The Suicide Booth

Well-being

The Neighbourhood glitters.

The rain is a coat of clear varnish. Water strikes the neon and burns like incense, and the sound that follows those drops of smoke fizzes—the fireflies are to blame. In the Neighbourhood they fly only when it rains, filling the streets like tiny yellow eyes.

My leather jacket hangs heavy, black with water and hot with sweat. The collar is turned up to cigarette height, as James Dean commands, and my hands sink into the worn pockets: my wedding ring toys with the last two Tokens I own.

Lines of umbrellas and coats pass beside me—colourful, floral, pastel—lighting the pavements like the neon signs above our heads: bars, clubs, little opium shops, then more bright arrows pointing towards alcohol and cigarette dispensers.
I slow down and draw closer. I warm my hand against the dispenser’s hot plastic and feel the neon’s mercury heart beating in my palm. I take out the Token, insert it into the reflective slot, and press the button marked Ancient Age, the Kentucky bourbon. I choose it because the advert challenges me: “If you know a better bourbon, buy it!” and the man on the billboard has empty eyes, as though someone had poured ink into his pupils. I draw the silver flask from the inside pocket of my jacket and place its neck, trimmed with a golden thread, beneath the nozzle. The alcohol plunges down, camouflaging itself in the dark.

I shake it and swallow a mouthful, chewing the liquor until the taste of caramel gives way to its less sweet final notes.

I watch a stranger at the next dispenser, the cigarette one: a small treasure, each cigarette worth three Tokens. He chooses Camels. A good choice, after all, as the slogan says: “More doctors smoke Camels.” The cigarette drops into the metal mouth. The man retrieves it and lights it at once, leaning back against the dispenser. I stare at the tobacco burning, red and aroused.

“Want some?” the stranger asks, holding out the little treasure.

“I have never smoked,” I answer.

“There is a first time for everything, right?”

The man comes closer.

“Rough night, eh?” he murmurs, passing me the still-warm cigarette end.

I thank him.

“Fancy a drink?” the stranger asks without looking at me.

“I am on my way to a booth.” With two fingers, I bring the filter to my lips and inhale.
The spices of the tobacco mix with the bourbon’s aromas, leaving a human, living taste in my mouth.

“Good for you,” the man says. “I keep spending my Tokens on cigarettes, opium, sometimes a film.”

I nod in mute, polite agreement, but the reality is that I am not listening to him. The truth is that I do not want to listen, so I give the cigarette back.

“Are you sure?” he asks.

“It is the right thing. I was not made for life.”

“Or for the Neighbourhood,” he presses.

I mark out a few seconds against the dispenser’s plastic with the tip of my shoe.

“Do you think I am making a mistake?” I bite my tongue.

The stranger finishes the cigarette and drops the still-smoking filter to the ground.

“You cannot earn Tokens any more, can you?” He says it without looking at me.

My silence answers him. I straighten my collar and leave, back beneath the rain. My destination is around the corner, red and sticky.

Suicide Booth 100 M →

I see it at the end of the street, beaten by rain, stroked by umbrella fabric, ignored by every gaze.

I slow down. I want to go in, but I do not want to be seen, so I walk gently, my heel pressing hard into the river of pavement. One step at a time I draw closer, slowly, buying time, looking around anxiously for people to dissolve, move away, cross the street, turn the corner behind me, and disappear.

I am one step from it. A woman watches us: green eyes, thick dark brows, and a mole beneath her right eye like a tear. She sighs and passes. Now the street is empty, watched only by a badly parked pink Ford Thunderbird.

I approach the Suicide Booth door, pull the metal handle, and step inside.

The smell of iron blows across my skin while blood laps at my shoes.

With my sole I push enough of that still-warm red wax out of the booth to let the door close behind me. The moment the latch catches, the rotary phone before me rings. Its black metal body vibrates, shaking the receiver in its cradle and urging me to answer. A woman’s voice welcomes me.

