Remo Went Rogue by Mike McCrary Page A

somewhere.
    If he wants to kill me, I’m here.
    While roaming, he passes a homeless guy holding a sign that reads, THE END IS UPON US. Remo stops in front of him, engrossed by the sign. He glazed stare is stuck on the words, as if not even reading them. More like he’s studying the inside of his own head and his eyes just have to look at something while he’s doing it. His stare bores through the crude sign, all in route to a spot in his mind, a hopeless little corner of the universe that only Remo can see.
    Homeless guy asks, “You okay?”
    “No.”
      “World’s on a freight train to hell, brother. You ready?”
    The question—You ready?—sparks an idea in Remo.
    The answer is an overwhelming, No!, But at the same time, Remo wonders why if he can’t stop his death, can’t he at least be ready to die? Is that the way to look at this? Is that the angle to play? Like those movies where the character is told he has cancer or some shit and they go through a journey of self-discovery blah, blah, blah…yeah, those. Now, of course, Remo and self-discovery are like a porn star and virginity. You can’t put the genie back in the bottle, but Remo chooses to look at it differently.
    I’m going to die, and that sucks, but now what? What’s the play? What’s my move with this?
    Remo’s wandering has brought him to a coffee shop, where he’s now sprawled out in a corner booth meant to seat six. A pot of hot coffee sits on the steel-topped table, his flask of Johnnie at the ready. Balled up wads of napkins are scattered among the salt and pepper shakers and the jelly tower. He works feverishly at writing something on a fresh napkin. He writes fast, pouring his mind out on the page, then stops. Crosses everything out and wads it up tossing it to the side to keep company with the other scraps of ideas.
    A young, hipster-punk waitress walks up topping off his coffee. Tattoo sleeves wrap her arms and cover her neck. Mermaids or some shit. She could be very attractive, but damn that’s a lot of ink. Nose and ears look like a pincushion.
    She takes note of Remo’s struggles with his writing then asks, “Whatcha working on?”
    Remo offers her nothing in the way of a response.
    Undaunted, she tries again. “Looks like it's giving you some stress.”
    He pours from his flask into the coffee and spins it with a spoon, working to get the mixture just right. Takes a sip, adds some sugar. He'd rather not engage in conversation with this person. Drinking is a better way to spend his dwindling time on this earth.
    “Oh come on, boss, I've been on since
3:00 a.m.
You're the closest thing to interesting I've got.” The waitress is almost begging him to engage. Remo can’t take it. As if he doesn’t have enough troubles, now he has to entertain this person with the remaining sand in his hourglass. He reluctantly replies, “List of shit I want to do before I die.”
    “Oh my God, are you dying?”
    Remo covers. “No, no, heavens no. I'm good. I saw that damn movie the other night, you know the one? With the before-you-die list? I was flipping around, it got me thinking . . . not getting younger and whatever the fuck.”
    “ Oh.” She gives it a think, wondering what she would want to do before she bit the big one. “ Sunrise in Thailand ?”
    “No.”
    “ Paris ?”
    “Could give a fuck.”
    “Three way with some black guys?”
    “Look, I appreciate your input here. I do. But I don't really have the kind of time for big event type things.”
    The waitress pulls back, confused. “Don't have time? You said—”
    “I mean, if or when you find out you're dying you really don't have a lot of time to spend. In theory.”
    She gets it. “What would you do if you only had, what? A couple of days, maybe only a day left?”
    “Bingo.”
    “I'd call my Mom.”
    Remo thinks, dig deeper kid.
    The waitress picks up a couple of the wadded up napkins. “Well, what do you have so far?”
    Remo tries to stop her. “Those are