whispered.

“No!” Abe cried. “Go get Ben; he’s in the office talking to Charity.”

“Be right back. Apply pressure to the wound.”

He got to his feet and ran out the back door. It was some distance to the office, but he ran as fast as he could. Once there, he shoved the door open and said, “Ben, Roger’s tried to kill himself with two knives. I tried to stop him, but I couldn’t. We need to get him to the clinic, now.”

Ben ran out, followed by Eddy, and said, “Where are you going, you’re in no condition to help.”

“I could at least clean up the blood,” Eddy said as he hurried to keep up with Ben.

“Sorry,” Ben said.

Eddy slowed, exhaled loudly, and finally stopped. He watched Ben go in the residence and soon Ben came out with Abe and Roger between them. They hauled him up into the four place speeder and were off as soon as they got Roger fastened to his seat. Eddy walked into the residence and saw Moli busily cleaning up spots of blood on the floor.

“Why didn’t you go with them?” Moli asked.

“Ben said I couldn’t help,” Eddy said. He looked at Moli. He turned and went into the living room and sat in his favorite wing chair, putting his feet up on the ottoman.

“Get out of there!” Moli yelled. “Your feet are bloody. Hey, why don’t you have any shoes on? Go in the kitchen and get some cleaner. Get that blood off the carpet and ottoman. But clean that blood off your feet, first.”

“Yes, Mother,” Eddy said, as he dejectedly walked back into the entryway.

“Hey, Bud, you haven’t called me Mother in years,” Moli said.

“You haven’t called me Bud for years,” Eddy said. “Moli, do you think we’ll ever get a residence of our own?”

“That’s up to you, Bud. You’re the one who keeps fucking things up by trying to kill yourself. You’ve been pretty good for the past four months when you came back from the hospital, but when are you going back?”

“I’m not, I don’t want to, I want to get better,” Eddy said. There, he said it to her. Came right out and said it. No more pouting around waiting for a trigger to set him off into another attempt at suicide. Maybe, it was Roger trying to do it to himself. Maybe, he felt he needed to be strong for Roger when he came back from the hospital, help him understand how to get better, how not to have those thoughts of self-destruction.

Yeah, that’s what he could do. Be the strong one for once in his life. Turn the corner and truly look forward to having children in their residence up at the flower farm; or, maybe they would have it down here where they have lived for the past sixty-eight years. Sixty-eight years of trying to self-destruct and now having to live here for another ten years before the bots were going to put a residence in for them. He wondered if he could convince them somehow to have them relent on the ten year rule and put in a new residence in five years. He would have to talk to them, but probably not for another two years, at least.

“Hey, Bud, are you lost in those thoughts, again?” Moli asked. “You need to get that blood cleaned up before it dries. I tell you what, go to the bathroom and clean your feet, I’ll start cleaning up the blood you’ve left. Hey, wait a minute, that can’t be Roger’s blood. It’s your feet! Hold one up and let me see. Oh, yeah, you’ve cut this foot real bad. Let’s see the other one. This one, too. Okay, go in the bathroom and put them in the tub and run some cold water on them. We may have to take you to the emergency room, too. Go on, I’ll take care of this blood and then come in and look at your feet.”

“Yes, Mother,” Eddy said. He walked back to the bathroom and put his now painful feet in the tub. He ran the water and winced as it burned his wounded feet. He hadn’t even noticed he was barefoot when he ran up to the farm office. All those crushed rocks had sliced the bottoms of his feet. Why didn’t he feel the pain then? The water was getting bloody, his blood, the blood he tried to spend over the past sixty-eight years for admittance in the long forever of death. Never again would he try that. He wasn’t going to let his father win, not after what he had done to him. He had a new life, a new chance, and he wasn’t going back to that med center. He ran some more water and winced, again, when it touched his feet.

“How’re you doing, Bud?” Moli asked after walking into the bathroom. “Hey, that water is bloody. Put some clean water in there.”

“I already did.”

“You stay here; I’m going to get Peter to see what he says.”

“Hurry back, this hurts.”

In a couple minutes, Moli returned with Charity and Dorcas, who said, “What’s with the feet? Drain that water, it’s bloody. Let me see your feet. Do you realize you’re in your underwear?”

“I had just gotten out of the shower when I saw Roger in the kitchen with the first knife. Do they look bad?”

“We need to send for an ambulance,” Dorcas said. “Can you walk?”

“Barely.”

“Are there any bandages here?” Charity asked.

