After the last cup of liquor, it was time for him to go.

My wife and kids were already asleep. I glanced at them, then gently pulled the door shut behind me.

The moon was bright, stretching our shadows long across the ground.

“Wu.”

I stepped outside. He raised a hand, telling me there was no need to see him off. I took his hand anyway and did not want to let go.

Wu, this old friend of mine, was the same age as I was, yet his back was already bent, his skin weathered to a deep brown. I did not dare imagine all that he had been through the past decade.

“When will you return?”

“I have to keep out of sight for some time. I've paid off two rounds already. Just one more debt to deal.”

He smiled easily, as though he were not a man who had spent all this time moving from place to place just to stay hidden, as though some passing whim had simply brought him here on this moonlit night to visit an old friend.

“Where to?”

“The Far East, perhaps. Some assets of mine over there have finally been unfrozen. I'll see what I can do with them—see if there's any way to get that business going again.”

“Anything I could help with?”

“You? Just a poor schoolteacher? Are you kidding?” he replied, teasing in his voice.

“Well, at least I’m not the one with creditors chasing me all around the world.”

“Sounds true.” He laughed. “A wife, kids, your parents. A happy family. Much better. Much better than me.”

He patted my hand.

“Oh, and I still owe you a wedding gift.”

“The wedding, the baby's first-month celebration, the kid's university admission—you owe me a lot.”

“Heh.”

He took two steps back.

“I'm off.”

He brought his hands together in an old-school salute. His lips moved for a while, as if there were something he wanted to say, but finally nothing came out.

“Able to see you again, isn't it?” I asked.

“Of course.”

He answered without hesitation, as though some of his old confidence was still there, not yet worn away by the past decade.

He turned into the alley and soon disappeared in my sight.

I stood there for a while.

Then I went back home, quietly did the dishes, and lay down in the rocking chair on the balcony, looking up at the moon.

It must be cold in the Far East.

I should have packed the rest of the liquor to him.

“Oh honey, you meant to get the pie. You know I made it from my grandmother's recipe. It's like a hundred years old. I mean, I know I asked you to get the cake for the kids. 

But no. I need you to try the pie. Go back and grab a slice. 

Hello Aunt Carol! It's so good to see you. Yes, thank you. I did put this all together for cousin Sarah and Grandma Cindy. I know, I can't believe she's already turning one hundred and six as well. It's wonderful. And Sarah turning six, thank god we have at least two birthdays on the same day.

Do you remember when it was mom's anniversary, too? Oh, it was wonderful when Daddy used to pay for everything.  

You know, of course, Harry paid for it this year. I know it's not as good, but what do you think? I'm gonna let Harry decide how to use all of those paychecks himself? He doesn't need to start thinking he has a choice in these matters. I don't care whose name is on them, as far as this family goes, those checks are mine…” 

I looked across the alley behind the apartment I had bought Jennifer. I had to move my car out of the way for her whole big Italian family to fit back here. They're good people, blue collar. I doubt they see me as one of them.

It's nothing personal. They just can't seem to understand how I write short fiction all day and make enough to provide for one of their own. 

I understand their skepticism as well. I don't even follow any of the local sports teams. Yes, that includes the Eagles as well. I mean, no offense, but God forbid I don't write about a sports team the mayor can't spell the name of.

Either way, though, I bought into Jennifer's life and everything that came with it when I asked her to marry me. Sure, that came with a family who may not have graduated from community college. But at the same time, I always wanted a family like hers. That tight-knit group of people who really look out for each other. Besides, it's not like I'm anywhere near a perfect guy. And ever since the last of my family passed, Jennifer has been my home.

The longer I sat there on that plastic folding chair, the clearer it became: as far as Jennifer was concerned, I could just as well have been an ATM.

I looked at the card table surrounded by a swarm of pink Barbie princess outfits. They were jumping up and down like an infestation of pink piglets, squealing in that universal sound of children cheering when they get to have sweets they don't need. 

A candle was still smoking on top of the cake I picked up at Acme. It was mostly gone at this point other than two slices left. Next to them, the pie sat there untouched.

My fiancé's mom had cut out pieces to pass around to everyone. I didn't know if she meant to give me the piece of cake when I went up there. I thought I had the choice of cake or pie. But she was a little preoccupied with her ex-husband on speakerphone. 

I guess Jennifer picked up that angry streak from her mom, because damn do they sound exactly alike whenever they yell. 

“Go back and grab the pie I made for the party…” 

I looked down at the slice of cake on my paper plate, covering the picture of some pink cartoon and a white plastic fork stuck into the cake like someone claimed it as territory. 

Jennifer's grandmother was sitting next to us in her wheelchair wearing a tiara, and a Depends which should've been changed about an hour ago, while drool was sliding out of her mouth. 

I looked up at her and said, “Grandma Cindy, would you like some cake?”

She focused those drooping eyes of hers straight at me and said,

“I want to die.”

She then reached her shaking hand over to me and gripped my arm with a strength I don't think anyone would have guessed was still in her.

“What?” I asked.

