Chapter 9

Your name is James, and you’re dead.

Five years after your death, the number of times strangers mention you can be counted on ten fingers—including your fleeting appearances in annual tribute videos for deceased gay porn stars. To your family and Anthony, you’re less like a dead person and more like a genie in a lamp. Perhaps because you brought them misfortune while alive, they now pin their hopes on your ghostly presence.

When your brother decided to become a tattoo artist, he said, I hope James gives me the courage to start anew. He probably forgot how much you hated the ugly tattoo on your left buttock, inked during your drug-addled days.

When your Anthony tried to embrace a new relationship, he said, I hope James sends my new lover to me as a gift. He probably forgot the furious expression you wore when you saw photos of him with another man at a birthday party you weren’t invited to.

Beyond that, your brother plans to commemorate each anniversary of your death by tattooing messy designs on his unmarked skin, while Anthony intends to release balloons by the seaside on your death day—bringing along his “gift” instead of the dogs you once raised together.

Anthony’s new relationship ended three months in when his partner admitted he wasn’t ready. Occasionally, Anthony couldn’t help but mention your name, unconsciously comparing you to this “gift” supposedly sent from heaven, who conveniently appeared at a drag show nightclub.

In Anthony’s words, your sex addiction and depression were stripped of their hysterical edges and repackaged as piercingly beautiful. Beyond that, he spoke of your documented loyalty and dark humor—along with a damnable ambition he imagined for you.

The day after they agreed to visit the beach for your memorial, Anthony told the man about how you spent hours learning Italian cuisine just to surprise him on an ordinary night—even describing the pattern on the apron that barely covered your naked body.

At the mention of “Italian food,” the man knew it was time to leave. You were immortalized by death, your flaws smoothed by time’s erosion. But he was alive—prone to mistakes, incapable of cooking Italian. You were a lighthouse in Anthony’s heart, its shadow cast thick as oil paint under the sun. Even your penis size and body fat percentage became silent metrics in Anthony’s mind. Hear that? It’s all your fault, you dead bastard.

So, the man said he wasn’t quite ready. On the day of your memorial, Anthony took your two dogs to the beach instead of the Italian-food-incapable “gift.” As the hydrogen balloons soared toward the horizon, if he listened closely, he might’ve caught a faint, smug chuckle.

Amid heartbreak, Anthony couldn’t help comparing this pain to the apocalyptic devastation of losing you—only to find it was merely the sting of a medical needle this time.

What was your apocalypse like?

In your sixth year with Anthony, your relationship seemed to reach its end. Not because love had soured, but because its cruel underbelly could no longer be hidden. For years, Anthony saw himself as your lifebuoy while you drowned—until he realized you were both sinking, and you clung to him like kelp, dragging him under. You nearly destroyed him with your manic sex addiction, treatment-resistant depression, relentless pessimism, despair-fueled rambling, and numbing drugs.

So damn close.

After years of suffocation beneath the kelp’s grip, Anthony kicked free and crawled ashore, gasping. He said he needed to breathe—you should separate for a while.

At the time, you sat slumped at the dining table, staring blankly at whole-grain toast smeared with blueberry jam. Your movements were as sluggish as your dementia-riddled grandmother, who no longer recognized you.

Anthony raised his voice, suspecting your mind was eroded by aspirin, antidepressants, steroids, and GHB. “Baby, I think we need some time apart. I love you, but I’m in pain. I want to save us—but it’ll take time.”

You heard him perfectly but stayed silent.

You felt submerged in turquoise water, icy tendrils coiling around you like a hundred amphibious limbs. Paralyzed, you sank toward the seabed as if pulled by a colossal magnet. Drowning wasn’t the issue—breathing no longer mattered. You just kept sinking. Just as you neared the bottom, the ocean split open. Undersea volcanoes quaked, and the earth’s fissures swallowed you whole. On either side, trenches of dark soil and fractured rock stretched like woven fabric, roots gripping the damp earth. You plummeted into bottomless black. That was your mood in that second.

The next moment, you stared at the purple-stained butter knife in your left hand, itching to plunge it into your right.

Anthony hugged you. Seated, your face pressed against his chest, your toast smearing jam onto his T-shirt seam—a stain easily washed out.

“Don’t leave me,” you begged. He assumed you didn’t know what “cooling-off” separations meant for married couples. Unlike them, your bond was fragile—this might just be Anthony’s strategy to slip away without provoking you.

Your body heated at the worst possible time. The knife clattered onto the porcelain plate with a dull clink. You spread yourself open like the chasm in your mind, and Anthony—perhaps out of self-preservation—chose to comfort you.

Afterward, he still left. He gave you three seconds to think, taking your silence as consent before you could refuse.

Anthony moved into his cousin’s place. As he packed, your dogs mistook his suitcase for a toy, wagging and darting around his feet. You drowsily ordered them to stop from the doorway.

Within a week, you cracked. Junk food, dark circles creeping down to your cheekbones, no shaving or gym visits. You overdosed on sleeping pills, preferring drowsiness over confronting loneliness.

You tried inviting Anthony to dinner, but he refused, citing exams. That midnight, you drove through a storm to his cousin’s home, pounding the door like a madman.

Anthony warily opened up, suspecting you were drunk, high, or both.

Your bloodshot eyes gazed at him lovingly—though to him, you were a furious lion, fangs bared, ready to rip his throat out.

Anthony recoiled, phone clutched in his fist. “One more step, and I’m calling the police.”

You raised your hands, meekly signaling no harm.

As you turned to leave, Anthony stopped you—worried you weren’t fit to drive. He insisted you call a friend.

You phoned Adam, pleading for a ride. Anthony let you inside, handing you coffee while avoiding your fingertips.

“I know I suffocated you. I could’ve been a better boyfriend, brother, son. But I wasn’t.”

Anthony watched you silently, just like when you first met.

“Your love became my weapon to destroy you, so you all race to leave. I’m trouble. A lunatic. A patient. I know.”

On the drive home, you asked Adam what having AIDS felt like.

“Like flirting with death every day,” he said.

The separation did nothing to mend your relationship—you felt the distance grow. Given your volatile state, Anthony didn’t even invite you to his birthday gathering.

His birthday was torture for you. You fried a steak, only for shredded meat to lodge between your molars. Hunting for floss, you realized—without Anthony, the apartment was a tomb. You called him, snarling, “Where the hell’s the floss?”

Anthony hung up after a stunned silence. Hours later, he sent photos from his party—including one with a muscular man. His revenge for ruining his cake moment.

You texted that you weren’t officially broken up—if he slept with that guy, you’d knock his teeth out.

Anthony shot back: You’re the one as open as a public-domain book.

The next day, you dragged yourself back to the gym. That night, your toned, drug-and-exercise-maintained body was back on rentboy sites—a glossy shell housing decaying organs and a lonely, deranged soul. Might as well put this tattered book on display while someone still wants to touch its spine.

Twenty days later, on your 30th birthday, Anthony texted wishes—but you waited until after your escort gig to reply.

128 days after turning 30, you died. The world flooded with melodramatic eulogies. You scoffed—you chose to destroy yourself. You had the final say, and you chose eternal silence.