November 25 Thanksgiving.

I've got a h.e.l.l of a lot to be thankful for. I watched a football game on TV. Big scab-faced guys slamming into each other over a chunk of leather. I don't know why they bother, since the season's going to end before the playoffs. I guess it's for the same reason that most people keep going to their jobs every day, the same jobs with the suck-a.s.s bosses that they used to b.i.t.c.h about all the time. Maybe they hope that if they pretend like everything's normal, if they just keep with the routine, then maybe, somehow, the end will slip past and they won't even notice.

Yeah, right.

Still, you see it in their faces. They quit carding at the liquor store, so now I don't have to bother with Reneau. But the b.a.s.t.a.r.ds still want the money. I'll bet that will be the last little social glue to dissolve.

I'm b.u.mmed today, for some reason. Even the liquor's taking a holiday. I'm drinking mostly out of habit. I haven't heard from Lonnie in a week. Dad's at some hallelujah shindig at the church.

Gee, maybe this is what it feels like to be lonely.

December 1 h.e.l.lo, December.

The last month of reality. It came in with rain, the clouds moping around like a guy whose dog just died. Depression city.

Now it's just you and me, Diary. Dad moved out, all he took was a few suitcases of clothes and a golf trophy. He's going to live with a bunch of Holy Rollers over at the preacher's house. I guess they're going to pray and circle-jerk until Jesus shows His shiny face.

Same thing's happening all over. The streets are nearly empty now. The TV news says there's been a big drop-off in crime. It's like, who wants to bother, right? What's out there that anybody really wants? You can't take it with you.

I used to think that if I knew I only had a few weeks to live, I'd be raping everything in sight. But, now, I don't even know if I could get it up. Lonnie popped by over the weekend, but neither of us were in the mood. Even the stumble biscuits didn't help. Maybe I'm losing my f.a.gness along with everything else.

You can't take it with you.

December 6 Beer and pills.

I found Dad's stash of p.o.r.no tapes. I was going through his closet, looking for money in his coat pockets. The tapes were stacked behind a folded-up exercise machine. "Butch Boy From Bangkok." "The Willie Train." "Frat House Hosedown."

The two-faced b.a.s.t.a.r.d. But I have to admit, it kind of makes him more interesting. Maybe that's why he's getting so righteous toward the end. He probably thinks he has a lot of wickedness to atone for.

I watched the videotapes. Some of the things the guys did to each other even turned my stomach. But half of me wanted to be in the scene, with the guys, anything but alone. I wondered where they were now. With their families? Or did they check out early, like Roget?

It's turning cold. The sky was dark gray today, kind of sooty. I expected snow, but it never came.

But we'll be warm soon enough. It's going to be a h.e.l.l of a winter.

December 9 They're dying.

Ma.s.s suicide today, 230 of them across town. Catholics, if you can believe it. a.r.s.enic in the blood of Christ. That's what I call a communion.

The TV said there were isolated deaths all over. Old folks, mostly. Loners. Losers.

I bought a case of vodka.

December 13 Mondays were bad enough back when there was a real world. Now they're a total b.u.mmer.

I've been grumpy all day. Hangover. I suppose it could be worse. I could have to go to work or something.

I walked down to the mall today, hoping to score some gra.s.s or X or acid, anything to bend this straight line of reality. The mall was nearly dead. I mean, a few stores had hung some half-a.s.sed Christmas decorations, but the total effect was like a grade school festival. I'll bet there weren't a dozen shoppers out, total.

Sign of the times: five stores had closed, even that one that serves all those funky flavors of coffee. Luckily, the arcade was open. The pimply-faced geek who managed the place was nowhere around. Claude was the only dealer in the joint, and he was slumped in the corner, his eyelids twitching. In the greenish glow of the video screens, I could see a little strand of drool drying on his chin.

"Claude?" I hollered over the bleeps and zaps of the machines. No answer. I nudged him with my boot. He slumped lower.

I knelt on the sticky tile and touched his neck.

The flesh was cool and doughy. I saw the empty bottle of Valium in his left hand. The dude had checked out, bigtime.

I searched his pockets and came up with a half-ounce of gra.s.s and some crumbly, unidentifiable pills that might have been speed.

I'm trying them now. To Claude. May your days be merry and bright.

December 17 Sitting in the park.

First time you've been out of the house, Diary. What do you think of this place?

Yeah, I know, you got no eyes. So here goes: A layer of gray snow under the bench, pocked by a dozen yellow holes where some b.u.m took a shivery p.i.s.s. A big black oak tree with its branches overhead like dead fingers. A tiny pond, its surface frozen white. The gra.s.s is brittle and thin.

A skinny dog with a mean face sniffs in my direction, but it keeps walking toward the little bricked-in gate that leads to the street. n.o.body has pa.s.sed in the fifteen minutes I've been sitting here. I heard a police siren; why the h.e.l.l they still bother, I don't know. I guess if you're a cop, you're a cop.

Sitting here on this cold concrete bench, freezing my a.s.s off, I feel like I might as well be the last person on earth.

Sun's going down. Seems like it's always cloudy these days. My f.u.c.king hands are freezing.

December 17 (again) I'm in love.

Two entries in one day, Diary. You know it's got to be good.

Walking home from the park, I saw Melanie. She was going down the street kind of huddled up inside her parka. She was the only other person out. I recognized the little daisy patch on the knee of her blue jeans.

"Hey, Melanie," I said. Her face was hidden by the ring of fur around the edge of her hood. She kept walking, so I yelled again, louder. We were beside a boarded-up drug store.

She stopped and turned, and I could see her eyes. She looked like she had drunk about a quart of bleach. She had dark wedges under her eyes. She kept jerking her head back and forth, like a lamb in the middle of a pack of wolves.

