Last Day on Earth by David Vann Page B

he’s manic, paranoid, because he won’t use his credit card. Someone could steal the number. So they fight again.
    Steve wants to have sex. Right now, and with a lot of different partners. Is it because he hates his life? Is it because he doesn’t want to be gay? Is it because of the medications? Prozac can reduce sex drive, but in a few people, it can intensify sex drive into radical promiscuity. Whatever the reason, Steve checks out Craigslist, posts an ad in Casual Encounters. “Katie” responds. She has 44Ds and is ten years older, thirty-seven, with “cushin for the pushin.” He blows it, though. Makes some stupid half-joke about asking whether she’s a cop. That gets her all paranoid, and she’s put off.
    It doesn’t matter. There are plenty of others on Craigslist.
    Steve starts his new job September 14, 2007, working as a correctional officer at Rockville Correctional Facility in Indiana. He’s dropped classes for this job and isn’t tutoring, either, or working as a research assistant. He’s made sacrifices, and the job isn’t what he expected. He enjoys parts of the training. They teach him how to use a Remington 870 12-gauge shotgun, the same model he’ll use in Cole Hall. He has to take a test detailing how to load and unload it. He’s fast at loading it. But he wanted to help people in this job, and instead he’s just moving the inmates around from place to place. He has to hide his education from most of his coworkers, too. Being in a master’s program is a kind of stigma here.
    On September 25, he’s hanging out with two of his coworkers, Nancy Hu and Samantha Hack-Ritzo, and tells them it’s the anniversary of his mother’s death. He’s just thinking about her. But because he sounds so oddly detached, Samantha tells him he should go to therapy, which he doesn’t appreciate. He’s taken himself off Prozac, because it’s given him acne all over his face, neck, and back. Going off Prozac is worse than being on it, though. He’s really anxious, and he’s checking everything, all day and night, can hardly get out of the parking lot in the morning, has to check so many times that his car door is locked. And he’s getting paranoid. His homemade sword tattoo on his forearm looks like a prison tattoo. So he has it covered by a skull with a dagger. The guy Jason who does it is good, has already covered Steve’s old rose tattoo with a skull and flames.
    Then something stupid happens, something maddening. He’s driving to work, early in the morning, talking with Jessica on the phone, passing endless farmland, cornfields, barns, and he misses his turn, drives past. This job is ridiculously inflexible. If you’re late even one minute on one day, you have to start over from scratch. Your couple of weeks in the training program are thrown out.
    So he turns around and speeds back, 85 miles per hour in a 55 zone, and then sees the flashing lights, pulling him over. So that’s it. Why shouldn’t everything in his life fall apart?
    He drives to Nick Eblen’s house—Nick is a training officer and has been letting Steve crash here some nights to shorten the commute—and clears out all his stuff. He leaves a two-page apology note, over the top:
    “Dear Nick and Susan, I wanted to thank you for your kindness, but I am, regretfully, unable to continue with IDOC or with my training due to poor judgment on my part. I sincerely apologize for any embarrassment or shame that I may have caused by my stupid actions. For this reason, I must resign/quit my position. What happened is as follows: This morning I accidentally drove past Putnamville due to driving in the wrong direction. Upon discovering my error, I drove at a high rate of speed in order to arriveat the training facility on time. I was pulled over for speeding by a Putnamville officer and was given a ticket for a very high amount. I was also held over for a short period of time and was already past the training deadline. It’s clear that I lack