You didn’t go far. Just far enough to pick up some cigarettes. You walked to the corner store, which is a little short of a mile away, and you bought a pack. Jerry Grey, who can predict how stories end, can probably predict what happened next, right? That’s right—when you got outside you put a cigarette into your mouth and before you even lit it you knew you don’t smoke. You never have. And right in that moment you remembered that it’s Zach Perkins who smokes, the detective from some of your books, and then you remembered that even he gave up smoking a few books ago. Right in that moment you also knew that the captain was real, that you were sick, and it was all going to unfold just like the counselor said.

You tossed the cigarettes and walked home. Belinda’s car was still parked outside. You climbed through the window and lay down on the couch and thought about what had just happened, and wondered if there would be other times you would think you were one of your characters.

Thank God you didn’t think you were the Bag Man!

The Bag Man, in case you’ve forgotten, stabs women in the chest and then ties a black garbage bag over their heads. He was in book five, and showed up again a few books later.

The Alzheimer’s isn’t going to let you go, Future Jerry, and it’s bringing with it a few quirks, along with the bigger ones of mixing up your character’s dirty habits as your own. One quirk is that you talk to yourself now. You’ve caught yourself doing this a few times. You don’t just talk to yourself, but you have conversations with Henry, your favorite writer in residence. Nothing deep and meaningful, but he’ll occasionally say something like You should put that into the journal or You deserve another drink. Henry isn’t a real person, and you’ve never seen him as such, but that hasn’t stopped him from making small talk.

The other development is the drinking really has become your best friend, though Sandra would tell you he’s the friend that doesn’t leave when the night is over. She knows you’re drinking—but doesn’t really know because she can’t catch you. All the slurring and unbalanced walking you blame on Captain A. You are planning on cutting back before the wedding—if you’re going to forget Eva’s name when you’re giving her away at the altar, you’d rather it be from dementia than from being a raging drunk.

Good news—your problems don’t seem as bad anymore. You’re caring less and less about the real world.

Bad news—the bad news is that the good news above really should have been bad news. Not only have you accepted what’s happening, but you’re ready. Bring it on, Captain A. Do your best. Oh, and in case Future Jerry can’t say it, let me say it—fuck you, Captain A, and the disease-ridden whale you rode in on.

Back in the lounge, the girl, Fiona Clark, hasn’t moved. She hasn’t gotten up and fled his imagination and taken all that blood and violence along with her. Is somebody due home? There are photographs around the room—one on the bookcase, one on the TV stand, a couple hanging on the walls, and in them is a recurring character, a good-looking guy around Fiona’s age, embraces and kisses and laughter. A recurring character who could be at work, or on his way here.

He finds a bathroom. He washes his hands under hot water and scrubs the blood away. The music has been replaced by the low hum of bantering DJs. He can’t hear what they’re saying. He uses a towel to dab at the blood on his shirt, but only manages to darken and smear it. He uses the towel to wipe down the taps and the basin, then wraps the towel over his hand and uses it to open the wardrobe door in the bedroom. There are only women’s clothes in here, so the guy in the photographs doesn’t live here, but then he finds a jacket that is big enough to fit him that the guy could have left behind, or belongs to an ex-boyfriend, or the father, or even the victim herself. He puts it on to cover his bloody shirt.

He wipes down other surfaces in the house, including the container of bleach that he doesn’t use, nor can he even remember for sure if the bleach would have helped. He can’t bring himself to set fire to the place. When he’s done he crouches next to Fiona and searches for something to say, but what is there? Sorry? Sorry I stabbed you in the chest? He cleans the knife in the kitchen sink then wraps it in the towel. He heads for the front door. There are ads on the radio now. Jingles. He pats down his pockets to see what he has on him. He doesn’t own a cell phone, so he grabs Fiona’s, and while he’s at it, he takes all the cash from her purse, which turns out to be ninety dollars. When he reaches for his own wallet, he finds a neatly folded black plastic garbage bag tucked into his back pocket. He has no idea why he has it.

Don’t you? Henry asks.

He takes the SIM card out of the phone and wipes his prints off and has one foot out the door when the song his daughter wrote comes on the radio. He recognizes it immediately. When she finds out what he’s done, it will destroy her.

Then make sure she doesn’t find out.

He tosses the SIM card in the garden as he leaves. The towel with the knife wrapped inside is tucked under his arm. He’s not sure what street this is, let alone what neighborhood he’s in. Everything looks middle class, nothing too run down, most of the cars parked on the street or up driveways are Japanese imports, most of them around seven or eight years old. He walks to the end of the block. The street signs don’t mean anything to him.

He needs to dump the towel. He keeps his head down as he walks. Soon an intersection has to make sense. He reaches a park two blocks later. There’s a bunch of playground equipment in the middle but, thankfully, no kids, which means he can sit on the bench and not have anybody rush over to call him a child molester while he’s collecting his thoughts. There’s a trash bin twenty yards away. He figures it’s a good dumping spot, then figures it’s actually a really bad one, that the police will end up looking here. They’re going to look in every trash can and dumpster within a five-mile radius. Looking at the trash bin and thinking about dumping the evidence gives him a sense of déjà vu. Has he done this before? Or was it one of his characters?

Honestly, I couldn’t tell you. I couldn’t even tell you what today is.

He needs to bury the knife. Or throw it into a river. Dump it in the ocean or send it into space. He takes the plastic bag out of his pocket and shakes it out, then puts the towel and the knife inside and rolls it all up. If he really had killed that woman, he’s sure he would know it. He would feel it somehow.

Like Sandra?

Sandra, dead because of him. He should do the world a favor and take the knife back out of the bag and become Henry Cutter and cut, cut, cut his way into oblivion. There is no mystery here—he killed his wife, he killed the woman he found on the lounge floor, and quite possibly the woman the police were asking him about.

He starts to shake. He can’t catch his breath. He’s a fool, a silly fool for wanting to escape the nursing home to prove his innocence because all he’s done is hurt somebody else. He is Jerry Grey, a crime writer, but really he’s nothing more than a confused old man who isn’t even old, but made old by the Big A. Jerry Grey, creator of worlds, killer of women, confused madman.

He’s a monster.

He’s the Breaking Man.

He doesn’t know what to do.

God help him, he doesn’t know what to do.