Spoiler Alert: The Hero Dies: A Memoir of Love, Loss, and Other Four-Letter Words

by Michael Ausiello

I was constantly in a rush to be somewhere other than where I was at in any given moment. And it was exhausting.

When I suggested that it seemed like he was taking a liking to our little rug rat, he rolled his eyes and sneered that he would “trade him in for a new flat-screen” in a heartbeat, as if Best Buy were running some kind of cats-for-TVs promotion.

Sitting directly across from us was an adorable-looking elderly African-American couple. The husband was busy people-watching, while the wife was flipping through a magazine. It was impossible to tell which one of them was there for treatment, because aside from the natural frailty that came with being in their late seventies/early eighties, they appeared to be perfectly healthy. They hadn’t said a word to each other since we’d sat down, but I’d already determined that they’d been together for a long time. Under normal circumstances, Kit and I would have looked at each other with endearment and said, “That’ll be us in thirty years.” But if Davis’s End of Days prognosis was to be believed, that would never be us. I was looking directly at the future I would never have with Kit.

Law & Order: Mother Fucking SVU struck again.

No, I will not fucking live for you. Because you are not dying. And if you do die, I’m going with you. Because a world where you are dead and I am alive is not a world I’m interested in being a part of is what I wanted to say.

I felt like a member of the family because they made me feel like a member of the family. They spoiled the shit out of me and I loved it. Prior to any of our visits, they stocked up on my favorite beverages—namely Diet Raspberry Snapple and Diet Coke—while also preparing a plethora of vegetarian/healthy options to supplement the traditional Pennsylvania meat and grease-soaked offerings on throwback-minded Kit’s food and beverage wish list.

The sight of him in dire straits released some kind of chemical in my brain that turned me into an emotionally wrought basket case who had to do anything in his power to make his pain go away, including, in the case of the aforementioned airplane imbroglio, prying open the airplane’s emergency exit door and hurling that hyperactive, prepubescent demon spawn out into the open air mid-flight as his passive, shoulder-shrugging mother looked on (you may’ve read about that incident in the news).

I announced to the receptionist, accentuating “husband” because (a) we were here, we were queer, we were betrothed—get used to it,

he referred to my assemblage of Smurf- and Muppet-themed ornaments as “something Chris Hansen would seize as evidence during one of his To Catch a Predator ambushes”—we

By sunrise, the Jell-O and Orangina were gone, but there was still a quarter of the Ensure left. My heart, meanwhile, was now completely full. Even though he hadn’t said a single word to me, it was one of the most intimate nights I had ever spent with Kit.

I was grieving for my husband’s fucking mistress. What couldn’t Kit do!

One of the hospice nurses reluctantly informed me that the phlegmy noise that accompanied each one of his exhales actually had a name, albeit a colloquial one: the “death rattle.” I thought she was kidding. Google confirmed to me that she was not. It described the terminal secretions like saliva that accumulated in a dying individual’s throat and upper chest. What an ugly, horrible, insensitive, crass label to attach to something so heartbreaking. Kit would’ve loved it.

I was reminded of something one of the hospice counselors had told us early on: “He will go when he is ready to go. And if you’re not present, that means he wanted to spare you that moment.”

And I just sat there for a few more minutes, processing that after eleven months of fear and uncertainty and surgeries and doctors and appointments and Carmel trips back and forth to Sloan and final goodbyes with friends and pain episodes and intimacy and closure and colostomy bags and shotgun weddings and heart-to-hearts out on the deck . . . it would all soon be over. And for an instant I felt a fleeting sense of relief. For Kit. For Kit’s parents. And for me.

The shock of Scooch’s improbable eleventh-hour visitation quickly gave way to sadness as I took in the beautiful, heart-annihilating scene before me. Kit and Mister Scooch—my family. Some of the happiest memories of my life were just of Kit and me snuggled up in bed or on the couch marveling at something ridiculous Mister Scooch was doing with his mouth or his paws.

As the final traces of air escaped his lungs, his mouth opened slightly wider, and the upper right corner of his lip curled upward. And it froze. I waited for another breath, but I knew one was not coming.

I hadn’t realized how deeply tethered my soul had been to his breathing. Until, at 10:30 p.m., it stopped.

If Kit had had a traditional burial, his tombstone would have been engraved thusly: “Kit Cowan: Ask Him About His Fonts.” There were no five words in the English language that more adequately captured my husband’s essence.

Yes, make no mistake. The person we’re honoring here today was the King of Cunts. And we loved him for it.

It sounds corny, I know, but he spent the past year living like he was dying, and I feel so privileged to have had a ringside seat for what turned out to be his farewell tour. Which sounds depressing but was actually spectacularly inspiring. We should all be so lucky as to be brave enough to go out with such gusto.

So when you think of Kit, and the tragedy of his life cut short, and you’re feeling pain, may I suggest that instead of letting it bring you down, you look up and say, “Eh, that Kit Cowan, he had a good life.”