Dream noir

John Lithgow died somewhere in my house, in his sleep, while visiting us.  Maybe in the basement?  It's not my fault.  But it is my problem.  The longer I wait to alert the authorities, the worse it's looking, the more complicit and criminal and indefensible my inaction will seem to be.  When a bad thing like that happens, you don't just wait three days until it's convenient to call the authorities, but that's what I've done.  There's just a lot of other shit going on right now.  

For example, there's a party happening, and I'm the hostess, preventing sleepy-seeming teenage boys from stumbling toward the guest bed in the curtained-off cellar corner.  

I can see a huge, inert human shape under blankets on that bed, in the dim cellar light.  I've not actually examined or confirmed that it's the larger-than-life famous actor.  I'm trusting what I've come to believe, but you couldn't pay me to go lift that blanket.  I just keep hoping the shape will be gone the next time I look over there, like he wasn't really dead after all, and got up and left on his own.  

I'm aware that perhaps people are even now beginning to look for John Lithgow at the hotel he was supposed to check out of several days ago.  They'll be asking the taxi driver where he got dropped off.  So, like, it will not look good if I haven't made the call before that search party arrives at my door.  

What am I going to say about this thing though?  What lie sounds more defensible than the truth, that I just didn't want to deal with it and hoped it would go away?

And yes, I am also sad about the loss of this fine man to the world.  I do feel that.  But it's not the dominant anguish.  I'm seething, because this should not be my job right now.  I should not be held accountable for hiding an unwieldy dead body, nor should I be punished for delaying its necessary revelation.  I didn't invite this burdensome man into my home, and I am not the one who killed him.  

He just died, and I'm probably gonna hang for it, because I'm sure a woman must pay the price for John Lithgow dying in her house.