The Deathday Letter

by Shaun David Hutchinson

  “No.”

  “Then why are you out here?”

  Mr. Dittrich crouches down so that now he’s looking me in the eyes. “To tell you what she won’t.”

  “And what’s that?”

  “Oliver,” says Mr. Dittrich. “I don’t want Ronnie to grow accustomed to losing the people she loves.”

  “She lo—”

  “Hush.” Mr. Dittrich is quiet for a second. “Deathday Letters are a blessing, Oliver. They give us the opportunity to say things that need saying and do things that need doing. They let us finish some of our unfinished business. But they’re cruel, too, because, for people like you and Veronica, they don’t give you enough time to finish something that’s only just begun. But you try anyway. You try to squeeze all that emotion and all those might’ve beens into a few hours.

  “But you can’t. And you’ll die trying.”

  “Sir, I don’t get it.”

  Mr. Dittrich pats my knee. “You’ll die soon, Oliver. And if you let her, Veronica will die a little bit with you. You probably can’t stop it but I’d appreciate it if you tried.”

  I’m still not really sure what he’s getting at but the seconds are ticking and I don’t want to waste any more time, so I just say, “I’ll do my best, sir.”

  Ronnie runs out the door as Mr. Dittrich stands up. She’s all bundled up in a ratty old sweatshirt and some jeans.

  “You don’t have your license, do you, Oliver?”

  I shake my head and say, “No, sir, but we’re not going too far. And I’ll be careful.”

  “Maybe I should—”

  “You’re not driving, Dad,” says Ronnie as she climbs into the passenger seat. She doesn’t even hesitate. It’s like she knew I’d come for her.

  Mr. Dittrich turns to leave but stops and says, “It’s been a pleasure knowing you, Oliver.”

  I just nod at him. More a shake of my chin. It’s not like we ever sat around watching football together, but I guess the fact that I never knocked up his daughter is good enough for him.

  I’m actually feeling kind of good. Things didn’t go the way I thought they would, but they didn’t exactly go south either. Ronnie’s beside me, and I still have just enough time to talk to her. Things aren’t going too bad at all.

  Then Ronnie turns to me and says, “The only reason I’m doing this is because my father said I’d regret it if I didn’t, so can we get this over with?” She looks in the back. “I thought we were done with the pudding.”

  I knew I should have gotten rid of it.

  3:41 LEFT

  Did you steal Shane’s car?”

  “Is it considered stealing if he left me the keys and a shifting diagram?”

  “No.”

  “Then no.”

  We sit at a stoplight in silence. I don’t want my plan to implode in the car before I even get a chance to unveil it, so I keep my mouth shut. It’s a lot harder to say something stupid if you don’t say anything at all.

  But it’s pretty clear that the silence is making Ronnie uncomfortable. Her hands move from her seat belt to the AC vent, to the hem of her sweatshirt, to her keys, to her phone, and then back to the seat belt.

  “Shane taught me to drive after you left.”

  Ronnie looks up. “Not very well. Light’s green.”

  Ease off the clutch, ease on the gas. No problem. No pressure.

  “I got pulled over by a cop.”

  Not a smile. Not a laugh. Not a twitch. She’s just blank. Like the day she broke up with me. Which was chickin’ finger day at lunch. I remember ’cause Shane tried to correct the spelling but the lunch dude schooled him. Apparently chickin’ is a genetically modified chicken product. Shane and I were discussing all the possible uses for genetically modified chickens, one of which was mounting them with lasers and using them as infantry soldiers, when Ronnie walked up to the table.

  We weren’t one of those clingy couples that had to sit next to each other at lunch. Even before we dated, sometimes Ronnie sat with us and sometimes she sat with some girls she hung out with in the art room.

  I smiled at her and grabbed her hand, but she pulled away. Her cold, blank face clued me in that whatever was wrong was more than her being mad that I’d been playing Halo with Shane while I was on the phone with her two nights ago. It was like she’d taken an eraser and scrubbed her face clean of all her emotions.

  She told me it wasn’t gonna work out. Just like that. I don’t think I said another word for the rest of lunch. I don’t even remember my classes after that.

