They were called Lifetime Lifetime-achievement awards.
A small thing, usually, set upon a tasteful wooden base. It was generally something significant to the recipient, though not always. Sometimes it was simply a tiny statuette.
They were, the gray, bureaucratic men who delivered them were quick to point out, not awards, per se.
“Acknowledgements, really,” they’d say. “Of, well… life, I suppose. Or perhaps simply of a life.”
They gray men didn’t like to hang around once they’d delivered them. “Lots to do.” They’d smile ruefully, and the pair (it was always a pair) of them would climb back into their clean, sensible, second-hand car and drive off to their next assignment.
Tom received his Lifetime Lifetime-achievement award on a Tuesday afternoon. He’d just put down the phone. He was angry, his hands shaking, and made more so because he knew his anger was futile. Another fight with his father.
Tom stood and put some music on. Chopin. Chopin always calmed him down. There was a knock at the door and there the pair of them were.
“Tom?”
“Yes?”
“We have your Lifetime Lifetime-achievement award.”
They handed Tom a small plinth upon which sat a large, anatomically-correct glass heart.
“Oh,” said Tom. “… thank you.”
They all stood quietly for a moment.
“It’s a heart,” one of them pointed out.
“Yes,” said Tom, mesmerised by the tiny glass veins. “Yes, I see.”
Quiet again. One of the the delivery-men coughed.
“We should probably go then, and-“
“Why? Why this, I mean.” asked Tom.
“Well,” said one of them, exchanging a glance with his colleague. “To signify a lifetime, I suppose. These things usually do. As to why the heart… well, we’d rather imagined you’d know.”
Tom could see the perfect glass chambers. Ventricles, he remembered. Atria.
“Thank you,” said Tom again, looking up. “Thank you.”
They smiled, tipped their caps, and left.
Tom closed the door and sat back down again in his armchair, the great glass heart on his lap. Quiet and calm now, he watched the sunshine sparkle through it, the sound of the piano lingering in the air. It was depthless and hollow and beautiful, he thought.
He sat there in his chair, still, for the longest time.
The heart-attack rolled through him quickly - thunder echoing through a distant valley. He didn’t have time to stand or move.
The music kept playing for a while longer before finally stopping.
