Swansong Read Online Free PDF Page B

to fall four stories.  If I jumped, I’d be dead in three seconds.
    You’d think people who survive terrible accidents walk away with a new lease on life.  You’d think they learn to appreciate what they almost lost.  There’s no almost for me.  I lost something too precious to appraise.
    Judas sits on the filthy roof.  I sit tentatively next to him.
    The sky looks amazing.  I tilt my head back and soak it in.  The darkness of the night is more blue than black, more royal than midnight.  How come I’ve never noticed that before?  Where the stars glow, spotty against the open canvas, the blue takes on an almost liquid radiance.  It swims in front of your eyes.  It’s pulsating and alive, somebody’s long-lost heartbeat, and it draws in a shuddering breath that leaves the stars rattled in its wake, twinkling faintly.  All this beauty, my eyes hurt just looking at it.  But it’s so beautiful, I don’t want to look away.
    “They’re dead,” Judas says.
    I think he means Mom and Dad.  Until he says—
    “The stars.  Most of them are already dead.”
    “What do you mean?”  They were alive?
    “They’re so far away, by the time their light gets here, they’ve already stopped emitting it.  You’re only looking at their afterimage.”
    “But they’re sparkling,” I say weakly, childishly.  I don’t want them to be dead.
    “Earth’s atmosphere refracts the light.  It only looks like it’s sparkling.”
    I feel like I could punch him.  No; I don’t mean that.  I’d rather hug him.  I can’t bring myself to, but I’d like to.  He’s my only family now.
    “What are you going to do for work?” I ask him.  Anything to change the subject.
    He shrugs.  “Not a lot of people tripping over themselves to hire felons, believe it or not.”
    “That’s surprising.”  Maybe if I try to joke…
    “Probably go into deliveries.  I don’t know.”  Judas lies down on the surface of the roof.  Is that really hygienic?  “Saved up enough with UNICOR.  We’re okay for a while.”
    Especially if we’re selling Mom and Dad’s place.  I don’t voice this.  “Maybe I could help you.”
    “You’re a kid.”
    “I’ve had summer jobs before.”
    The silence between us says what he doesn’t say: Not with brain damage you haven’t.
    “Hey, Jude?”
    Judas laughs quietly.  I smile feebly and roll my eyes.  I didn’t mean to channel the Beatles.
    “Jude,” I say.  “Do you ever think about changing your name?”
    “That won’t work.  You change your name, the feds can still find you.”
    “Not that, I—”  I laugh in spite of myself.  “You’re named after one of the biggest jerks in recent human history.”  Why would Mom and Dad…?
    And Judas just looks at me.  “Judas was innocent.”
    “Huh?”
    “Judas Iscariot.  He didn’t do anything wrong.  He’s got a bad rep is all.”
    “Well, that’s…”  Silly.  This is silly.
    “You study any Greek in that school of yours?” Judas asks.
    I shake my head.  I stop, suddenly dizzy, dull pain flickering in my temples.
    “John, Chapter 6, Verse 71.  ‘For it was Judas that should betray him, being one of the twelve.’ “
    Jude’s been away for ten years.  He’s had a lot of free time on his hands.  Maybe it makes sense that he’s been catching up on some reading.  “But you just said ‘betray’…”
    “That’s the English translation.  The original Greek word was paradidomi .  Paradidomi doesn’t mean ‘betray.’  Paradidomi means ‘hand over to God.’  Judas didn’t betray his master.  He helped him rid himself of his human flesh.”
    Stunned, I sit in silence.
    “Funny, isn’t it?” Judas says, his hands tucked under his head.  His expression is melancholy.  I’ve learned not to anticipate anything else.  “One botched translation, and the entire course of history changes.  We’re human beings.  It’s our job to misunderstand one another.  We base our lives around