He eats his final meal on Sunday at seven p.m.; the surgery is at eight the next morning, and so he is to have no more food, no more medication, nothing to drink, for the rest of the night.
An hour later, he and Willem descend in the elevator to the ground floor, for his last walk on his own legs. He has made Willem promise him this walk, and even before they begin—they will go south on Greene one block to Grand, then west just another block to Wooster, then up Wooster four blocks to Houston, then back east to Greene and south to their apartment—he isn’t sure he’ll be able to finish. Above them, the sky is the color of bruises, and he remembers, suddenly, being forced out onto the street, naked, by Caleb.
He lifts up his left leg and begins. Down the quiet street they walk, and at Grand, as they are turning right, he takes Willem’s hand, which he never does in public, but now he holds it close, and they turn right again and begin moving up Wooster.
He had wanted so badly to complete this circuit, but perversely, his inability to do so—at Spring, still two blocks south of Houston, Willem glances at him and, without even asking, starts walking him back east to Greene Street—reassures him: he is making the right decision. He has pressed up against the inevitable, and he has made the only choice he could make, not just for Willem’s sake, but for his own. The walk has been almost unbearable, and when he gets back to the apartment, he is surprised to feel that his face is wet with tears.
The next morning, Harold and Julia meet them at the hospital, looking gray and frightened. He can tell they are trying to remain stoic for him; he hugs and kisses them both, assures them he’ll be fine, that there’s nothing to worry about. He is taken away to be prepped. Since the injury, the hair on his legs has always grown unevenly, around and between the scars, but now he is shaved clean above and below his kneecaps. Andy comes in, holds his face in his hands, and kisses him on his forehead. He doesn’t say anything, just takes out a marker and draws a series of dashes, like Morse code signals, in inverted arcs a few inches below the bottoms of both knees, then tells him he’ll be back, but that he’ll send Willem in.
Willem comes over and sits on the edge of his bed, and they hold each other’s hands in silence. He is about to say something, make some stupid joke, when Willem begins to cry, and not just cry, but keen, bending over and moaning, sobbing like he has never seen anyone sob. “Willem,” he says, desperately, “Willem, don’t cry: I’m going to be fine. I really am. Don’t cry. Willem, don’t cry.” He sits up in the bed, wraps his arms around Willem. “Oh, Willem,” he sighs, near tears himself. “Willem, I’m going to be okay. I promise you.” But he can’t soothe him, and Willem cries and cries.
He senses that Willem is trying to say something, and he rubs his back, asking him to repeat himself. “Don’t go,” he hears Willem say. “Don’t leave me.”
“I promise I won’t,” he says. “I promise. Willem—it’s an easy surgery. You know I have to come out on the other side so Andy can lecture me some more, right?”
It is then that Andy walks in. “Ready, campers?” he asks, and then he sees and hears Willem. “Oh god,” he says, and he comes over, joins their huddle. “Willem,” he says, “I promise I’ll take care of him like he’s my own, you know that, right? You know I won’t let anything happen to him?”
“I know,” they hear Willem gulp, at last. “I know, I know.”
Finally, they are able to calm Willem down, who apologizes and wipes at his eyes. “I’m sorry,” Willem says, but he shakes his head, and pulls on Willem’s hand until he brings his face to his own, kisses him goodbye. “Don’t be,” he tells him.
Outside the operating room, Andy brings his head down to his, and kisses him again, this time on his cheek. “I’m not going to be able to touch you after this,” he says. “I’ll be sterile.” The two of them grin, suddenly, and Andy shakes his head. “Aren’t you getting a little old for this kind of puerile humor?” he asks.
“Aren’t you?” he asks. “You’re almost sixty.”
“Never.”
Then they are in the operating room, and he is gazing at the bright white disk of light above him. “Hello, Jude,” says a voice behind him, and he sees it’s the anesthesiologist, a friend of Andy’s named Ignatius Mba, whom he’s met before at one of Andy and Jane’s dinner parties.
“Hi, Ignatius,” he says.
“Count backward from ten for me,” says Ignatius, and he begins to, but after seven, he is unable to count any further; the last thing he feels is a tingling in his right toes.