  And that’s how she looks right now. I can’t tell whether she just doesn’t care that I’m dying or whether it’s so much that she’s just blown a fuse.

  I keep driving. It’s all I can do.

  It’s only a few minutes, but it feels like hours. It’s funny because I have a feeling my last few hours will feel like minutes.

  “Are we going to your dad’s restaurant? Some stupid candlelit midnight snack isn’t going to fix this, Ollie.”

  Not talking. Not me. Nope. Not gonna say a word. I look at her quickly and whisper a prayer that she doesn’t decide to jump out the window.

  “Predictable,” says Ronnie as we pull into the lot of Caroline’s. Dad named it after Mom. She hates it and has spent a considerable amount of effort trying to get him to change it. “It’s always about food or sex with you, isn’t it?”

  I resist explaining to her for the millionth time that it really is always about food or sex, but it’s not our fault. I’m passing that torch to Shane. It’s a battle he’ll never win but it’s a war we have to keep fighting.

  The lights inside are on. Dad must be doing what I asked.

  Miss Piggy idles. She’s grumpy, I think. She chugs and shudders, chugs and shudders. I don’t think she’s used to so much driving in one day.

  “Let’s do whatever lame-ass thing you have planned, Oliver. Some of us have school tomorrow.”

  “Ouch.”

  I catch a glimpse of a crack in that blank face of hers. Ronnie’s in there somewhere. I just have to dig her out. Good thing I have that shovel Shane gave me.

  Ronnie pushes open her door and walks around to the front while I turn off the engine. All my insecurities crush me like one of those wicked machines they have at the junkyard that turns perfectly good cars into cubes. That’s me. A twisted metal cube of wuss. But it’s not really being wussy if my fears are founded, right? I mean, this could tank the same way Plan Pudding did. I could say the wrong thing again and screw it up.

  Get your head in the game, Travers. There are a thousand ways to screw this up, and if I don’t concentrate, I’ll lose Ronnie forever.

  “I haven’t got all night,” says Ronnie from the hood of the car where she’s waiting.

  The night is actually about all I have.

  I get out of the car and say to Ronnie, “You ready?”

  Ronnie sighs. “Ready to be underwhelmed? Ready to be annoyed? Ready to leave? Yes. All of the above.”

  I hold out my hand for Ronnie to take, but she shakes her head, stands up straight, and heads for the door. I let her get all the way there before I say, “We’re not going inside.”

  Then I start walking. I don’t look back to see if she’s following because I know she is. She’ll probably stand at the door for half a second because, even though she said she wasn’t, she was kind of hoping for a romantic meal with two plates of beautiful food and some nonthreatening alternative ballads with candlelight and flowers and nice tablecloths. None of which I have. Then her curiosity will get the best of her and she’ll follow. She’ll follow because she needs to know what plan I’ve managed to brew in my soupy brain that she didn’t anticipate. That’s who Ronnie is. She thinks she knows what’s gonna happen, and she preemptively insulates herself from the imagined fallout.

  But that’s not gonna happen here. I won’t let it.

  I shove past the bushes and around the side of the building where the Dumpsters and grease traps are. The smell
is warm and familiar. And gross. I keep going past the Dumpsters though, until I’m at the back of the building. The back of the building faces the road that leads to the MFEI Bridge. Our bridge.

  And I wait.

  “Ollie?”

  Ronnie lets me take her hand this time. Probably ’cause of the dark. The reason doesn’t matter.

  The stars are pretty awesome though. Come on, I gotta be a little grateful that I’m not dying on a day where the forecast calls for thunderstorms. I mean, if you’ve gotta die, and I’m not saying I recommend it or anything, doing it on a day as beautiful as today is pretty sweet.

  We’re not here for the stars, though.

  “Ronnie.”

  “Ollie?”

  “I know you kind of hate me right now.”

  “I don’t h—”

  I turn to Ronnie and put my finger to her lips. “Yeah. You do. Maybe not for the reasons you think you do, but you do.”

  Ronnie drops my hand and shoves me away. “I’m mad at you because you’re a jerk.”

