October 20: A Night Out

The October Diary is a work of fiction originally released serially during October 2015. The complete list of posts can be found here.

October 20th

I went out with Kate tonight. She noticed I was in an odd mood. It was awkward not to tell her why, but I was glad to see her.

Dying is incredibly lonely, particularly when you are the only one who knows that you will die soon. There were a few times I almost told her. It might have been nice to say it:

“I’m going to die. I’m going to die on October 31st. Thank you for being a good friend. Goodbye.”

Perhaps she’d cry. Perhaps she’d plan me a going away party. Most likely she would have thought I was joking. She’d say something like, “Well, it’s too bad I won’t be around to see that, but I’m going to die on October 30th.” Then she’d laugh.

Worse yet, what if she remembered my alleged joke after the fact? She might feel guilty for not believing me, as though there was something she could have done to help.

No, I avoided that particular subject.

Kate’s been a good friend. She always reminds me of Brendan, which can be weird. Sometimes when she wants to talk about her dead brother, my dead husband, I try to change the subject as soon as possible. Tonight though, when she got reminiscent, I let her go. It gave me an acceptable reason to cry.

Oh, and we laughed too. We made silly jokes and got a bit tipsy.

And we made plans to get together again.

On November 1st.

Clearly I’d prefer to get together before that, but her month is really busy. (I lied and said mine is too.)

Initially when she suggested November 1st I said it wouldn’t work, for reasons obvious only to me, but then I changed my mind.

I have no idea what is going to happen to me at the end of the month, which means I have no idea if anyone will even know that I’m dead. I don’t like the thought of being one of those bodies that only gets discovered when the smell gets too bad.

If Kate comes over on the first, then the longest I can go undiscovered is a day. It’s comforting to know that.

I cried when I hugged her tonight saying “Thank you” and “Goodbye.” She said I was drunk. I nodded my head and laughed, trying to ignore the dark, smiling figure watching from across the street.

What happens next? Read the next part of the story here.