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Diego

A short story about the sweet relief of death.

By Scott NinnemanPublished 2 years ago 11 min read
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Image by David Mark from Pixabay.

The movies romanticize death. They lead us to believe death is this beautiful, if not magical, event. We want to believe there is some sort of otherworldly transformation when one reaches the end of his life. We imagine that death is a sacred and ceremonial event.

The truth is, death is nothing. In a second, life becomes death with no fan fair, revelations, or transformations. I know this because I was there the day my friend died.

Death took its time. As I sat with him, reaching out to stroke his hand, the last remnants of life left in small waves like the tide going out. When the end came, my mind told me his chest was still moving up and down. It seemed impossible that life could end without some spectacular event.

He was gone. His lungs no longer filled with air. His heart rested in silence in his chest. Beside me on the sofa was the shell of the man who once filled so much of my life.

I shouldn’t have been there that day. Diego and I had long since grown apart, and in the last few years, our meetings were rare. He became someone I saw at weddings and funerals. We would laugh and smile, maybe even hug, but there was no substance left. Any friendship was as dead as his body next to me. Yet, there I was, the only one in the damp cabin, watching as he finally ended his crazy journey.

It’s a complicated story, our time together. The beginning of our story holds no fantastic tales of kindred spirits tossed together by a chaotic universe. Even when we were together every day, the middle of our relationship had no stories of extraordinary human kindness or overcoming insurmountable odds. The end was a somber exit; me sitting alone beside him in his lakeside cabin, waiting silently until it was over.

Diego and I met at a mutual friend’s party about twenty years earlier. The first introduction was only a thirty-second conversation where we exchanged names and occupations. We both wanted a beer and collided at the buffet table while reaching for a bottle in a large silver bowl full of ice. Our attentive rushed over to offer introductions. We tried a polite conversation, neither of us able to hear the other over the blaring music, but quickly gave up on conversation and retreated our separate ways.

It was three months before I saw Diego again. Once more, it was a chance meeting. It was a Friday afternoon. Exhausted and frustrated after another long week of butting heads with my cantankerous boss, I stopped at the grocery store to pick up toothpaste, toilet paper, and something unhealthy for dinner. I was walking out of the store, struggling to put my credit card in my wallet while juggling my bags, when I ran into him.

“Ryan, right?” He extended a hand to me. His infectious smile drew me in like a mosquito to a bug zapper. His teeth were so white they glowed in the early evening light, and his thin mouth opened just enough to reveal his sharp-pointed incisors. A square jaw and uneven dimples made him appear welcoming, the ideal disguise for a predator.

“Diego.” I shook his hand, nearly dropping everything. “It’s nice to see you again.”

My intention was to keep walking. My greasy dinner in its styrofoam container looked bad enough already. I hated to think how much worse it would be if it got cold. Besides, I had a full night planned of muttering and complaining.

“Hey,” he stopped me. “Um, I really hate to ask this, but my car won’t start. Would you mind giving me a ride?”

In retrospect, I wish I had run. That simple, small request set the tone for the next ten years. Diego was always going to need something. I was always going to be the one to provide it.

During the next decade, we were together night and day. He moved in with me a few weeks after the grocery store, a temporary measure, while he worked out an apartment situation. Then he stayed, nearly a full ten years, coming and going as he pleased.

When he had some cash in his pocket, he would disappear for days at a time. When the money ran out, I was driving to get him or wiring him the money to get a ticket home.

The destructive relationship was my fault. I could have kicked him out. He gave me plenty of reasons. When I reached my breaking point, sure this was the last time, he’d flash that wicked white smile, and I’d succumb to his charms once more.

Then his grandfather died. Diego had no relationship with him, but was the only surviving relative. He disappeared the day the money showed up in his bank, and it was a year before I even knew he was still alive.

By then, I was healthier. I didn’t need his serpent charm or dazzling smile. I healed inside, becoming for myself what I always hoped he would be.

In recent months, I tried to ghost him, ignoring his many attempts to contact me. The tone of his voice in the last pleading voicemail struck a heart string. Diego knew my buttons, and the following Saturday, I drove out to his cabin, cursing myself the entire way. During the drive, I wondered if I was ever going to be free of him.

He met me at the door with a rehearsed monologue about the latest European adventure. He’d spent the summer hiking some distant mountains. My mind disengaged a few words in, but I smiled and nodded at appropriate intervals.

One wall in the center of the cabin was a floor to ceiling bookcase. The middle of the cabin had a loft, the bookcase making up its privacy screen. The case was full of books he’d never read and souvenirs from his many adventures. In ten seconds, I calculated the twenty-five thousand dollars I had invested in many of those trinkets.

“Anyway,” he was saying as he started scaling the bookcase like a monkey, “while I was there I got to thinking about this puzzle box I picked up the last time I was in Italy. I couldn’t remember if I ever showed it to you.”

“Don’t you think you’re a little old to be climbing the furniture?” I mumbled, nodding my head toward the rolling ladder that was only a few feet away. He smiled, ignoring my comment, and continued his climb, reaching a two shelves below the vaulted ceiling.

“Life comes at you fast, Ryan,” he informed me. “You need to learn to take charge. Take that over there,” he gestured to a human skull on the mantle, a prized possession of his I never understood. I used to put it in the garage whenever he was away.