  “Okay. True. I’m a jerk. But you’re not mad at me for that.”

  “No?”

  “No.” I take both of Ronnie’s hands this time. “You’ve always known that I’m kind of a jerk. In the same way that all dudes are jerks.” She wants to pull her hands away but I don’t let her. “You’re mad at me ’cause I’m dying.”

  “That’s ridiculous.”

  “And because you dropped everything to try to help me leave my mark on the world.”

  “Ollie, don’t.”

  “And that didn’t include leaving my mark on some random girl we met at a drug dealer’s house. You wanted me to leave my mark on you.”

  “I most certainly did not—”

  “That came out wrong.”

  “I’ll say.”

  My stomach starts to sour. I’m screwing this up. “I fucked up, Ronnie. Not for hooking up with Hurricane but for not seeing what you were trying to do. And the only way I know how to apologize is to help you the way you tried to help me.”

  Ronnie’s mouth opens but before a single word gets out, floodlights barge into the night and light up the place. Ronnie covers her eyes with her hands and slowly takes them away, blinking in the almost bright enough to be midday light.

  “What is this?”

  I shift Ronnie so that she’s staring at the freshly cleaned brick wall. “There’s no tablecloth, no food, no silverware, no candlelight. What I’ve got is a blank wall, a drop cloth, paint, paintbrushes, and you. Oh, and music.” I snap my fingers and a song comes on that I know Ronnie will instantly recognize.

  “Is this what I think it is?”

  “The mix you made for Shane and me when we both had our tonsils out.”

  Ronnie smiles. Briefly. So briefly you’d need a superspecial camera to capture it, it’s that fast. But it’s another crack, so I’ll take it. Then she says, “I don’t get this, though. Ollie?”

  I let go of one of Ronnie’s hands. The paints are stacked to the side, along with brushes and ladders and things I’m pretty sure weren’t even on the list. Seriously, my family is full of rock stars.

  “It’s a wall.”

  “I get that, I’m not stupid. It’s a wall. But what are we doing here?”

  “You sacrificed your feelings today to help me cross shit off my list. Well, mostly off Shane’s list, but you get the point. So before I die, I want to help you cross something off your list. I wanna help you make your mark on the world.”

  I let go of Ronnie’s hand, walk over to the pile of supplies, and get her a paintbrush. “Go on, Ronnie. Make your mark on the world.”

  Ronnie looks at me and then to the bridge behind us in the distance. The same bridge we jumped from. “But, Ollie,” she says. “It’s just a wall.”

  “It’s a place to start.”

  Ronnie holds the paintbrush. It shakes in her hand. “I can’t do it alone.”

  “Yeah you can.”

  “I don’t want to do it alone.”

  “I won’t leave until I have to.”

  Ronnie runs her fingertips over the brush and closes her eyes. I don’t know what she’s doing—remembering something, maybe? All I know is that she’s more peaceful than I’ve ever seen her. It’s like she’s doing something she was always meant to do. I almost feel like an intruder, like I shouldn’t be here, but I’m glad I am.

  We’re beyond words right now. Ronnie’s so small, I just want to collect her in my arms and kiss the sadness away. But this isn’t my moment; it’s Ronnie’s.

  Plus, my parents and Nana are staring at us from around the corner, giving me a big thumbs-up, and Shane’s right behind them with his freak show–crazy grin.

  I smile and wave them away. Wave them good-bye.

  “So, what do you want to paint?”

  Ronnie straightens. She’s not small anymore. She doesn’t need my help. Even if she says she does. “Ollie, I don’t—” Ronnie turns around, looking into the night.

  Then she begins and I just follow her lead. It’s a bit like dancing that way, but not the awkward, lock-kneed kind we did in eighth grade. This is like a waltz.

  My parents are gone. Shane’s gone. It’s just me and Ronnie and the wall.

  2:01

  You’re really terrible at this,” says Ronnie as she watches me at the top of the ladder. “You’re holding the brush like it’s going to bite you.”

  I look behind me and hold the paintbrush over Ronnie’s head. She stares up at the drop of yellow paint just daring it to drip. Of course, I pull back before it does. Because I’m not stupid.

