text: Hazed he looked at the bottle, unable to comprehend the meaning of his actions. In his heart he saw it for what it was, but in his mind he only saw the orange tinted bottle with the warning label on the side. In the sink he watched the water flowing down the drain and felt a strange familiarity with the water. Both he and the water ebbed and flowed, rushing to somewhere else, yet unguided by their own actions but rather by a superior natural force. The haze grew stronger now, and he felt the heavy hand of reality pushing down on him. Down he fell into darkness, down to its comforting solitude. Down... Up. Up he rose in a sweat and quickly looked around. He could feel the anxiety of the dream left from the adrenaline in his blood, and his heart yet raced from the illusions of the unconscious. His room was as always a mess, and beyond the crumpled sheets he could see his trusty alarm clock, once again waiting to awake him at the hour when the world needed him up. Today it read 6:34, and being as he wasn’t due to awake until 7:00 he considered falling back into a sleep. As he flopped back he realized that his heart was still accelerated, and he felt shaky, as though he had consumed one to many coffees. Slowly he rose from the bed to face the bathroom, which had frightened him so much in the dream. His steps were small and measured, as he felt his way through his apartment to the small room that functioned as his lavatory. Had it been any smaller and the French would not be the only one’s calling a water closet. Waving his arm through the air as though he was conducting an invisible orchestra he found the string that descended from a single bare bulb that was overhead. The soft yellowish glow made him feel as though he was ill, perhaps due to how it made him appear so in the mirror. The harsh lines created on his face showed his fatigue and stress, and he brushed it all away as he turned away from the ghastly image of himself. His thirty-two years of wanderings had left him largely penniless, alone, and in debt to loan companies and creditors alike. He would often reflect on his life and how it was largely unremarkable, and wonder what he would ever do that would matter. His career as a painter had been mediocre at best, with painting sales almost never equaling what he had spent on supplies, and his career as a writer being equally as successful. He looked at his watch, 6:48, time to prepare for another day at the office, another day making sure other peoples lives go according to plan, while his sat on hold in the wings, just waiting for the next act. He trudged through his routine and grumbled as he past his latest project, which now sat dormant upon his desk, no longer igniting a fire within his heart. The manila folder held within it detailed accounts of the people who were buried at Shady Willow Cemetery, which pending approval from the city council were to be exhumed and relocated in order to make way for a strip mall. He had spent nearly 6 months gather old newspaper clippings and interviewing surviving relatives in order to write his article, almost a page and a half per person, which he hoped would raise public awareness and stop the transfer. It was one of the few things he had taken a real interest in, and he truly felt as though he knew the people that were buried there better than any who were still among the world of the living. Perhaps if he could get that printed at his paper he would stop being merely arranging other’s work into an nice page format and writing articles of his own, but that would have to wait, as another days paper needed a layout. He paused before heading out the door after he was ready, checking his appearance in the mirror, he once again felt as though he was looking upon a ghost of himself, a shell of a person that he knew he could be. He let out a long sigh and opened the door, once again facing a world that had forgotten him. As he walked the several blocks to his office, he passed a homeless man, who appeared to have been beaten by life, held down at every turn. It reminded him of Neil Brennen, one of the people buried at Shady Willow. He had been a soldier in the first world war, and survived only to come home and get caught up in the whirlwind of the Roaring twenties, but once the Great Depression had set in, he found himself struggling on the streets to stay alive. As he tried to find work and food, he grew ever sicker from his life on the streets, until he quietly succumbed to hypothermia one winter night in 1932. The thought crossed his mind that he should feel pity upon this man, but then considered his own position. The world treated him with neglect, almost refusing to acknowledge his existence in the first place, and he found him self longing to be beaten back by life just so he knew that someone out there knew that he was alive at all. The bells jingled as he pushed open the door to the North Collins Courier, drawing unwanted attention to him from the editor. The editor was a short middle-aged man, whose inflated ego was eclipsed only by the demands he placed upon his employees. Striding to him folder in hand he began to talk before he had truly come within normal conversational distance. “Here is the articles that need to be arranged for tomorrows paper, and lets try to have them done before I have to send them to the printer this time.” The man’s air of annoyance came across clearly, through both tone and the presence of a slight twitch of the eye, which made one worried about the sanity of the editor. “Have I not been on time, I thought the deadline was 4pm, I always have it in by then,” He struggled to figure out why he was being questioned when he could not remember a time when he was late. “It is, and you have, but some people try to do more than the minimum. Perhaps it is why you are still stuck arranging words that are not your own. I sometimes wonder if you truly grasp how unremarkable you are.” His contempt was felt thoroughly, and his words haunted him all the way through that day. If only he could have the originality of Willard Stevenson, another corpse who found its resting place at Shady Willow. Willard Stevenson had done many things in his life, but what he was most noted for was not what he did while he lived but rather how he had died. While serving with the Union army he found his line breaking and unit in retreat. Unwilling to go down in history as a failure who had run from danger, he had broken rank and ran into the Confederate line. He fired his rifle and proceeded to bayonet confederate soldiers as the approached him. As the line enveloped him many soldiers were wary of getting to close to him as he was drunk with bloodlust, choosing instead to fire with their weapons at the single man flailing several yards away. Unfortunately they had him surrounded and