text: “This party is lame.” Jacques says this statement to no one in particular, his eyes remaining focused on the clock above the Rembrandt painting hung upon the wall, musing over the elegance of the print, which is without a doubt an authentic original, and the fact it had been hung so haphazardly upon the wall without so much as a single protective layering seemed an atrocious affront to the art itself, which resonated a certain sort of dread inside him. He turns from the painting then, catching the eyes of two nameless guests of the party. The two men both avert their eyes so as to avoid contact with his. There was no denying it; he stuck out like a sore thumb in this crowd. Maybe it was his all-black-outfit consisting of jeans, a black t-shirt, a black goatee, and a shaved head... or maybe it was his general demeanour. Where does one begin and the other end? A person’s perception of themselves versus the way they present themselves? Was one a product of the other? It was hard to say. The only definitive thing Jacques could say had already been said; the party was a lame one. He was only here because his sister had insisted he come. She was married to a politician, and most of the people here were at least a decade older than Jacques. But that was all well and good, considering Jacques had drank the last of his vodka late last night as he went about his nightly ritual of battling sleep (and the dreams which accompanied it), and he was already late on his rent for that month so, the fact he could get drunk for free here had been a deciding factor in his presence. *“Ahem!”* Everyone’s head swirls at the sound of a cough from somewhere within the lavish living room overlooking the lake. “Don’t worry,” a woman’s voice calls out, “he’s just a smoker!” Speckled spots of laughter ripple through the crowd, the lingering trauma of the pandemic clearly still fresh upon the tip of their cerebellums. Jacques is accosted then by a short blond girl who introduces herself as Beatrice, her outstretched hand looking much like a broken twig to him. “What brings *you* here?” she asks, her eyebrows emphasizing the fact that the ‘you’ is italicized. “The unfortunate condition of life,” he says, sighing and sipping from his drink. “What’s this?” Beatrice asks, leaning to get a closer look at the block of text tattooed on the inside of Jacques collarbone, which reads ***GODISNOWHERE.*** “God is now here?” she reads the words out loud, musing over them with a quizzical look on her face. “That’s... a nice thought.” “Is it?” Jacques says, sighing. He didn’t have to the strength or conviction left in him to bother pointing out that the tattoo could also be read ‘God is nowhere.’ It was all too much for him; the way their eyes hung on lingering a little too long, and how they leaned in close to whisper in each other’s ears, talking of life’s tiny trivialities from safe on high in their golden nests. Suddenly, it was hard for him to take in breath, his lungs rejecting the savage air with utter disdain. *This place is toxic*. He felt as if his skin was been scorched, the temperature rising from within. He proceeds to shuffle towards the kitchen where countless liquor bottles line the counter beside the sink. He pours himself a stiff rye and coke. As he takes his first sip from the drink, brushing his bangs from his eyes, a couple enters the kitchen and makes their way for the makeshift bar beside the sink. They were closer to Jacques in age, both of them dressed up in expensive designer clothes for which Jacques had no reference. Words like *Armani*, *Calvin Klein*, and *Gucci* flitter through his head like the wings of a fly; a mere nuisance. "What kind of sauce do you think would go best if you had to eat a person?" "BBQ sauce for sure," the woman says, her dark hair shimmering in the kitchen light. Her lips were painted a dark shade of red; all crimson in the dim light. "Not apple sauce?" the fellow says, his eyes narrowing intently. "No, of *course* not!” she scoffs. “Too sweet. It would have to be a spicy BBQ sauce, and you'd want to cook it crispy, you know, since humans have a lot of fat - generally, at least around here!” The two share a laugh while Jacques can’t help but overhear. "I would never eat a person," he interjects, taking a long pull from his drink while the two unknown faces stare at him in momentary disbelief. "They're fucking disgusting." "Chill out man," the guy says, giving him the once over, his eyes trailing over him. "Yeah, it was just like... a totally hypothetical conversation," the brunette woman with drawn-on eyebrows adds. "Well, I still wouldn't eat a human,” Jacques shrugs, “too much toxicity." The couple move uneasily past him, the woman shaking her head. Jacques rolls his eyes and moves the other way towards the multi-leveled deck overlooking the lake. "There you are!" his sister cries out, appearing in the hallway of the kitchen before he can make his escape. She comes at him in a barrage of curled hair and silk-smooth arms, wrapping herself around him in a drippy hug. "Isn't this just the best?" She is wearing a silver dress which shimmers in the light. "It's pretty great," he says, looking past her at the clock hung from the wall. "What are we celebrating again?" "Oh Jacques," Marissa laughs, slapping him on the chest. "You have such a *wicked* sense of humour." "I honestly have no idea what this party is for," he says again, disinterested. "You're a riot, little brother. A real rebel without a cause." He goes to move past her then, sighing as she reaches out and grabs him by the arm. *Where are you going?