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“Dude, did you know your brain still functions during seven minutes after you die?” Had said Cal few months ago, as they were planning on Zero Day. Andre had looked at him with slight disinterest at the unrequested information. He cared more about the technical planning than about the philosophical and poetical aspects Cal couldn’t help but bring to the conversation. He sighed, underlining his apathy, though he forced himself to ask:
“Yeah?
-Yeah. It’s like the line between life and death is blurred for a moment and you think of the good parts of your life or something.
- Sounds scary. Andre replied, thinking about the deaths they’d inflict on Zero Day.
-Sounds beautiful.” Cal corrected, thinking about his own death.
Andre never thought about this conversation again. Those futilities would distract them from their plan. He cared enough to decide who will live and who will die during Zero Day, but he drew the line at thinking about what the brains of the deceased students would do. A true God doesn’t bother himself with such details.
He hadn’t expected this exchange to rush back to his mind when the world was suddenly dark and empty, his body unable to move though he could still hear the distant siren sounds of the police cars. Cal was right, the line between life and death seemed oddly blurred now that they had both shot themselves.
And he had already spent one minute solely rethinking about this.
It was an absent-minded experience, where memories would come and go detached from thoughts and feelings, almost as if he was witnessing a life that wasn’t his own.
A birthday. July 17th.
No, his birthday.
He could see the candles, the number eighteen, the modest cake. There were three other people in the room : his parents sitting next to each other and Cal. It was the last birthday he ever lived. He remembered vividly how despite the lightness of the festivity, a part of him was already grieving the feeling of celebrating birthdays. After Zero Day, they’d never be the same. Maybe he would celebrate them in a getaway car, in Canada, in South America, or in jail. But he hadn’t considered that the last birthday he would witness was here, in his memories.
His dad’s German accent would annoy Andre sometimes. The same way his mother’s protectiveness would frustrate him. Calling to know when he’ll be home for dinner, asking him how he was doing in school... He remembers that bitterness when they gifted him that camera Cal and himself ended up recording everything with. It wasn’t the model he wanted. He remembers complaining about it to Cal afterwards, but he never told it to his parents. He was actually glad he didn’t. They seemed so joyous about their gift that they almost looked stupid.
He loved them so much to the point that he despised them. After all those years, they were still as in love as the first day. “You two disgust me.” He would tell them sometimes, as they’d joke around like teenagers or slow dance in the living room. The profound hatred was actually driven by his fathomless feeling of solitude. He envied them, he envied their carefree happiness, their naïve days and their sincere love. He envied how everything was right with them while everything was wrong with him.
From the birthday memory, everything flowed in an uncontrollable manner. He was losing touch with reality, including with the concept of time. How long had he been thinking about his parents? How much time did he have left?
Cal was laughing, holding the camera as Andre’s parents hugged their son at the end of the birthday party.
Cal.
He was so tremendously mad at him. Until the last second, he had looked at his partner in crime, hoping he wouldn’t shoot, frozen in place as his hands were shaking in the worst way. He felt like even if Cal killed himself, Andre wouldn’t be able to pull the trigger. And yet, he mechanically fired the moment he heard Cal’s gunshot. It was almost as if he was a puppet who couldn’t keep dancing around the scene if the puppeteer had stopped pulling the strings.
They had made it clear that none of them was the leader of Zero Day. They had both built this project together, with no regrets nor imbalance of power. It felt like their souls were so deeply interlinked that they unbridled the worst out of human nature. But that was for Zero Day. The suicide was something else.
Cal didn’t want to die alone and Andre didn’t want to live alone. That was about it. When Cal finished his performance, Andre instinctively turned off the stage light.
It was so dark and cold in here. The siren sounds had stopped.
Then, there was a fire. Andre couldn’t feel its warmth anymore, but he could recall what happened that night.
They were burning up all of their prized possessions. Cal had brought his bible, Andre had folded in his pocket that note from a girl he had known in eighth grade. Cal had made fun of him and read the note out loud as he could feel his chest burning with embarrassment.
As much as Andre hated to admit it, he had always kept the note on his desk or in his pocket and now, in his last moment. He remembered how that girl had hidden it innocently in his backpack, he remembered how he never brought it up or thanked her for it. She will never know how he would read it every night for a month, how consoling it felt to know that one person appreciated his company. What did she think of him now? Did she even remember his name?
He remembered hers. He could see himself taking the note back from Cal as he was about to read her name out loud. Their tapes and documentations on Zero Day were quite thoroughgoing and honest; the police should thank them for how easy they made the case. There was nothing left to deduce, nothing left to see. But he had kept that one moment of warm sun in his heart, that one secret he’d bring to his grave, or wherever they’d put his body: her name.
Wait.
What was her name again?
Her name wasn’t Chris. Chris was someone else.
A loud laugh, a cheerful tap on the shoulder, a hot summer afternoon in the fields.
Chris was his cousin. He could be a bit boorish sometimes with his lame parties and stupid jokes. Cal would force himself to laugh nor to remain polite at very least, but Andre was genuine. He liked Chris and his stupid friends more than he ever told him. He would probably believe Cal and Andre were exploiting him all along to get access to his guns and to learn how to use them. He would probably feel sick to his stomach knowing his weapons and aiming tips were used to shoot some kids. But Andre liked those afternoons spent shooting with Chris. He liked his loudmouth and obscene jokes.
Once, Chris told him he was proud of him.
No.
This doesn’t sound like his cousin.
There was a strong German accent.
He was back in the car with his dad, driving a bit carelessly just to scare the old man, in vain. His father always told him he wasn’t a sentimental and that in Germany, men weren’t allowed to cry or to be sensitive. But despite the reasoning, he could see in his father’s eyes how he loved his son. There was something hauntingly beautiful in that car drive. His father telling him he was proud of him, how there were bigger things for him out there.
Would he still be proud of him today? He was right, there were bigger things that awaited Andre. He got to decide who would live and who would die, who to spare and who to sacrifice. For a few minutes, he was a God and now, he was a mortal again.
His mother’s laugh, Cal’s voice, that girl’s handwriting, Chris's jokes, his father’s praises...everything was slipping away.
How much time did he have left?
What is time?
He can’t remember.
He can’t think.
Two last impressions remained, evanescing slower than the rest.
The fulfillment of taking all those lives and something stronger;
The regret of taking his life.