Afterlife

by Douglas Clegg

  She remembered Joe’s number. She’d surprise him. It had been at least two years since they’d talked. And now, here she was, a block away from his place. Opened her cell phone. Tapped in the number.

  He picked up on the third ring. “Julie?” he asked. Caller I.D. ruined her surprise.

  “Hey Joe,” she said, feeling as if she were not midthirties but mid-twenties.

  “Well, we thought you’d dropped off the face of the earth. How the hell are you?”

  “I’m in the neighborhood.”

  “Want to come on over? Or we can go over to Starbucks.”

  “I just was remembering. Remember when we all got tickets for Phantom?”

  “Oh yeah, that was great,” he laughed. “We show up on the wrong night, miss the night we were supposed to go, and then Alicia manages to flirt with one of the ushers.”

  “And gets us the best seats in the house. Sneaking into a theater was never so fun. God. We used to have such adventures. Some of which are not befitting a properly married suburban wife.”

  “I know. I’ll be able to blackmail you in a few years.” As he said this, she could practically hear his good-natured grin on the phone.

  “We were such good friends, Joe.”

  “Hey. I’ll hear none of that. We still are,” he said. “You don’t sound so good. What’s up?”

  Should I tell him? No. If I tell him, it’ll lead to a long sad story and I’ll cry and he’ll cry and he’ll insist on coming down here to comfort me and I’d have to look at him and feel as if my life were nothing but sorrow.

  “Just a bad day,” she said. “And I’ve got to get back to the kids.”

  “Well, don’t be a stranger. Rick mentioned you the other day. He said he thought he heard your name somewhere. Couldn’t remember where.”

  “It’s always nice to be remembered. I miss you, Joe.”

  “Ditto, Jules.”

  After a bit more of the “let’s get togethers” and “be sure and call back soons,” she closed the phone, reopened it and was about to call her sister. Two skinny girls of eighteen or nineteen, dressed as if they were Fifth Avenue fashion models, walked in Prada and Gucci along the cracked sidewalk in front of her. “And so I was like, he’s gay you idiot, run for the hills,” one girl said to the other as they loped along, uncertain in the stiletto heels.

  Julie glanced at the cell phone, and then set it down on the step. She opened her handbag, dug down to her wallet, opening it up and digging through a few torn small pieces of paper.

  When she found the sliver of paper she had been looking for, she stared at the phone number for a few minutes as if an entire world were within it.

  Whomever her husband had been seeing, this was her.

  This mysterious woman in the city who had some hold on Hut. She looked at it. Looked at the scrawl of it. Not Hut’s handwriting. Did you have a lover, Hut? A woman whom you met in the city? The one who kept you there some nights, not sleeping on the Aerobed or the cots at the clinic—someone whom you burned to see when Matt or Livy or I got to be too much for you?

  She wanted to call the number.

  Instead, she called up her sister, to come get her, to take her home.

  3

  Mel had other ideas. “You need a meal in you, and the kids’ll be fine with Laura. She said they could spend the night if need be.”

  They drove to Benny’s Burritos, and Mel got them a table at a corner window so they could have a little privacy. Mel ordered a chicken burrito that they’d split, and a margarita for Julie. “A little tequila never hurt anybody.”

  “Except a drunk. You shop for anything?” Mel squinted her eyes, slightly, as she watched her.

  “You really want to know?”

  “Sure.”

  “I got a Pilates workout tape. I wanted some nice

  towels, but none of them seemed right. Some scented candles. They smell like blueberries. Oh, and I got you a gift. Just a little one. A bathrobe.”

  “Thank you,” Julie said, managing a grin. She felt cold inside.

  “Well, it’s just a terry bathrobe. Don’t thank me too much. I just don’t want to see you wandering the house in your underwear ever again.”

  When the chips and salsa came, Mel pushed them toward Julie. “Start eating. I don’t think you’ve had more than toast in two days.”

  Julie hesitated, then decided that appetite or no, she needed something. “It’s good.”

  “It’s always good here,” Mel said. “So, why’d you keep me waiting?”

  “I needed a hike.”

  Mel grinned. “Good. First sign of life from you.”

  “I’m running on fumes right now,” Julie said. “I am so angry. Pissed off. At the fucking cops.”

  “You never swear,” Mel said. “You kiss with that mouth?”

  “I’m sorry. They’re incompetent. I didn’t want him moved from Rellingford anyway. Why can’t they just do their dirty work at the Rellingford Morgue? And that stupid sheriff out there, just…signing off on this…not even asking…”

  “Can you just calm down a second?” Mel asked, dipping a tortilla chip into the salsa, dripping a little on her sweater. “Look. I’m the one who told him it was okay to move the body. You were down for the count, and needed sleep. Julie, it’s a murder investigation. This is some psycho who is out there killing people. Four people so far. They need help in this. And do not give me that look—you were out cold or crying, and when I talked to that detective, and the sheriff, they both made it clear that my permission or yours didn’t count. This is something that just had to be done.”

  “And so, they lost his body,” Julie said, grabbing her margarita practically out of the server’s hands.