* she asks. *Out for a smoke,* he says. He makes his way past the throngs of people in the living room, some of them wearing little pointed party hats, all of them laughing far too loudly than Jacques assumed was warranted; there was nothing particularly humorous about anything occurring at this particular moment, in his particular opinion. *Just another circle-jerk*. An evening of laughter and self-grandeur hidden beneath the guise of whatever trivial banality they were pretending to give a shit about. Jacques pushes past a group of people and out into the vast expanse of the five-hundred foot second-story deck which had been built during the quarantine, the stain finish fresh and glistening. Outside, the air hits him like a slap in the face - that sour heat of the city melting away across the Muskoka Lake. Lamps carve a path through the darkness down to the water’s edge. It was still strange seeing all these people clustered together without masks on, at least to Jacques. Everyone else at the party seemed relatively nonplussed by the fact that there were clearly over one hundred people present at his sister's little get-together. Jacques spots his sister's husband, Reginald, entertaining a group of important looking people; mostly older men in expensive suits with customized cufflinks and gold watches. *Prostituting himself for votes no doubt*, Jacques thinks to himself as he moves in the opposite direction, pulling a battered cigarette pack from out of his pocket and lighting up one of the smokes in an effortless gesture. The smoke hits his lungs and, and for a moment, he feels calm. "Hey! You're Marissa's brother, right?" Jacques turns to see a couple approaching him. Both are dressed extravagantly in designer clothing purchased from niche boutiques in Paris, or at least that's what Jacques presumed. The tall man is dressed in a navy blue pin-striped, single-breasted-suit and his assumed wife (or mistress) wore a blood-red dress with a scandalous slit revealing most of her left leg, looking milky white in the silver moonlight. “How are you tonight?” the woman in the red dress asks, smiling at him. “It’s Jacques, right?” “It’s nice to be out of the city, I guess.” “So nice,” she agrees, turning to the tall man. “I was just telling Bertrand that. Isn’t that right sweetie?” “That’s right, she was,” he nods. “Fascinating,” Jacques says, only half listening to the words coming out of his own mouth. “Sometimes I feel so suffocated in the city, too many people. Did you know that rats carried the plague back in the dark days, and now, I guess you could say that humans are the rats...” The sharply dressed man shares a look with his partner. “Don’t you think you’re being a little... over-dramatic?” “Funny you say that,” Jacques says to the woman in the red dress, chuckling as he pulls from his cigarette. “I find that most people don’t get dramatic enough.” “And what is it that you *do*, Jacques?” Bertrand asks, sipping from his cognac glass and smirking into the silver moonlight. “I’m a programmer,” he says, disinterested. In that moment, their eyes are all drawn to the full-moon suspended in the velvet black sky, a hollow wind blowing through the trees and causing their leaves to rustle like the sounds of a thousand whispers. “And what do you program mostly?” “Computers.” “Oh.” “Yeah,” Jacques says, shrugging and gulping from his now empty tumbler. “Hey,” he says, after wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “Do either of you know what this party’s for?” “This party?” the man asks, gesturing with his arms in two big circles. “Yeah, like... what are we all doing here?” “Well, I thought that was obvious,” the lady in the red dress says, incredulously. Jacques looks on, his face wet with anticipation. “We’re partying,” she says, pausing before giggling to herself, drinking her wine. The red from her lips leaving a stain upon the tip of the crystal-stemmed wine glass. “Whatever,” Jacques sighs, shaking his head and turning away from them, the sounds of their laughter following him as he moves to the edge of the deck, his eyes drifting past the trees and out into the water below. His mind drifts along with his eyes, thoughts of Dylan flittering through his consciousness like a snake beneath the water’s surface. There’s a part of him that missed him very much, the way his dirty blond hair seemed to glow in the morning sun... and he wished very much that they could be together. But there was another part of him, perhaps a much greater part, which cursed Dylan for leaving him behind in this world. Often times he would catch himself pontificating on how he wished things had happened in reverse; that *he* would have been the one to get sick, and Dylan would have had to watch *him* die a slow and irrelevant death, his lungs gradually filling with liquid that the virus caused, leaving his last breathes sounding like the engine of an old lawnmower. A glass shatters somewhere behind him upon the deck, startling Jacques from his lovesick trance. *“Opa!”