Free The Bus Driver Who Wanted to Be God & Other Stories by Etgar Keret

bag fell to the ground and all his junk started spilling out. I saw Grace’s body stiffen for a second, with a kind of spasm at the corner of his mouth, and right away he got up to help. He kneeled down on the sidewalk, gathering up the newspapers and the empty cans, and putting them back in the bag. The sight stayed fixed on him. His face was mine now. The red spot of the sight was floating on the middle of his forehead like a fluorescent Indian caste mark. That face was mine, and when he smiled at the old man, it glowed. Like the paintings of the saints on church walls.
    I stopped looking through the sights, and took a good look at my finger. It was hovering over the trigger guard. Straight out, almost frozen. It wasn’t going to go through with it. No point in fooling myself. It simply wasn’t going to. I thumbed on the safety, and eased back the bolt. The bullet slid from the chamber.
    I headed down toward the café with my gun in its case. It wasn’t a gun anymore really, just five harmless parts. I sat down at Grace’s table, facing him, and ordered a coffee. He recognized me at once. Last time he saw me, I was an eleven-year-old kid, but he had no trouble remembering. Even remembered my name. I put the envelope with the money on the table, and told him that someone had hired me to kill him. I tried to play it cool, to pretend like I’d never even considered going through with it. Grace smiled and said that he knew. That he was the one who’d sent the money in the envelope, that he wanted to die. I’ve got to admit his answer caught me off guard. I stammered. Asked why. Did he have some malignant disease? “A disease?” he laughed. “Guess you could say that.” There was that little spasm again at the corner of his mouth, the one I’d seen through the window, and he started to talk: “Ever since I was a kid I’ve had this disease. The symptoms were clear, but nobody ever tried treating it. I’d give my toys to the other kids. I never lied. I never stole. I was never even tempted to hit back in school fights. I was always sure to turn the other cheek. My compulsive good-heartedness just got worse over the years, but nobody was willing to do anything about it. If, say, I’d been compulsively bad, they’dhave taken me to a shrink or something right away. They’d have tried to stop it. But when you’re good? It suits people in our society to keep getting what they need, in return for a shriek of delight and a few compliments. And I just kept getting worse. It’s reached the point where I can’t even eat without stopping after every bite to find someone who’s hungrier to finish my meal. And at night, I can’t fall asleep. How can a person even consider sleeping when you live in New York, and sixty feet away from your house people are shivering on a park bench?”
    The spasm was back at the corner of his mouth, and his whole body shook. “I can’t go on this way, with no sleep, no food, no love. Who has time for love when there’s so much misery around? It’s a nightmare. Try to see it from my point of view. I never asked to be this way. It’s like a dybbuk. Except that instead of a dybbuk, your body is possessed by an angel. Damn it. If it were a devil, someone would have tried to finish me off a long time ago. But this?” Grace gave a short sigh and closed his eyes. “Listen,” he went on. “All this money, take it. Go find yourself a position on some balcony or rooftop, and get it over with. I can’t do it on my own, after all. And it gets harder every day. Even just sending you the money, having this conversation.” He mopped his forehead. “It’s hard. Very hard on me. I’m not sure I’ll have what it takes to do it again. Please, just pick a spot up on one of the rooftops and do it. I’m begging you.” I looked at him. At his tormented face. Like Jesus