You Look Tired

The first thing Thijs Hoekstra said when he saw his best friend in Greenland was, “Fuck, Jeroen. You look fucking terrible.” Jeroen Verhoeven laughed. That was what he had learned to do. He laughed when people mentioned the weight he had lost. He laughed when somebody noticed the gray spreading through his beard. He laughed when his knees hurt getting out of a chair and somebody made an old-man noise for him. He laughed when photographs appeared on his phone from two years earlier and presented a healthier stranger with broad shoulders, thicker arms, and the irritating confidence of a man who still believed his body belonged to him.

               Twenty-five pounds.

               That was what the surgeries had taken so far. Twenty-five pounds and nearly two years of his life. Jeroen had once worked hard to stay physically fit. He had lifted weights four or five days a week, watched what he ate without becoming obsessive about it, and remained proud that he looked considerably younger than most men his age. Then came one surgery. Another. Complications. Recovery. Another procedure. Months when lifting anything heavier than a grocery bag was forbidden. Weeks when eating felt like work. Long stretches when the closest thing he got to exercise was walking from his bed to the bathroom without needing to sit down.

               The muscle disappeared first. Then his face hollowed. His clothes hung differently. Mostly, he laughed when Thijs said it. “You look tired,” Thijs added. “Long flight?”

               “For me, yeah. What the fuck is your excuse?” Jeroen smiled.

               Outside the airport, Greenland waited beneath a sky the color of dirty steel.

               “Welcome to Nuuk.”

               “Beautiful place.”

               “You have not seen anything yet.”

               “I've seen you. That's frightening enough.”

               Thijs laughed and slapped him between the shoulder blades.

               Jeroen smiled again. He had gotten very good at smiling. At 45, Jeroen had endured what he privately called the Year of Shit.

               Not a bad year.

               Not a difficult season.

               The Year of Shit.

               It had actually begun before the calendar year did, with the first of the medical problems that would eventually consume almost two years of his life. Then everything else seemed to realize he was vulnerable and lined up for its turn.

               His mother died.

               The company he had worked at for 11 years eliminated his position. His marriage imploded. Medical bills accumulated. One surgery became another. Recovery became complication. Complication became another hospital admission. There were drains. Needles. Incisions. Medications. Restrictions. Instructions about what he could not lift, could not eat, could not do. There were mornings when Jeroen stood naked in front of the mirror and barely recognized the narrow shoulders and surgical scars looking back at him.

               Eventually came the temporary contract in Greenland. Jeroen took it because there was nothing left keeping him home. He arrived in Nuuk carrying two suitcases, three prescriptions, and enough resentment to heat a small building. Thijs knew all of it. That was important. Thijs had been Jeroen's closest friend for 37 years.

               They had met somewhere around six to eight years old. Neither could remember exactly because they both came from broken homes. They had gotten drunk together, traveled together, stood in each other's weddings, buried Jeroen's father together, watched football together, fought twice, reconciled twice, and accumulated enough shared memories that Jeroen sometimes had difficulty remembering which parts of his youth belonged exclusively to him.

               Thijs had also watched Jeroen deteriorate. At first, the jokes had helped. When Jeroen sent a photograph after one of his surgeries, Thijs asked whether the hospital had accidentally removed his muscles too. When Jeroen complained that his back hurt, Thijs mailed him a brochure for an assisted-living facility. When Jeroen sent a photograph from Greenland wearing a heavy coat, Thijs replied:

               Hard to believe you used to be built.

               Jeroen responded with a laughing emoji. Then:

               Fuck you.

               Thijs sent:

               Seriously though buddy you look about 60.

               Another laughing emoji. Another joke. Another small incision. By the time Thijs announced he was coming to Greenland for eight days, Jeroen had accumulated hundreds of them. He picked his friend up anyway. Because he loved him. That was important too. Three nights after Thijs arrived, they sat drinking in Jeroen's rented house outside Nuuk while wind scraped snow against the windows. The building stood alone. That had been one of the reasons Jeroen chose it. He did not realize that until later. Thijs poured another whiskey.

               “You remember Amsterdam?”

               “Which time?”

               “Twenty-sixth birthday.”

               Jeroen smiled. “Barely.”

               “You had those two girls following you around all fucking night.”

               “One of them was following you.”

               “Bullshit.”

               “She was.”

               “She went home with you.”

               “Technicality.”

