“I think I just met the happiest person in the world!”

I said it again with as much gusto as I could muster. The face staring back at me looked less convinced than ever. My therapist said if it was the first thing I heard every morning after looking in the mirror that one of these days I’d believe it. I think I need a new therapist.

Shower, shave, coffee, breakfast. Won’t be doing any of that. Bottling in my body odor with this oversized sweater sounds a lot easier. Glass of water, that should do. Forgot to charge my phone, thirteen percent.

Piles of bloody flesh on the floor, no, just the canvas I tore up in anguish last night. Created over four months, destroyed in four seconds. My soul churns.

Out the door, down the block, stomach grumbling, head starting to thud. Need caffeine. Wallet barren. Charlie O must be working.

I peek in the window of the cafe, there he is sweaty as ever, I hop inside.

“Charlie O’Malley!”

“Ah, starving artist! Let me guess, free coffee?”

“Well, if you’re offering.” I land on a stool at the counter.

He smirks and hands me a cup. Friends with benefits. A fancy old man walks in.

“Double shot?” Charlie knows his order, must be a regular.

“Merci.” They exchange a knowing glance.

I sip my coffee, my brain jolts. “Nice mustache.” I compliment the gentlemen.

“Merci, aussi.” He twirls his facial hair. “And who might you be?”

“The happiest person in the world.” I sip.

The old man opens up a barrel full of french laughter, sounds like a goose fight. He reaches inside of his overcoat and produces a monogrammed handkerchief that he uses to dot the corners of his eyes.

“Oui mon ami, this must be true!” He sits on the stool beside me and places his handkerchief back in his coat. Charlie places a tiny steaming mug on the counter in front of him.

“And who might you be?” I raise my eyebrows and sip, pinky out this time.

“Well, when you get to my age, you will have been many different people. But you may call me Jacques.”

“Pleased to meet you Jacques.”

Charlie sweats behind the counter as he purges the steam wands on his espresso machine.

“The pleasure is indeed mine. But you must share your secret, what makes you the happiest person in the world?” He raises the tiny mug to his lips.

I think back to last night, the fleeting moment of frustration. Months of work squandered in an instant of uncontrolled emotion. I let out a deep breath.

“Belief.” I say to the old man before finishing my coffee. He seems to contemplate this for a moment, nods to himself then downs all of his espresso.

“A powerful tool indeed.” The old man smiles as he rises from his stool. “Charles, my thanks for another world class cup. I must be off, affairs to attend to.”

Jacques reaches into his coat again and this time pulls out a small business card. He places it face down on the counter next to me.

“Au revoir.” The old man slides the card in front of me and tips his hat. In a moment he is out the door and Charlie is looking at me with that smirk again.

“Another cup?” He’s already pouring me more coffee before I can answer.

I turn the card over on the counter. Simple but elegant lettering.

‘Believe - Art Gallery’

Before I can stop it a smile is spreading across my face. I look up at Charlie who is topping off my cup, he’s fighting back his own grin.

“One day I’ll pay you for these coffees Charlie.” He smiles at me but says nothing. “Don’t you believe me?”

“Let’s just say on that day, consider me the happiest person in the world.”

“I have to leave to protect.” That was the only thing he said to me. The sun was just starting to come up, it wasn’t even ten degrees outside. I had slept on the couch so I could talk to my parents as soon as they woke up. Something wasn’t right.

My brother woke up before they did. If I hadn’t slept on the couch I wouldn’t have known but I heard him walking through the living room and it woke me up.

I asked him what he was doing, why he was fully dressed already. He only looked at me and said those six words: “I have to leave to protect.”

———

We were both in town for Christmas, but it wasn’t the normal cheery holiday. A few weeks earlier my father had called me to tell me some tough news. There was something going on with my brother. He lived on the other side of the country so it was hard to keep tabs on him, but his friend had got in touch with my parents to share their concerns about him.

There had been some episodes, times where he had shown up in a panic sure that someone was following him. The cops were called but when they showed up there was nothing but wild looks and confused conjecture. One night when this friend got home late, my brother had somehow been waiting inside his living room for him, feet bloody from sprinting through the woods barefoot. My brother just wanted somewhere safe to hide but his friend couldn’t take it anymore and called my family to intervene.

———

Now it was my parents and me trying to assure him that everything was fine and no one was out to get him, surely not here three thousand miles away from where he lived.

After my parents had gone to bed last night his behavior started getting strange. He kept nervously looking out the window as if someone might be standing in our front yard. When he finally did go to bed he would come back out to the living room every thirty minutes or so to tell me he was going to get some sleep and that he loved me. I knew something was wrong. He was on medication now but had we actually watched him take his pill?