Welcome to Suicide Booth 1-9-9.

Please dial your citizen number to confirm your identity.

The plastic dial is freckled with blood, concealing the curved lines of the numbers. I place my finger in the small round hole where zero is still legible and draw semicircles of different lengths: I am citizen number 18082012.

Good evening, Zero. I am Leda, your suicide assistant.

The process that follows consists of three stages.

Stage one – Interview.

Stage two – Reflection.

Stage three – Method.

Initiating procedure number 4-5-0.

Answer yes to confirm the start of the procedure.

I utter a chewed-up yes, seasoned with a cough.

Thank you. Stage one: Interview. Please answer the following questions with yes or no.

The walls nearly brush my skin, and I feel as though I am suffocating in a display case.

Rain fogs the glass and blunts the view. One hand grips the receiver, still hot from some stranger’s ear, while with the other I wipe away condensation so I can spy on the dark and let it spy on me. I hear something hidden beneath the courteous voice and the crackle of the line: a little bell, perhaps.

Zero, does happiness exist?

No. If a feeling so good existed, there would also have to be a counterpart of the opposite nature, and it would be terrifying.

“No.”

I cough as though trying to swallow that truth.

Zero, have you ever been happy?

It is a reflex. I touch the ring. It is cold, tight around my swollen ring finger. I try to glimpse my reflection in the gold, but there is nothing: a damp film clings to it.

“Perhaps?”

Unable to record response. Do you wish to interrupt the procedure?

Please answer yes or no.

I feel nothing, and I felt nothing. So why say perhaps? Maybe because sometimes I feel warmth, more often cold, or because when I am not staring at my life like a stranger at the window, I feel shame: a pure distillate.

“No, Leda.”

Procedure in progress.

Zero, have you ever been happy?

Another no. I like the sound of that refusal. The tongue strikes the palate and curls, a complex yet satisfying muscular evolution, in the mouth and in the mind.

Response recorded. Next question.

Zero, do you want to know happiness?

I did not know happiness was something one could know. I thought it happened, like accidents. But I have heard old stories: stories in which happiness can be discovered, built, even created. Fairy tales.

“No.”

Are you sure? Through the new Lazarus System, you can acquire happiness points convertible into Tokens, or undergo Life Recycling. For more information...

I answer with a sharp no and decide it is time to remove the ring. It grips a circle of greasy, sweaty skin, and every push hurts. One firmer tug and my finger is free. The ring flies off, strikes the wall, and falls. I hear it drop and chime against the metal crusts. Leda is processing the answers, and moments of silence follow—long enough to hear the rain knock and the taffeta of umbrellas scrape against the booth.

Processing complete. Stage two: Reflection. Please answer the following questions using no more than three words.

Answer yes to confirm.

I confirm. This time, a yes salted with sweat.

Zero, why do you want to die?

It has been months since a woman spoke my name, and Leda says it in a strategically maternal tone. I lower my head, massage my temples, and consider an answer. My eyes are half closed, but I see the ring shining on the metal floor and think: why not reverse the roles and the question?

Tell me, Leda,

“Why do you want to live? And please answer in no more than three words!”

Response not recorded. Do you wish to cancel the procedure?

“No, I do not want to cancel a fucking thing, you stupid machine!”

Response not recorded. Cancel procedure?

Please answer yes or no.

“No, do not cancel the procedure!”

I sing-song the answer like an overly irritated teenager, and I am a little ashamed of it.
I am thirty-five. My body looks fifty, my mind is six, my reactions belong to a fourteen-year-old, and I wish I had a spot here on my chin so I could masturbate my anguish away.

Procedure in progress. Please answer the following questions...

“Give me a moment. Is this stage not called reflection? Give me a second to gather my thoughts, for fuck’s sake!”