“Nothing big enough to cover my feet. Where’s Moli?”

“I think she went to summon the ambulance,” Charity said.

“Where do you keep your bath towels?” Dorcas asked.

“In our rooms, in the linen closets. Use mine; I don’t want to bloody Abe and Roger’s.”

“The ambulance will be here in about ten minutes,” Moli said as she came back into the bathroom. “How’re you doing, Bud?”

“Bud? Is that what you call him?” Charity asked.

“Yes, he calls me Mother.”

“Kids! Eddy, when are you going to grow up and stop messing with your body? How did this happen?”

“You remember when I ran up to the office; well, I didn’t have any shoes on. I didn’t notice until Moli said something. You know, I’m starting to feel a little woozy.”

“Lay down on the floor, not in the blood. Here put your feet on this stool. Moli, get him a towel for his head.”

“Bud, where do you have your towels?”

“In my linen closet. Ooh, there’s that woozy feeling, again.”

“Here’s some towels and one for your head,” Dorcas said. She rolled one up and put it under his head. “Charity, you take one foot and I’ll wrap the other.”

“Where’s Moli?” Eddy asked.

“I sent her out to watch for the ambulance,” Dorcas said.

“I think he’s going to pass out,” Charity said.

“We can’t let him do that,” Dorcas said. “Come on, Eddy, keep your eyes open. Don’t give in to it this time. This seems to be a rather crude way of trying to do it, though.”

“Charity knows; I was trying to do something. I was getting help for Roger. I didn’t know I didn’t have any shoes on. I didn’t have time to put them on.”

“Why didn’t you send Abe?” Dorcas asked.

“He was with Roger, he sent me to get Ben. I just went. I, I, uh, I don’t feel good.”

“Keep talking, Eddy. Keep talking. What did you do at work today?”

“I, I, I think I got a new bed set up for seedlings. I don’t know, I can’t remember. Hey, what’s that noise?”

“That would be the ambulance,” Charity said.

Two medics came into the bathroom and looked at Eddy. They put down their medical cases and knelt beside him. One of them asked, “Hey, aren’t you the kid who keeps trying to commit suicide?”

“Uh, that would be, uh, me, but I, I didn’t do that this time. I, uh, I was, uh, helping.”

“Let me take a look at his feet. Pressure bandages, Monus, an opioid for pain, and some, no, we’ll just take him with the bandages. Can you walk?”

“Barely,” Eddy whispered.

The medics applied gauze and the pressure bandages to Eddy’s feet. Then one took out the cases, but returned within a few minutes. He said, “The bots are bringing in the stretcher. Can he walk, Stesser?”

“He said he can’t. The way his feet look, I suppose they’re too painful to take any kind of pressure. Let’s try to get him out as far as we can. Come on, kid, time to go. Do any of you women want to go with him?”

“I’ll go,” Moli said.

“You’re his fiancé, right?” Monus asked.

“Yes.”

“Okay, go on out to the ambulance and we’ll show you where to sit after we get him in.”

Dorcas and Charity followed the medics as they carried Eddy out of the bathroom and down the hall. They watched them lay the boy onto the stretcher and the bots take it out to the ambulance. The medic named Stesser said, “We’ll send a message back in case the boy has to stay overnight and the girl will need someone to come and get her. He’ll be okay, but I don’t think he’ll be walking for a while.”

********

“Well, Eddy, you’re back,” the psychiatrist said. “I expected not to see you for at least another year or so. What was it this time, your father again?”

“I didn’t try to kill myself. Why won’t anyone believe me? I was trying to get help for Roger. He was the one who stuck two knives in his stomach; I just ran across some crushed rock to get someone to help and didn’t notice what I did until Moli said something.”

“Roger? You didn’t leave him alone, did you?”

“No! I waited until Abe came. Then Abe sent me to get Ben. I ran as fast as I could. I offered help, but Ben said I’m in no condition to help and that’s true, Doctor.”

“Roger is here with us, if you want to see him.”

“No, I want to go back home. I can help him there when he gets out of here. I’m not coming back here unless I have another accident and the emergency room doctor sends me here, like she did this time.”

“How do you plan on helping him? From our short talk, he’s very depressed about not being able to help out at the farms.”

“He can help. He just doesn’t want to make the effort. There are a lot of things someone can do with only one hand. He might even make the other one more useful if he’d only exercise it. He stopped doing that. He’s given up. I think I can help him focus on a happy future with Abe. Like you told me, take it one minute at a time. Shake off the bad memories and replace them with good. Give him some hope. I think he needs that.”

