Chapter 20 Red October Issue (1)

9. Red October At Christmas in 1989, Lucien was very ill. We didn't know when death would come, and we were fettered by the inevitability of the symptoms, as well as ourselves, and each other by this invisible chain.When disease enters a family, it not only takes hold of the patient's body, but also weaves a dark web of buried hope in everyone's heart.Such a thread as thin as a spider's web entangles our plans and breathing, and disease, day after day, devours our lives.When I come back from the outside, there will be a feeling of entering the catacombs, and I will always feel chills all over my body. It is a cold feeling that cannot be calmed down. Until the last few days before Lucien died of illness, when I slept in his bed I felt as if he was slowly sucking my body heat away.

The disease was diagnosed in the spring of 1988.The illness, which had plagued him for seventeen months, finally took his life on Christmas Eve.Old Mrs. Morris made a collection among the residents, and beautiful wreaths were placed in front of my concierge, with a ribbon without any signature, and she was the only one who attended my husband's funeral.She had been a pious, cold, haughty lady, but there was something real beneath her stern and somewhat gruff exterior, and when Lucien died a year after her death, I often wondered , she was such a nice person, I might miss her, even though we never spoke a word to each other in fifteen years.

"She couldn't get her daughter-in-law to rest in the end, God bless her, she was a good person," added Manuela -- with a Racine-like distaste for little Mrs. Morris -- Can be used as a eulogy for a funeral. Except for Cornelia Maurice, with her veil and her rosary, Lucien's ailments were insignificant, perhaps because of the insignificance of life and the loss of oxygen for money and society.Rich people seem to think that such little people are incapable of strong human emotions and are especially cold and unfeeling.Since we are only porters, death is a matter of course for us, and it is extremely unfair to the rich.A dead concierge is just a small hole in daily life. This kind of physical necessity does not need to be connected with tragedy. For the house owners who meet him every day on the stairs or at the door of the concierge room, Lucien just a non-existence returning to a nothingness he had never been in; or an animal, for he was only a remnant of life, without pomp or means of living, doubtless in death At times, one should experience only inferior resistance.Like everyone else, we suffer from pain, and as pain eats away at us, our hearts are oppressed by rage, and amidst the horrors of death, we slowly disintegrate and rot, And that doesn't affect any of our homeowners.

One morning, three weeks before Christmas, I came home with a straw bag containing radishes and ox lungs for the cat, and found Lucien all dressed up and looking ready to go out.He even put on his scarf and was standing waiting for me.I looked at him, exhausted and pale from walking from the bedroom to the kitchen, at this man who hadn't been able to take off his pajamas for weeks, which seemed to me like a mourning suit, but today was very strange, his eyes Bright-eyed and mischievous, the collar of his winter coat was pulled up, covering his surprisingly red cheeks. His abnormal appearance almost made me faint.

"Lucien!" I exclaimed, and rushed up to him, propped him up, helped him sit, and undressed him, knowing that my illness had taught me actions I had never known before. , in the recent period, these movements have become the only things I can do. I put my bag down, put my arms around him, let him lean against me, and so much more. At this time, I have started to breathe Breathing heavily, his heart swelled strangely, so he stood up and rested. "The time is right," Lucien said to me, "the movie starts at one o'clock." In the heat of the movie theater hall, I was close to tears. I had never been so happy, and it was the first time in many months that I held his warm hand.I knew it took an unexpected confluence of forces to lift him out of bed, to have the strength to dress him, to look forward to going out, to enjoy the joy of being together again, and I knew it was him. A sign of the end of time, a flashback before the end of life, and none of this is important to me, I just want to enjoy this rare moment, this moment of breaking free from the shackles of the disease, the moment of these two hands clenched , an overwhelming moment of mutual joy, because, thank God, this is a movie that we can both share in.

I think he passed away after the movie ended.Although his body lasted another three full weeks, his soul left after the movie, because he knew it would be more complete, because saying goodbye to me in the movie theater, there is no too sad regret, Because in this way, he finds peace, and when the two of us watch narrative movies together, he loses himself in the silence between the two of us. I accept it all.