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They
reminded me of those dead things in horror movies.

They
reminded me of zombies.

JANICE

My
room was dark. Tree branch shadows went up and down on the walls.
So
this is it, then,
I thought.
This is now my life.
I
wanted to cry again. I didn't care how stupid it made me feel. Odd
sounds were all around me: Feet shuffling outside my door, snoring
that turned into choking, weeping women, vomiting sounds, someone
counting backwards, a distant cat being stepped on, a weatherman on
TV, piano music, pills dropping to the floor, hands rubbing on
balloons, splashing sounds, skating sounds...and sometimes I'd get a
whiff of something bad. I forced myself not to think. No no no: The
loneliness was getting to me again.
Fight it; fight it. I
don't need anyone anymore; I've trained myself to enjoy my own
company.
Sanglan popped into my
head; he was leaning on his cane; he was all smiles. In my mind, I
reached out for him. He waved...and vanished. The crying came easy
then.
I tried to make the best of it. Hey, at least I didn't
have to cook anymore. In the home, I had the chance to just be lazy
and have people feed me and bathe me. What the hell? Just give up all
together. Just go with it, Janice. Just give up and get ready to die.

No
no no.

I
couldn't do that.

I
could take care of my own damn self. 80 or whatever, I didn't FEEL
old. My body was still
vibrating
. All those years of being a
health guru paid off, and it felt dead wrong to just...to just get
lazy and piss away all that work. So I got up and did pushups in the
dark, and situps, and jumping jacks, and shadowboxing. After I worked
up a good sweat, sleep was easy. I dreamed that I was on a
mountaintop, eating some sort of frozen treat. Eagles were all around
me. Some sat on my shoulder. I felt...free.

Alive
.

In
the morning, I did the same exercises again.

There
was a terrible crash outside of glass shattering. I swung the door
open and looked down the hallway. A male nurse was wrestling with an
old man.

“I'm
okay! I'm okay!” shrieked the old man.

The
nurse brought up a noose.

“Then
what is this? Huh? At it again, eh, Coontang? I should report you.”

The
old man was on his knees.

“Please
don't. They'll take me away! Put me in the loony bin! Do you know
what they do to old people there? I've seen movies, man.
Movies
.
Don't let them take me away. I like it here.”

The
nurse stuffed the rope into his pocket.

“I'm
keeping this. Now don't let me see you acting a fool again. Right?”

“Yes,
right, right. I promise.”

The
nurse grinned and walked away. Coontang put his hands to the floor
and began to weep. As if sensing me, he looked over his
shoulder...and growled. I ran back into my room and slammed the door.
He
saw
me. Was he sane? Was this a home for old people or a
mental house? The stereotype was that the older you got, the crazier
you got...the more you lost your grip on reality...your mind. Was it
true? I began to worry. I shook my head and leaned against the door.
No no no. I
knew
I was sane. I was healthy – physically
& mentally. You needed to tend to both, see? That was the trick.

A
knock on the door.

I
didn't want to open it.

Another
knock.

It
was Coontang, I knew it, out to get me – angry at me because I
saw him crying. He was ashamed. He felt less of a man, and now he
wanted to reclaim his
manliness
by beating up an old woman.
And then he would go
all out
. Sure. Why not? After committing
sick murder, why stop there? I imagined him running all through the
home, waving rusty, bloody butcher knives in the air and cutting off
faces. He'd run outside to meet 50 police cars, lights all circling
blue and red, and fall to his knees in disbelief at what he had just
done – at all the faces he cut off and stuffed in his pockets.
As the cops stick their guns in his face, he'd whisper how unfair
life had been to his dreams, to his
body
.

I
opened the door.

Coontang
smiled and extended his hand for a shake.

“Jackson
Coontang,” he said. “Pleasure to meet you.”

He
had wiped the tears away from his cheeks. But his eyes were still
swimming.

JACKSON
COONTANG

That
was a great morning. I showed Janice around the home. More people
were up and about than usual. In fact, the place was absolutely
buzzing with activity. It reminded me of a zoo, and someone let out
all the snakes. I held Janice's hand as we walked, and I was
delighted that she held back. I felt a connection with her. She was
quiet and never interrupted...always listening. Being around her
calmed my noisy brain. Being around her made the home tolerable.