“Well, you know, Eddy, I think you’re right, but we’re keeping him here for at least a month, maybe more. Now, I’ll arrange it for you to go home. You’ll need a wheelchair, right.”

“The nurse wouldn’t let me bring it in here. I have to call him if I need to use the toilet and only then does he bring it in here.”

That afternoon a bot high-speed six place cruiser landed in the residence parking area. After the cover retracted, two bots picked up Eddy and carried him out while another one brought out the wheelchair. The two bots settled Eddy into the chair and he said, “Thank you for helping me.”

“It’s a pleasure to serve you, Edward 01-787o,” one of the bots said. “If you do not attempt to self-destruct in two years, we will install a residence for you and Moli 20-578p. You did a brave thing and you have a responsibility to keep someone alive, you need to be rewarded, but we have to be certain you do not attempt to self-destruct. Have a good life.”

“Thank you, again,” Eddy said. “I promise, never again, never will I attempt to do that to me.”

“Good,” the bot said, its eyes went dark and after a moment they brightened. “In one year have a responsible adult, such as Benedict 02-933g or Peter 41-331u send a message to bot headquarters here on Ring 5 to report on your progress. There is a chance we may lessen the time. Please brief them on that responsibility.”

“Oh, thank you,” Eddy said. “Thank you very much. I promise, no more attempts. I’ll help Roger, I will.”

Eddy rolled away from the cruiser and watched it slowly rise into the air. Then he suddenly became aware of a problem, there was no way for him to get up the steps to the residence. He looked around and noticed the path to the barn went flat to the walk in front. He rolled up that way, but was presented with another problem; the walk was up a steep slope. He rolled up toward the barn, but the slope didn’t lessen. Ben came out of the office and said, “Hey, Bud, good to see you. What’re you doing up here? You need to get in the residence.”

“This thing won’t roll up steps and I was looking to see if I could get up to the gravel path, but I think it’s too steep,” Eddy said.

“Well, that does present a problem, doesn’t it,” Ben said. “Okay, let’s go back to the steps and I’ll pull you up.”

“Hey, Eddy, what’s going on?” Charity asked after she came out of the office.

“He can’t get up the steps in that thing and came up looking to see if the slope to the path was easier than down by the residence,” Ben said.

“I was asking Eddy.”

“It’s Bud, you know what Moli said.”

“Oh, yeah, sorry, Bud, I didn’t remember.”

“That’s alright Charity; you can call me Eddy if you want.”

“Come on, Ben, I’ll help.”

Eddy turned around and backed into the foot of the slope. Ben grabbed the handles and backed up the slope pulling Eddy along with Charity pushing the arm rests. At the top, Eddy tried to turn the chair and was presented with another problem. The gravel was too loose to support the chair’s wheels.

“Doesn’t work, huh?” Ben asked.

“No.”

“Okay, back you go down the hill.”

“You know, Bud, I think we’re going to have get a ramp built for the steps. I’ll check with Freddy to see if we can have a carpenter come out here and see what can be done.”

“Sounds good to me. Though, you know, Ben, you’d better hurry because my pain med is wearing off and I need to piss, too.”

“Say, how long are you going be in this thing?”

“Oh, I have to go to the clinic in town next week to see how my feet are doing. So, I won’t know until then.”

“I don’t suppose you want to stay in the residence, do you?”

“I can. I know it’d be stupid to put something in if I won’t need it in a few weeks.”

“I’ll contact Freddy anyway.”

“Where’s Abe?”

“Here; worried sick about Roger.”

Once up the steps, Eddy went into the residence and into the kitchen where he took the bottle of pain killer out of his pocket. He took one and went out to the bathroom. After finishing, he went down to his room and lay down on the bed, concentrating on keeping the pain at bay. He didn’t regret doing what he had done yesterday and looked forward to Roger coming home.

“Hey, Eddy, you’re home,” Abe said at the door. “How are your feet?”

“Painful.”

“Did you see Roger? I heard the doctor sent you to the psych ward at the med center.”

“No, sorry, I didn’t. The psychiatrist asked if I wanted to, but I said no. I knew they’d have him drugged out of his mind, so he wouldn’t have known I was there. Sorry, but I was more concerned about coming back here. How are you?”

“Worried.”

