The Last Rational Man Read online

would kiss it. Maybe, maybe she would offer her cheek.

  More likely she would glance in the box, give him a strange stare, and hurry off. It was a weird-looking thing after all. Here he was, faced with meeting the most beautiful looking and sounding woman in the world, and all he could give her was a twisted, sick, amateur attempt at sculpting. He would have been better off sending her an arm. At least it was sculpted properly.

  He glanced at the clock. One a.m. He had no plans for the morning, so it made no difference what time he fell asleep. Still, he had been in bed for over two hours. How long could you stare at the ceiling for? He reached over for the TV remote. Ninety eight channels, and nothing to watch.

  Still, he had to do something. He had to distract himself. He propped himself up on a couple of pillows and watched some Sumo wrestling. Boy these guys were huge. Huge, but graceful in their own large way. But true grace was…better to watch something else, something that wouldn’t remind him of you-know-who.

  There were beautiful women in nearly every commercial TV show. Most sports shows too, for that matter. He settled for a war documentary. Naval warfare in the US Civil War. As long as they didn't go on about the beautiful lines of the Monitor or the music of the artillery or some such thing. Well, some time must have passed. One fifteen? That's it?

  J never drank, but he had to get to sleep. He went to the mini-bar and cracked open a beer. From what he understood, one beer wasn't going to do the trick, certainly not for someone in his condition. He'd need to be near unconscious before he'd actually get to sleep. There was a small bottle of Scotch in the mini-bar, so he drank that, along with some fruity alcoholic drink they had in there.

  He woke up with a splitting headache early in the afternoon. Sure, he got a good night's sleep, but it came together with a hangover. Just what he needed on this day of all days. He had a buddy at work who once told him that hangovers were really a result of dehydration, so he drank a few glasses of water in hopes that it would pull him through.

  By the time evening came around, he had pretty much recovered. He had even managed to eat something, an activity that had seemed quite impossible in the morning. Most of the decisions were behind him now, except for one. Should he attend the concert, or just wait outside for her?

  As it turned out, he didn't have to make that decision. When he got to the concert hall the security guard took one look at the box he was carrying and told him that it couldn't be brought into the hall. He could check it, but then it wouldn't be handy after the concert, and he might miss her altogether.

  He left the hall and wandered around the building, trying to figure out where Hélène would come out. It wasn't that complicated. There was an unmarked door in the back of the building. A couple of chartered buses and a limo were parked nearby, and the drivers were lingering around. A few words with one of the drivers confirmed what was already obvious. He sat on a bench across the street, and settled down to wait.

  At first the drivers gave him some odd looks. He could see why. They knew why they were waiting there. It was their job. But what was he doing there? And why was he carrying that box? He tried not to look nervous, but he didn't think he was successful. He was radiating nervousness, an emotion lamp illuminating the entire street.

  The limo driver went into the building for a few minutes. Probably to use the bathroom. He spoke briefly with the other drivers, and they gradually calmed down and stopped staring at him.

  It was hard to kill time, waiting for her to show up. One of the drivers was smoking. He wished he smoked cigarettes or chewed gum, anything to help pass the time. He made sure not to look at his watch. He knew it would make the minutes go by even slower. Maybe he could hear the music. He concentrated, straining his ears, but wasn't quite sure that he could hear the symphony. There was too much background noise from the traffic. The concert hall was built to prevent those sounds from coming in and disturbing a performance, so it stood to reason that sound couldn't leave there very easily either.

  It was hard to wait. As a kid he had liked star gazing. A perfect activity to help pass the time. You couldn't see many stars in the middle of the city. Too much background light from the street lamps.

  Finally he saw a crack of light around the door. He got up, clutching the gift to his chest. The limo driver had noticed as well, and was reaching for the handle to open the limo door. He'd have to hurry if he wanted to meet Hélène. He walked quickly towards the limo as she came out of the building. He'd hardly noticed that a security guard had come out with her.

  He was still a few meters away when she reached the car. He somehow managed to find his voice.

  " Hélène!"

  "Yes?"

