[ WP ] Suicidal people can choose to `` gift '' remaining years to other people on Earth .

My name is Roger Harbach, I'm sixty-three years old, and I'm finished. 
 
 In two days, I'll cough down an awful-tasting liquid and sit there as it slowly infects my organs and shuts them down one by one. 
 
 The flight for Oregon leaves at 2:30 PM tomorrow, and the hotel is right across the street from the doctor's office. He's got a good track record with this sort of thing. 
 
 Today, I faxed over the paperwork. Diagnosis: Parkinson's. Insurance Provider: Cigna. Year recipients:... 
 
 The pen quivered in my fingers as I filled in the lines with my chicken-scratch handwriting. Years are allocated on the basis of the standard human life expectancy - in the U.S., 78 for males - so that left me with fifteen. It's completely confidential, but that does n't make it any less difficult. 
 
 With a deep sigh, I wrote: *Henry Harbach, 19, grandson - 15 years*. Then I sent the file through cyberspace without giving it another thought. 
 
 All I know is, the kid needs them more than I do. 
 
 * 
 
 Grandpa does n't deserve to die. 
 
 What kind of planet do we live on where one moment someone's walking around, healthy as can be, and the next they get slammed with a terminal illness? 
 
 I've been thinking about this for a long time. How the universe is unfair. How it takes people from the Earth who are n't ready to go, and holds on to people who do n't want to be there anymore. 
 
 I take my tie from the closet. Dad gave it to me the day I graduated from high school, and it's speckled with blue and yellow polka dots - the school colors. I loop it over, once, twice, and make a tight knot, then hang it from the rack where I keep my coat hangers. 
 
 I left a letter in my pocket explaining who I want my years to be given to. They can stick a needle in you and drain the rest of your years by essentially leaking them out of your head. I assume that's what they do in hospitals, and I hope that's what they'll do when they find me. 
 
 I scan the letter one more time. Thirteen to Mom, thirteen to Dad, thirteen to Sandra, and twenty to Grandpa. I wish I had more to give. I slide the letter in my pocket, walk towards the closet, leave the door open a crack, and slide my neck inside the tie loop. Then I tighten it and wait. 
 
 And wait. And wait. 
 
 I did n't do it right. I'm not feeling anything, and I still breathe just as I always have. I sigh and loosen the knot, sliding to the ground and bursting into tears. 
 
 Grandpa's already gone. I can feel it. 
 
 I sit there crying in the closet for what feels like hours until I hear the door open. I swipe the tie from its spot and hide it behind my back as the door opens. 
 
 `` Henry? Henry, we need to talk to you.'' 
 
 I peer out from the crack in the closet door and see Mom holding a clipboard with a paper attached. I already know what they're going to ask me. 
 
 When someone gives their years to you, you can choose whether to accept or reject their donation. Rejected years are destroyed. Imagine the fights that could break out. Imagine the battle for immortality. Imagine someone who lived forever on the pain, sadness, and loss of hundreds of strangers. 
 
 Mom opens the closet door, and I know she sees the tie on the floor. Dad turns his head and sees it as well, then covers his mouth with his hand. 
 
 `` Henry... we need to know,'' Mom says, choking on the words, a tear staining the line for a signature. 
 
 I look up at them, at their tear-stained faces, at the tie on the ground. My mind screams at me, screams of my worthlessness, screams of the unfairness of it all. 
 
 Then I leap up, sign the page, and embrace them both - ignoring my mind, ignoring the thoughts, just for that one crucial moment, and crying for as long as I can stand it. 
 
 I know my difficulties are not over. I know that I do n't understand why I'm here, and that the pain of uncertainty will plague these years that I have been given. 
 
 But I hope those years still have a shred of Grandpa in them. I hope I can see the world the way he saw it, and live life without needing to know what it means. 
 
 I hope that this embrace, and this moment, can remind me why I live. 
 
 
 
 
 
 

