Champions

August 3rd, 2065 

My name is Edward Macky. I do not want to die, and that is okay. I am entitled to my feelings. Fuck. 

This is going into the garbage like the ones before it. This is going into the garbage like the ones before it. If it's going into the garbage, then I should feel liberated to write this, right? It shouldn't feel so weird to just sit here and talk to myself, should it? 

My therapist suggested I do this. He's the only one who knows, and even what he knows is limited to the compulsive lie that I tell myself. He respects my confidentiality, and in the spirit of that, I feel like I must also maintain his and others who might be mentioned later. It doesn't matter anyway. This is going into the garbage like the ones before it. 

I just don't know how to start. 

August 6th, 2065 

No matter what they say, I am not against the cause. They might say that this is hypocritical of me later, but I can only promise that I am sincere. I agree with and support the Individual Freedoms act. I was even born of the second sexual liberation that followed. I understand that it is that act that I have to thank for being blessed to be born in the time that I was. 

And although the land has finally started to heal from our overpopulation, I cannot accept that self-euthanasia is the best solution to our problems. Yes, everybody has the right to live how they see fit, so yes, everybody has the right to die however they see fit as well. But is it so bad that someone wants to live? 

It is not 'Lazy' to survive. I am not a 'Leech' like the internet would have you think. I wake up every morning just like everybody else. I go to work every day just like everybody else. But all they want to talk about is how they want to be Champions. Work, work, work, work, Champion the cause. They are miserable, miserable people, and I don't care if they are self-culling for the greater good; these people are depressed. And they want me to be just like them? To live life the way they want me to live it? This is a circus, a madhouse. It's...surreal. 

We do have too many people. We do have to limit our population for the sake of the environment. It is their right to live their life how they want to live it and die how they see fit. I thank each of them for the sacrifices they've made so our land can continue to heal. But what is the point if we're living to die? 

August 11th, 2065 

My brother got married this weekend. His wife hung herself that night. It was a massive tax write-off. I was with him when he cried; they were tears of joy. It was their plan all along that was his third "Champion." At this point, I'm showing up just for the cake; I don't even want to remember anybody else's name. I know enough people. 

He likes to joke that he's a "Last year" kind of guy. He marries them and makes their final years the best that he can. Makes his money as a widower, supporting the Campions of the cause. He respects them deeply, and there's a glowing empathy in him to do something about it. He's smart, far more intelligent than me, sitting next to him with a socially acceptable grin, trying desperately not to scratch my neck. It itches when I get nervous. Maybe it's loneliness. I didn't know it was possible to feel so invisible. 

My mother was there as well. She lived a long and healthy life doing the same thing as my brother. Only she referred to it as "Day trading" in jest. It's funny how casual people can be when they think we're all on the same page. 

Well, I guess she assumes that as you get older, there's less to see. Maybe I am naïve, but I disagree. I don't know what's there, but I do want to see it. Of course, a fair argument could be made that I am just not ready. For now, I will accept that. It beats the hell out of talking politics with my mom. 

She also made a comment about my hair. It's longer than it has ever been before. When I was a child, she would warn me that she would paint my fingernails pink if it got this long. I hadn't heard that in years, but I felt it whenever she tilted her head to get a better angle on it. I brushed it off.  

Whenever I think of my hair, I am reminded of the man who built my first apartment, a renovated loft in the heart of the woods near a garbage mill. He grew his out because he was keeping track of time. His last haircut was the day he smoked his last cigarette. He was dying of lung cancer but wouldn't get the chemo. Keeping track of your time, knowing that you're going to die. What a hell of a concept. 

August 14th, 2065 

I can hear the celebrations in the distance. There's always a 21-gun salute for the Champions who decide to stand along the wall. When I was a kid, I remember seeing a woman get hit, and she survived. Four bullets entered her back, none of them lethal, and all exited the other side—straight through. They finished the job, but I remember seeing her moving. I caught her eye under the scarf and noticed color. 

August 16th, 2065 

My brother called. He's the only one who calls these days. Ever since Melony died. Melony is dead. 

