Van Toombin

Van Toombin was drowning in the turbulent sea. Thioverge had laughed as he'd taken the noose and put it around his neck, pulling him out a hundred feet from shore and driving the stake into the sea's floor fifteen feet below. And then he'd pulled the rope tight as Van Toombin sank into the ocean, pulled by the neck toward the sea's floor.

It became ever darker as Van Toombin descended. His last sight of the sky's light came as he looked to the surface of the water and saw Thioverge laughing at him. He wanted this over, he wanted this done with. He didn't want to drown, but he wanted to die. All he had to do was wait. They say that drowning is painless, he asked himself, hoping that it was indeed true. Well, he would find out. He had always feared drowning -- he, who had been captain of his college swimming team back in the 1980s. And here he was, about to drown one hundred feet out from the shore of the French Riviera. All because he'd met the handsome hustler Thioverge.

And there it was, the bottom of the ocean floor, the noose tightened around his neck. They say that your life flashes before you when you die, but none of that happened to Van Toombin. He tried to remember the date -- wanted to know what day it was. Oh, yes. April 8, 2008. 4-08-08. That's what the headstone above his grave would say. His mother would be crying as they lowered him into the ground. He did not want to think about his mother now.

Surely they would find his body. The authorities would identify him quickly and send his remains back to Ohio. Van Toombin hoped that his mother would bury him next to his father. He had never told his mother this, but now as his death came ever closer, he wanted it desperately. But there was no way to tell her this from where he was right now.