The Attic

Fifteen

            The nagging thought just wouldn’t go away. Not when he woke up early, stared blankly out the window, before remembering what he was doing. Not when he sat down and read a book, finding himself so incapable to focus that he read the same paragraph seven times over. Not when he stood up, and filled the kettle with water to make himself some tea.

            What if it was fate?

            John had never really believed in the idea until the sixties, when they’d started to go mystic, and even travel over to India to supposedly find their inner selves. Then came the whole “there’s nowhere you can be that isn’t where you’re meant to be,” and John wasn’t quite sure what he thought.

            The little scrawl from the psychic Zafora’s from so long ago came to mind. She’d predicted something terrible would happen in December 1980. John’s neck prickled and he slopped water onto the kitchen floor. A slight jerk of the hand.

            “What if it’s fate?”

            “What?”

            Paul wasn’t paying proper attention, and he now turned droopy, sleep-deprived eyes towards John.

            “What if it’s fate,” John repeated, mussing his hair with both hands as he kept an intent stare on Paul.

            “What… the crazy bloke trying to kill us?” Paul asked, John’s true meaning dawning on him. “You can’t be serious. He’s not allowed to kill us because of fate or anything—“

            “Not allowed to, but supposed to,” John said lightly, staring a little to the right of Paul but his mind obviously elsewhere.

            Paul felt something like absolute terror pass through him in an icy shower. John had always been unpredictable, but this was just a step too far. Paul frantically searched for a way to snap him out of it.

            “No, John, that’s crazy. I mean—why would it be fate for both of us to die? That—that doesn’t make sense. We’ll get through this.”

            “I think it was just me from the start,” John mused, still seemingly removed. “You were always in the way—in the way of fate. And now it won’t stop.”

            “No,” Paul said firmly, and he reached his good arm across the angle of the table to force John’s head to turn, to force his eyes to lock on to him, and focus again.

            “It’s not fate. Shut up,” Paul said with authority.

            John didn’t disagree, but neither did he agree.

            He slowly peeled Paul’s hand off his chin with something like regret apparent on his face.

            *   *   *

            The box was there in the closet, though a secret part of him hoped that maybe it might’ve just disappeared. That would’ve been nothing short of supernatural, but ever since Paul had been shot, John’s life seemed unreal, hurtling forward in a dreamlike fashion.

            He took out that slip of paper, one amongst hundreds, and tried to find a loophole in the prediction.

            Won’t live much past 40th—inevitable tragedy—Dec 1980.

            The words were harsh, final. There was no way to misinterpret “inevitable tragedy.” John tried to remember when he’d gone to that clairvoyant, but the name stirred up absolutely no memory. He’d probably been off his head on drugs anyway.

            Hadn’t he felt fear when his death had been predicted so bluntly? How could he have lived all that time without a care in the world, hurtling towards death?

*   *   *

The pain was growing, and had escalated to a twisting, ripping sensation, as every fiber screamed for mercy. “C major,” Paul growled, as his fingers shook violently in their spots. It took an enormous amount of muscle power just to keep them there while he plucked his way up a simple scale.

“E… F natural,” he said, his voice just above a whisper. In his mind he heard how it was supposed to sound, how it would’ve sounded in a concert a month ago, effortless, the strings full of life and the music welling up almost in spite of him.