“First
thing's first,” I told her. “Don't talk to anyone that
doesn't smile. Sounds simple, but trust me. People here don't lie
about how they feel. Whatever emotion they're feeling, they let it
allll come out. The weak ones do, anyway. I, for one, try to control
myself.
Control
. It's the only thing we old folk have left.”

She
cleared her throat.

“I'm
not old.”

I
laughed.

“You're
80.”

“And
what?”

“That
makes you
old
.”

“Are
there people here who are 90? Or 81?”

“Well,
Miss Feewoy is 90...” I said, “...and Grackow is 81.”

She
waved me away.

“As
long as there's someone older than me, that makes me younger. Makes
me
young
. Understand now?”

She
was smiling up at me: Eyes shut, all teeth.

I
saw her point – and it was a good one – and for a second
I bought it. Then, as was always the problem with me, I thought of
people 80 and under. The youth. I bit my tongue. They always made me
feel like punching through a wall. When I was a younger man of 80,
you could find me in the park everyday all day, playing soccer with
the guys. Reliving my glory days was my true joy in life. After the
guys all died, something in me died. The passion had faded. The joy
was going away. I had no one to play with. Loneliness set in. I felt
time catching up on me. For the first time in my life, I feared TIME.
I started thinking about how Benway got a heart attack and collapsed
in the cereal aisle, how Jamantha crashed her car into a bus of nuns
because her brain just “gave out”, how Dizziton's cane
broke in two and he fell into a manhole – right into the sewer
and drowned in all that filth. I couldn't stop thinking. I was
polluting my mind with junk. And it was right then that I got sick,
got weak, got TIRED. Whenever I got into that terrible vibration, all
that helped was biting my lip.

Janice
said that my lip was bleeding. I said that it was normal, and we
moved on.

We
walked into the playroom.

“This
is where we go to play various games: Ping pong, chess, hide and go
seek, Twister, so-forth and so-forth. Every once and a while,
Jealousy The Clown comes down and tries to cheer us up by doing all
these back flips and magic tricks and moonwalks. The guys usually
just stare right through him. That stupid clown hates being here as
much as we do. Whenever I walk by and catch him doing his act, his
face is filled with rage & boredom. Once someone cracks a smile,
he throws his hands up, packs up his bag of tricks and animal
balloons, and says, “All right! My job is done. Smell ya
folksies later.”

“I
hate being called a folksie. Makes me
feel
old.” “I
hate that damn clown. I threw a cupcake at the back of his head once
when he was leaving.”

Janice
frowned.

“Be
careful. The more you push against something, the more it pushes
back.”

That
crazy old girl Heineken zipped by on her roller skates. Janice yelped
and hugged me. My heart jumped. What was happening? Did she like me?
Maybe this girl was the
one?
Was she flirting with me? Did I
have to make moves on her? Did I even remember how? What was the next
move? I had to say something.

“
Heineken must be in a good mood,” I said. “She's wearing
her goggles and helmet.”

Heineken
whooshed by a nurse, scaring her, and disappeared behind a corner.

“Att'a
ma way!” she went, words fading.

Her
skating girlfriends sailed by us. It was a damn platoon of old people
rollerskating.

“That
looks like fun,” Janice said. “Think I could join them?”

“Sure.
One thing, though. Heineken is their leader, and if there's anything
Heineken hates, it's roller
blades
. This other woman (I think
her name was Yangyang Harowiski) joined them. When she showed up with
rollerblades, Heinekan tore them off her feet and threw them THROUGH
a window, hitting a passing dog that was last seen skating down
traffic. Yangyang ran away crying and was never seen again. I think
she lives in Mexico now, God help her.”

“Why?”

“Well,
I hear the water in Mexico gives you the runs, and it's just so hot
there.”

“I
mean, why does Heineken hate rollerblades?”

