The errant list

Two years before he died, Ambrose listed all the things he wanted to accomplish before he died. He didn’t know he was going to die in two years. Things just worked out that way.

He had wandered into a discussion about ‘bucket lists’ at the retirement party of a fellow staffer, wanting to deliver his congratulations and pleasantries in person. He’d worked with the guy and his staff on a marketing campaign a few years earlier. Attendance seemed appropriate.

At the party, he’d gravitated to a small gaggle of his fellow actuaries, eager to join the conversation. They seemed uncharacteristically animated and vocal, roaring with laughter at nearly everything that was said. Ambrose wanted to know the topic, and what was so funny about it. Since none of them had what he considered a great sense of humor, it was unusual and raucous behavior. These were the staff that dealt with actuarial tables, and were generally very somber and focused as they labored over the work that, in part, dwelt with death and estimations as to when their clients would die.

Ambrose believed his sense of humor was lost on the others. At work, he held his tongue, often many times a day, rather than blurt out his hilarious (he thought) takes on whatever was being discussed.

The group was well into the topic, and the wine that fueled the conversation, when Ambrose joined them. Bucket lists. They were regaling each other with lists of the things they wanted to accomplish in their lives. Some of these were serious, others ridiculous or unrealizable.

“I want to bungee jump and sky dive at some point,” Clare said. The others scoffed.

“You could do both at the same time, “Brett suggested, “Kill two birds with one stone.”

“Or kill herself,” Jordana added, laughing.

“Well, at least I’d go out in a blaze of glory,” Clare exclaimed, laughing at the mental picture of herself, dangling out of a plane clinging to a bungee line.

Actuaries discussing death was no surprise to Ambrose. However, joking about it was. As his glass was refilled - a few times - Ambrose felt himself feeling somewhat fonder of his workmates. He liked this carefree, tongue-in-cheek banter. They weren’t so bad, he thought, as he downed his fourth glass of Pinot Grigio.

*******

A bucket list. Exactly what he needed, he thought, as he sat down to write. His life had always been humdrum and strictly regimented. Ambrose was a perfectionist and, yes, a control freak, who liked to keep his life tidy and ordered. He was quite eager to begin and sat for awhile in contemplation, mentally listing what he’d done already (which was scant) and what he’d like to do. It should be exciting, but that wasn’t a criterion. Just something he wouldn’t naturally do in his regular life.

The first thing that caught his mental fancy was money, a lot of it. At least 100 million. He didn’t speculate if he would earn or win it. But that amount. At least.

BUCKET LIST

o * Acquire $100 million before I die.

- He paused before listing the next. His pen hovered above the paper, urging his attention to the task at hand. He tried to visualize his life going forward and what he wanted from it. The life that currently spread out before him was bland and dismal. What would spice it up? What would spice him up?

Tentatively, he added the second item.

• Become a celebrity.

It didn’t matter why or for what. “I should be more specific,” he thought, saying it out loud to the emptiness.

o Be a crewmember on a space shuttle. Be the next Bezos or Musk or Zuckerberg. But better. He began to wonder if $100 million would be enough for his specific desires. Maybe a billionaire. Or a quadrillionaire! was there such a thing? Someone would no doubt be some day. Why not him?

• Pay for the space shuttle. Maybe two.

• Dine exquisitely at all the best places.

o Own the largest super yacht on the planet and sail the world in luxury.

o Sail the world on the self same yacht, stopping where all the other celebrities vacationed.

The quadrillionaire of his imaginings continued to itemize all the fabulous things he would do before he died.

A sudden realization made him stop writing. He would be able to do all those things with the fortune he had – somehow – acquired so, really all he needed was the truckloads of money in his imaginings.

Simple.

Ambrose tucked his writing pad into a kitchen drawer, and as the days and weeks passed, he luxuriated in the wealth he would accumulate; andbegan to calculate what things a sudden monetary windfall could buy for him. Occasionally, he took out the pad to record a few more bucket list must ‘do’s. All that money would be invested and balloon to an even higher figure. What came after a quadrillion, he wondered?

There were just so many luxuries he could buy, and things he could do. He agonized over various ways get his hands on $100 million, It should be enough to start with that.

