The Last Story (22 page)

"Because I'm a dragon. Everybody is afraid of me."

The girl laughed. "Well, I'm not. You don't scare me one bit. You just look like a big, ugly lizard to me. Do you realty have magical powers?"

The dragon was offended. "Yes. My powers are well known."

"Then grant me my wish. Give me happiness."

"Not so fast. If I give you this, what will you give me in return?"

"My sorrow," the girl said simply.

The dragon laughed. "What kind of bargain is that? I don't want your sorrow. If I give you happiness, then you must give me something special in return."

"What do you want from me?"

The dragon thought. "How about your heart?"

The girl considered. "All right. You give me happiness, and in return I'll give you my heart. In fact, to show you what a good sport I am, I'll give you my heart first. But if afterward you fail to give me happiness, then you must give me your head. You must allow me to cut it off with a sword."

"What do you want with my head?"

"It's none of your business. I just want it."

The dragon was amused. He believed the girl was a fool. If I take her heart, he thought, she'll be dead. I'll have what I want and I won't have to give her anything in return. The dragon believed he was making the best bargain of his long life.

"Agreed," the dragon said. "I'll cut out your heart and then I'll give you happiness. If I fail to do so, you can cut off my head."

"Fine." The girl stepped close so that the dragon could reach her. Spreading out her arms, she said,

"Take my heart, you ugly lizard."

The dragon reached over and clawed open the girl's chest and pulled out her heart.

Immediately the girl fell to the ground dead, and the dragon laughed long and loud.

"What a wonderful day," he said. "I have won a human heart for free."

Satisfied, the dragon took the heart and crawled back down into his well. There he sat for a long time in the dark thinking how wonderful the heart would taste for dinner. He planned to eat it just as soon as it stopped beating. He planned to have it with potatoes and maybe a bottle of wine. The dragon got all excited imagining the wonderful feast he would have.

The only trouble was that after many days, the heart still hadn't stopped beating. Indeed, the sound of it pounding in the cold dark began to disturb the dragon.

Because—as is well known—dragons have very sensitive ears. It got so the dragon couldn't even sleep, and he grew dizzy and bad-tempered. Yet never for a minute did he think of throwing the heart away. His hunger for it was too immense.

Finally, though, seven days after killing the girl, the dragon's hunger and fatigue grew so great that he could

bear it no longer. Lifting the girl's heart in his scaly claws, he stuffed it in his mouth and swallowed it whole.

For a moment he was satisfied; it had tasted good going down. But then he realized the heart was still beating inside him, and that scared him. Because, besides having very sensitive ears, dragons have no hearts. He didn't know what to do now that he had one. He didn't know how to get it out of him. He only knew that it was driving him crazy, the sound of it, pounding and pounding, even when he closed his eyes and pressed his claws over his ears and tried to rest.

"Oh," he moaned. "Poor me."

For another seven days the dragon wandered helplessly at the bottom of the well, banging his lizard head on the stone walls in frustration. Finally he called out for someone to help him—this monster that had never turned for help to anyone. At that moment he heard the girl's voice in his mind.

"What do you want?" she asked.

He stopped his pacing. "Who's there?"

"The girl whose heart you stole."

"It can't be. You're dead."

She ignored his remark. "You called out. What do you want?"

"Your heart—it's driving me crazy. I want you to take it away."

"You stole my heart, which contained all my sorrow and all my happiness. Yet you gave me nothing in return.

Why should I help you?"

The dragon wept, another thing it had never done before. "Please. I will do anything you ask if you will just take it away."

"Are you sure? Anything?"

"Yes! Just get rid of it!"

"All right," the girl said. "But I have one condition. You must keep your end of your bargain first. You must give me your head."

The dragon was afraid. "But then I will die."

"Maybe. But you said you would give up anything for me to take it away. You are bound by your word, as you bound all the people who came to you before me."

The dragon was terrified. "But I have lived for centuries.

I don't want to die."

"Then I can't help you," the girl said. "Goodbye."

"Wait!" the dragon called. "Come back! You have to help me!"

