Earlier I may have spoken unkindly to you, he said. Called you certain unkind names.
Satan, I said.
Yes, he said.
Bitch, I said.
Yes, he said.
Stupid bitch, I said.
I’m not myself, he said.
You’re dying, I said, more bluntly than I might normally have done.
My charge fell silent. His thoughts grew fearful.
It was time.
Time for him to know me.
Attend, I said, commandingly.
My tone snapped him to attention.
You stand accused, I said. Of something. Something involving the weather. You find yourself reluctant to engage with these accusations, lest they invalidate all that you have accomplished.
He gave a small grunt of surprise.
Yet these accusations torment you, I said. They loom large as your time approaches. You fear that you may, at the hour of your death, be dominated by them, sent into a panic, and perish in a state of agitation.
No, he said.
Yes, I said.
A faux–Old West clock on the mantel let out a conspicuous tick, the first it had made all night.
He was off-balance, stung, receptive.
I could now offer him the most precious gift of all.
But be not afraid, I said. For you areinevitable.An inevitable occurrence.
Another tick from the clock.
Who else could you have been but exactly who you are? I said. Did you, in the womb, construct yourself? All your life you believed yourself to be making choices, but what looked like choices were so severely delimited in advance by the mind, body, and disposition thrust upon you that the whole game amounted to a sort of lavishjailing.
The clock let out two more ticks, then fell silent.
Not following, he said.
What makes the bars of that jail? I said. Your pride in the glories you have accomplished. But if your worth depends on your glories, it must also depend on your sins, which, in your case, are grievous. Are they not? However: forswear the glory, forswear the culpability. The self is the culprit. With the self disavowed, what blame or glory can possibly affix to it?
Not following at all, he said.
Let these ideas enter your heart, I said. And thereby be moved towardelevation.
Just then a smell came into the room.