the ensuing crossfire killed many more confederates than he could ever have, but enough rounds found their way to his body to end his fateful one-man charge. Having been honored for bravery, he was buried in his hometown of North Collins, with full military honors. The days work became monotonous as the hours wore on and he pressed to finish with time to spare. As lunch arrived the other employees filed out of the office to eat, while he stood fast to finish his work early. He did stop long enough to take note of the cute field reporter as she passed, and allowed himself to imagine himself for a moment with her as Mr. and Mrs. Avante must have been during their younger years together. They had met while summering at Cape Cod, and found that they fancied one another more than just as a summer fling. He was 21 from the prestigious Avante family from North Collins, and she was an Astor, a legendary family in its day. The two fell in love and wasted no time in getting engaged. Soon after a wedding followed and they were off exploring the world together, traveling upon the substantial fortunes of their families. From Paris, Rome, and Greece they would send home photos they would have done showing their exploits, and how they were becoming a truly worldly couple. As the years went on they found themselves traveling less and spending more quiet hours beneath the willow tree on the Avante estate, enjoying each others company and the solitude of the place. Mrs. Avante had taken ill in 1898 and died within a year, causing Mr. Avante to such grief that he dedicated the land around the Willow tree as a cemetery, and paid to have all the honored people from the town of North Collins Cemetery transferred there so that his late wife may rest among people he deemed “worthy of her greatness”. He died penniless 3 years later after a long depression and drug addiction in an effort to dull the pain of his lost love. The thought quickly dissolved from his head as he shook the ethereal feeling from his head. He knew that he needed to concentrate upon his work if he was ever going to finish by the deadline, let alone before it. He turned his eyes once again to his work and dove into its repetition almost robotically. As the day came to a close he stacked up the final copies that would become tomorrows news and placed them back into the folder, ready to go to the editor for final approval. Upon arriving at the editors door he felt his heart sink as he was met with a cold stare and an impatient tone. “Unremarkable yet again, congratulations,” and with that that editor turned to his work, completely dismissing his existence. He felt worthless as he walked home, wishing for some form of inspiration to bring him from the past to the present, so that he might someday have a future. His gaze searched around him and fell upon a young girl who was conversing with what appeared to be her classmates, and his mind was taken away once again, this time to Sandra Nelson, who had earned her spot in Shady Willow not through her deeds but rather her inability to grasp how mortal she really was at 16. The night air had been hot, and the smell of gasoline had her scrunching up her face, its pungent aroma reminding her all to much of her father. She sat aside the high school football star in his old ford, waiting to race some greasers from a rival school. She felt the thrill of being in the race and couldn’t help but hope that he was as turned on as she was by the situation. She gazed at him deviously as the race started, and continued to do so as they flew down the road. The next thing she knew she felt like she was flying, and before the terror of the situation could fully sink in to her the car landed on the passenger side roof, killing her instantly. She was laid to rest in the only cemetery that her father could afford, the old Avante place where only the poor were buried now, its treasured status having died with Mr. Avante some 50 years prior. He shook the image from his head as he walked along the sidewalk, once again contemplating his own life. As he walked up to his apartment he thought that perhaps he should walk to the cemetery that had dominated his thoughts all day and invigorated him in the past. The buildings quickly faded from thought as he walked down the road which led to the large tract of land that made up Shady Willow. As he approached he saw a peculiar sight, what appeared to be five people standing around a grave as though they were at a burial, only no one had been buried there since the 1950’s. As he approached closer he could make out the tell tale black clothing and decided to approach from behind them as to not be seen. As he came closer he saw that they were staring at a empty plot, with no headstone to speak of, as if they were waiting for something. No sooner had he come within several feet then did the crowd split and form a path for him to walk through. He looked upon the people with disbelief and horror, for he knew every one. His eyes went from the veteran to the couple, the girl and the hobo, and he found himself speechless. “You were the only one who cared for us, so it is fitting that we are likewise the ones who will care for you” The young girl spoke in a voice that was quite angelic to him, and he found himself captivated but the spectre. “How are you...what am I seeing?” he stammered. “Your mind is creating us as a result of those pills you took this morning. Your body has shown to be quite strong that you managed to fight it this long, but your body is failing, and it is almost time to rest.” The lovely wife expressed sweetly, and yet the meaning somehow hurt just the same. “You mean I am dying? You mean I will die here?” he questioned, barely audible. “You already have, brother, you already have.” The veteran said has he peered down at the now still body lying upon the plot. He rendered a smart salute and turned to leave. The other apparitions likewise turned and dissolved with the spirit of the lifeless corpse. The editor and reporter had volunteered to help clean the apartment, since the man had no family to speak of. As she cleaned up the paintings and writings, the reporter came across the folder sitting on the desk. She leafed through it quickly, and then called over the editor. He thumbed through the pages, reading the remarkable stories and the well-written opposition to the impending transfer. He knew that he would have to run this in the man’s honor, and so he hurried out of the apartment and back to his office. The small staff of the Courier stood around the grave, and each bowed their heads in respect. No one knew what they could say that could top what the editor had picked for the headstone, which was in no doubt a reference to his ability to save the cemetery posthumously. They filed away silently, never again to return.