But the girl was gone. Yet her heart remained, pounding inside the dragon's chest, and with her departure, there was no hope for him ever to rest, ever to have a moment's peace. And, because of the heart he now possessed, the dragon knew that He realized that it was he who had been tricked. That the only thing that would make the girl happy would be to slay him, and that she had done so even though it had cost her her very life.

"Damn you," the dragon said.

Picking up his sword, the dragon fell on it and cut off his own head.

The dragon died. Yet the girl's heart happily lived on

Beholding the Orion commander, Sarteen remembered her grandmother's story, and finally understood

what it meant, for her, at least for her own soul. She turned to Pareen and smiled.

"I love you," she said.

Pareen smiled. "I love you."

Sarteen nodded in the direction of the alien invader, who stood poised with a sharp purple weapon pointed at her chest. "Welcome, Captain Eworl. I am Sarteen, commander of the starship Crystal. This is my first officer, Pareen." Then, gesturing in the direction of the communication board, where the nanoegg was hidden, she added, "And there's the ghost of my daughter. Do you see her? Do you recognize her? You met her once, a few hours ago, when you destroyed her world." Sarteen took a defiant step toward the enemy. "Do you remember her? You goddam dragonl Her name's ... Cira!"

The human starship, Crystal, exploded, as did the alien vessel, Adharma.

Cool story. Both of them, all of them.

I am finished.

Except there is someone I must see. Someone I must say goodbye to. Perhaps, after I see her, I will not have a chance to make a final entry. My head pain weighs on me like ancient burdens. A last few concluding paragraphs should be no problem for me, however, even from a ghostly distance. I believe I do have a muse who helps me with my stories, an angel who watches over my life. In the same way, I have played my brother's muse before, when I dictated Remember Me to him. Perhaps I will play his muse one more time.

* * *

My old house, in Huntington Beach, is not entirely dark as I park out front. There is a light on in the kitchen. Someone is up late, probably unable to sleep. As I walk to the door, I wonder if this someone is sipping warm milk and thinking of me.

I knock lightly, making it sound like the wind brushing against the wood. I do not wish to startle her. Yet my mother is quick to answer.

My mother bore my father scant resemblance, except that she was also attractive. She was tall and sleek, quick and loose. Her wide, thick-lipped mouth and her immaculately conceived black hair were her prizes.

Standing in her wrinkled bathrobe, she looks frail and tired, as if it has been a long time since she won a beauty prize.

"May I help you?" she asks.

"My name is Jean Rodrigues. I am the author of Remember Me. I am a friend of your son, Jimmy's.

He told me you wanted to talk to me."

"Jim told you that?"

"Sort of. He said you had read my book."

"It's late. Why are you here?"

I shrug. "Honestly, I don't know, Mrs. Cooper."

She stares at me a long time and then steps aside.

"Please come in."

We end up in the kitchen, where I came a few minutes after waking from my fatal fall.

Then, four years ago, my mother and father sat around the table smoking and eating cake and talking about me as if I wasn't even there. Of course, they didn't know I was there. I was a ghost, invisible. Studying my mother across the table, I wonder if she knows now.

"Can I get you anything?" she asks.

I shake my head. "I'm fine, thank you."

She grips her glass of warm milk with both hands and stares into it as if it were a crystal ball. She has trouble looking at me. I understand. I appear completely different, but a part of her recognizes me through my eyes, the windows of my soul. Yet I will have to part the curtains on those windows if she is to see all the way inside. And I don't know if I want to do that.

"So," she begins. "You're the famous writer."

"Yes."

She nods. "I did read your book—Remember Me. " Her lower lip trembles. "It was a very good book. It touched me."

"Thank you," I say.

She glances up uneasily. "How long did it take you to write?"

"Not long. It came to me all at once, like a movie playing on a screen."

The questions are hard for her. She wants the truth but, like the rest of us, she knows intuitively it is too much for her. "Did something in particular inspire the story?"

"Yes."

She swallows. "Can you tell me what it was?"