“You have a right to be. I know Moli was worried every time I had to go to the med center, but that’s going to change. I’m not going back unless some stupid emergency room doctor thinks a farm accident was intentional and sends me there.”

“Fifteen times gets you noticed.”

“Sixteen times, I tried at the university.”

“Oh, sorry. What about Roger, do you think he’ll try again?”

“Probably, given the chance; my psychiatrist told me a secret the last time I was there. He told me to think happy thoughts. Just start for a second, build it up to a minute, five minutes, and on and on. And when you have a bad thought you need to replace it with a good thought. Plus, Roger needs to get out in the farms and help. He needs to use that good hand. He needs to feel useful instead of moping around the residence feeling sorry about himself. We need to help him all we can. We need to get him out. Give him something to do. He can pick fruit one handed. He should be able to shovel beefalo shit with one and half hands. Speaking of which, he needs to get back trying to use that left hand or it’s going to whither into nothingness.”

“Wow, Eddy, you sound serious about this.”

“I told the psychiatrist and Moli I wasn’t going back. I’m going to get better and get a residence for me and Moli. We’re going to have children around here. Speaking of which, do you think we can have a residence down here, instead of up at the flower farm?”

“Well, that depends on where Lee and Willy are planning on having theirs. Plus, there’s the land issue. If the four of you want to stay down here, you’ll have to arrange it with Peter and Dorcas, and Ben and Charity; they’ll have to give you part of their land. If you have them up at the flower farm, you’ll be free to put them wherever. You’d better talk to Lee and Willy first and then make your case with the other four, but I think being down here makes more sense than up there. Why do you ask, I thought you have to wait for ten years?”

“The bots said I don’t have to wait that long. We can get a residence in two years or, maybe, in one year if I don’t mess up and Peter or Ben would be willing to send a report to the bots that I’m not acting like I’m a danger to myself.”

“Wow, what brought this about?”

“Well, you know, what I did for Roger, you know, getting the knives away from him and running up to get Ben. Plus, promising not to mess with myself. I guess I impressed them. And, now, I have something to work for, besides staying safe.”

“Well, I wish you luck. I’m just worried about Roger.”

“I know, do you what me to fix supper tonight?”

“No, Dorcas said I can go over there, but now that you’re here, maybe you can go, too.”

“Not in this wheelchair, it won’t go down or come back up the steps.”

“Oh, yeah, I’ll have to tell her. Can I ask you a special favor?”

“Sure, what?”

“Well, you know, well I feel I need to be with someone. Can I lie down next to you? I won’t do anything, promise. I just need someone.”

“No problem, bro, no problem at all; come on lay down beside me. You can lie down on Roger’s side, if you want. And it’s okay to snuggle.”

Eddy lay there listening to Abe’s breathing amazed he wasn’t afraid that Abe might have wanted something. Could he do that, knowing it would be just to comfort his friend? No, not that, he was never going to do that, never again; even if it was a favor for a good friend.

********

Three weeks later, Eddy was on crutches and able to get around much better. He figured in another week he’d be able to go out to the flower farm and start helping with what he could. At nights he was sleeping with Abe and as Abe promised nothing happened, which, in a way, was good for Eddy because he could see that being with a friend was more important than just saying you cared. He told Moli and, at first, she was afraid for him, but when he assured her that Abe needed to have a friend up close, he felt she kind of understood. Though, he could see in her eyes that she was worried and she had a right to be after all that happened with his father.

Then everything fell apart. He was at the residence planning on where they were going to put their new residence when there was a knock at the door. When he answered it, he saw it was Charity. He asked, “What’s up?”

“Come with me,” she said walking inside.

He followed her into the living room where she sat on one of the sofas and said, “Here sit beside me.”

“What’s going on?” He asked as he sat down. “It’s Roger, isn’t it? He’s done it, hasn’t he?”

“Freddy received a message from the med center. He wedged a knotted sheet between the door to his shower room and the jamb and he tied the other end around his neck.”

“Does Abe know?”

“Ben is in the barn telling him, now. He’s going to need you more than ever, now.”

“Yes,” Eddy said as he felt a tear trickle down a cheek. She put her arm across his shoulders as he began weeping. Why? Why did it have to be Roger? Then he thought back to when he had talked to the psychiatrist. Now, he had to be strong for Abe to help him get through the inevitable grief. He felt the warmth given off by Charity’s embrace, but knew he had to put himself together, at the very least, for Abe. He wiped his eyes and face and said, “Thank you for telling me. Can someone come over this evening and fix something light for us? I don’t think Abe will be in any mood for anything heavy. I’ll have to be with him until I can get him to sleep, that will make him feel better.”

