INTERROGATION

Let me see. Let me think. Just a minute, now. Don't go off, you know, off all, what do you call it, half-cocked. Ready to fire. Playing Dirty Harry and everything. Thirty years is a long time, longer than you been alive. Can't expect me to remember it all at once, can you? You think you could, in a room like this, cold and, and, and gray, you think you could remember something that happened twenty-five years ago just like that? Didn't think so.

What's that?

Yes, we were friends. 'Friends'. Well. Okay. You want to use the word 'friends', that's what we'll use. 'Buddy', 'friend', 'compadre', whatever. I don't know what you young guys call yourselves anymore, anyways. Don't know what the word 'friends' means anymore. Are they people you play video games with? Are those the kind of, you know, the kind of people you'd call friends?

Hey, I'm not the one off-topic here, fella. Not me. I'm not the one who, you know, was talking about the weather and the Leafs and the, and the, and the goddamn basketball scores. Like you care about basketball. You want to get off-topic, fine by me, but don't go, don't go calling me on that, on that very same thing when I'm sitting here, under this light, waiting for the cup of hot chocolate I asked for twenty minutes ago. I'm trying to remember, like you want me to.

Was a while ago, that's all.

Did we fight?

No more beating around the bush, eh?

You want to ask me the question you been wanting to ask since you picked me up?

You want to ask it?

I didn't ask, you know, I didn't ask, didn't say, that I was going to answer it. I asked if you want to ask it.

Good. You got balls. Finally. I had my doubts for awhile.

You want me to say I bashed his head in with a rock? You want me to say that? Want to know the, the, the colour of it, the colour of the, of the blood? You want that? I can give you all that. Confession and everything, I just did. Confessed. But I'm asking for the other stuff. You want that? You want to know what it's like, seeing your best friend go, go away like that? Seeing his, his, well, I don't want to say 'soul', too religious for my tastes, but seeing his life flow out of him? I saw it, same as I see you. Saw his life go...Up. Up up and away, like the guy in blue and red. That what you want to hear? I can tell you all that, if you want. Colours, screams, the whole deal.

Of course I remember it now. Of course I do. But you, you didn't want all this, did you. You wanted 'yes, I did it', or 'no, I didn't'. That's all you want. You want the, how would you call them, details for the judge and jury, sure. But you don't want to think about the nitty gritty too much, young fella like you. Don't want to hear what we can do to each other, us humans. Do to the people we love. Don't want to hear, don't care to hear it. Don't want nothing more than the facts.

Fine.

You got the facts.

I spared you the human stuff. The stuff that, that, you know, you might recognize in your own, in your own mirror. Guy like you probably looks at every mirror he passes by. Vain little, little runt.

Now do I get a cup of hot chocolate or what?