The Desert Ghost and Corpse

My mouth was dry, my heartbeat fast, and I knew I slipped into death's fate with each heavy breath I took from this hot, unforgiving air.

I looked up and watched the birds circling above, and I wondered: is it me they are waiting for? But it didn't matter. What did?

I thought about my life, out of the conclusion that this was what I should, and tried unwillingly to bear forgiveness for those who long did me wrong. I couldn't. And I rebuked my hard and selfish heart that even upon death's doorstep could not be opened to mercy.

I closed my eyes, I shut my mind; I let everything transform into nothingness: the flying birds, the shifting sand moving with the wind, the little gray plants, my sticky bloody clothes, the leather bag, the beauty of...

"Hey there, pal. You going to need that?"

I opened my eyes, a little annoyed, to see an elder, a broken stick in his hand to give him support and an old frail cloak that covered him so loosely as to offer abashment to the cultivated viewer. A dirty green scarf, seemingly torn off an old cloth, was wrapped around his head to form a deformed turban that sheltered half his face from the sun.

He was old, he was ugly, and he came at the wrong moment. I did not have time for this.

"Go away," I called, not in the usual politeness I offer strangers – perhaps it was the situation that got me into such a mood.

"I will, I will," promised he. "But can I take that first?" He pointed at my bag.

"What? No! No, you can't! Go away!" I repeated, trying to put a threatening tone to my voice, resulting in a strong cough and blood dripping on my lower lip. I closed my eyes again.

Moments passed; in fact, I daresay I thought the man left. That was, until I felt a small tug on my bag...

"Hey!"

The man withdrew his hand and blushed as a little child. "I'm – I'm sorry. I just, you know. I thought you were dead already and I thought maybe..."

My face reddened as his, only with agitation rather than shame. "What makes you think you can just take my bag, even if I were dead?!"

"Well I..."

"That's what I thought! Now leave me in peace, old man!"

I felt my heartbeat speed dramatically but I could not die now! Not now when I know my corpse will be robbed by this man; so I did what I never thought I would in such a situation: I tried to stay alive a bit longer.

"What do you need my things for, anyway?" I asked, fighting to keep my voice strong.

The cloaked man smiled and sat beside me, as if preparing for a long talk with an old friend. "Ah, you see," he said lightly. "Right now anything would help me to get across this wasteland, but," he pointed at my bag, "I also have a special passion for leather. This might not be of best quality, but there is plenty to work with. See these cuts? I bet I could loosen the string tying them and spread them and use my good knife here to..."

I was suddenly as if taken by a black cloud: my vision blurred, my senses weakened, and I felt my eyes rolling in their sockets. I fought it and it vanished, leaving me with the old man, staring gleefully.

"What are you looking at?"

"You actually."

"You waiting for me to die, ain't you?" I blinked, fighting the cloud to keep it away, yet I wandered how long I could keep at it.

"Well, yes. When you die, you won't give me as much trouble. And then I can take not only your bag, but also you fine shoes!" I looked down at my jagged and battered sandals.

A sudden sharp pain in my head blurred my senses once again, but made me take immediate action.

"When I'm gone, I'll be sure to tell Conk of your theft! So His Mightiness can punish you in the Afterlife!"

The old man laughed. He laughed so hard, tears came out of his eyes; I blushed, since no one took such a threat as a joke.

"Why would Conk care? Why would any God care?" He barked another laugh.

"What does..." I began, but my voice broke and my pain grew – I would not live much longer.

The old man's face softened. "We are the Gods' circus: merely a big world of entertainment for Them, one among thousands. And if only we would have been more amusing to Them, maybe we would get more answers to our prayers. But we don't."

Any minute now, I thought. The black cloud took me again, more fiercely now – it was ferocious. But I was too. So I croaked my last request: for I had to know the man's name in order to complete my threat, or else it would all be in vain. And I said:

"Who – who are you?"

Seconds past, seconds in which I thought I would die without knowing my thief's name: the old man whose face are to be my last view of the world; and what a shame that he had such an ugly face.

Then:

"Don't you recognize me?" He asked. "Don't you know? Luke, I am y–"

But his sentence was already gone, when the cloud took me again, and I heard another voice, calling me into the Afterlife; and I remember my last thought I bared in conscious mind before my end:

Wait. My name ain't Luke!