“Heineken
was the master and commander of rollerskating back in the '70s. When
the '90s came around, she met her enemy: Rollerblade queen Reena
Yamatosha-Gag. There was this big tournament in Waikiki called The
Roller 2000. Everything was 2000
this
and 2000
that
back in those days. The whole island showed up for the race. It was
bigger than the Honolulu Marathon. The Roller 2000 would determine
once and for all which skate was “better”. The roller
skate
, or the roller
blade
. The race was to start in
Waikiki and end at
Kaneana
Cave
(Makua
Cave). I always felt it was a bad spot to end a race. Exhausted
skaters could wobble off and tumble down to the ocean. It would be a
long-ass fall, indeed.

“Right
at the sound of the gun, Heineken and Reena were ahead of the pack –
neck-to-neck all the way to the end. They looked very professional as
they went, leaned forward and all. It started to rain later, but they
just kept going, nonstop, even when two cars slipped on the road and
crashed into each other right next to them, they just kept going,
huffing and puffing. When they reached the cave, Reena tried to push
her off the cliff. KILL HER. Just to win a race. The whole thing was
caught via helicopter. Heineken tackled her and they went skating
into the cave, headbutting and biting and punching each other in the
gut. Long story short, Heineken got the crap beaten out of her, and
Reena went to jail; but she still
won
the race. And Heineken's
been PO'ed ever since. Sometimes I hear her skating down the hallways
at three in the morning, mumbling something about “caves...caves....”
No one complains. We all feel too sad for her. Just let her skate.
But if you want me to introduce you to her, just let me know.”

“Never
mind,” Janice said. “I don't even know how to skate.”

“What
do you like to do?”

“Pushups,
situps, shadowboxing, normal things like that. I used to be a health
instructor.”

“Do
you like...soccer?”

She
smiled.

“I
love soccer. Are you a player?”

“One
of the best,” I said, grinning. “I can teach you all my
tricks.”

Someone
young screamed. A nurse ran out from a room, carrying a tray of pills
and little cups of water – ran right into a wall, knocking
herself out. The tray hit the floor and the sound pierced my ears.
Pepper walked out of a room, pointing at her arm.

“She
tried to stick me with a needle!” she yelled. “I said NO
needles! Don't you young idiots understand English?! You kids think
you're so hip with your complicated shoes and lazy tongues!”

Other
nurses ran to her and put their hands up in front of her, trying to
soothe. Janice came close to me.

“Is
that person crazy?”

I
moaned.

“That's
Pepper Ann. She's 90.”

Pepper
saw me and narrowed her eyes and licked her lips and rubbed her
breasts in a sexy way. The nurses dragged her back into the room. I
took Janice's hand and moved on.

“Best
you stay away from Pepper,” I said. “She's worse than
crazy. She's a
witch
.”

HAWAII
MOUNTAIN POLICE

Investigation
Report - 12/01/11

Summary:
On 11/28/11, Debra Hateer was found up a tree in the Ke'eawa woods.
When police tried to coax her down, Mrs. Hateer proceeded to pelt the
officers with rocks and sticks and spit and wild hisses. A pebble
dropped into Lieutenant Bligh Sharlamain's eye. He fell to the ground
bleeding and weeping and was sent to the hospital for physical and
mental evaluations. Lieutenant Clipe Whitenhoussen brought out his
gun to shoot Mrs. Hateer and protect himself, but she hit him in the
face with a jagged rock that sent him to the ground unconscious. The
remaining officer, Lt. Dia Mamia, threw a rope up at Mrs. Hateer and
lassoed her foot and dragged her out of the tree.

In
Lt. Mamia's own words, “Mrs. Hateer was like a dog with a
stepped-on tail.” She continues: “It was an old woman.
Another one of those THINGS. She began to eat the other officers. I
tried kicking and
shooing
her away, but it only seemed to make
her more excited. Finally, I tried shooting her body, but to no
desirable effect. The old woman jumped up at me and went for my face.
I ran my fingers into her skull and yanked out her eyes. I puked.
Then, remembering my younger days as a rodeo clown, I got my rope and
tied it around the zombie and threw the other end up a tree and
pulled as hard as I could. I hung that monster good. So good, in
fact, that her body disconnected from her neck and fell down like a
sack of onions. The head swung, eyes moving in circles, that mouth
opening and closing...spitting.”