by Curtis Bunn
“He has a son, you know?”
“I found that out tonight. But what are you saying? You’re not going to be a part of this for your brother?”
“I’ll talk it over with my wife and my nephew and we’ll figure it out. Is this a good number to call you back?”
“It is. So you’re going to call his son?”
“Yes, I’ll call my nephew right now. Thanks for calling. I’ll call you tomorrow.”
I continued my drive home, but did not quite recall the ride. That had never happened before when sober. Too many times I had too much to drink to be driving, but made it home safely and did not remember much of the ride. This was different. After hanging up with Donovan, the magnitude of what happened occurred to me as if in a dream.
A man was dead. My friend. I found him hanging like a pig on the back of a truck in New York’s Chinatown. That image haunted me.
It made me think: What were his last thoughts before kicking that chair to start his hanging? How tormented was he to end his life? Why do so many who suffer from bipolar disorder refrain from staying on their meds? Lastly, I thought, what could I have done to prevent this tragedy?
That last question haunted me as much as the image of Walter dangling by his broken neck. Did I see but ignore warning signs? Did he send me signals? The last time I saw him, we met for a round of golf at Landsdowne Country Club in Northern Virginia. Thornell could not make it, so it was just Walter and me. We had lunch in the grille before our round, and…now that I think about it, he talked more than usual. He talked about the challenge of teaching today’s kids and how it had made him feel less and less effective.
“Our purpose is to teach, you know?” he said. “But when you have these parents who seem to be working against you, it makes the job harder than it has to be.
“Listen, this kid was graduating and needed a B in my class to maintain his GPA to get into Virginia. I talked to the kid the whole semester about getting work in on time, coming to class consistently, the whole thing. His mother came to school midway through the semester and had the fucking nerve to get mad at me for the C-minus he had at the time. It took everything in me to not slap the shit out of her.
“And it wouldn’t have been because she was yelling at me in front of her child, my student. But I wanted to slap her because she was doing her son a disservice. He needed to hear her say, ‘Son, you have to do better. It’s your responsibility to raise this grade. Your future is in your hands.’ Instead, she yells at me as if I’ve done something wrong.
“I pulled out my grade book and showed her that he missed one quiz, scored a seventy-two on one test, seventy on another and had missed three classes. He actually averaged out to a D, but I liked the kid and gave him the benefit of the doubt. So, when he does almost exactly the same in the second half of the semester, what am I to do? I don’t want to hold a deserving kid back. But, at the same time, he’s got to do the work. Now I’m morally compromised. That shouldn’t happen—and wouldn’t have happened if the mother just did her part instead of coddling the kid.”
“So,” I asked, “what’d you do?”
“I gave the kid a B,” he said. “I sold out to the mother. That bothers me a lot. I… I don’t know. It makes me feel unworthy of the job.”
“No,” I said, “you didn’t sell out to the mom. You did what you thought needed to happen for the kid to succeed. That’s what sometimes happens with us. You had a tough decision and you chose the kid, not the mother.”
“It feels like I gave in to her foolishness,” he said. “I’ve been struggling with it ever since. These parents put you in a bad a position. I didn’t want to punish the kid because of the mother. But am I really helping him by letting him slide by? Man, you just don’t know—this is a real struggle for me. If I can’t do my job without worrying about hurting the child with potential or worry about a mother not doing her job so I have to make up for it…it’s too much of a burden.”
I wonder if that was a hint of his mental struggle. I told him in the grille: “We’ve had this internal struggle from the beginning. It’s always there. I’ve failed kids and it pained me to do it because they have so many obstacles in front of them. I did what I thought was right. That’s all you can do. But it’s hard when it’s not just about the grade or the work. With our kids, there are many times other dynamics that come into play.
“If you could make a decision without considering them, you’d be less than human. You’re struggling with the same thing all teachers, especially in public schools, do…all teachers who care, that is.”
“Yeah, but you did the right thing,” Walter said. “You didn’t give in. You held true to your ethics.”
“It’s always a judgment call,” I added. “I could say you held to your ethics by doing what you thought was right for the kid. That’s our goal—to do right by them by preparing them for the next level. You’ve done that. He’s a kid from Southeast D.C. who will go to Virginia. That’s a great thing.”
He didn’t respond; he looked off through the window for several seconds at the lush golf course. I finally broke the silence by suggesting we go to the driving range before our round. But that was the most he’d ever talked and he seemed genuinely pained by his issue. Recalling that put everything came into question: Was that a reason for a sick man to take his own life? Was he going on and on to signal me to help him?
I decided I had to let it all go before I drove myself crazy. But it wasn’t easy. When I took a shower, however, I had reason to forget about everything. With the hot water running down my back I was taken away from all the drama—and then something happened.
A pain so severe and sharp and penetrating shot through my stomach and drove me to my knees. I was more scared than I had ever been. I felt like Redd Foxx on Sanford and Son: This was it. The big one.
