Max Tadlock

“ It's been eight days—eight days away from death, yet I'm closer to it now than ever before. And I can't think of it. The fear has come crashing through and I can't think.
This thing, this body is too far gone. I won't be able to make it move. I'll just feel it getting away—little by little—ripping apart cell by cell, and then everywhere all at once.
I can feel it now. But in that great silence, I could almost hear the tearing—yet there was no sound.
The doctors have given up all hope. I can see it in their faces. I could hear them talking among themselves when they brought me in. ”

“ It couldn't be that all who died had no whole being to return to. Not every death is marked by a body completely uninhabitable. I myself had heard a doctor say, "There is nothing organically wrong now. The patient will recover if only he has the will to live."
The will to live! Suddenly I knew I had found the way. I myself would go and see and return to tell them all.
I answered all the requirements. I had a healthy body to return to. I had the will to live, for I enjoy my reading and acquaintances. And I alone had thought it wonderful that pigs can die when they merely want to. ”

“ You know how sometimes a lull comes in a conversation. Then I'd say, "Pigs are able to just up and die if they want to."
But nobody ever paid any attention to me at all. They seemed to ignore the remark. One man did say once, "What the hell are you talking about?" but even he wouldn't listen when I tried to explain.
Perhaps it was just too improbable. Besides, people don't like to think about death. They talk about it sometimes and sometimes they brood about it, but they never really think. It has always been too unknown and that frightens them. Then they only fear and stop thinking. ”