Friday, June 19, 2009

A room



Now I was sure psychologists had determined that a rustic bedroom was the most soothing ambiance for waking up from dead. This room was a little different from the previous one, less frillsome and more to my taste, but all the same basic elements were there. I couldn´t be bothered with the details, though, and threw away the soft duvet and stepped to the window to see the view outside. A wide expanse of windblown sand, with occasional copses of reeds, and a sea of white-tipped waves. At least I wasn´t in Ireland. And, apparently, the world hadn´t been blown to smithereens in a nuclear war during my two-year absence as I could see a few seagulls hovering over the waves. But then, this could plausibly be Australia and the last beach.

I let out a sigh. It seemed that dying put me in a morbid mood. There was an oval mirror on the cupboard door, and to distract myself I decided to see if there had been any changes or if I was the old engineered myself. Everything seemed in order; Engineer wouldn´t have allowed anyone to tinker with perfection. I let out another sigh. Perfection wasn´t enough to tip the scales when it came to bumbling bisexuals. In my subjective sense of time, Harry had broken up with me just three days ago. Impending depression.

There was a knock on the door, and Mauro entered with a lopsided smile.

“It´s OK,” I said. “Thanks for killing me.”

“You´re welcome,” he said, recovering some of his regular good mood. “And welcome to Denmark.”

I frowned. That seemed ominously close to Sweden, under the circumstances. Something was up.

“He and Britta divorced five months ago,” Mauro explained, resigned to the role of a reluctant matchmaker.

Perhaps being dead didn´t deserve all the bad rep it usually got.

A thought crossed my mind. “How did that pow-wow go, about letting me recruit someone?”

Looking more resigned than ever, Mauro said, “They could hardly say no after I killed you.”

“You don´t think it´s a good idea.”

“I think it´s a great idea,” Mauro said forcefully. “But you haven´t had time to think it all through. It´s going to be far more trickier than you´d believe.”

“I know. He might not be crazy about the idea of having a bunch of anthropologists in his head, watching while he´s doing kinky homo things.”

“You can´t even be sure if it should be him. Two years have passed,” Mauro reminded me. “I don´t want you to get your hopes up.”

“Is he seeing someone?”

“That´s something you need to find out for yourself.” He stood up. “How about if we go out and do something Danish?”

“What´s that?”

Mauro cocked his head. “Words beer, smörgåsbord, and welfare come to mind. I guess that means going to a bar to get drunk and fat on government´s money.”

“The next time, please wake me up in Ireland.”



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