Gary Braver - Elixir

In the moonlight he saw his hands.

His hands, they screamed with pain, and before his eyes they shrivelled up to small knobbed things. He brought one to his face. It had gotten tiny and dark. His fingers hurt, but he barely felt the pain. His face felt totally unfamiliar. It was full and flabby, the creases too deep, the flesh under the chin too loose, the neck too thin. It was like touching somebody else's face. And his head all smooth with thin fuzz in the back.

Then the pain erupted. And he suddenly saw himself from above, lying on the bed of snow in a clearing, his body convulsing with agony as he began to shrivel up and die-like Methuselah and Jimbo-

Like Dexter Quinn-

Like Sam-

But then the pain stopped and he felt his mind slow down as if under rapidly dimming power-a thing old and weary and barely able to process the few sad moments left, wishing it would get itself over with, wishing he could for one last time see his wife (don't let her find me like this), sensing himself going down a long spiral stairwell, not bumping his way step by step but moving smoothly because he couldn't walk since his feet were all gnarled and twisted which explained why he was slouched up in a big metal chair with wheels on the side locked in place and on this special escalator that corkscrewed down toward a small ball of white light at the bottom that grew larger and brighter as he descended, his poor eyes fixed in horrid fascination on the glow which in no time became a dreamy white light, not hard or harsh, but like fog lit up from within-a warm incandescent blankness that closed around him like a shell, the interior growing dimmer and quieter until all he registered was the soft raspy sigh of his last breath before the long long night closed down on him.

The kid with the blond ponytail under his cap was good.

He was from Pierson Prep where they had an experienced team and a dedicated coach who trained his wrestlers as if they were heading for the Olympics.

Wally Olafsson had watched the kid's last match earlier that afternoon. He had pinned the captain of Appleton Tech in a mere thirty-nine seconds. He wasn't too tall, but he was well-built, fast, and balanced. Worse, he knew some fancy moves Wally's son, Todd, hadn't experienced before, including a cunning reverse cradle. Unfortunately, Todd was facing the kid for first-place finals in the 135-pound weight class for the region. If Todd won, he'd go home with a two-foot-high trophy. If he lost, he'd take second and a fourteen-incher.

It was after seven, and the gym was packed with wrestlers and spectators filling the stands and pressed five deep around the three mats where the matches had been running continuously since ten that Saturday morning. Parents with cameras were squatting on the edges, hooting and hollering for their boys.

Wally sat high in the stands so he could get an overhead zoom of Todd through the video cam.

All around him were wrestlers-young hardbodied Zeuses smelling of Gatorade and testosterone. The heat of their presence took him back to his own high school days when he played varsity baseball at Buckley High in Urbana. Now he was fat, bald, and grossly out of shape. His joints cried out just watching the boys twist each other into crullers. Yet, there was a time when he, too, was lean and made of hard rubber. But, sadly, at fifty-seven, Wally Olafsson had decided that he was beyond physical fitness and had settled into middle age ripeness. George Bernard Shaw was right: Youth is a wonderful thing; too bad it's wasted on the young.

Because Marge had moved to the other side of the state with Todd after their divorce, Wally saw his son wrestle only at these weekend tournaments. And this was the biggest-a three-state regional. Wally could barely steady the camera as Todd faced off with the kid in the green Pierson tights. First place would mean everything to Todd.

The ref blew the whistle, and instantly the Pierson kid dropped to a predatory crouch, dancing to keep Todd at bay. It was the same strategy he had used in his last match-start low, jig a few seconds, then springing to take his opponent off guard and pulling him down like a cheetah on a gazelle.

Tiring of the sparring, Todd made a move to get the kid in a headlock. But he missed. And the Pierson boy flew up, catching Todd around the shoulders and pulling him down on his back with a hard thud. In a reflexive squirm, Todd rolled onto the kid's back which through the viewfinder seemed like a smart move but proved fatal-a ploy the Pierson kid had used on his last opponent. In a lightning flash, he whipped his right arm around Todd's neck, turned 90 degrees to his body, and pressed his back to Todd's front, brilliantly arching him into a reverse cradle. The ref dropped to the floor, and a moment later smacked the mat with the flat of his hand. It was over. Todd had been pinned in fifty-seven seconds.

Instantly, the Pierson crowd exploded and jumped in place. Wally's heart sank as he zoomed in. The disappointment on Todd's face was palpable. He shook hands with the Pierson kid who pulled off his cap and waved at the crowd.

In the split instant as the kid turned full-face into the camera, something jagged through Wally's consciousness. It was too fast for him to process the experience-like trying to recompose a television image after the set had been turned off. But something tripped his mind.

He climbed down from the stand and cut through the crowd, hoping to console Todd who sat on the bench with his head in his hands. He muttered a few words of consolation, but Todd wanted to repair on his own.

The big green Pierson team was on the far side of the gym. Although Wally was toxic with resentment, he decided to congratulate the winner. He also wanted to dispel something he had picked up through the viewfinder.

He cut behind the gallery until he spotted the blond ponytail, then aimed the camera. The kid was taking slaps and high fives from teammates. Wally thumbed the zoom button until he had a tight shot on the kid's face. He was handsome, with a tight muscular jaw, finely etched features, a thin straight nose, high forehead. Somebody put his arms around him in a bear hug, and Wally froze.

The man in the blue sweatsuit and baseball cap was clearly the kid's father-the same build and facial structure. What stopped Wally's breath was not the strong resemblance to his son but to somebody else… the guy who lived upstairs from him at Harvard back in 1970.

Christopher Bacon.

A thrill of recognition shot through him. The last he had heard, Chris had taken a job at some chemical lab around Boston. He must have relocated.

Wally cut through the crowd for a closer look. The man turned. Except for the dark beard and long hair, it was Chris Bacon.

Sweet Jesus, the guy had kept himself in good shape. Through the zoom, he pulled the man in all the way and hit the record button.

If it was Chris, he must have had some plastic surgery-lots of guys did these days-because he didn't look any older than he did in grad school when Chris was doing a post-doc in biochem, and Wally, a doctorate in economics. They had both been freshman proctors at Pennypacker House, Chris on the second floor-a corner room, and the center of all-night bull sessions.

In a flash, Wally was back in Cambridge: in that room, at the Wursthaus in the Square, clinking glasses (and under the warm glow of the alcohol swearing "Friends for life!"), partying at tight Garden Street apartments, protesting Dow Chemical recruiters on campus, storming Harvard Square over Nixon's carpet-bombing of Hanoi, getting maced by Cambridge cops after Kent State, Harvard-BU hockey games, double dating at the Orson Welles Cinema, and the King of Hearts marathon in Central Square… (What was his girl's name? Brenda…? Wanda…? No…Wendy. That was it: Wendy .)