               Thijs laughed. Jeroen did too. For several minutes, it was 25 years ago. That was what made what happened next so difficult. Thijs pulled out his phone. “Wait. I have something.” Jeroen knew before he saw it. An old photograph. There he was at 32, shirtless beside a swimming pool. Lean. Tanned. Muscular without being enormous. Thijs stood beside him holding two beers. “Look at that guy.”

               Jeroen stared. “Yeah.”

               “What the fuck happened?”

               “Life.”

               “I mean, seriously.”

               “Thijs.”

               “No, look at you.”

               “I am looking.”

               “You were fucking ripped.”

               “Yeah.” Thijs reached across and squeezed Jeroen's upper arm. There was barely anything left of what had once been there. Jeroen pulled away. “Stop.”

               Thijs laughed. Then came the sentence. The one that changed everything. Maybe it shouldn't have. Maybe after 37 years a friendship should have been stronger than 11 words. But friendships were not bridges. They did not collapse because one enormous thing hit them. Sometimes they rusted. One microscopic piece at a time. Thijs looked at the photograph, looked at Jeroen, and shook his head. “Old, gross, and pathetic at 45. That's fucking tragic.” Jeroen stared at him. Thijs smiled. “Come on. You know I'm fucking with you.”

               “Yeah.”

               “You okay?”

               “Absolutely.” Jeroen stood. “Another drink?”

               “Hell yes.”

               Jeroen walked into the kitchen. He placed both hands on the counter. For several seconds, he stared at them. They were shaking. He thought about his mother. His marriage. The hospital ceiling. The drains hanging from his body. The bills. The unanswered job applications. The months of restrictions. The first time he tried to lift something that once would have been effortless and discovered his arms could not do it anymore. The nights he had lain awake wondering how a person could lose so many pieces of his life without technically dying.

               He thought about Thijs making him laugh through some of it. Then he thought about the photographs. The assisted-living brochure. The comments. The fucking comments. Jeroen opened the cabinet. He had imagined this before. He admitted that now. Not killing Thijs. Never that. Just silence. Just one night when Thijs could not talk.

               One night when the jokes stopped.

               Jeroen crushed several tablets. He stood looking at the powder. Then he whispered, “Don't.” He almost listened. Instead, he poured it into the whiskey.

               Thijs woke tied to a chair. His first sensation was cold. His second was pain. His third was confusion. “Jeroen?” Jeroen sat across from him. The room was beneath the house, an unfinished storage space with concrete walls and exposed pipes. A portable heater hummed near the stairs, doing little against the cold. Thijs pulled against the restraints. “What the fuck?” Jeroen said nothing. “Jeroen.”

               “I am here.”

               “What happened?”

               “You passed out.”

               “Why am I tied up?”

               Jeroen looked exhausted. More exhausted than Thijs had ever seen him. “You called me pathetic.”

               Thijs stared. “What?”

               “Old, gross, and pathetic.”

               There was a moment of silence. Then Thijs laughed. Not because it was funny. Because the alternative was impossible. “You've got to be fucking kidding me.” Jeroen's expression changed. Only slightly. But Thijs saw it. “Oh.”

               Jeroen leaned forward. “I need you to understand something.”

               “Untie me.”

               “I will.”

               “Now.”

               “I can't do that yet.”

               “Jeroen, this isn't funny.”

               “I know.”

               Thijs pulled harder. The chair scraped across the concrete. “UNTIE ME!!!” Jeroen flinched. The fear in his friend's voice hurt more than he expected. He stood and walked toward the stairs. “Where are you going?”

               “I need a minute.”

               “Jeroen.” He stopped. “Jeroen, come on. Whatever this is, you made your point.”

               Jeroen looked back. “No,” he said. “I haven't.”

               He began with time. That was the first torture. Nothing happened. Thijs sat for hours. Jeroen came downstairs periodically, gave him water, checked the restraints, then left.

               No clock.

               No windows.

               No phone.

               Nothing indicating whether it was morning, afternoon, or night. Thijs yelled until his voice cracked. Eventually he begged. That was when Jeroen returned. “Please.”

               Jeroen crouched in front of him. “Do you know what helplessness feels like?”

               “Fuck you.”

               “I asked you a question.”

               “Untie me.”

               “My mother was dying and there was nothing I could do.” Thijs looked away. “My marriage was falling apart and there was nothing I could do. My company erased 11 years of my life with one meeting. I woke up in hospitals with tubes coming out of me and had to ask people for help doing things I had done for myself since I was five fucking years old.”

               “Jeroen…”

               “I watched 25 pounds disappear from my body. Mostly muscle. I watched myself become weak.”