  “Maybe I wouldn’t suck so hard if you’d tell me what I’m painting.”

  Ronnie steps back and looks at the wall, then at me, and then back at the wall. “Just get back to work, Travers.”

  The truth is that even knowing what Ronnie’s inspiration is, I’m not sure how the swath of blue under a gray arch trailing a yellow blob is ever going to look like anything. Right now, to me, it’s just a mess of paint. I guess that’s why Ronnie’s the artist and not me. Besides, watching Ronnie move across the wall is like watching a ballet. Yes, I’ve actually seen a ballet. It was pretty amazing once I got over the nausea-inducing softball-size bulges in the dude dancers’ tights. One graceful move led to another and another and a lift and a twirl and that move where they stand on the tips of their toes. Each part of the dance, if taken separately, was beautiful but incomplete.

  That’s how Ronnie’s wall is. I don’t know how it’s all going to add up, but I know that it will. And it’s going to be way cool.

  “How did you know I could paint?” asks Ronnie. “I never told you guys.” We’ve switched places and now she’s on top of the ladder and I’m standing at the bottom, staring up.

  “I’ve seen some of your stuff in the art room.” I laugh. “I never really thought of you as a real artist. Well, not until now. Honestly, I just thought the idea of it would be cool. You know, make your mark on the world and all.”

  Ronnie’s body shakes with a laugh. “So it was just another stab in the dark?”

  “No,” I say. “It wouldn’t have mattered if you’d come out here with me and painted stick figures on this wall.”

  “It would have mattered to me.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I want this to be perfect.”

  I take the paintbrush from Ronnie and hand her a smaller one. “Well, that’s just silly.”

  “It’s not silly.”

  “It’s definitely silly,” I say. Ronnie stops painting and looks down at me. “This doesn’t have to be perfect. No one’s perfect. Look at me. If today was my wall then I pissed all over it.”

  “Today wasn’t so bad, Ollie.”

  I cock my head to the side and say, “Today was a wreck.”

  “Not all of it.”

  “Okay. Not all of it.” I breathe deeply and get Ronnie some more paint. “The point is that today wasn’t perfect. Today was a wall full of pornographic
stick figures.” Ronnie starts to argue with me again but I don’t give her the chance. “But they’re my pornographic stick figures, and I’m damn proud of them.”

  We fall silent and into our work again.

  A few minutes later Ronnie says, “Maybe your wall was marked up with porno stick figures today, but tonight it’s the Sistine ceiling. And that makes it perfect to me.”

  I lean my head against Ronnie’s leg. “So I guess I’m not so terrible at this after all?”

  Ronnie points to the wall with her brush. “At this? No, you’re a wreck. But for the rest I’d say that you’re definitely getting better.” Ronnie blushes under the bright lights, and as if to cover her embarrassment, she takes the paintbrush and slaps me on the cheek with it, leaving a patch of green in my peripheral vision.

  “Oh, it’s on!” I sprint to the paint cans, get a brush dipped in blue, and fling it at Ronnie as she leaps off the ladder and runs.

  “Watch the wall,” she yells, though she’s mostly giggling.

  I whip a wide arc of paint in her direction and watch it splatter across her torso.

  Ronnie clutches her chest and falls to her knees. “I’m hit. Ollie, I’m hit.” She holds out her hands and they’re covered in blue.

  “Score!” I go to Ronnie to help her up and she ambushes me with her brush, smearing paint right up my neck and under my chin.

  “Even?”

  “Barely.” I drop the brush and go in for the tickle. Ronnie’s deceptively strong and she wriggles around so that, before I know it, she’s on top of me with her fingers in my armpits and under my knees and against my ribs. I squirm and laugh and scream for mercy but she’s relentless. I attempt a counterattack but Ronnie’s defenses are impenetrable.

  “Mercy! MERCY!”

  Ronnie drops on top of me and she’s breathing so hard she can barely speak. “That was fun.”

  “For you.”

  “You liked it,” says Ronnie, and winks at me.

  “Maybe a little.”

  We lie on the ground and stare up at the sky. The floodlights make it difficult to see the stars, but neither of us moves.