This sun was just killing me. My throat was hot sandpaper. OH. my God. Please just get me somewhere.

I ran away. From my problems. From that empire I cooked up. From this whole stupid situation.

I walked away from the king. Let him bleed out.

I must have kept that AK on his throat for a solid 5 minutes.

He’d gotten bored of me. I could see in his eyes as he muttered in Arabic under his breath.

And I just left him.

I left him there…

because he

believed.

The first real person who believed in me. Killing him would be like killing my hopes and dreams. Killing the only person who understood me. And what, I should just destroy that, ’cause it’s the right thing to do?

I couldn’t do it. Instead I turned on the king’s stupid phone and threw it into Zeb-rover. Let someone else blow him to shreds.

And now I was hiking up a tall mountain. No one ever tells you how painful a mountain really is. WHY. were these STUPID rocks SO PAINful.

The quiet was the thing that really got me. The only sound was my breath. Zeb-rover was stopped next to a mountain. At like a million mountains really. There wasn't much of anything around, but I knew that I had to get to the top of that mountain cause there was shade. If I got high enough, I could at least get out of the sun.

After pumping holes into the King, I full-on sprinted up. At least for a bit, until I lost any drive. I just kept putting one leg in front of the other. I felt the golden AK getting hotter.

The wind brushed me. I thought I would be sweating more. I looked at the specks of water that were forming on my chubby arms. At least I knew that I still had water in me. On the ground I saw some green plants popping out of the desert. Watermelons.

Tiny watermelons. I grabbed one and opened it up. A bunch of white shit hit my hand, and just seeing it I knew I wasn't gonna like the taste. I was right.

Now what. NOW WHAT HEFTY? You just HAD to fucking run your mouth. You could have been a king, but you just HAD to fuck everything up. GOD...DAMMIT!

I sat down on a rock, but it tipped over, and I fell on my haunches.

I was lying straight up toward the sun. Honestly, I just wanted to stay there forever. Wait a few hours until the sun crossed the sky, and I could see the stars. What the hell is wrong with me?

In the silent whips of the canyon, I heard a rattle. I turned and saw one BIG fucking snake creeping out of the holes between the rocks next to me. In two seconds I judo flipped my chunky skin off of the dusty rocks. I hardly had a chance to think before I caught up with my body. My brain woke up in the middle of a full on sprint. My lungs were chugging dusty air. It was nice to know my body had a clue of what to do. Turning back, I saw the snake winding around the rock I was sitting on. It hit me: why did I get up?

Fuck. I had one chance at dying peacefully.

Getting a poisonous nip from a rattle snake.

Having all this torture just be over with.

And I ran away. FUCKING HELL.

Then I heard another rattle in front of my running legs.

Another rattle snake. I turned forward to see a smaller, pocket-sized version of the first snake. I was about to run right into it. I vaulted clean over the damn thing, with the damn thing jumping and snatching for me. It wanted to nip me, but it couldn't reach.

My feet did what they were supposed to. FUCK!!!! That's two chances at death. Wait a minute. WAIT a minute. STOP. Stop it feet. Hold the fuck on.

I grabbed my knees and felt my heart thump and thumP and ThUmp around my body. There wasn't anything in this canyon anymore. Not a noise. I just skipped two chances at death. And I whiffed.

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What was wrong with me? Seriously Hefty, what is wrong with you? You had two beautiful shots at death without suicide and you skipped them both. I sat down and I thought about mom.

and Emma.

and Ghada.

And fucking Johnny.

And the fucking king.

And I just let it go and I cried.

I fucking hate my life. I just wanna go home. I just want to be normal. I just want to have a normal fucking life.

My whole life there's always death lurking somewhere in my head.

And then I saw Zeyad being snapped in the head, and all those prisoners in the jail, and Omar. And the guys in Zeb-rover.

Blood and death, and killing people with N-Bombas.

The Browns Stadium.

Holy shit. I'm a bad person.

Damn.

The red and brown walls were quiet as I breathed that in. I'm a horrible person. There wasn't a thing I could touch that didn't turn to shit.

I looked around and saw the smooth walls that laid around me. It must have been a river. In this desert, a river was the last thing I would have imagined. I looked up, and all around me, there were tall walls, painted the sooty brown dust. The color of the rest of this fucking desert. In the right brain it would have been beautiful.

My brain wasn't right.

And then I knew what I needed to do.

My body was two steps ahead of my brain. I was standing at the foot of the wall. This mountain had a top to it, and these cliffs were scalable. More than anything though, they were high enough so there wasn't any turning back.

I swung the AK to my back. I put my hands in and started going up. My fingers reached in, wishing for a scorpion, or a rattler. Or even a bee. Anything to stab me out of my misery. I put my hands in blindly, hoping for the best. Or worst. Whatever if it even mattered.

