Weekend Write-In

Solapse or, the Cat in The Box

He loved this. Sitting there on the patio in the morning. Just him, his plaid and his coffee. If weather permitted, out in the open. Otherwise, he'd sit under the gable roof. This morning was no different. It was chilly. April mornings could nip. He left the saucer on the table and cupped the thin bone china in his hands and sipped gingerly at the coffee. Papua New Guinea. That's where it had come from. It is not right, though, he thought to himself, our bargaining to buy this fine coffee so cheaply, disregarding their abject poverty. Saddened by this sudden thought, he looked across the coffee cup into the garden, lingering on the trees in the back. Holding the cup in his left hand, he reached over to get his pipe from the table. Then pain struck! As if a giant was twisting the joints to tear his legs off like drumsticks off of a chicken. Flashes of searing pain shot up through his spine, grabbing him like a giant vise. For a brief moment, his vision was clear and curiously observed the cup as it hung motionless in mid-air before gravity finally took possession of it, then tears welled into his eyes and pain blurred everything from existence...

It was night now. He had woken up several times since he got here. The morphine had kept him docile for days. Only a brief moment when the doctors spoke of surgery did he drag himself up from the slumber to disallow any life-prolonging procedures. The doctors had argued their case, but not for long. He'd die whenever he chose to, he had told them. With dignity. The morphine was slowly losing its edge. The pain becoming more acute but so too his awareness. The room was plain. Hospitals are so... inhospitable. Erwin would have loved this, he mused. Here I am, sitting alone in a sterile box, everybody else on the outside. And the moon is shining through the windows. I knew it'd be there. He closed his eyes in mock contemplation. He half laughed and half coughed in pain as he opened them. "Hi Max!", he said, smiling at the old man in the chair by the window.

"Did you read Erwin's conjecture?" He looked down at his hands.
"I think he was on to something."
The old man nodded.
"He went back to Vienna, you know." Max looked up at him.
"What, Erwin? I thought he was in India."
"Nee... Ireland, actually."
"Mmmh, he was wrong about the cat, though."
"Cat?"
"You know, his absurd box."
"Oh, that. Why absurd? We are both here... in a box... are we dead or alive?"
Max looked at him with a mischievous gleam in his eyes.
"Sagt mal Max, siehst du den Mond?"