  "I'm, I'm a fan of yours. I've brought you a gift."

  He lifted up the box, showing her what he had brought, but the security guard interfered.

  "I can't let her take that without checking it first."

  "It's just a thing, something I made for her."

  "Don't come any closer. Open the box."

  The guard's hand was dawdling near his pistol now. J stopped where he was, opened the box, and tilted it so the guard could see.

  "What is it?"

  "A sculpture. I made it myself. It's a gift."

  "Lift it up out of the box."

  J lifted the sculpture up, and carefully unwrapped it. It was clearly visible under the streetlight. The guard was peering at it, not quite sure what to make of the strange twisted figure. Hélène interrupted.

  "It's OK. I'll take it."

  She took the figure out of his hands.

  "Thank you."

  Before he could respond she was in the car, leaving him with the empty box. A few seconds later the limo was gone.

  He had done it. He had given her the gift. He knew he should be relieved now that it was all over, but he felt empty, like something was missing from his life. He was empty, like the empty box. The almost empty box. It still had his card in it. She would have no way of finding him, and he would never find out whether she liked his gift. It was just as well. This way he had gotten her out of his system, and he could go back to a normal lifestyle.

  He walked slowly back to the hotel, drained by the evening's events. He thought of taking a shower, but didn't have the energy. He sat on the bed, reached down and untied his shoes. Then he leaned back onto the bed, leaving his feet on the floor. He'd just rest like that for a while, then get up, go out, and get some dinner.

  When he woke up he realized that he had overslept. Getting too late to go out for dinner. He looked at the clock. Five a.m. Too late for much of anything. He'd never get back to sleep either. He managed to stand up and strip off his clothes, leaving them in a pile on the floor. It took a while for the hot water to reach the shower. Probably because nobody was using water at this time of day, so the water sat in the pipes and cooled down.

  Eventually the shower was steaming hot, the way he liked it. He spent forever in there, trying to lose consciousness in the vapors. He would have stayed there forever, but you can't do any one thing forever. Sooner or later you need to stop and do something else.

  He brushed his teeth, got dressed, and went out. The streets were not as deserted as he thought. There were always those who had to start the workday early, and there were the inevitable breakfast joints that catered to the early morning crowd.

  J joined them for some scrambled eggs, toast and coffee. He wasn't as hungry as he thought, and ended up eating the toast, leaving the eggs to cool off on his plate. Grease slowly congealed around the egg. Some things have to be eaten hot, or not at all. He slowly sipped his coffee, trying not to think, keeping his mind a blank.

  They had sugar cubes here. Just like his grandmother used to use. She'd hold a cube between her teeth and sip her tea through it, the tea sweetening as it filtered through the sugar. Here they had both white and brown sugar cubes.

  He played with the cubes, lining them up in rows, alternating brown and white stripes, moving them here and there absen
t-mindedly.

  "You play?"

  He looked up. The waitress was looking at him. She had just asked a question.

  "Play?"

  "Yes, play. I play the flute. You play the piano, I gather. Looks like you daydream about it."

  J looked down at the table. He had managed to arrange the sugar cubes into a keyboard. A bit rough, but recognizable.

  "No, I don't play. I only listen."

  "Maybe you should think of playing. Take some lessons. You look pretty obsessed with it. Next thing you know you'll be building a working piano out of Legos."

  "Could be."

  The waitress left, leaving him alone with his sugar piano. He was drained. He didn't care about that female pianist. He didn't care about Beethoven. He didn't care about pianos. He hated red ribbons in women's hair. Come to think of it, he hadn't noticed whether she had her hair tied up when she came out of the auditorium. It must have been. But he wasn't sure. How could he have not noticed?

  He stared at the sugar cubes. Who was he fooling? He hadn't cleared her out of his mind. He had only made things worse. Now that he had invested so much time and effort into tracking her down, he felt even more attracted to her. He was chained to her much more than before. He had made matters worse. Much worse.

  Everything reminded him of pianos. Everything reminded him of Hélène. Damn those sugar cubes!

  J swept his hand across the table, scattering the piano cubes all over the floor. The physical act