August 20th, 2065 

I find that I have been sleeping a lot these days. I've been calming myself by sticking my hands between my knees and rolling up the dead skin with the friction of my palms. I'm anxious. It's almost the day. My brother offered to go with me to Melony's plot, but I told him it wasn't a big deal. I'm probably not even going to go. I have the old locket she left behind, the one with her mother's picture in it. She would probably want to have it. I wish we still got stones when we died. That way, I didn't have to leave it on the floor. 

August 25th, 2065 

When I was 19, working outside of my home state for the first time at a rustic little gas station just off the freeway, I thought I met a ghost. I was right across the street from a strip mall. Our parking lots were empty at closing, the population there was minimal at best. I was outside smoking when this kid exited from the shoe store. He was overweight and slow. Saggy pants, ratty shoes, and dull eyes. His dome was capped with a blue beanie, which stood higher than gravity should have allowed. 

I went inside and got behind the desk. It's crazy to me that I spent so much time working back then. I would never get that time back. Anyway, I think nothing of it as the kid enters the store a few minutes later. He wanders around for a while and stares at the pastel bars of chocolate lining the counter. Occasionally, he would reach up underneath the cap with one of his chubby, round fingers and scratch his head. I asked him if there was anything I could assist him with, as his presence was heavy with the weight of the unknown, and I felt it best to stick to what I knew to do: my job. 

He spoke with the slow drawl of the mentally handicapped. I glanced around for someone, anyone who might be his handler. (Is that wrong?) "Sorry," he said, like syrup. Each syllable stuck to the end of the other. I was not offended, and I felt empathy that he should feel the need to apologize for being himself. But I stayed silent, as his mouth had yet to close, and I anticipated more. 

"I'm a little slow." He finished explaining, finally. I tried to tell him that it was alright and let him know if there was anything I could get him, but he interrupted me in the middle of my script. 

"My friend was shot." 

I held my breath. For a moment, I wasn't sure if I should call the cops or if this was all due to his...condition. But then, he offered more struggled details. 

"We were walking home last year (he didn't really pronounce his R's. This was the first time I noticed that he just sort of...rolled over them.), and we got jumped. He wanted our money. He shot us in the head, but I survived."  

The whole thing took no less than 10 minutes, and I hung on the end of every letter, waiting for but dreading the next. Then, finally, he reached up and scratched underneath his hat. 

"The hole. It itches sometimes." 

I asked if he wanted me to call anybody. He assured me he was fine and walked away. Shaken, I immediately went back outside for another cigarette. He hadn't left the store more than a minute before me, but by the time I went outside, he was gone. 

To make sure I wasn't crazy, I went into the shoe store and asked if they remembered seeing him half an hour before. I gave them the best description I could and even tried to emulate his speech to the best of my ability. But they said they hadn't seen a soul all night. 

I have spent many years thinking that he didn't survive that bullet the night he was mugged, but the scar on my neck itches whenever I think about him now. 

August 27th, 2065 

You know what's crazy? I have never had a locket. Heart-shaped or otherwise. Now I don't even have hers. My brother and I dropped it off at the base of her placard in the Hall of Champions. I even took the time to dust off the footprints. Every brick a name. Mother says my father is in here somewhere. He did it for the family. My wife did it for me. I just pulled the trigger. Twice. 

August 31st, 2065 

They say that a percentage of people who get shot in the head survive. A small percentage, but there's a number for it somewhere. I remember hearing that it didn't hurt. There was adrenaline involved, too much to feel the pain. The pain comes later, just like life. The pain comes later. It hurts like hell if you live through it, though. 

I don't want to be the voice of the survivors. I think that's what I am.  I am not a champion. But am I a survivor? I want to live, and that is okay. It will be okay because it must be okay. 

I have made it another year. And I will make many more. I try to spend at least an hour every day thinking about that. Waiting for an angel of inspiration to show up. Sometimes she does not. It is like waiting for a beautiful woman at a bus stop. You only hope you ever see her again. But time is none of my business. I exist in the here and in the now. 

I keep checking my watch, and I feel silly. It does not matter. I know I will simply be here until I am not.