Give me a second, the length of one breath, Leda. I have not swallowed air in days—oxygen, yes, but air is now a five-Token luxury. I do not need long. My existence is a zero like my name, and for some absurd reason I feel betrayed, even though life never promised me anything.

...using no more than three words.

Zero, why do you want to die?

“I feel betrayed.”

I tighten my grip on the receiver.

Response recorded. Next question.

Zero, is death the only solution?

“Death is a choice, not a solution, Leda,” I whisper away from the microphone.

I pull the flask from my inside pocket. I drink, and the alcohol struggles down my throat like a rope soaked in petrol.

“What do you think, Leda?”

Response recorded. Thank you, Zero.

Three exact words. They need not have meaning; three is enough. But in reality they are not enough. They never are.

Before we continue, protocol requires me to remind you that alternatives to suicide exist.

I discover that the Neighbourhood has a heart, as well as an enormous guilty conscience.

“Such as?”

I play along. Dying two minutes earlier or later makes no difference to me.
What matters is finishing one thing, at least today.

Processing. Please wait.

The line crackles out of tune, but I hear the little bell’s crystalline sound more clearly.

There are 988 alternatives to suicide. Would you like to consult the list?

“Why not?”

I can read it out. Choose a number.

Zero is a number.

“Zero.”

Error. Choose a valid number.

I laugh. My mouth yawns open in a perverse laugh, off-key in its highest notes and threatening in its lowest. I keep laughing until laughter regains its natural shape and original melodies. The pager vibrates.

Zero, you have just received one Token. You may collect it from this Suicide Booth if you wish.

I mumble yes and an awkward thank you as the flayed black box spits out a Token, which comes to rest on the little metal slide. I take it, and the jingle begins—inside my head, through the receiver, and across the pager’s green electronic letters.

One Token for your happy thoughts.

Silence again. I cannot hear the rain, I cannot hear footsteps, and I do not feel alone.

Would you like to continue consulting the list?

“No.”

Let us continue. I have to finish something.

Zero, is death the only solution?

I do not want to give life another chance. It is like leftovers: good the first time you reheat them, good the second too, but from the third day onwards they are only hard and dry.

“Yes. The only one.”

Response recorded. Next question.

Zero, what would make you change your mind?

Everything. Nothing. Anything. None.

The truth, Leda, is that I do not care.

“Her voice.”

The answer is another reflex. Guilt provoked it, I know. It has not fasted for a day, and I decide to indulge it again, swallowing another mouthful. The flask is cold in my hand, and no reflex has returned it to the inside pocket. I suspect fate, and drink again. I latch onto the bottle’s neck like a dummy and feel my bladder swell when an unexpected sound diverts the airflow to my lungs. I strike my chest with a fist and draw a primordial breath, as though breathing for the first time, and I hear Her voice.

Zero?

It is Her.

“Giò, is that you?”

Yes, darling. Are you tired? Your voice sounds dim.

“It is true. I have been a little worn out lately. I cannot work, and I miss you.”

I miss you too.

I could come and apologise to her every evening with this tongue swollen with alcohol, and that would be a life with meaning.

“I am sorry, Giò. I am tired.”

I can hear that, Zero.

“Forgive me, Giò.”

I forgive you.

She does not forgive. She can bury, hide, and pretend, and then simply disappear, leaving nothing behind: a note, a slap, a little disorder.

Come home, Zero.

“You left, Giò. There is no one at home.”

The line trembles and the voice goes out, as though Giò’s batteries had died. Leda returns, precise, to soothe the embarrassment.

Processing complete. Your request for assisted suicide has been accepted.

Do you wish to proceed? Please answer yes or no.

I wait for my brain to spit something out. A word, a memory, a worthwhile quotation, any foolish thing that might push me to say yes or make me refrain. But inside my head there is a small chaos, a tangle of voices hunting down every thought and claiming it: say yes and you will be free.

“Yes.”

Suicide Booth thanks you. You make the Neighbourhood a happier place.

