Why does it take so long? Why doesn't it just END ALREADY!? That useless gaggle of so-called physicians has assured me time and time again these last 3 months with promises and assurances that the disease would kill me by the end of the week. Then the week would end and it would be a "marvel" that my fragile constitution could withstand so much torture. And torture it is my friendly friend. Not so much the pain from pieces of me that are no longer there or have simply withered into knots of black dread but more-so the pain of the empty sound my room makes when I mutter a word to the walls or moan towards my door. I am haunted by a secret these past many years that has slowly sunk a wedge between what is alive in me and what is in the world to affirm I still am, that I still breathe and something of me exists still within these mildewed walls. I do have people. Lots and lots of people. Nurses and quacks and shylocks and paralegals and accountants and advisors and people who hold clipboards and say "Just a few more initials here and here Mr. Corbin.....good, and here....here.....here.....and one more right......." AHHHHHHHHHHHH! I cannot take it anymore I say! I have signed away all that has made me what I am. I have gladly passed on what equals to an empire to foundations and trusts and any other entity smart enough to get an audience with me during this last year. I am done. ALl the pieces of silver have been tossed away. And now I am waiting for the Grim Reaper who has proven to be quite the procrastinator! I hold in hand one last document. It is wrinkled and smudged from holding it too tightly in equally wrinkled and smudged hand. It is in that hand now and it shall stay there until it is released along with my final breath. It is a request that I be burried next to my departed wife. She was the sole love of my life and the sole heir of a huge fortune that she brought to the marriage. I have given very specific instructions to be intered beside her in a fine plot at Richmond Hills Cemetary once they remove her body from under the Gazebo I built 15 years ago and place her properly in a casket beside mine. Finally I can tell her I am so sorry I hurt her all those years ago and more than that, I am so sorry to be such the coward that I could never admit to my misdeed. I can tell her how much I love her and she will forgive me. I know she will. Then finally, God willing, I won't be lonely anymore.