"Your daughter."

"I see." She shudders. "Did you know Shari? Is that why you adopted her name for your pen name?"

"Yes, I knew her. Better than anybody. She wanted me to write her story and I did." I hold up my hand as she starts to interrupt. "Please don't ask me where I knew her from. I can't tell you, and I'm sorry. Just know that her story is true and that she is fine. I know that above all else she would want you to know that."

Tears appear on my mother's face. "I don't understand."

I reach across the table and take her hand. "She goes on, we all go on. That's the point of the story.

And wherever she is I know she would want me to tell you how much she loved you.

That may not have come out as clearly as it should have in the story, but it's true. You were a great mother to her."

She sobs, shaking. "Who are you?"

"I'm a friend." I let go of her and sit back and put my hand to my head. A wave of severe pain rolls over me and I have trouble seeing. For a moment the world goes completely black and I have to strain to maintain consciousness. Forcing in a breath, I whisper, "I'm no one."

"Are you all right?" my mother asks, concerned.

I speak with effort. "I had a head injury. Sometimes it acts up and I get dizzy. Then I just have to lie down."

My mother stands and gently takes my arm.

"Come, why don't you lie down in the living room."

I can barely get to my feet. "Thank you."

My mother is anxious. "Oh dear, you're as white as a ghost. Maybe you should lie down upstairs, in my daughter's old bedroom. I'll call for a doctor."

I smile faintly. "That's not necessary. I'll feel better in a few minutes. Just let me rest in her room. That's all I need." I pat her hand as she leads me toward the stairs. "Don't worry about me, really. This headache thing is nothing. It's so nice for me to be here with you."

"The world is a place to visit, to enjoy. It is not your permanent residence. When you don't know what to do, you return to your true home."

"It was nice of you to come to see me," she says with feeling.

My bed is freshly made. I sit down on the edge and my mother removes my shoes. Lying back, I feel the familiar comfort of a small child as she tucks a blanket over me. She leans over and I am surprised when she kisses me on the forehead.

"I feel like I know you," she says.

I brush her cheek with my hand, wipe away another tear that has come. How much I had prayed to do that for her in the days after I died.

"You do know me," I say. "You remember me."

She doesn't fully understand but that is OK.

After squeezing my hand and telling me to rest, she leaves the room, carefully closing the door behind her. In the same way I close my eyes. I know I will not open them again.

My peace is a divine gift, my joy a wonderful miracle. As I listen to my breathing slowly begin to

«^

run down, I remember how the last time I left I wished that I could have made my mark on the world, done something that would have changed the course of history. Something to be remembered by. Now 1 don't care about those things. I have been given the chance and done my best. No one waits on the other side to judge me. Besides, it doesn't really matter. It's all a play.

God is not impressed by our acts, only by how much we love. I don't have to be important. I am grass, no one. Perhaps, in another place and time, I will learn the last of the yogi's lesson, and complete the flow of life.

I will become everyone.

"v^

JL ETER NICHOLS AND JIMMY COOPER gathered in Jimmy's bedroom two hours after the funeral for Jean Rodrigues, bestselling author of numerous teenage thrillers and aspiring moviemaker. Jimmy sat at his desk in front of his computer, Peter on the edge of Jimmy's bed.

From his back pocket, Peter withdrew a small square floppy disk and handed it to Jimmy.

"She was almost done with it when she went to see your mother," Peter said.

Jimmy nodded, studying the disk. "She wrote this during the last week?"

"Yes."

"How could she when she was in so much pain?"

Peter shrugged. "Writing always made her feel better. It was her first love."

Jimmy sadly shook his head. "You were her first love."

Peter nodded. "We both were." He bowed his head and a single tear slid down his cheek.

He had not wept at the funeral, nor had Jimmy. There seemed no point; Shari would have just laughed at them. Yet the loss was hard for both of them, very hard. Peter added, "I can't believe how much she did in such a short time."

"Yeah. She was great." Jimmy's voice fell to a whisper as he remembered the end of her most important story. "She was the best sister a guy could've had."