NOVEL
Guilt
The Last Human in the Milky Way — Excerpt from Chapter 16
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The story
The situation in the world is unpredictable. Eric, the main character in the novel The Last Human in The Milky Way, has left his home in an attempt to find out what is happening in the country and in the world. He drives over a high mountain plateau and wants to try to reach a town where he can find answers to his questions. He stops the car and climbs up a mountain to try to get an overview.
He reached out to grasp a birch trunk with his hand and was about to hoist himself up onto the next rock on the path. Then suddenly he felt it again. This stinging in the chest. There it was again. He stopped, pressed his lips together.
He thought about what he felt in his body. Wanted to reject it, wanted to mentally remove the sting, this nameless tingling in the chest. If only he could get it away, a bit at a distance, it would be all right. If only he could think of something else, something good, something that was good.
As he went further up, he tried to push these thoughts further away. He didn’t like to dwell too much on this kind of existential thought, as he used to call it. He wanted to return to the everyday, the trivial. He felt uncomfortable, felt a resistance within him to let this come to mind.
He had thought so much about Sara and what had happened between her and him. And he would have preferred to erase it from his mind, get peace from it. But it kept coming back. These thoughts always came up. What had happened, actually?
He could not quite put into words what he was annoyed about. Obviously, there was no uncertainty about what had happened. What had happened, had happened. He had let it happen — wasn’t it as simple as that?
Guilt.
— What kind of guilt?
“I should have done something different; I should have said something else. I should have answered something when she said what she said. I should have kept quiet when she said what she said.”
He felt that no good thoughts were coming. He did not dare let this flow further. Yes, he should have done something else. He should have taken care of the opportunities, which he has not done.
He felt the hopelessness subside. He knew himself. He knew he was in such a negative, downward spiral. And he had to free himself from this here, this negative.
He set the pace and walked all he could. It became fast steeper, it got heavier and heavier, but he told himself that he should go as fast as he could. And he felt the sweat running, he had a taste of blood in his mouth.
It was on the edge, this. He pushed himself and after more than half an hour at this pace, he could suddenly cross a ridge and saw the very large surface down there. The sun was reflected in the large lake. It was unbelievably beautiful. A large black bird hovered overhead, not too far from the top. He bowed his head back to study the bird.
He feels that his body is getting hot. The mountainside is steep, breathing increases with ascent, heart rate increases as exertion increases.
He reaches the first cairn, where there is a ledge, a small, flat area, some short trees, some grass stumps. Hard-trampled, dry soil. There have been people here before. Many boots have pulled here, stopped a bit on this small plateau and turned around and looked out over the wide high mountain plain.
When it started, in the beginning, everything was simple. She was who she was, and he had been himself.
Little by little, without them noticing, it had begun to go awry.
“You said it!”
“No, I did not!”
“You said you wanted to.”
“No, I did not say that.”
They had crashed, without understanding what was about to happen.
“You do not hear what I say.”
“I do not want this.”
He did not want this either. And yet they carried it out.
They hurt each other. They misunderstand each other.
They do not take each other seriously.
“I’m talking. Listen to me.”
“I hear you.”
Silence.
He hears her breathing. She sighs.
“I say something to you.”
“Yes, I hear you.”
“But you answer something else.”
It’s hopeless.
(…)
I started writing The Last Human in the Milky Way early in 2021, and I took a pause from writing the novel last winter. The last months I have resumed the work on the novel.
The author is currently reviewing, rewriting, and editing the manuscript for the novel The Last Human in the Milky Way. Excerpts from selected chapters will be published as previews on Medium.
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