* Someone from inside the house yells, the sounds of laughter swelling briefly before the gentle hum of a dozen conversations resumes. “There he is!” his sister croons, walking over towards Jacques with a handful of guests in tow; a barrage of Armani suits and diamond jewelry. “Leave me alone,” he sighs. “Oh, why are you always such a party pooper?” she whines, smacking his arm. A few of the people behind her are whispering behind cuffed hands. “Aren’t you happy to be here?” “No one even knows what this party’s for.” “You’re missing the point,” his sister says, rolling her eyes. “Have you been down to the water yet? You really ought to go down. It’s *so* beautiful down there.” “Maybe I will,” Jacques says, surveying the illuminated path. “There’s a significantly less presence of humans down there.” “My brother,” his sister smiles, “the constant cynic.” He rolls his eyes at her before turning and descending the stairs. The sound of his footfalls easily drowned out by the party, and he flicks his cigarette butt into the gravel pathway. He approaches the water’s edge with his hands in his pockets, casually kicking at orphan stones as he walks. He thinks then of all that happened in the last year, all that he had lost, and part of it still left a sour feeling in his stomach, yet his apathy had effectively muted the initial rage and betrayal he felt... but that was the problem. He didn’t know who exactly had betrayed him... Unbeknownst to Jacques, a large chunk of earth had been removed earlier that week when Reginald had had the dock replaced, and when Jacques’ foot came down expecting to find earth, it instead found two feet of air, sending him tumbling head-first into the dark-deep water, the sound of his splash barely audible over the sound of the music playing from the deck above. Jacques’ sister turns to one of the guests then, clinking glasses with him. "I love champagne," she says. "I hear you made out like a bandit on Pfizer,” the man replies. "We did well," she nods. "Thus, the champagne." *Help, please, someone help me! I can't swim!* Jacques’ sister turns to face the crowd then, clinking the side of her glass with a caviar spoon. She waits patiently until everyone at the party has quieted, all of their eyes transfixed upon her and her dazzling silver dress. "We are gathered here tonight to celebrate life itself...” *Please, please! I can't swim... the water is too deep!* Sounds of soft applause ripple through the crowd. "...because life, as we learned over the past year, is something we all take for granted. It’s not until we’re staring death in the face, or finding death in the face of our loved ones, that we realize just how lucky we truly are...” *Can anyone hear me, please? Help me! I can’t swim!* "...which is why we should party hard tonight!" "Yeah!" the crowd cheers in unison, raising their glasses to one another. "Help!" Jacques cries, reaching towards the sky with his hands, his head partly submerged in the black water. "So let us toast our amazing fortunes and impeccable taste in company," she pauses then to allow for the speckled laughter to fade, "and on a more serious note... let us remember all those who died last year in the wake of such an awful virus. Truly, the world has changed so much since it all began..." *Pl-weeeuhhh-ggrrrrr-ease!* "Hurrah!" *Hel-argagagargagragr-llllllllppppppp...* And as Jacques’ head slowly disappears into the lake, his last thoughts revolving around his mother as the water fills his lungs, most of the partiers move back inside where there was warmth and food, his sister poking her head out briefly and looking around before returning inside as well, closing the sliding glass door with a hollow thud that travels over the rippling water which was now a grave for the forgotten. Some of the guests linger on the deck a while longer, smoking cigars and sipping their flutes of champagne, talking casually of relevant recent events; another dictator overthrown in some middle-eastern country, another president elected in the U.S., more riots in the streets in the Southern States, a celebrity died and rumors are swirling he overdosed - while more sinister speculations suggest he was actually murdered... another conspiracy cover-up job... THE END.