“Dorcas and I will come over. Do you think anyone else?”

“No, not tonight, maybe tomorrow. Did Freddy say when Roger’s ashes will be sent over?”

“Tomorrow.”

“I’ll have to talk to Abe about having a funeral. Something simple, with just you guys around here. Maybe, Freddy and Marcy, too. That’ll be up to Abe, but I won’t bring it up until the morning.”

“Do you want us to come over and fix breakfast?”

“No, I’ll fix some bacon and eggs, the way Abe likes it.”

“The way Roger made it?”

“Yes, the way Roger made it. It may help him remember the good parts of their life together.”

The door flew open and Abe ran in and they heard the bedroom door slam.

“I’d better go to him,” Eddy said. He winced from putting pressure on his feet, but Abe needed him.

“I’ll let myself out,” Charity said. “We’ll be over at six.”

“That’s okay. Try to keep everyone else away until then, including Ben and Peter.”

“Moli?”

“Yes, Moli, too. Abe doesn’t need a lot of company now. Maybe, later.”

Eddy went down the hall and stopped at the bedroom door and knocked. Not waiting for an answer, he went in and over to the bed. Abe was lying on top of the covers in his dirty clothes and boots, crying. Eddy sat down and said, “I’m going to undress you and put you to bed.”

“Don’t leave me,” Abe whispered between sobs.

“I have no intention of doing that,” Eddy said. He went about pulling off the boots, socks, pants, and then sat Abe up and took off his shirt. He said, “Stand up for a moment so I can pull the covers back. There, lie back down.” He took his own clothes off and lay down in his place beside Abe. He snuggled up and put his arm across his friend’s back. Abe went back to crying.

Eddy didn’t know how long they lay there close to each other, but after some time Abe rolled onto his side facing Eddy. He pulled the younger man into an embrace and continued weeping. And there they lay in the close embrace Abe needed.

Eddy was startled awake by a knocking on the front door. He looked at the clock and saw it was six, time for Dorcas and Charity to be over to fix supper. “Abe, wake up. There’s someone at the door, I have to get up.”

“No, I’ll go,” Abe said. He pulled the covers back and sat up. Without putting anything more on he went out.

Eddy got out of the bed and started to put his clothes on not noticing he was standing until a sudden excruciating pain shot up from his feet. He sat down on the bed and pulled his pants and put his shirt on.

Abe came back into the room and said, “Dorcas is here with some food, Charity and Megan will be over in a little bit with something more.”

“Are you okay?” Eddy asked.

“No, but I have to eat something. I just don’t want them to make a big deal about this, not right now, okay?”

“Okay, Abe, we’ll wait until tomorrow for the big deal.”

“What’s that?”

“Planning Roger’s funeral.”

“Oh, yeah, what do you think we should do?”

“We’ll talk about it tomorrow. Come on let’s go get something to eat.”

Later after everyone had left and the boys listened to some music for a couple hours, Abe said, “I want to go to bed, now. I’ll go in the bathroom and freshen up, and then you can have it.”

After Eddy went into the bedroom, Abe was already in bed and he said, “Take off everything.”

“Everything?”

“Roger and I never wore anything in bed, things were easier that way.”

“I don’t want things.”

“I know, but I need to feel your body against mine. Okay?”

“Well, okay, but I don’t want what you two did. My father did that to me.”

“How do you know what we did?”

“I could hear the bed springs squeak in that unmistakable rhythm.”

“Oh, sorry, I didn’t know you could hear. Why didn’t you say something?”

“I did, twice, but after a while I’d hear it, again.”

“Do you think that set you off?”

“It certainly didn’t help.”

“Oh, Eddy, I’m sorry. You don’t have to take off your underwear.”

“No, it’s time for me to get past all the horror my father put me through.”

********

Five days later in the back beefalo pasture a small group gathered around Abe who said, “I want to thank all of you for being here with me and Roger. We really didn’t know each for that long, but we were in love and that was the most important thing. I chose this place for Roger so I will always know where he is if I want to come out and talk to him. It seems a shame that all I have of him is this bag of ashes, but I know he’s here and that’s all that matters.”

Abe opened the bag and started to pour out the ashes as he turned around, scattering them onto the tall grass. The beefalos would be out here later to start cropping the grass to the ground, fertilizing the pasture for the next crop. Finally, he stopped when the bag was empty. He folded it up and put it in his shirt pocket to keep it close to his heart.