  “They what?”

  4

  “Apparently, it’s an ordinary screw-up,” Julie said. “Ha.”

  “I can just picture you with those cops. Reading them the Riot Act.”

  “I don’t know,” Julie’s voice grew faint. She looked out the window and saw a crowd outside the Tea Shop across the street. A lesbian couple walked by, arm in arm, looking as if they were happier than Julie had ever felt in her life. An elderly woman in a mangy fur coat walked an equally mangy little Yorkshire terrier, pausing at the window of the restaurant as if gazing at her reflection. “I don’t know. I think I was too stunned to react. I should probably call Andrew.”

  “Hell, yes,” Mel said. “The threat of a lawsuit might just do something. You know, if they don’t find his body in the next twenty-four hours…”

  “Maybe it’s what Donati said.”

  “Who?”

  “One of the officers. She said it happens now and then when bodies get transferred. They think all that happened is that he ended up in another morgue in the city. They’re blaming the driver, who had several pickups and deliveries. It’s all very…complicated.”

  “Well they damn well better find him, that’s all I’m saying,” Mel said, biting into a slice of avocado.

  “It’s all too much for me. Too, too much.” Julie continued to look over her sister’s shoulder, to the world outside, the world of smart young women parking their cars, a group of men in suits talking excitedly as if they just made some corporate deal that would make them all millionaires, the woman in the ratty fur coat, picking a newspaper out of the trash can on the corner.

  Then, she re-focused on Mel’s face. Mel looked at her as if trying to read her thoughts. You can’t get inside me, Melanie. You can’t. I’m not that easy-to-see-through little sister you once had. Not anymore. I am made out of stone. I don’t feel anything anymore. I am impenetrable.

  “It may be something else, though, Mel. It may be about the killer. The killer may come back somehow, to collect the bodies. One of the other victims also went missing. It’s just sick. It’s disgusting. I don’t even want to think about it anymore. I don’t. I can’t.”

  5

  A rundown Volkswagen Jetta was parked on the street in front of her house when they
got home that night.

  “How does she do it?” Julie asked, shaking her head. “She runs that crafts store in New Hope, gets her master’s in psychology and does crystal therapy…and has that awful boyfriend…and she still manages to get here this fast?”

  Mel shrugged, as she turned the car into the driveway. “Toni Marino. AKA mom. What more is there to say?”

  6

  If she were ever to draw her mother, it would be with nothing but circles and squiggly lines. Her hair was a bird’s nest of jet black with glimmers of gray, her face was round, and round glasses upon her round nose. Even the word “mom” seemed to be a round word. She somehow had lost the angular half-Italian look of her Connie Francis-inspired youth and had transformed into Earth Mother by the age of sixty-four. “I picked up the kids from your sitter,” her mother said, too quickly, as a shadow crossed her face. Her voice still with a strange hybrid of the Jersey shore and Pennsylvania clip, hugging Julie while at the same time glancing around at the living room as if about to give one of her famous critiques. Livy was practically attached to her grandmother, clinging to her skirt like it was a security blanket.

  “I am so sorry my baby,” her mother whispered, kissing the edge of her ear.

  Julie fought back tears as she felt the intense warmth of her mother’s cheek pressed against her own.

  7

  Mel made some coffee, while Julie and the kids sat around the living room as if they had to entertain her mother. “The one thing I’ve learned about life,” her mother said with that wiser-than-thou voice. “The only thing, really, is that it’s about accepting loss.”

  “We were talking about that in my coffee group,”Mel said.

  “Your coffee group?” Julie chuckled, with a little too much condescension in her voice. “God. My God, that sounds like 1950s with white gloves and cute little casseroles. You mean the church ladies?”

  Mel must’ve been working to keep a kind look on her face. Julie was impressed.

  “The altar guild. My friend Elaine lost her husband to cancer three years ago. It was her faith that really pulled her through. There really is no death.”

  “You’re only in that group because you have the hots for Father Joe,” Julie blurted, and then quickly apologized.

  “It’s not like Episcopal priests can’t marry,” Mel said, shrugging.

  “We all go to heaven,” Livy suddenly said, her small, wise voice a bit of a surprise.

  “That’s right, honey,” Mel said.

  “I don’t know,” Toni said. “A lot of people believe different. Death is just a problem of our vision. You know, how we see things upside down? How our eyes work? Our mind works that way, too. We go on. We

  just can’t see it.”

  “Not your ghost crap again,” Mel said, a bit under her breath.

  “If you have your sexy Jesus, Mom can have her spooks.”

  Mel shot her a look, then glanced at Livy, as if to say, what kind of talk is that around your daughter? “Wait just a second, sweetie,” Toni said. “They’re not spooks. And I’m only a lapsed Catholic, not a heretic. I believe in heaven.” She motioned for Livy to come sit on her lap.

  Livy looked a little frightened, but Julie gave her the nod. Livy went over, and climbed aboard the Gramma Express. “Spirituality doesn’t start or stop with a church or a dogma. What is out there is out there. I’m not going to sit here and say that one group has cornered the market on the truth of existence.”