My feet followed behind my hands, and the hot rocks became my friends. At least I had one in the world left for me. I started going up the cliffs of the mountain, and I knew exactly what I needed to do. I placed my foot and the rock slipped away. The canyon erupted with the sound of tumbling rocks, as my body tensed like a frightened cat. I stretched out still, breathing like I was giving birth to an elephant. I looked down. Mistake. I couldn't really see anything underneath me, and I was already at a height where the way down would break me a few bones. No turning back.

"Mom..." fuck, I thought. Who was I even talking to? Mom wasn't here. Just a fucking fat tub of shit and a few snakes. Maybe some spiders. "Mom, I'm so sorry mom," I whispered into the air. "I'm sorry mom!" I yelled into the canyon "I'm SORRY!" and I cried harder. My sorrys echoed around the mountains. My toes were cramping, but I couldn't hold back any of these tears. It was hard to see. Maybe this would be the end. Maybe it wouldn't be too bad. And if there really was a God, he might let me into heaven for not committing suicide cause I fell on my way off the mountain.

And then I remembered the Browns, and knew again that hell awaited me one way or other. My tears dried up.

Let's hope God wasn't real. For my sake. I saw my arms, working harder than ever. There weren't any beads of sweat off them.

I looked up, and saw the next hold. "Mom... I just hope it was worth it," and tugged myself up.

It got easier. The climb wasn't nearly as steep going past that slip. Things leveled off. I still had a few yards to go, to puff my way up the cliff. The sun was getting hotter. The wind was audible again. The canyon was getting louder and I remembered myself again. I had a little clarity, but I was still going to do it. I wanted to now. Going up and up, step after step, my sides were starting to cramp up. Heavily. Everything up to now was behind me. It was good to finally have some direction.

If I killed myself now, then I could stop all the hurt I caused everybody. Now Johnny could finally find some friends who weren't freaks. And mom could have someone who didn't just drag her into more pain. Ghada could get on with a new husband. A real husband. The Browns...

All the wasteoid druggies on the Dark Web could have one less drug dealer ruining their life, and all these ISIS fucks could have one less bomb laser guided up their bungholes. Finally, I could let everyone get on with their lives. I could give something back to the whole world by gifting them with my absence.

And then I reached it. The top. It was beautiful up there. I could see for miles. Canyons poking up like table tops. A whole desert of tables for my eyes to see.

Looking down, my head went fuzzy and my stomach turned. It wanted to say no, but my brain was shutting that up pretty good. Thinking of how much better the world would be without me was awesome, and that's what I was going to do. It was just better this way. For so many reasons.

I looked down, and I stood up, shakily, and I could see my future down there. It was about to get a whole lot closer in a second.

No note. No nothing fucking with me anymore. I looked across the expanse. On the neighboring canyon wall, there was someone on the other side, looking at me. I squinted my eyes, and sure as shit. Holy fuck?

It was a dude in blue jeans, an Ohio State cap and a number 24 Browns jersey. In this desert? He was staring right at me, and then I blinked him out of existence.

Whoa. What the fuck? I looked around and I couldn't see him anymore. Wait. What?

A bead of sweat rolled into my eyeball. I could still sweat.

It was for the best. I shouldn't think too long. Come on Hefty. Do this. You can do this. I looked down and then my eyes stopped working, and I saw mom. It was Mom. It was actually her. In Portland. I saw her talking to a policeman. "Mom?" I whispered to myself. She looked up, away from the policeman. She was looking right at me! We were finally together. We were really together. She was right in front of me. I was about to run and hug her, but she looked worried. She looked more worried than I'd ever seen her in her entire life. More worried than the hospital or the puking. Staring deep into my eyes. It was like she cared.

A tear came down again, and then she was gone. And then I looked down again, and the way looked so much farther than before. That image of mom was burned into my head. What was that? I was losing it. Fuck Hefty. Just do it already. Take one last look around, one final 360 and then get on with it.

I stepped around, checking out the final place of my hellish existence on this stupid Earth. I wouldn't be falling with FOMO. God, that would be a nightmare, and as I turned halfway, I saw Zeb-Rover, blinking in the sand... only something wasn't right. From all the way up I could make out the tiny pixels of the men I had killed... but the right front door was open. The King wasn't there. The seat was empty and the King wasn't there.

Three bullets to the shoulder... and he got up and walked away.

Fuck.

I thought I would have killed him. I killed everyone else on the fucking planet. I killed the Browns. I didn't kill the King?

I turned back and saw the cliff. And my grave at the bottom. Sweet relief... but my body was telling me no.

FUCK.

It was so simple. I knew what I needed to do, swinging the AK into my hands.