"Hey," she finally said.

A person can change a lot in just a short amount of time.

Of course, we kind of measure time differently these days. Doomsday has that effect on people. But Melanie looked like she'd aged about twenty years since the last time I saw her.

"How's it going?" I asked. My heart was beating like I'd just popped a fistful of speed.

"It's going."

I nodded. "Cold as a cop's heart out here."

"Yeah." She licked her pale lips. I wanted to kiss her.

"Uh..." I figured, what did I have to lose? "Where's your boyfriend?"

Her eyes rolled to look up at the sky. "He offed himself in one of those ma.s.s suicides."

"I'm sorry."

"I'm not."

I thought about it for a second. "I guess it doesn't matter."

She looked past me, up the street. Dead cars and deader doorways. Then she pointed at the book in my hand. "What's that?"

"Uh, nothing. Just a diary."

She started laughing. It was a weird laugh, almost like she was crying but her breath was all broken up.

"What?" I said. I didn't like being laughed at. Even by a wrecked babe, like her.

She said "You're totally apes.h.i.t crazy, you know that?" Maybe that was a good thing, in her eyes. I grinned like a corpse.

We talked for a few minutes, about nothing in particular. That's really all that's left to talk about. Then we both started getting cold. I gave her my address and told her to drop by anytime.

We'll see if anything comes of it.

December 22 Doomsday has a bright side.

They forgot to lock the liquor store. I went there today and stocked up. The city's starting to stink, even in the cold. I guess there's probably a lot of rotting bodies behind all those closed doors.

I sat by the window most of the day, watching for Melanie. I saw old lady Benzinger next door slip on some ice and fall flat on her a.s.s. I think she broke her arm. I was going to help her, then I remembered the time she told my dad that I'd been smoking pot behind the garage. By the time she got up and staggered back up the porch, her tears were frozen on her cheeks.

I told you it was cold.

Scotch is pretty good stuff. After a few sips, you can chug it like Kool-Aid.

Melanie didn't drop by.

December 24 I watched a bunch of Christmas specials on TV today. Phones don't work anymore. It's a miracle the power's still on. Otherwise, I'd be freezing my a.s.s off.

I'm down to my last joint. Dope is getting real hard to score. The thought of sobering up is pretty d.a.m.ned scary. But alcohol works in a pinch. Dad came to the house.

"The family ought to be together for the holidays," he said. He'd quit shaving, and he had a fuzzy patch of hair on his cheeks. Looked like a Confederate Civil War general. Maybe he was trying to come off as a half-a.s.sed Santa or something.

"As far as I'm concerned, I don't have a family," I said.

"We have each other."

"Wonderful. Merry f.u.c.king Christmas."

"Here. Take some money."

I stared at the money and shook my head. What a dumb b.a.s.t.a.r.d. "Better give it to your little G.o.d," I said. "He needs it worse than I do. He's going to have a h.e.l.l of a heating bill."

Dad almost cried. Almost.

Melanie didn't come by.

December 25 I had planned on staying holed up all day. Me and two fifths of bourbon. But, it's Christmas, you know?

I ended up going to see Reneau. His favorite supermarket had closed. I don't know where he had been getting his food sc.r.a.ps.

We pa.s.sed the bottle back and forth. I was surprised that Reneau hadn't frozen to death in that refrigerator box of his. He was wearing the suit I had traded him, and I was pleased to see that it was stained with p.i.s.s and tomato sauce.

"Reneau, you're apes.h.i.t crazy," I said. "All these houses around, all these apartments, all these stores with nothing but dead people in them, and you live in a f.u.c.king cardboard box. Why don't you move into some big mansion or something?"

He sucked at the bottle and belched. "I don't belong there," he says.

Doesn't f.u.c.king belong? Can you believe it?

But looking at him with that bottle, he was probably one of the happiest people I'd ever seen. The world coming to an end? Big deal. No roof over my head? I don't give a s.h.i.t. A full bottle of liquor? Now there's a f.u.c.king future!

When I got back home, I found a note on the door. From Lonnie. And a present, wrapped in shiny green foil.

I went inside. After my fingers warmed up, I opened the present. A bag of gra.s.s and ten Quaaludes. What a great guy.

Then I read the note.

"Hi dude: Merry Christmas. Sorry I missed you. Hope we can get together before you-know-what. I love you, Lonnie."

I love you.

Can you f.u.c.king believe it? He must think I'm a f.a.g. I burned the letter and then burned some of the gra.s.s. Melanie didn't drop by.

December 27 Melanie dropped by.

It's kind of funny.

You want something so bad, you do stupid things to get it. Then when you get it, you wonder why you were such a dumbf.u.c.k to want it in the first place.

She knocked on the door sometime in the afternoon. I know it was then because I was just waking up. I opened the door and she was standing there, in a long black dress that was made of some kind of clingy material. She had lost weight, but her figure was still pretty nice. She was holding a gray cat like it was a football.

"I just thought I'd drop by," she said.

"Yeah." I stood to one side and she came in. I threw a look at the sky. A smoggy day, the clouds down to the tops of the buildings over in the business district. G.o.d or whoever sure knew how to whip up some kick-a.s.s doomsday scenery.

The power had shut off for good a day or two back, so I lit a candle. We sat in the living room, a table cluttered with empty bottles and food wrappers in between us. She was twisted sideways in a chair, staring at the empty fireplace as if something was burning there. She stroked the cat's head over and over.

"How's it going?" I finally said. I had a headache.

"You know." She didn't look away from the fireplace.

"Yeah." I was turning into that doll again, the one with the pull string.