Select a suicide method according to your preferences.

Press 1 for painless suicide.

Press 2 for suicide by firearm.

Press 3 for suicide by drowning.

Press 4 for suicide by overdose.

Press 5 for suicide by blade.

Press 6 for suicide by free fall.

I barely rotate my fingertip and dial one.

Selected suicide method: painless.

Insert five Tokens to start the procedure.

To cancel, press 9.

I laugh—or rather, I chuckle. A grimace twists my beard.

I press nine and listen to the list again, measured out in Leda’s monotonous accent. When silence takes possession of the booth, I realise the wind has risen. It has dried the water on the glass and left me exposed again, at the mercy of darkness and gazes.

I ask for the prices. More than most, I recognise the value of death.

Painless suicide, 5 Tokens.

Suicide by firearm, 3 Tokens.

Suicide by drowning, 1 Token.

Suicide by overdose, 4 Tokens.

Suicide by blade, 2 Tokens.

Suicide by free fall, 1 Token.

I glance at my watch: a few minutes past midnight, the long hand wedged in white.

Instinct caresses the flask again. I know it is empty, but there is nothing to lean on inside this booth.

Select a suicide method according to your preferences.

Fly or drown?

The choice is obvious. Unless drowning means suffocating in litres of ethanol, I might as well try the thrill of flight.

Selected suicide method: free fall.

Insert one Token to start the procedure.

To cancel, press 9.

The Token is in the upper pocket of my jacket. I draw it out between index and middle finger as though pulling a playing card, and aim for the slot. I cannot hit the target. The Token trembles, swaying like the faulty typebar of a typewriter. After a few seconds, I use my other hand to grip my shivering wrist. The Token grows calmer and slides into Leda with a chime.

Invalid Token.

The machine spits it out. I inspect the coin: its edges are worn smooth, as though someone had rubbed the metal hard.

Fuck fate. I take out the other Token and repeat the operation, this time more calmly.

Thank you.

The floor splits in two. Metal snaps into darkness and I fall. I plummet, the void behind me, the booth’s light shrinking—tiny now, microscopic—and before me the ring: a firefly in the black.

My heart slides into my stomach and my head overloads.

I wait for the climax: the fragment of memory that will change my entire existence. It will race before my eyes like a speeding train, and I will relive every sensation and moment as though dipping the film of my memories into a jar of honey.

I wait while the overbearing air swallows my clothes and the whistle of the void fills my eardrums.

I wait for the click that will bring me back to life.

I wait, but nothing comes. Zero.

Then, suddenly, my body hits something, and I wonder how death can be so warm.

It is not the bottom. Something has broken my fall.

Hands and arms covered in a jungle of wires and sparks seize me. They brake my body and hold me suspended above the abyss. Mechanical fingers sob and clamp my wrists and ankles while a skeletal metal palm supports my neck. On walls filed down by rust and blood is a faded drawing: a jester’s cap.

Leda’s voice booms.

Hello, Zero. Your Suicide procedure is still in progress.

Do you wish to continue?

Please answer yes or no.

I close the door behind me. The sky is clear and black, my clothes dry. Only my forehead and palms retain any damp. I search my pockets. The ring lies in my palm. I close my fist and throw it behind me, but I do not hear it fall. Two green eyes and one black tear have intercepted it. They approach the booth and inspect first it, then me.

“You are still alive,” she says.

“Apparently,” I answer.

“I thought you wanted to die.”

“That was the idea.”

“Is it because you are fat?”

“What?”

“Did you want to die because you are fat?”

Her eyes drop to my stomach and then turn towards the booth. It did feel tight, and I thought it was anguish.

“No. That would be a rather stupid reason, do you not think?”

“There are no stupid reasons to die.”

Silenced by those green eyes.

“It was something else, anyway. Nothing to do with my figure.”

“Something else?”

“Yes. Something else.”

She smiles, takes hold of the door handle, and flings it open.