               “You weren't weak.”

               “That's funny.”

               “I mean it.”

               “Now you mean it.” Thijs said nothing. “And every time I told you I was struggling, you made me into a joke.”

               “I was trying to cheer you up.”

               “I know.” That stopped Thijs. Jeroen's eyes filled. “I know you were.” For several seconds neither spoke. “That is what makes this so fucking hard.” Jeroen covered his face.

               Thijs watched his shoulders shake. “Then stop,” he whispered. “Buddy, just stop.”

               Jeroen lowered his hands. “I can't.”

               “Yes, you can.”

               “I need you to understand.”

               “I understand.”

               “No. You're afraid. That isn't the same thing.”

               Jeroen stood.

               “What are you going to do?”

               Jeroen hesitated. Then he answered. “Make it the same thing.”

               Pain came gradually. Jeroen was methodical. That surprised both of them. He did not rage. He did not scream. He did not beat Thijs senseless. That would have been anger. Jeroen wanted communication. He began with small things. A finger bent backward until Thijs screamed. Pressure applied where it hurt most. A shallow cut across the thigh. Then another. Never enough to end anything. Enough to promise continuation. Between sessions, Jeroen cleaned the wounds. That was somehow worse.

               He wore gloves.

               He used antiseptic.

               He bandaged each injury carefully.

               The first time, Thijs stared at him. “You're fucking insane.”

               Jeroen taped the gauze into place. “Probably.”

               “You need help.”

               “I needed help six months ago.”

               “I was there.”

               Jeroen stopped. “You were.”

               Thijs swallowed. “I was.”

               “And somehow I felt lonelier every time we talked.” Jeroen finished the bandage. Then he rested his forehead against Thijs's knee. “I am so sorry.”

               Thijs began crying. “So stop.”

               “I am sorry.”

               “Then fucking stop.”

               “I can't.”

               “Why?”

               Jeroen looked up. “Because now you know how that feels.”

               Eventually, Thijs stopped insulting him. Then he stopped threatening him. Then he stopped promising that the police would find him. He began bargaining. He apologized for the jokes. Every one he could remember.

               The old-man comments.

               The photographs.

               The muscles.

               The weight loss.

               The gray hair.

               The surgeries.

               He apologized until apologies became another form of screaming. Jeroen listened. Sometimes he cried. Once, he untied Thijs's right hand. Thijs stared at it. Jeroen sat opposite him. “Go ahead.”

               “What?”

               “Hit me.” Thijs did. Hard. Jeroen fell sideways. Blood appeared at the corner of his mouth. Thijs raised his fist again. Then stopped. Jeroen sat up. “Why did you stop?”

               Thijs was breathing heavily. “Because you're my best friend.”

               Jeroen smiled sadly. “Exactly.” He tied the hand back down.

               On what Jeroen believed was the third day, the storm intensified. Wind battered the house. The world beyond it disappeared beneath white. Jeroen brought two beers downstairs. He opened one for Thijs. Held it to his mouth. Thijs drank. Jeroen drank too. They sat quietly.

               “Remember Rotterdam?” Thijs asked.

               Jeroen laughed. “The bicycle?”

               “The fucking bicycle.”

               “You stole it.”

               “I borrowed it.”

               “For three days.”

               “We returned it.”

               “To a different street.”

               They both laughed. It was genuine. For perhaps 30 seconds, they were eighteen again. Then Thijs began crying. Jeroen did too. “I don't want to die,” Thijs said.

               Jeroen stared at the floor. “I know.”

               “Please.”

               “I know.”

               “You've made me understand.”

               Jeroen nodded. “I think you have.”

               Hope appeared on Thijs's face. It was instantaneous. Beautiful. Jeroen hated himself for noticing. “So you're letting me go?” Jeroen looked toward the stairs. Outside, Greenland howled. He imagined untying him. Calling the police. Confessing. Prison. He could accept prison. That was not the problem. The problem was that this could never become something they survived together. There was no version of tomorrow where Thijs remained his friend. That realization devastated him. Jeroen began sobbing. Thijs understood. “No.” Jeroen cried harder.

               “No, no, no. Jeroen, listen to me.”

               “I am sorry.”

               “Don't.”

               “I am so fucking sorry.”

               “Jeroen.” He stood. “JEROEN!!!”

               “I love you, man.”

               “Then don't fucking do this!” Jeroen climbed the stairs. Behind him, Thijs screamed his name.