Jennifer nudged me, “She said, Go get her the pie like I've been telling you! Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, I don't know how many times I have to tell you. Harry, the cake was for the children. I wanted you to have the pie I made with Grandma Cindy's recipe. You are completely ruining this entire party I put on, and all you've been good for is buying a cake…” 

I looked back at Jennifer's mom, still on the phone, held between her shoulder and ear, shouting, 

“And my daughter made this pie for you. But you can't even show up to what is probably going to be my own mother's last birthday on this earth, all because you're too busy buying whores to show off down the shore in front of all of your little boyfriends, and shoving those poor girls’ asses in everybody's face because you think you bought them for the night it makes them your property or some…” 

At the same time, Jennifer was yelling at me and talking to everyone else at the party about the one hundred year old pie recipe from her grandmother sitting next to us. 

I wanted cake. I didn't know I was going to end up with pie. But to be honest, I think I'm with Grandma Cindy on this one. 

“Oh, I'm sorry, Jennifer. Did you make the pie? I didn't know that you made the pie. This is really your party, isn't it? I mean, no it's not actually your birthday here, and despite you enjoying the idea of your grandmother being around, she could die right here and you wouldn't be able to stop yourself from making sure everyone knows you put this whole thing together. Well, good. I'm so glad that you got to make your pie and have your party.”

I shoved the cake into her lap, got up off the chair, walked over to my car, and drove away.

Once, there was a sea where I stand.

Warm and shallow and crowded with monsters, majestic and mundane. They cast beautiful shadows beneath the suns radiance.

Now, their ghosts rattle the pipes, lounge in the potholes, haunting the puddles.

But I fret for not them. For there is a mountain I see in my dreams, unborn.

Someday distant, when my bones lie with theirs and we trade stories a million years long, the ground will pull, flexing, crowning. And its lofty peak will make our shared tomb into a sun-kissed terrace, where the clouds break against ossified stone like so many white waves.

Before there was light, before there was darkness, there was tohu va vohu. The attempt to make order out of chaos. The attempt of being. The essence of life.

The epidemiologist understood and so named the virus. Tohuvavohu sought order, being, essence, supremacy.

It sought these relentlessly. Single-mindedly. But there was no mind. No reason. It was not hampered by delusions of morality. The virus was need. Pure need. Self-fulfilling. Opportunistic. Ego-less.

We fought well. Grandly in many cases. Our weaponry was truth and faith. Our vulnerability was truth and faith. Sentience and science could only take us so far when we were battling not only a most patient virus, but the very limits of our collective memory, our shared humanity.

Over the long haul, we forgot quickly. Tohuvavohu was not time bound. It could afford generation upon generation of assaults, retreats, regroupings and counterattacks.

Humanity was hamstrung by expectation. We were no longer wired to forgo life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. We believed in our due. Submitted to our false creed: our superiority. Thinking we could outrace, outcompete, any threat.

We were the hare. The virus was the tortoise. And it was turtles all the way down.

We had no concept beyond rock bottom. Beyond economic collapse. Beyond political collapse. Beyond moral collapse.

Nothing was solid anymore. There was nothing for us to stand on. There was only tohu va vohu. Before light. Before darkness. The struggle to be.

Tohuvavohu was tohu va vohu. An attempt. A stab at re-order. At perfection.

The epidemiologist had it right. We sought to wrong it.

The virus was not to blame. We were not to blame. Creation suffers no blame. For, like tohuvavohu, what are we but another attempt at dominion.

And as the final chapter of my work, my protagonist - who I felt was similar to me, had to accomplish the athlos of shooting the last targets of the game. And then, he appeared in the front; and he stood in the way dumbfounded. Who had brought him here? There was no meaning or cause for his presence. Was my challenge to shoot him?

Of course I would, he held no importance to me. But I lowered my gun slowly, and submitted to my defeat of the game. He was standing there. I observed him, and he was different. His hair had grown longer, his mustache this time was thicker, and he was now taller; his face looked more mature and adult-like. I asked him, "what are you doing here?" He was staring, confused, with his eyes wide open. "What are you doing here?!" I asked again in frustration.

He was just being silent. "Why do you look like this, Damian?" He refused to speak a word. "Why do you look like this all of the sudden?!"

He looked insulted, and afterwards, embarrassed. "Your hair has grown longer, why don't you cut it to how it was before?" He pulled his curly hair to unfurl and see them.

"Your mustache has grown thicker, why don't you trim it to how it was before?!" I yelled. He touched his mustache and felt it.

"Your face has become slimmer! Why do you not look seventeen anymore?" He looked around in embarrassment, and started taking steps back, like he always would. Slowly, he had begun walking backwards.

"I never actually wanted you" I said, finally calming down. But his sight felt too intense for me. And his stance was so awkward and scared and frightened! It was such a distraction within the game.

At the end, I had to forget it - but instead, I lost awareness of everything around me. And, in contrast to him, I had begun taking steps towards him.

Finally, I let myself go.

"Damian, do you want to be how you were before?"

"Yes," he said in a low voice.
"I can be how I was before."

And then, I felt frightened. I turned around to see who had brought him here! And I had no answer to his statement! My mind went blank and my eyes felt empty. Our embarrassing talk had been showcased to everyone!

And then I tore the paper apart.