Page 52 of Diamond in the Rough

“I’ve been in here twenty years, and guess how many visitors I’ve had?”

Maddox frowned. “No idea.”

“None.”

“I’ve been in here twenty years, and guess how many letters?”

“None.”

Ernie hummed. “Nothing for twenty years. I mean nothing, and now more than ever, I look back at my life, and I regret meaning nothing. Money, drugs, reputation—it faded. It died long ago, and for twenty years I’ve lived with this…loneliness, this abyss, and the only thing that’ll save me from it is death.”

“Is this the shrink talking again?”

“If I’d have known I’d feel like this, I would’ve…”

Maddox rolled onto his side. “Would’ve what?”

“Traded it all.”

“You loved the money and the power—”

“I would’ve traded it to be an everything in someone’s eyes, and to feel that someone was my everything.”

Maddox snorted and shook his head. “I think they’ve increased your medication.”

“Don’t mock me because when you can see your end and realize no one will be weeping or feeling the loss, you’ll realize how pointless your life has been. There will be no one to hold up my coffin or read out a eulogy.”

Maddox rolled onto his back. “So what would you like your funeral to look like?”

“I’d want women weeping. I’d want kids watching on, wanting to do their dad proud.”

“I’m sure you’ve got kids out there.”

Ernie laughed. “You’re right, but I don’t know them, and all they know about me is that I’m a murderer. Anyway, back to my fantasy. Maybe I’d have some wife twenty years younger than me, beautiful but distraught, but not the ugly kinda crying, you know, she’d cry gracefully.”

“Of course.”

“But then, maybe she’d become overwhelmed with emotion and throw herself on the coffin and beat it with her fists.”

“You’ve thought about this a lot, haven’t you?”

“Yeah, I’ve been ill a long time. She’d cry that she wished I wasn’t dead, that she loved me and would never love anyone again, and she wouldn’t. She’d swear off sex for the rest of her life.”

“You’re torturing your fantasy wife?”

“Loyal and smitten, that’s how I’d want her even after I’m dead. What about your guy?”

Maddox bit his lip, stopping himself from answering, but the silence lingered, and he gave in. “He’s loyal, smitten, and would be distraught if I died.”

Ernie smirked. “And you?”

“Me?”

“You’re loyal, clearly smitten.”

Maddox narrowed his eyes and huffed.

“And if he died?”

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