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He’s sitting on his couch, laptop on the coffee table in front of him, a cup of tea with precisely one cube of sugar and a teaspoon of cream (drinking nothing but Red Bull for twenty years straight is, apparently, very bad for your health). The news has never captured his attention before, but he finds the drone of news reporters while he codes almost calming. He almost never looks up, because seeing the fallacies of his own species makes his day marginally worse. But there is always a name that is going to make him flinch, and this time is no exception. His fingers stop abruptly, his chin jerks up, his eyes gone wide and shocked.
“…at the age of forty-four. Sources are still pouring in on the late Eduardo Saverin. Reports say his assistant had been the one to make the call, but whether or not it was already too late by then is still unknown. More on that story later. Moving on to last week’s heat wave…”
After that, Mark stares at the television screen for a half hour. He watches as the people on screen gesture at a giant map of California, and what the heat will mean for traffic conditions and other everyday things, and all Mark wants to do is tear his flat screen off the wall and throw it out his window. But he doesn’t.
He gathers his laptop and charger off the table and walks upstairs, hands in his hoodie pocket. At his age, dressing practically is viewed as smart rather than rebellious. Meticulously, he packs it in his case and brings it back downstairs. The Facebook offices are sure to be buzzing right now, and Mark wonders why no one cared to contact him, but then he remembers he’d left his cell phone in his office. He doesn’t take a second more to ponder it and instead drives straight there.
Mark doesn’t take time to meet with anyone. Things like this can be taken care of without him, believe it or not. In a few days he’ll be asked to make a public statement on the issue, and he will. But now, he goes to the back of the building where share holder and investment meetings are held, where he knows no one will think to look for him.
He sits down at one of the long tables and opens his laptop. Mark doesn’t leave for three days.
The rest of Mark’s life is normal. There are no more world-changing creations or billion-dollar lawsuits. No dramatized movies scripted from his life. He prefers it this way, and when he retires, he’s almost relieved. Facebook was his life, and he loved it, but when you live to see yourself start to go bald and wrinkle, you have time to think about what else there is to do. Mark learns fast that there are more things to do with his life than code and make more money. He decides to spend it on himself and things he cares about.
Mark tries to forget about Eduardo. He fails every time.
He invests in a lot of things while he can, while people still view him as important, as a face worth mentioning. There are health problems in America, and Mark donates and helps run organizations that spread the word on eating right, sleeping on a schedule, and just taking care of yourself in general. Mark’s not trying to say anything with it, just that he knows, okay.
There are other things that he helps out with less publicity behind them, because it’s less for himself and more for his guilty conscience. Organic mood stabilizers and politicians trying to change the way people are treated in America and around the world are some of the few.
Like most things in his life, Mark controls his own death, too. At eighty, he’s content with how his life has turned out, and what he did with it, for the most part. His parents and most of his friends have already passed, and there isn’t much left to do but lose what’s left of his mobility and memory.
He lies down on his bed among the tens of pillows and sheets. It feels just like falling asleep.
The aftermath feels nothing like falling asleep. One minute, he’s content and happy with the fact that he died before he needed help shitting, the next he’s lifting himself from the ground, the wind knocked out of him from his fall.
“The fuck,” he curses, rolling his bitten tongue over his teeth. He looks around, notices the endless grey around him, and mutters, “I’m too old for this shit.”
After pulling himself into a sitting position, he looks around more, noting the absence of, well, anything, and is just thinking well, what now? when he hears the echo of footfalls behind him.
“You asshole,” he hears, and Mark almost chokes, his throat constricting.
“Wardo,” he gasps, head whipping around, but he sees no one. Panic settles in for a moment, and he thinks he’s just experiencing another nightmare, the ones that make him sweat and writhe in his bed, when he feels a cool hand on the back of his neck. Mark whirls around and almost bumps foreheads with Eduardo.
“You weren’t supposed to die for another eight years,” Eduardo says, close and intimate. His eyes are soft but hurt, happy but agonized.
Mark answers, “Well, you didn’t have to experience osteoporosis, so I don’t think you properly empathize,” but it feels empty on his tongue. He’s looking at Eduardo, memorizing each and every line of his face and curve of his expressions. He looks exactly like he did in Harvard, suit pressed but looking entirely at home on his body.
Eduardo smiles at him finally, brown eyes flicking back and forth between Mark’s. Mark has never felt more relieved. He regrets every moment he didn’t stop to stare forever at that smile when he had the chance. He’s not going to make the same mistake twice.
“It’s good to see you,” he says, accent thick and warm.
Mark doesn’t reply. Instead, he reaches out and grabs Eduardo’s wrist. There’s the butterfly thrum of a pulse there, and Mark presses hard against it, concentrating every last bit of his thoughts on it. Eduardo is not a dead body in morgue, not a vacant corpse rotting below the ground in a coffin that’s stupidly expensive. He’s there with his hand on the back of Mark’s neck, his pulse jumping under his fingertips.
“Is this real?” he asks. “I know the brain doesn’t die for a while after death, so I don’t know if…”
“When I died, I couldn’t move. I was still… I tried, but my body wouldn’t move. The janitor had already left, so I don’t think anyone would have heard me if I screamed, but I still could have tried to call, you know? And then everything just disappeared, and I was gone.”
That Mark can’t take. He pulls his hand away from Eduardo’s wrist and rubs his eyes, willing away every overwhelming emotion that’s running through his body. He reaches out blindly, grabs Eduardo by the shoulders and holds him close. Mark leans his head on his collarbone and breathes Eduardo in deep. Mark isn’t sure what’s real or not here, but he knows he can smell the strong scent of Eduardo’s cologne and feel his heartbeat against Mark’s chest.
“We’re dead,” Mark says.
“When did you start stating the obvious?” Eduardo teases.
Mark waits for a few moments and Eduard starts rubbing his back. His old Gap hoodie, his favorite one from college, is on him, and it’s that feeling of comfort that allows him to say it.
“What now?”
Eduardo pulls away, his expression honestly confused, lips pursed, and all Mark wants to do is kiss him.
“I don’t know. I guess we can leave. I think I could have, but, I never really wanted to.”
“Oh,” Mark says, looking away.
Eduardo puts his fingers under his chin, makes it so Mark is looking straight at him, his eyes so gentle that it makes Mark’s heart ache, his brain sing embarrassing eighties love songs, and his sarcastic soul spew self-deprecating insults.
“I want to now,” Eduardo whispers.
Mark smiles like he hasn’t done in years, and soon their vision fades to white.