The doctors told me I would experience occasional pain, but they lied. This was something beyond pain. I couldn’t stand up. I couldn’t move. I could only curl up and hold my stomach and pray harder than I ever had for relief. But it did not come. I began sweating, from fear and excruciating pain. I felt like I was going to vomit. My body began to involuntarily shake. What other recourse did I have but to think I was dying?
The water built up in the shower; my foot covered the drain. And I could not move it an inch to let the water flow. I was paralyzed in pain. All that and I’m not accurately describing the otherworldly discomfort that ravaged my body. The stomach was where all the pain was coming, but it rendered the rest of my body immovable. I thought I was going to pass out. Actually, I hoped I would pass out. I could not take the pain.
And I did. I had no idea how long I was unconscious, but apparently I moved enough to unclog the drain before or while I was passed out, relieving the water and preventing me from drowning. I came to with the water, now cold, bearing down on me as if I were lying under a Costa Rican waterfall.
The pain was still there, but far less devastating. I realized I hadn’t died, and slowly pulled myself from the shower floor, all the while holding my stomach, feeling like my hand provided some support. I was scared to remove it.
Fearful the debilitating pain would return, I slowly, cautiously moved to pull myself up, turn off the water and wearily make my way from the bathroom to the bedroom. I didn’t even consider drying off. I made it to the bed and delicately crawled into it. I curled into a fetal position. Naked and soaking wet, I cried until I fell asleep.
CHAPTER SIX
PAIN & GAIN
I awoke feeling slightly disoriented and scared. I believed the doctors. I believed I had cancer. Before that episode, there was nothing beyond the X-rays and their prognosis that really indicated I had it. I didn’t feel like I had cancer. I knew it after that episode in the shower. I felt it. And I was even more scared than when I was first told. That’s why I cried.
Stomachaches from food poisoning or cheap liquor or a bad mix of alcohol was nothing compared to what I experienced in the shower. This was s
omething altogether different. It was like the lining of my stomach was laced with acid, while being stabbed with tiny razors. It felt like how I thought cancer might feel. Only cancer could be that excruciating.
My stomach was sore in the morning, as if it had been punched repeatedly. With a pipe. I was able to stand upright and move about enough to grab my heating pad from a hall closet, plug it up and delicately place it across my midsection. As it heated up, I relaxed and eventually dozed off to sleep.
I dreamed that I was on the golf course with Walter and after making a hole-in-one, he told me he was thinking of killing himself because he was depressed. I asked: “How can you be depressed after making a hole-in-one?”
He didn’t answer. So, I made him agree that if I got a hole-in-one, too, that he would not kill himself. Then I hit a 7-iron one hundred seventy-six yards over a lake and into the hole. I jumped up in celebration of my ace. I turned around to face Walter and he had a rope around his neck and was hanging from a tree.
I forced my eyes open. My heart was pounding. I lay in bed, looking at the ceiling, thinking about Walter’s death and about my life. Neither made me feel good.
My cell phone rang, but I couldn’t figure out where it was. That’s when I learned I was a little disoriented. I couldn’t determine where the sound was coming. Finally, I decide I didn’t care who was calling. I was too scared to care.
Feeling like I had cancer was different from being told I had cancer. Now it was real, tangible, and I was petrified. I tried to call on Reverend Henson’s prayer, but I couldn’t remember it. I thought about Walter and figured it was better to be alive than in the ground. But that did not offer any comfort.
After another indeterminable period of sleep, I woke up with a different mindset. I was no longer so scared I couldn’t move. I was scared. But I was going to use that fear to my favor and challenge myself to press on.
With the pain minimized, I could think without distraction. I found my phone. And then I found the most powerful pain-killers I could get my hands on. I knew I had to at least attempt to manage the pain. I knew it would come again, and maybe worse, and that was not something that appealed to me. So I would make sure I would have a bottle of oxycodone handy at all times.
When I looked at my phone, I noticed the missed call came from area code 703. That was Northern Virginia, where Walter’s son lived. I checked my voice messages, and sure enough, it was Walter Jr.
“Hi, my uncle Donovan called me about my dad. I wanted to call you to talk about getting into his house and searching for insurance information, his will, bank accounts, whatever. Please call me back at this same number.”
I was uncomfortable. There was no sense of remorse that his father was dead. He was as a matter of fact as one would be about ordering a pizza with particular toppings. I wanted to call his ass back immediately and let him know how I felt. But it struck me that I did not know the nature of their relationship…and that it was none of my business.
So I, instead, gathered myself and went into the bathroom. I was startled that the shower curtains had been pulled off the railing and that water was all over the floor. I could not recall how I got out of the tub or even turning off the water. I was in that much pain.
I grabbed a few towels and placed them over the standing water. The shower hooks were broken, so I would have to replace them—and a new shower curtain, too.
When I got to the mirror, I scared myself. I had forgotten that I had all my hair shaved off and the image I was not expecting jolted me. I rubbed my head as I stared at myself in the mirror. The bald head would look better on me once my scalp’s color caught up with my face. But I was OK with the look. Significantly, I felt different with no hair. A little more free.