Now I was watching him walk out the front door into freezing cold weather with no coat and there was nothing I could say to stop him. “I have to leave to protect” was all he could manage as an explanation.

I snapped fully awake as he closed the door, running to the window to make sure I knew which direction he was heading. Throwing on clothes over my pajamas I heard someone shuffling down the hall. My father half awake heading for the bathroom.

“He left.” My eyes must have looked frantic to him as I tried to convey the seriousness of the situation as quickly as possible. “He isn’t coming back!”

“What? Where did he go?” My father tried to force himself fully awake.

“I don’t know, I’m going after him.”

“Take mom’s car.” He pointed to the keys on the side table.

I laced my boots up and stormed outside into the frigid morning air. Staring down the street in the direction he headed but not seeing any signs of him. I hadn’t driven a car in months but the only thing on my mind as I shot backwards out of the driveway was whether I would ever see my brother alive again.

Our street turns out onto a main road that cuts through some swampy woods. I stopped at the end not knowing which way to turn. It felt like any second spent thinking was a waste so I turned left and hoped for the best.

Two minutes later I was turning around at the end of the road following it past my street and to the other end. Nothing. The main road ends at the highway, could he have got this far already?

It seemed unlikely so I turned around again. As I got closer to the turn for my street I saw my father’s car on the side of the road. I pulled over and my dad was in the woods calling out my brother’s name.

“He didn’t have a coat.”

My father’s response was trudging deeper into the woods. I followed as both of our voices rang through the trees calling his name.

A day that starts at the spa shouldn’t end in the mud. Well, actually they did give me a mud treatment, but that’s a different kind of mud. My corpse though, so muddy and filthy. My hands had never been dirty like that, but my nails looked perfect. That has to count for something

I never saw my killer, or maybe I did and I’ll never know it. The last thing I remember was sliding along my back in the grass. My arms felt like rudders that I used to help stay straight. I realize now that someone was dragging me by my legs, but at the time it felt like I could swim through the grass. Before that I was in the sauna. The perfect way to end a perfect day.

It was one of those lucky times that I had the room to myself. Although I guess it would have been luckier to be any other place on earth. Whatever caused me to go unconscious happened in that room. If someone had access to its controls, they could have introduced something other than steam through those vents.

If my heart was still beating it would be racing, now that it wasn’t this hardly seems worth getting worked up about. Was there anyone that worked at the spa who I had wronged? I had gone there so much that almost all the employees knew me by name. Sure I had spoken to the manager a few times about some of the girls at the front desk but nothing consequential ever came out of it. Often the other ladies and I would engage in some not so subtle conversation during massages, but we were trying to send a message. And our desires almost always were fulfilled so it felt like the most couth way to air our grievances.

The ladies, I hadn’t considered them. They’ll be devastated to hear the news I’m sure. Looked up to me as something of a leader around town. The conversation will suffer the most. God, who will keep Deborah in check? Well, it isn’t my concern anymore if she wants to go on and on about the newest masseuse and what she would do to his biceps. If she wants to embarrass the group someone else will have to put an end to it. I can’t be expected to keep an eye on her while I’m trying to enjoy my afterlife.

Speaking of which, there has to be a spa around here doesn’t there? What kind of paradise doesn’t have a place where you can sit back and unwind. I’m going to have to see if I can get this place a little more catered to my tastes. The decor for one thing is looking a little dated and not in that charming type of way. A little update may be in order. I should have plenty of time on my hands now to get this place shaped up. The ladies will be here at some point and won’t they be so pleasantly surprised to see that I’ve taken care of everything on this side of things as well.

Oh, what’s this? Elihu? Why would there be a picture of him here? Dreadful. It’s bolted to the wall! Who would do such a thing? This must be some cruel jest, what an odd place this is. Where’s the door? How can there be a room with no door? The window is barred! I won’t stand for this. There must be an exit the room wasn’t built around me. Who picked these chairs? None of them even match.

I better sit anyhow, who knows how long it will be before they come for me. This must be a waiting room, soon they’ll usher me away to my permanent residence. There will be no portraits of that horrible man adorning those walls. How shall I pass the time then? The legs on this chair aren’t even the same length. It wobbles. I’ve got nothing to wedge beneath it. Though maybe it’s the floor now that I think of it. Seems wavier than a stormy ocean. All the furniture is bound to wobble on a floor like this.

I would stand here in anger but the boredom is causing me great weariness. I could nap in that wretched bed until they’re ready to move me. Wobbly, but comfy. Now that I’m lying here though, sleep seems to elude me. Maybe I’ll try standing again.

Hmm, sleepy again...