               Jeroen returned an hour later. He had changed clothes. Thijs noticed immediately. So did he notice what Jeroen carried. “No.” Jeroen placed the knife on the table. “Please.”

               He sat across from Thijs. Neither spoke for a long time. Finally Jeroen said, “Tell me something good.”

               “What?”

               “Something good about us.”

               Thijs stared at him. Then laughed through tears. “Amsterdam.”

               Jeroen smiled. “Which time?”

               “Every fucking time.”

               They talked. About Amsterdam. Rotterdam. Weddings. Bad girlfriends. Good whiskey. Road trips. The time Jeroen broke his ankle and Thijs carried him nearly half a mile because neither had cell service. The time Thijs's father died and Jeroen slept on his couch for four nights because Thijs did not want to be alone.

               Thirty-seven years passed between them in fragments. Eventually there was nothing left to say. Jeroen stood. Thijs shook his head. “Please.”

               Jeroen picked up the knife. “I am sorry.”

               “You don't have to.”

               “I know.”

               That was the worst answer possible. Jeroen stepped behind him. Thijs began trembling. Jeroen placed one hand on his forehead. For a moment he could not move. His oldest friend was beneath his hand.

               Warm.

               Alive.

               Terrified.

               Jeroen leaned down and whispered into his ear. “This is what I wanted you to understand.” Then he drew the blade deeply across Thijs's throat. The sound was smaller than Jeroen expected. The wound was not. Blood came immediately, hot and astonishingly bright against the gray room. Thijs convulsed against the restraints. Jeroen dropped the knife. “Fuck.”

               He moved in front of him. Thijs's eyes found his. Jeroen held his face. “I am here.” Blood ran between his fingers. “I am here, Thijs.” His friend's mouth moved. Nothing recognizable came out. “I know.” Jeroen pressed his forehead against Thijs's. “I know. I know. I know.” He stayed there until the struggling stopped. Then longer. Much longer.

               Jeroen sat beside the body until morning. He knew it was morning because a thin blue light eventually appeared around the basement door. The storm had passed. Greenland had become impossibly quiet. Jeroen washed his hands upstairs. The blood took longer to remove from beneath his fingernails. He looked in the mirror. Forty-five. Gray spreading through his beard. Cheeks narrower than they should have been. Dark circles beneath his eyes. Shoulders that had once filled out his shirt now lost inside it. Surgical scars crossing a body that had been opened, repaired, reopened, drained, medicated, weakened, and told repeatedly to heal faster than life was willing to allow.

               Old.

               Gross.

               Pathetic.

               He waited for anger. There was none. He waited for satisfaction. None of that either. He had believed, somewhere beneath the hatred, that making Thijs helpless would transfer something. That despair obeyed the laws of matter. That if another person carried enough of it, Jeroen would somehow carry less. Instead, there was simply more despair in the world. Thijs had understood. That was true.

               For those final seconds, he had understood perfectly. And it had fixed absolutely nothing. Jeroen returned downstairs. He untied his friend. He cleaned Thijs's face. Then he dragged another chair beside him and sat down. Outside, the first weak daylight spread across the snow. Jeroen rested his head against Thijs's shoulder.

               “I thought it would help,” he whispered.

               The dead man offered no opinion. Jeroen closed his eyes. He remembered being 32 beside a swimming pool. Thijs beside him. Both holding beers. Both young enough to mistake youth for permanence. He remembered how effortless everything had seemed then. How neither man had understood that a human life could narrow one loss at a time until simply getting through another day began to feel like an accomplishment nobody else could see.

               Jeroen began laughing. He couldn't stop. The laughter became sobbing, then laughter again, until he no longer knew which sound belonged to which emotion. Eventually he became quiet.

               He looked at Thijs. “You look tired.”

               The words hung there. Jeroen wished desperately that Thijs would insult him. Tell him he looked 60. Make another joke about the arms that had disappeared. Tell him he looked like shit.

               Call him old.

               Call him gross and pathetic.

               Anything.

               He would have given anything to hear one more cruel fucking joke. Instead, there was only the wind beginning again outside. Jeroen reached over and took his best friend's cold hand. Thirty-seven years of friendship had survived marriages, deaths, distance, arguments, careers, children, hospitals, and everything else life had thrown at them.

               It had not survived the Year of Shit.

               Neither had Thijs. Jeroen squeezed his hand. For the first time during that miserable year, he understood that things could always get worse. And for the first time, there was nobody left to blame for it but him.