It took a while for me to clean up the bathroom and to get dressed, but I did and it was a relief that my stomach was pain free. I thought better of telling my daughter about that stomach episode. It would only make her more worried and I couldn’t bear that. Not even my father would know. What would be the point of telling them? They’d just get upset. I had caused enough drama.
Finally, I sat down on my living room couch and returned Walter’s son’s call. I was hoping he’d be dejected to know his father had passed. But I didn’t detect a strain of sadness. And that made me angry.
“So, what are your plans for a funeral?” I asked. “Will you and your uncle work it out? You’re his only relatives.”
“That ain’t got nothing to do with me,” he said. “I ain’t involved.”
“But you just asked about the insurance money, his will, his bank accounts. Above all that, he’s your father.”
“In name only. Man, you seen him more than me in the last five years. I ain’t complaining. I’m just staying out of the picture.”
“But he’s your father. And he loved you. I don’t know about issues you all had. But he’s your dad. He helped raise you, right? How can you just stay out of the picture?”
“The man killed himself. That tells you everything you need to know about him right there.”
“But you want his money? How can you not want to give him a proper burial but at the same time talk about getting his money?”
“Because I’m owed at least that.”
“Walter is owed a proper burial by his family.”
The kid and I went back and forth for another minute or so without him budging off his stance. Eventually, we agreed to meet at his dad’s house later that evening.
I called Walter’s brother back to see where he stood on the funeral. His phone went straight to voicemail. I was sort of glad it did; I wanted to be a good friend to Walter, but I had my own issues to figure out. First was what to do about preventing or minimizing another attack.
I called Maya about going to Atlanta for the holistic treatments. The strength of the treatments was that it would release much of the cancer or whatever was in my body through the enemas. Whatever hang-ups I had about enemas before my episode disappeared after it. I would do almost anything to prevent going through that again.
“Why are you so eager to have the treatments now?” Maya asked. She was keen. She knew me and knew that I could be stubborn. “Why the change?”
“I don’t know. I can sense that I just need to get this stuff out of my system. My stomach doesn’t feel right. I’m scared to eat much; I feel like I will get sick if I do. So I’m hoping the treatments can make me at least get my appetite back.”
She bought what I was selling, but not totally. “Yeah, OK, Daddy. If you say so. That’s all the more reason for you to fly instead of riding the bus for fourteen hours down there. Your first appointment is in six days. So you have to leave soon.”
I told her about Walter’s suicide. “Oh, no, Daddy. I remember him. He was a nice man.”
“I’m surprised you didn’t see it on the news.”
“I haven’t turned on my television in two days.”
“When did you meet him?”
“That time at school when you were honored for Teacher of the Year. He was quiet at first. I sat next to him at the ceremony. But when he learned I was your daughter, he opened up. I’m so sorry to hear this. This is crazy. Why would he do that?”
I told her about the e-mail to me and that I felt obligated to attend his funeral. “I understand. Anything I can do to help, let me know, Daddy.”
Another call came in; it was Donovan. I told Maya I’d call her back.
“I’m at the airport. I’m on my way there.”
“Really? Good. That’s a big turnaround from last night.”
“I talked to my nephew and, well, I just need to be there. We’ve got some papers to go through.”
My instincts told me it was about money. He was coming to D.C. for the money, whatever money Walter had. I wasn’t aware of any, but that didn’t mean anything.
“Papers? You mean insurance?” I asked.
“Insurance, checking account, savings, investments.”
I shook my head. “So, wh
at time will you be here? I can meet you at the house to let you in.”
“I arrive around eight tonight. Do me a favor? Don’t tell Walter Jr. I’m coming.”
“Why?”
“Because I need to see those papers before him.”
“I really don’t want to be in the middle of whatever you all have going on.”
“You don’t have to be. Just let me in and you can go on about your business.”
It was astonishing that it took Walter killing himself to get his brother to visit. Money: the stimulus of the greedy.
I decided I would tell Walter’s son about his uncle coming to town. Why should Donovan get the money, if there was any to be gotten? But that call to Walter Jr. was equally disturbing.
“My uncle is a trip. He thinks he should get something before me? I’m his son.”
“What about a funeral?”
“Who said he deserves a funeral? He offed himself. I don’t think he wanted a funeral. Who would come anyway? He didn’t have any real friends—except you, I guess.”
“You really don’t know your father—didn’t know your father. He touched a lot of young people’s lives over the years. Dozens and dozens. Hundreds. He was loved by his students. He taught them and helped lead them on the path to success. That’s a big deal, Walter. You can’t deny that about your father. That would be wrong.”
“What’s wrong is that he didn’t do that for me. He was there. I mean, there were a lot of times when he didn’t take his medication. And that’s when he wasn’t a good person to me.”
“What did you do to help him? You abandoned him, from what I can tell. His e-mail said you would not return his calls. He raised you. And then you get to a certain point and instead of helping, you abandon him? That’s wrong.”
“Easy for you to say; you weren’t there.”
“What I know is that when people you love are in need, you don’t abandon them. Worse, all you—and your uncle—are talking about is his money. I don’t hear any grief in your voice. No plans to remember him for the good man he was when he was healthy. It’s all about money for both of you.”