Later that night Abe and Eddy were again naked lying in the bed. Abe said, “Eddy, I need something.”

“No, Abe, I can’t do that.”

“Please, Eddy, for Roger; please, I won’t ask again, but I miss Roger and I need him tonight.”

Eddy looked back into his mind, but all he could see was Moli smiling on that first time when he did this to her. Reluctantly, he said, “Okay, for Roger and Moli. I suppose you want me on my stomach.”

“No, on your back, I need to watch your face.”

********

A year and a half later, Freddy and Marcy, Theo and Beau, Jack and Bill, Dorcas and Charity, Lee and Willy, Peter and Ben, Matthew and Mark, Luke and John, Peter and Barnabas, Megan, and Abe were on the patio of a new residence between Abe’s and the ranch office. Eddy and Moli stood in the middle of the crowd holding each other’s hands, looking into each other’s eyes.

“I, Moli, take you, Edward, to be my husband for as long as the stars will shine in the heavens,” she said.

“I, Edward, do pledge my heart to you, Moli, to be my wife for as long as the stars will shine in the heavens,” he said.

They kissed and turned to their friends and together they said, “We are now wife and husband.”

Everyone, in turn, came up, congratulated, and kissed the couple. Afterward, Peter opened the bar and Ben started the grill.

Abe signaled to Eddy, who went over and said, “What do you want?”

“When do you think we can get together?” Abe asked.

“I’m married,” Eddy said.

“Eddy, come on, I know you. Why don’t you talk to Moli, maybe she’ll understand guys have needs.”

“And, I know what you need.”

“You don’t seem too bothered by it.”

“That’s the problem, I’m not.”

“It’s different when you like it, isn’t it.”

“I don’t want to say it, but yeah, I do.”

“Have you and Moli done it?”

“Yeah, whenever we get together.”

“You mean you’ve already consummated the marriage before getting married?”

“Yeah, she likes it.”

“And, you like it, too.”

“Yeah.”

“Hey, you two, what’s going on?” Moli asked as she walked up to them.

“We’re discussing when you’re going to let Eddy come over to my place to spend a little time with me,” Abe said.

“What do you mean spend some time with him?” Moli asked. Her voice changed to something other than pleasant. “Eddy? Have you and Abe been doing something that I might find disagreeable.”

“Well, that depends on how much you like me and how much you love Eddy,” Abe said.

“Eddy, I thought you never wanted to do anything like what your father did to you,” Moli said, her voice still sounding stern.

“When we do it, it’s different, isn’t it, Eddy,” Abe said.

“Yeah,” Eddy said, sheepishly.

“Do you love each other?” Moli asked.

“Do you love Eddy?” Abe asked.

“Of course I do,” Moli said.

“Then, what’s the problem?” Abe asked. “I love him. You love him. You get him all the time. I get him for a few hours a week. Can’t we share? I promise to babysit the twins when you get them.”

“Well, can I think about it?” Moli asked.

“Certainly, but just remember I might not babysit if I have to give up the man I now love,” Abe said.

“You’re incorrigible,” Moli said. “Okay, but he’s mine tonight and tomorrow night, you can have him the night after. No more than four hours, though.”

“It’s a deal,” Abe said.

“But, never on Diosday night,” Moli said.

“Never on Diosday, but that would mean I couldn’t have him for three days,” Abe said. “I’ll take him on Moonday, Botsday, Ancrosday, and Stefansday. That gives you Diosday, Marsday, Starsday, Titansday, Archday, and Carlosday. I get four and you get six. Deal?”

“Deal,” Moli said with a smile.

“Don’t I get any word on this?” Eddy asked.

“No,” Moli and Abe said almost in unison.

“A kiss makes the deal,” Abe said.

“So, kiss me, but no kissing Eddy outside your residence,” Moli said.

“Fine,” Abe said.

They kissed, smiled, and kissed again.

“Can I get you two some sparkling wine?” Abe asked.

“You two have the wine; you made the deal over me; I feel like a side of beefalo; I’m having a shot of whiskey,” Eddy said.

“You know you’re not supposed to drink alcohol,” Moli said.

“Well, I’m doing it now. I’m knocking it back in one swallow.”

“Will you bring our wine, Bud?” Moli asked.

“Certainly, you guys are the bosses.”

“We’re not like that, Eddy, we love you too much to boss you,” Abe said.