Free The Joy of Killing by Harry MacLean

realize. Not the ticking on the window, not the rattling from below, not even my own breathing. Absolute stillness. I listen harder, then stand up to hear the chair scrape. Nothing. I twist the roller to hear the clicking. I see the sounds, but I hear nothing. Complete silence. The branches are knocking silently against the window. I say Joseph’s name, but nothing sounds. I say it again, louder, “Joseph!” and still nothing. “Motherfucker.” I bang my knuckles on the desk. I bang them again, and listen hard. I snap my fingers, I whistle. Has the world gone silent? I walk to the door, open it, and poke my head into the darkness. Nothing. I needed to go down the stairs, to the bathroom, but not in a soundless space. Whatever was rattling and scraping down there might be hanging around at the bottom of the stairs. The thought brings me to panic. I need to hear something, anything. A silent world is unbearable; it is noise that keeps you glued together, keeps the borders secure, the floors and ceilings in place. There must be a switch to flip. I kick the door shut. I turn back into the room. I inhale a large breath, and on the exhale hum soundlessly “row, row, rowyour boat, gently down the stream.” I close my eyes, snap them open. My hands are someone else’s, thick and bulky, like a farmer’s. I spread the fingers wide, see a shakiness, like leaves in a wind. I press them onto the table, hard, until the trembling stops. You don’t suddenly go deaf, I think; it’s some sort of a hysterical reaction. I walk to the window. Lift the small, rusted latch on the right edge of the oval, swing the window out. The night seems sharp and clear, scrubbed free of the grime of perception. The branches framing the scene, black and spindly, seem tightly woven together as if by an overly industrious spider. The moon has turned a bright white and skimmed a little closer to the house. I can see the hatch marks of the bats on the surface quite clearly now. I reach out to touch the very edge. The almost-round orb holds perfectly still, until an icy tingle touches my fingertips. Suddenly, I see a million years back into the universe, a depth beyond imagination, as if I were sailing into the timeless glitter of the ancient, boundless heavens. The sense of isolation vanishes; whichever way I turn are endless dimensions of stars. The dark rim of the moon glows orange, until it finally catches fire, and the entire orb begins a slow spin forward. The universe is silence, I realize; the stars don’t whir as they sail on their paths; the planets hurl soundlessly through space. It’s neither cold nor hot out there, neither good nor bad, full nor empty. I feel a searing peace. A tremendous wave of gratitude overcomes me, and my eyes well up. Knowing is a false God. Understanding a ruse. Feel yourself a member of the universe, properly belonging, as much as a star or a galaxy, with all the rights and privileges pertaining thereto, and you will be free because you will know once andfor all that nothing matters. You can live that feeling as you walk silently through the garden and climb the stone wall, and standing there, tall and straight, perusing the curvature of the universe and the mighty wave of stars overhead, tipping, tipping, ever so slightly forward, until your balance is gone, and forward you tumble into space. Not Joseph, or the detective, or Willie Benson, or David, or the look in my mother’s eye, or even the girl on the train, goes with you. Shrug your shoulders and it will all fall away like a cloak. Without the sound of the wind, or your cry, you will feel nothing as your form dissembles and your spirit flutters off. A soul at peace in the smooth lake at the end of the path. Clarity is an illusion. And a cruel one at that.
    A puff of air brushes my cheek. A touch. The girl on the train. My eyes close. So she is alive, somewhere, existing in the same moment under the same godless heavens.