Guillermo who had been typing all this on his laptop had long since stopped. He looked at the instrument as if it had told him to go fuck himself. He was pallid and red at the same time in different parts of his face. After a struggle that was apparent with the sweat that oozed out of his forehead, Guillermo spoke with a higher voice than before.

‘I will need your full name and the address of your permanent residence for my paperwork, Señor Ever.’

It was duly offered; a thank you was returned.

‘I need to find a printer.’

He said exiting with the relief of a sickly bowel movement.

*

The two of them sat.

Not a word was spoken until Guillermo returned with forms for Lomita to sign, which she duly did. There were then copies handed to both Manita and Ever.

They studied what she had dictated. It started with the name at the top of the document.

I, Lomita Tracy Nairn, have dictated this as my full and final settlement.

It went on but Ever was incapable of reading the rest: he reread the first sentence, then again, and then again.

The Tracy who had HIV/AIDS: this person would change his life.

It carried no concern for him, it was his ultimate gamble, the reason for his life.

The journey.

The arrival.

The final destination.

There was no panic, no nausea, no shaking, it had a beautiful justice, the most perfect eventuality.

This was his Tracy, it was now revealed, the weakness, the illness, the tiredness, the medication, the wasting, the wheelchair: it was all clear, beautifully, star-gazingly clear; as clear as the universe in its ultimate justice; the perfect sky; the rounding of all in life; the returning of the soul; the reason for existence.

She was his Tracy.

His very own.

She had led to him the clearest picture of life that he could ever have contemplated, imagined or constructed.

She had given him his reason for life, she had rounded and completed the circle.

The purpose and reason to stop it all.

The madness.

His destiny.

His fate.

Lomita spoke.

‘Is everyone happy? Oh, and Guillermo, if there is a civil action brought against me after my death, I am sure you will be able to make any financial compensation that is pursued impossible with the complex structure of my offshore companies. What I am basically saying is, and it may seem ungracious, but I do not want a billionaire’s wife, even though I killed her husband, benefitting in any way from my estate. Do I make myself clear?’

Lomita smiled in the face of the bluntness of her statement.

‘Yes.’

Was all Guillermo could muster. No one else spoke a word; not even a thank you.

This seemed to have a finality, an end. A full stop.

For Ever it had produced a gurgle of laughter at the back of his throat, a result of excitement.

He swallowed hard.