didnât come down: he was convinced he had died. Many people underwent a kind of ego-death on psychedelics, Abby explained. It was considered standard, something experienced users knew to anticipate. She read aloud pertinent passages from Timothy Leary and others. But what other people experienced and said meant nothing to Seth; what he had undergone was permanent and real: he was essentially and truly dead. And do you know the great thing about being dead? Youâre arenât
afraid
all the time, because thatâs what every fear is based on, the fear of death. Dead, he felt more alive than ever before. It was great to be dead!
It would clear up on its own, Abby hoped. Meanwhile it was summertime. Lewis drove out to a ranch to swim in the lake, ten dollars per car: an old man took the money and opened the cattle gate. They heard that the far end of the lake there were cliffs and a rope swing, but access to it was blocked by a gang of high-school skinheads who would appear arms folded on the footpath, their girlfriends swinging their white legs in the trees. It turned out the owner of the ranch was the grandfather of the leader and had raised the boy part-timeâthe mother was a meth addict, the father in Leavenworth. But being dead, Seth decided to demonstrate his fearlessness by challenging the bigger, vicious-looking skinhead leader. Which meant Lewis would have to fight too and Lewis didnât particularly enjoy fighting or give a damn about some rope swing. In addition to which this Skinhead was not just a kid with a shaved head and swastika tats; he was affiliated through his convict father with a regional white-supremacist group. Even if Seth and Lewis won the fight, they might find themselves being forced off the road on the way home by a car full of Hammerskins or Hammerheads (Lewis never got the name of the group straight or wanted to) and shanked in the bushes. But in the end they settled not on a fight but on a contest to see who would jump off the highest point on the cliff above the lake, the winner having the right to be gatekeeper to the pathetic fucking rope swing. Lewis watched Seth climb higher and higher up the cliff, until on the final, winning jump he struck the water on his side and briefly passed out from the pain and Lewis leapt in, afraid he might drown. Sethâs first act as rope-swing gatekeeper was to welcome his biracial friend Marley, son of a WSU faculty couple, which touched off an endless, moronic debate about race, worse in its way than fighting would have been, Lewis often found himself thinking.
Then Seth flew to New York for his annual one-week visit to see Virgil. The night before he left, Seth came into Lewisâs room. He wondered aloud about what it was going to be like,
flying on a plane when youâre dead
. Lewis studied him. The kid still believed he was dead. It was the strangest thing. He referred to it in everyoneâs presence. Abby was out with Rennie, âlifetime companionâ du jour, and when Seth lit a one-hit pipe, Lewis had a small social puff. But it was strong and he found himself thinking harder than he had about Sethâs claim: heâs dead, my little brother. Lewis had always lived in dread of Sethâs dyingâin a car crash, drowning at the beach, cancer. Now, in this strange, Alice-in-Wonderland fashion and under his nose it had happened anyway: Seth was dead. He turned to contemplating his own death, that beast of legend. Seth was dead, ergo Lewis too was going to die, one day the hour would actually come. The beast was real. He could make it out in the farthest distance, like a grainy photo of Bigfoot. But suddenly it turned and flew across that vast space and pressed itself against him and Lewis couldnât breathe, he broke down gasping out sobs of terror. âItâs OK,â Seth said, soothing him. But Lewis knew he was gloating too: breaking Lewis the doubter was a victory. He would do the same with
afraid
all the time, because thatâs what every fear is based on, the fear of death. Dead, he felt more alive than ever before. It was great to be dead!
It would clear up on its own, Abby hoped. Meanwhile it was summertime. Lewis drove out to a ranch to swim in the lake, ten dollars per car: an old man took the money and opened the cattle gate. They heard that the far end of the lake there were cliffs and a rope swing, but access to it was blocked by a gang of high-school skinheads who would appear arms folded on the footpath, their girlfriends swinging their white legs in the trees. It turned out the owner of the ranch was the grandfather of the leader and had raised the boy part-timeâthe mother was a meth addict, the father in Leavenworth. But being dead, Seth decided to demonstrate his fearlessness by challenging the bigger, vicious-looking skinhead leader. Which meant Lewis would have to fight too and Lewis didnât particularly enjoy fighting or give a damn about some rope swing. In addition to which this Skinhead was not just a kid with a shaved head and swastika tats; he was affiliated through his convict father with a regional white-supremacist group. Even if Seth and Lewis won the fight, they might find themselves being forced off the road on the way home by a car full of Hammerskins or Hammerheads (Lewis never got the name of the group straight or wanted to) and shanked in the bushes. But in the end they settled not on a fight but on a contest to see who would jump off the highest point on the cliff above the lake, the winner having the right to be gatekeeper to the pathetic fucking rope swing. Lewis watched Seth climb higher and higher up the cliff, until on the final, winning jump he struck the water on his side and briefly passed out from the pain and Lewis leapt in, afraid he might drown. Sethâs first act as rope-swing gatekeeper was to welcome his biracial friend Marley, son of a WSU faculty couple, which touched off an endless, moronic debate about race, worse in its way than fighting would have been, Lewis often found himself thinking.
Then Seth flew to New York for his annual one-week visit to see Virgil. The night before he left, Seth came into Lewisâs room. He wondered aloud about what it was going to be like,
flying on a plane when youâre dead
. Lewis studied him. The kid still believed he was dead. It was the strangest thing. He referred to it in everyoneâs presence. Abby was out with Rennie, âlifetime companionâ du jour, and when Seth lit a one-hit pipe, Lewis had a small social puff. But it was strong and he found himself thinking harder than he had about Sethâs claim: heâs dead, my little brother. Lewis had always lived in dread of Sethâs dyingâin a car crash, drowning at the beach, cancer. Now, in this strange, Alice-in-Wonderland fashion and under his nose it had happened anyway: Seth was dead. He turned to contemplating his own death, that beast of legend. Seth was dead, ergo Lewis too was going to die, one day the hour would actually come. The beast was real. He could make it out in the farthest distance, like a grainy photo of Bigfoot. But suddenly it turned and flew across that vast space and pressed itself against him and Lewis couldnât breathe, he broke down gasping out sobs of terror. âItâs OK,â Seth said, soothing him. But Lewis knew he was gloating too: breaking Lewis the doubter was a victory. He would do the same with
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