The vicarious thrill Ambrose got from his financial imaginings gave him a new lease on life. He grew more confident at work and in social situations and, to his surprise, met and married someone he’d met on Tinder. (He chuckled to himself that he might have to move on to a trophy wife eventually.) Things were wonderful. Life was wonderful. And all as the result of his highly curated bucket list.

Two years passed. Things became less wonderful. On a routine checkup with his physician, Ambrose learned he had an aggressive liver cancer. Exploratory surgery revealed the malignancy had already spread throughout his body. The physician couldn’t give him a prognosis as to how long he had left to live.

His wife, Maggie, didn’t know about the bucket list that had such a hold on Ambrose’s imagination.

One day, about two years later, Maggie found a very weak Ambrose lying in bed, in tears. This was a bit of a surprise. He had kept his emotions to himself throughout his medical ordeal.

“What is it, Ambrose?” she asked. “You’ve been so brave the last number of months.” She thought, then said, “It may be good to release all that you’ve been feeling, what you’ve tucked away. Lord knows you have every reason to feel whatever it is you need to feel.”

She sat on the chair at his bedside, reaching out to take his hand. She doubted Ambrose would want to discuss what had him so uncharacteristically emotional, and was surprised when he suddenly became animated and fretful.

“I’m going to hell,” he nearly whispered. Then, “I’M GOING TO HELL,” he shouted through his tears.

“Don’t be silly. You’re not going to hell. You’re a good person, a generous person,” Maggie said in as soothing a voice as possible.

“No. That’s it. That’s just it. “ Ambrose informed her, his agitation growing. “I’m not generous and I’m guilty.”

Maggie smiled and stroked his hand, “Why do you think you’re guilty. Of what?” she inquired in a tone usually reserved for an upset child.

“The Commandments,” Ambrose began. “The Ten Commandments. One of them has something to do with lust…” he began, his voice revealing the fear that gripped him.

“Lust,” Maggie exclaimed, then laughed somewhat tentatively. “Other women, is that what you mean?”

“No,” he stammered. “Things. Money.”

“I think everyone does that to some degree,” she responded.

“I made a list of things I wanted to do before I..,” he said, looking up at her with swollen eyes. “You know. Died.”

“Practically everyone does that,” Maggie assured him.

“Not the same as I have. I craved money. So much money. And visualized all the self-indulgent belongings I’d acquire. I could nearly taste the greed,” Ambrose tried to explain. "My real life started to matter less. I was consumed."

“You’re not going to Hell for that, I’m pretty sure.”

“Lust…greed. I’m going to hell.”

Maggie looked at him, thinking he wasn’t serious. What she saw surprised her. The face looking up from the bed, so thin and hollow, was contorted in terror.

“I only thought of myself. What I could have. What I could buy. What I could own.” His voice seemed to be fading.

Before Maggie could say anything, Ambrose closed his eyes, and seemed to be confessing what it was that seemed to be torturing him.

“I’ve been selfish and greedy and ignored all the good I could have done in the world,” he said, though the effort had drained him. “All the famine and the genocide and cruelty…I could have given my money to those kinds of need.”

“But it didn’t actually happen. It was just your fantasy,” Maggie responded, grimly.

“It’s a sin. All a sin. The Commandments …” he began, then stopped, trying to recapture his breath. “I know what’s going to happen. I’m scared, Mags.” He did his best to squeeze her hand.

She began to get frantic, wondering what she could say to comfort him, to assure him he was in God’s grace. Maggie wasn’t a Catholic, and she hoped that whatever she would say would be the sort of thing Catholics would want to hear before they… .

As she finally began to form the words, Ambrose gasped. His breathing was shallow, nearly gone.

And then, suddenly, it was. But with his last shreds of energy, he whispered as one tear began to trickle down his cheek. “I’m going to Hell.”

“No, Amb, you’re going straight to Heaven.”

He smiled, then managed a final breath.

The front door bell rang and, overcome by grief, Maggie willed whoever it was to go away. Then she remembered. She had called the parish priest. He had come to give Ambrose the Last Rites.

“You’re too late,” she shrieked at the front door. “And he believed he was going to Hell.”

*****

Father McCreavy assured her the soul didn’t leave the body immediately, and that Ambrose had received the Sacrament in plenty of time, absolving him of his sins.

It was small comfort. But it was comfort. Maggie did something she’d never done before. She made the Sign of the Cross. “There,” she whispered. “You’re safe now.”