The Suicide Checklist

Chapter 6 - Christmas Lights

My music played only as background ambience, filling the otherwise dead silent car. I don't know why it was so quiet between us. When Jared and I were in the cafe or even just standing in the empty parking lot we had plenty to say. Now that he was here, sitting a foot or so away from me, a strangeness filled the air. I had never had a boy in my car before.

I had to break this silence. It was going to suffocate me. And that's a horrible way to die.

"How come you were smoking indoors earlier," I asked, not knowing what else to say.

"I thought I was sitting at some table outside the cafe," he said.

"Impossible," I added, focused on the road ahead. It's not like I needed to make eye contact anymore. Even though we never really did in the first place because of those sunglasses.

"I did! I really did!"

"I mean, inside and out are very different places."

"I know, right?"

"Jesus. How have you not been hit by a car or something yet?"

"Wait, metaphorically or literally?" I scrunched my eyebrows. What kinda question was that? Then I realized he couldn't see my expression. At least we were talking now.

"This is a nice car. I thought a buncha ghouls made this based on how it was acting, but it's pretty nice." He seemed to have this thing where he called anyone he didn't like or he thought was inept 'goons' or 'ghouls.'

"Now I understand why your paintings are so terrible. But that old one with the witch was pretty good."

"I like my paintings. Even if I can't see them, it's still fun to imagine what people tell me I'm looking at and feel the flow of the strokes on the canvas. I like to imagine it's the pulse of life. Sometimes it's frenetic, sometimes it's calm."

Although that was a pretty poetic way of describing painting, all I could think about was how he got around while blind. So I asked him. "Hey, how d'you move around if you're blind?" He stuck out his wrist and pulled back his sleeve half-way up his forearm.

"I got this Apple Watch here," he said. "I tell Siri I wanna go somewhere and the watch vibrates to tell me to turn here or turn there, bringing me to my destination. Blip-blip-blip. And that's kinda what guides my whole life. A buncha small vibrations... I guess that's what they mean when they say life is all about the small things."

Yet another poetic way of looking at things. Honestly, if I were blind, I'd probably kill myself. Not that blind people should, I just think life is enough of a struggle with all five senses working properly. He must have strong character to stay alive. I wonder if I have a weak resolve...

That's when I noticed, sticking out from under his watch, three marks. Short lines going down the line of his arm all the way to a...

Dear God what is that?

I noticed another thing on his well-defined arm. It was peeking out just from under his sleeve.

"Is that a tattoo," I asked.

"Huh?" He looked down, as if he had forgotten he can't see. "Oh, are you talkin' on my arm?"

"Yeah," I said, looking back up at the road before I almost drove us into a ditch.

"Yeaaah, I did it myself with one of those at-home tattoo kits. I did it while blind too. You don't need to see to write a sentence. You can feel your way through it. Try closing your eyes and write. It really works."

I looked down to see. Some letters were overlapping a little and the handwriting was offensively sloppy. I couldn't even make out what it said. That was fine, anyway. My eyes needed to be focused on the road ahead, not chicken scratch on an arm.