Удушье (Choke)

Preservatives is what she needs. The more preservatives, I fig­ure, the better.

A whole shopping bag full of puddings in my arms, I go to St. Anthonys.

It's so early the girl isn't at her desk in the lobby.

Sunk in her bed, my mom looks up from inside her eyes and says, 'Who?'

It's me, I say.

And she says, 'Victor? Is it you?'

And I say, 'Yeah, I think so.'

Paige isn't around. Nobody's around, it's so early on a Satur­day morning. The sun's just coming in through the blinds. Even the television in the dayroom is quiet. Mom's roommate, Mrs. Novak the undresser, is curled on her side in the next bed, asleep, so I whisper.

I peel the top off the first chocolate pudding and find a plastic spoon in the shopping bag. With a chair pulled up beside her bed, I lift the first spoonful of pudding and tell her, 'I'm here to save you.'

I tell her I finally know the truth about myself. That I was born a good person. A manifestation of perfect love. That I can be good, again, but I have to start small. The spoon slips between her lips and leaves the first fifty calories inside.

With the next spoonful, I tell her, 'I know what you had to do to get me.'

The pudding just sits there, brown and glistening on her tongue. Her eyes blink, fast, and her tongue sweeps the pudding into her cheeks so she can say, 'Oh, Victor, you know?'

Spooning the next fifty calories into her mouth, I say, 'Don't be embarrassed. Just swallow.'

Through the muck of chocolate, she says, 'I can't stop think­ing what I did is terrible.'

'You gave me life,' I say.

And turning her head away from the next spoonful, away from me, she says, 'I needed United States citizenship.'

The stolen foreskin. The relic.

I say that doesn't matter.

Reaching around, I spoon more into her mouth.

What Denny says is that maybe the second coming of Christ isn't something God will decide. Maybe God left it up to people to develop the ability to bring back Christ into their lives. Maybe God wanted us to invent our own savior when we were ready. When we need it most. Denny says maybe it's up to us to create our own messiah.

To save ourselves.

Another fifty calories go into her mouth.

Maybe with every little effort, we can work up to performing miracles.

Another spoonful of brown goes into her mouth.

She turns back to me, her wrinkles squeezing her eyes narrow. Her tongue sweeps pudding into her cheeks. Chocolate pudding wells out the corners of her mouth. And she says, 'What the hell are you talking about?'

And I say, 'I know that I'm Jesus Christ.'

Her eyes fall open wide, and I spoon in more pudding.

'I know you came from Italy already impregnated with the sacred foreskin.'