In one blink, the room changed from mirth to tragedy. Diego’s hand was outstretched toward the skull, his body twisted, as his right foot missed his next step. His remaining hand lost its grip, and he fell, spinning slightly, crashing into the glass end table nearby. 

Diego falling was no surprise. Despite his charm and false confidence, he was one of the clumsiest people on the planet. Dozens of my things met untimely ends because of his carelessness. He was lucky enough to never receive a scratch, so I didn’t rush over to save him from his current disaster. I gave him a moment to regain his bearings, brush himself off, and laugh the way he always did.

But this time, he didn’t jump up. He didn’t move at all.

“Stop joking,” I scolded him, but there was no response.

I walked over and pushed my foot against his leg, expecting the laugh I knew was coming. Diego never moved. I nudged him again and nothing. I squatted beside him and picked up his right hand, which was closest to me, and let it drop to the floor. The thud elicited no reaction.

“Come on, man, this isn’t funny.”

Still nothing. Diego was incapable of keeping himself from laughing for very long. He was hurt.

“Crap,” I muttered to myself, knowing he had just become my responsibility again. I couldn’t just head home if he was injured.

I rolled him to his side to get my arms under him and picked him up, carrying him to the nearby sofa. It took a moment to realize my right hand was warm and wet. As I eased him onto the sofa and pulled my hand away, I nearly collapsed at the abundance of blood covering it.

“Diego!” I gasped. Without thinking, I shook him hard.

“Oh, God!” He gulped for air but seemed to find none. Examining his shirt, I saw two large holes. Pulling the fabric back, a large glass shard stuck out from between two of his ribs and another protruded from his side. The side wound appeared to be where most of the blood was pouring out.

Diego opened his eyes and stared at me in complete terror.

“Oh my God,” I exhaled in disbelief. The enormity of the situation hit me with blunt force. “Oh, God, Diego.” I grabbed his hand.

“Help me,” he pleaded, his voice a whisper.

“It’s going to be okay,” I promised him. With my clean hand, I reached into my pocket and grabbed my cell phone, dialing 911. Diego clenched his eyes closed as his pain receptors fired in overtime.

In that moment, looking down at my mortally wounded friend, something sinister swept through me. Diego lay there, helpless and frightened, needing me to rescue him once again. His pain was reflected in his contorted face as a bright red stain grew across his shirt and sofa.

An unexpected calm settled over me. I held the phone up to my ear, never having hit dial.

“Yes,” I spoke into my silent phone, “I need an ambulance. My friend has fallen and cut himself. He’s bleeding a lot.”

Standing beside him, still holding his hand, I looked down at Diego with a caretaker’s eyes, nodding my head to reassure him it was going to be okay. I squeezed his hand a little tighter, comforting him, making him believe that, like every other time, I was there to save him.

“Yes, that’s the address,” I said to no one. “Please hurry.”

I turned my phone off and slipped it back into my pocket. I laid the hand I’d been holding across his chest and reached to pull over the black leather ottoman. Sitting on the edge, I leaned close to his ear.

“Diego,” I whispered. “Diego, I want you to listen.” My voice grew softer with each word.

“Diego, you need to relax. Everything is going to be okay.” I wondered why I cared about reassuring him at all. He had never comforted me.

Another part of me reveled, hoping his long hold over me was finally going to be severed.

“Diego,” I said, but there were no more words. There was nothing else I wanted to say to him. The realization that I would soon be free of him was intoxicating.

He forced his eyes open to look at me. “Please,” his lips said, but no sound followed. His face grew paler with every second. “Bleeding,” he tried, struggling to get any air into his lungs.

“Yes,” I smiled at him. “You are bleeding. There’s blood everywhere.”

Amidst all the panic and pain, the tone in my voice registered in his brain, and a fresh fear entered his eyes.

“Yes, Diego,” I told him. “It’s time to say goodbye.”

He tried to lift his head, but was already too weak. I placed my hand on his shoulder to hold him in place.

Moments later, he closed his eyes for the last time. The pain that creased his face subsided, all of his muscles went limp. A few jagged breaths later, and it was over.

Reaching out, I touched his hand one last time. His skin already felt different. The body before me was no longer the friend I once craved to have in my life. Diego was gone. There would be no curtain call this time.

His blood on my hand was already drying. Any other time, the sight of blood would have sent me heaving. This time, I just sat in silent contemplation, fascinated by how quiet it went and how quickly the blood was drying.

I was free of Diego. A stranger’s laugh escaped my throat, and for a second, I flushed with embarrassment. Still, I was free. Finally. The relief brought on by the end of years of agony made me feel weightless. I imaged I could float from the room.

I sat with Diego a while longer. Scanning the bookcase, I smiled at the trinkets that were now meaningless.

Later, I meandered down to the lake behind the cabin and washed my hands in the cold water. I found a comfortable spot on a large, gray rock and watched the sunset. No day had ever ended more beautifully.

Long after the sky was completely dark, I found my way back into the cabin. I saw the body of the man who had once meant the world to me. A tear wanted to form in my eye, but there were no tears left for him. I pulled my phone from my pocket and turned it back on, finally calling for help.

“Yes,” I started when a woman answered. “I just arrived at my friend’s cabin. I think he might be dead.”

Short Story
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About the Creator

Scott Ninneman

Bipolar for 49 years, chronically ill for 36. The voice behind the Speaking Bipolar blog. Wrestles taxes by day, wrangles words at night. Thinker. TV Addict. Poet. Links: https://speakingbipolar.com/socialmedia

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