Ready For Death

M. watches as a man he's spoken with on many occasions but whom he barely knows, is seemingly at his end, all in half-an-hour and quite unexpectedly. It's just that M., and no-one else, happens to be there when this happens; that's all.

The man doesn't seem distressed or put-out by what is happening to him; it seems to be more of a process which he's simply undergoing; there is no noise and no frantic eye-rolling; what signs there are, seem (to M.) to be only the reflexes of a body that is taking this short time to shut down. And these reflexes are thus: a sudden tipping onto its back, and after this a waving of the four limbs which resemble articulated sticks for the man is an unnaturally thin creature. On the man's face, M. can clearly discern his readiness. It is his time. M. doesn't know whether the fellow has already achieved what he'd wished to, or lived it up as he'd wanted, or perhaps committed his great crime - how could he know? But what he can see, is the fellow's Readiness. And so M. himself is not distressed by this dying; nor is he put-out in any way; there is no regret written on either man's face. Indeed, M. would be grateful for the chance to do this fellow a good turn; to help with this process if he could. And thus it is that, after a comparatively short while, M. sees the legs being drawn in close to the body and the arms being drawn in close, and next the limbs slowly curling in at the knees and at the elbows; he is dying as a spider dies. And one by one, each of these four limbs becomes still, one after the other, and not quite perfectly - for a still limb does sometimes flicker a little as if moved by some misdirected charge. And indeed on the very last limb, M. sees the need of his help, for it is the last one to need tucking in and the man seems to be without enough strength, and so M. presses the thigh with his hand, and taking the shin in his other, very gently folds this final limb in close to the sleeper. And indeed he receives, at the last, a pleasant smile of gratitude from this comparative stranger, a smile which he returns just as some overwhelming emotion begins to engulf him.