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more than survivor's talk, because no one who's dead can tell you what they
were feeling before they died, especially from high falls.
"Yeah, doc, I saw everything I ever done flash before my eyes. Saw my
gramps, who died in '72, saw crippled little Janey Hathaway from kindergarten,
saW Billy what's-his-name get sucked into the hay baler on Christmas Eve, saw
Tammy before she got fat, saw Ray before he got skinny, saw ... "
Survivor talk, usually followed by a white light, some ghosts of Aunt
Regina, cousin Artemus and other assorted figures, and then darkness. Some
survivors say they hear God telling them that, by golly, it isn't their time yet
and to go on back and have some fun a little while longer. As for Merrik, he
doesn't see his life flash before him, doesn't see his long-dead Uncle Rizzo hold­
ing out a comforting hand, doesn't hear the voice of God.
What Merrik sees is the fractured cliff face rushing past as he falls eight
hundred feet to the bottom of the canyon.
If there's a bright spot to this particular fall, it's that Merrik's body has
twisted around so that he's facing upward, or mostly upward, toward the sky
and clouds. And he's thankful for that, because the last thing he wants to see
are the oncoming rocks of the canyon floor. Had he seen them, he wouldn't
have liked them, though they are cool with their spiky points and wavering red­
orange color. Not what someone wants to land on after an eight hundred foot
plunge, that's for goddamn sure.
Merrik watches the cliff face rush past, but he doesn't scream or cry or
carry on. At first, he thinks that might be a strange reaction, seeing as how
death is seconds away. But he took loads of pills this morning, and they've
given him a different perspective. Yeah sure, okay, he slipped at the worst place
a person could slip. And yeah, he should have worn crampons, but dammit,
they sounded too much like tampons. He isn't sure what a crampon even looks
like, but if it looks anything like a tampon, well, to hell with them and to hell
with the rangers for suggesting he wear them. Merrik bets that the rangers
don't have to face the likes of Jo-Jo and Ron and Amir five days a week.
Merrik considers adjusting his body so that he can actually see what's
waiting for him at the bottom. Exactly why he wants to do that, he isn't sure,
but he thinks it might be part of his new need to see things he has never seen
before. How often do you get to see the ground rushing up at you at fifty miles
an hour? Besides, he reasons, people are curious. Why else would they spend
lots of money on backpacks and boots, only to slip and fall to their deaths
before getting the chance to put them to the test?
That's Merrik's biggest gripe at the moment - the one thing that has
him really steamed. He spent all that money, and for what? So that he can fall off
a cliff? Does that sound even remotely fair? Jesus, he could have done that with
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