  “Is daddy a spirit-chew-aliddy?”

  Toni kissed her granddaughter on the top of the head. “Different people believe different things, sweetie. Some people believe we come back as newborns. Some people believe we go to heaven. Some people believe we never really leave. Some go, some stay, some come back. Like when babies are born. Maybe they’re old souls.

  Who knows?” She kissed Livy on the top of her scalp. “I think you’re an old soul, sweetie.”

  “Wow,” Livy said.

  “I bet in your last life you were a brilliant doctor like your daddy.” Then, Toni looked over at Matt.

  Matt had his camera on and it was aimed at her. “I’m on Candid Camera.”

  “I like when you talk about this stuff,” Matt said, fiddling with the lens.

  “Okay,” Toni said. “I think I was a sherpa in my last life.”

  “Is that like a shepherd?” Livy asked.

  “Mom,” Julie said, sternly. She felt a severe headache coming on.

  “What? Reincarnation’s as valid as anything,” her mother said. Then, she gave her that look that Julie hadn’t seen in years—it was one of her “Take a life

  lesson” looks. “You want to live a happy life, Juliet, you start thinking about what comes after. It’ll put a lot of things in place for you.”

  “It’s like a nice fairy tale to tell kids,” Matt said, “but the truth is, there’s nothing after you die.” He spoke so suddenly that it was like a shock through the room. He pivoted the camera around to look at Julie. “It’s like the fairy tales about wicked stepmothers.”

  Toni chuckled. “That’s a zinger, Matt. Do you ever come out from behind the camera?”

  Matt put the camera down and stared at Julie and then her mother. “Talk talk talk,” he said. “That’s all anyone does. My father dies and it’s all about blah blah blah.”

  He got up and stomped out of the room as if he’d been insulted.

  “Teenagers,” Livy said, as if she’d heard this from her mother.

  “Shouldn’t you go to him?” Toni asked, hugging Livy. She had an expression on her face that was halfway between being aghast and ashamed. “That boy needs you.”

  “He’ll be fine, Mom. Don’t butt in where you don’t know…”

  “Sometimes my daughters can be so cold,” her mother said, in a whisper meant to float over Livy’s head. Then, more softly, “Children need to talk about death. About what happens afterward. About where we go.”

  “Where do we go?” Livy asked.

  “Upstairs, sweetie,” Toni said. “Upstairs, only when we’re alive, we don’t know where upstairs goes.”

  8

  Julie couldn’t take her mother anymore, and left the room. As she went up the stairs, to her bedroom, she heard Mel say something about sleep and shock and Julie almost felt like going back down there and just telling them all to get out of her house and leave her and her kids alone, and wondered how much she could get away with—how cruel and mean she could get and still be forgiven later—how much slack did you get when your husband was murdered out in the woods by a psychopath?

  She lay down on her bed, covering her head with the pillow, and submerged into sleep.

  9

  In a dream, his head was between her legs, and his tongue circled lazily, one circle wetly moved into another, opening her, with a kind of pressure of pleasure that disturbed her even while her body gave in to it. Hut whispered, his voice soft and vulnerable, like a little boy who has just discovered a new forbidden hideout, “Ah, yes. I love it. I love the taste. I love the smell. I want to be inside you. I want to dive into it. You’re the lake, and I want to swim through you.”

  Her pelvis began to buck involuntarily, and she hated herself for the feeling she was having, which was not pleasure, but some kind of mechanical movement as if she had no control over her body and it had no connection to her mind, but was a machine that just moved back and forth and up and down when someone put coins in—knowing that Hut was gone, knowing that this was not really him, knowing she was in a dirty, filthy dream where nasty words were said that she’d never uttered in real life nor had he, and shivery forbidden fantasies could exist, and the reality of the world, of death, was beyond this.

  10

  Sometime in the night, someone touched the edge of her cheek. Julie opened her eyes, feeling nearly out of breath from a terrible dream that she couldn’t quite remember seconds after waking up.

  In the bedroom, a small shadow before her. “Mommy?”

  �
�Oh baby,” Julie said. She scooted further into the bed, allowing her daughter to climb up onto it. The heat of her daughter’s body pressed against hers was comforting.

  “I have an idea. Let’s ask God to get Daddy back.” She kissed Livy on her forehead.

  “I mean it,” Livy said, her voice wispy and full of

  wonder at her own idea. “Maybe nobody’s ever tried, Mommy. We just ask. Maybe God feels bad for us and he’ll send Daddy back. I can ask in my brain radio. I can.”

  “Oh, baby, honey, shhh,” Julie whispered. “I love you so much.”

  “God can do anything. Matt said in the Bible, God sent back a guy named Lazzus.”

  “Lazarus, sweetie. But it was different. That was a miracle.”

  “Nobody ever asked for their daddy back. Maybe,” Livy said, getting louder, until finally she was yelling, “Maybe if someone did, it would happen. God can do it!” “I’m sorry.” Julie couldn’t control her tears.

  “I just want God to send him back,” Livy said, too loud. “I want my daddy back. God can do it.”