“Well if you’re here for the money, you’ll have to wait for next week. I don’t plan to die until Thursday. I intend to pass away after watching the final of ‘University Challenge’”
I took a drink of water from my glass.
‘’I see that impending death has not affected your as always dry sense of humour. Are you not in the least bit scared?”
“What? You mean going into the other side? I’m quite at ease now”
My brother burst into tears quite suddenly. I sat up painfully and put my hand on his shoulder as he sat down on the side of my bed. My ex-wife had always accused me of having no sense of empathy and to be quite honest I think she was right, I just argued the point with her for the sake of it. Ever since I was a child I had always held a ‘c’est la vie’ attitude to most things regarding life and death. The life that I was living and the people I saw weeping when we went to relatives funerals. Although I was not emotionless, I could never fully empathise with people and when I tried to, whatever came out seemed insincere.
‘’Luke, Luke, Luke please.” He stopped somewhat, just snivelling now and then.
“You’ve been the best brother a man could ever wish for. If anything, be happy for me. I’m moving on, like getting a new job or something except my body’s going to be burned and my ashes thrown into the wind.’’
He put his hand over his eyes and burst into tears. Rebecca appeared at the door, I saw her in the corner of my eye but did not look at her. She put a handkerchief to her eyes and moved off.

I really did not get what all the fuss was about to be quite honest, so many people down through the years had hated me, whether it be on a personal level or for my journalism. I had surmised one day in the past, that it was most probably a 60:40 split, with personal hatred in the majority. However, when I first had to step down from my ‘Rasmussen Rants’ column in the ‘Independent Herald’, cards upon cards arrived through the letterbox the very next day and had continued in spurts up to and including my death. They were not ‘get well soon’ cards as my readers had discovered upon typing my name into google that I was well past the point of no return with stomach cancer. Indeed among those cards were a few wishing me a painful death, obviously these people were not in the niche of what I would call fans. Evidently I had lambasted them, their organisations or relatives/friends in the past. In fact they were getting their wishes, as it was quite a painful death despite all the painkiller cocktails I had been given.

I had made it to watching the final of University challenge, St. Johns College, Oxford ran out winners to Pembroke College, Cambridge, much to my disappointment. I had studied at Pembroke College, Cambridge due in no small part to my grand-uncle who had been a very successful businessman. Whenever my mother was trying to coerce me into doing my homework as a child, she would always use the line:
‘Do you not want to grow up to be like your uncle Robert? More houses than you can count on both hands!’.
Frankly I did, I always loved my mother telling me whenever father had heard from Uncle Bob, always in some far flung place like Cairo, Sao Paulo, Perth or Singapore. She would most often tell me before bed of Bob’s latest news. I remember distinctly, the day I received a large hand painted dragon on canvas from Singapore in a large bubble wrapped airmail envelope. The colours so rich and warm, yellows and reds and purples. As a teenager, I imagined the story as to how Bob had obtained that mysterious dragon. From those thoughts I conjured up the story that he’d bought it in some opium den from a man with a catfish moustache and thin icicle beard. My uncle, although possessing an excellent business decorum, was an extremely shy man. He never married and I can still to this day imagine him stepping in between the beautiful scarlet women adorning the entrance of that opium den and with his face reddening while refusing each one as he past. I still laugh thinking about that conjecture. That piece of art hung at the end of my bed until I moved out and I took it with me. In my student house, complements were always passed upon it, that is until we had a Friday night house party and a Welsh bastard threw it in the fire. Consequently I smashed an empty bottle of vodka over his head and dragged his unconscious body outside of the front door. He was gone in the morning.

For me College had been the biggest jump I had had to take in life. I was the oldest of two, my brother was 10 when I left for England. I took an early morning flight from Cork Airport and all my family were there to see me off. That was my parents, brother and grandparents on my fathers side. I had no proper auntie’s or uncles because both my parents were the only child in their family. It was in a fit of heavy breathing that I made my way to Tenison Road where my father had organised lodgings. It was a large rather overbearing grey house. On the pavement outside, was the largest array of alcoholic beverage bottles I had ever seen. There were three black refuse sacks filled to the hilt with bottles and then there was the comprehensive collection nearby. I knocked on the door. A short and bearded young man opened it:

“Hello” I mouthed, aware that nothing came out
“Hello mate, you must be our new housemate, come on in man, come on in”
He stuck out his hand which I shook
“Yip I’m Will”
“Joe….pleasure to meet you”
I followed him up the stairs. As we were climbing I noticed he was only wearing a pair of speedos. He motioned to me to enter the room to which he had led me.
“This is your room mate, I know it’s pretty small but there’s enough room if you know what I mean” he winked as he nudged me with his elbow. I chuckled, I didn’t get it.
“Alright we are lighting a massive spliff downstairs and expect to see you down there in 5 minutes.”
“No probs, see you in five” I did pretty well at hiding my fear.

It was all so sudden, now I’m a student, doing drugs is an everyday thing I assured myself. Yes I had dabbled in drugs when I was in 5th year in secondary school but that was the occasional joint. Now I was definitely in the big league, we’re talking spliffs and bong and god knows what. After quickly throwing my stuff out of my suitcase and checking my mop of blond hair, I headed downstairs. Passing an open door, I glanced in to see in the reflection of a mirror hanging on a wardrobe, a young woman drying her long auburn hair. Then Mr. Speedo’s joke illuminated itself unto me. That was Charlotte, my rose, my thorny rose of whom it was impossible to love without the skin being pierced by the black, black thorns. In some masochistic way, I always went back to her.