by Matt Forbeck
I even begged every President I'd ever served under to intervene on Colleen's behalf. None of them came through. They pointed out that they didn't really have the power to grant amortality, and even if they did they wouldn't have used it. If they decided to save my wife, then where would it end?
I found myself weeping for Colleen all over again. Six put an arm around my shoulders.
"I miss him too," he said to me.
I couldn't bear to tell him the truth.
I remembered holding Colleen's hand as her life left her. Just before that, she looked up at me and gave me the best smile she could manage. The painkillers only went so far.
"Ronan," she said. "When I'm gone, I want you to move on."
I tried to protest, but she just shushed me.
"Please," she said. "Go on with your life. Enjoy this amortality of yours for as long as possible. Find happiness for yourself wherever you can. Never forget me – but never let me get in your way."
And I never have. Here I am, at our great-great-greatgrandson's funeral, and all I can think about is her and how much better a job she would have made of all the time that somehow fell into my lap.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
At first, I hadn't noticed that the bishop had stopped talking. My grief over Colleen had swallowed me once again, and I felt like I might drown in it. I heard someone next to me clearing his throat.
"I repeat: would anyone from Ronan's family care to say a few words about him?" the bishop said. The woman's voice was filled with such compassion. I knew she only wanted to give Lexa and Six a chance to remember Five in front of his family and friends, but they didn't want to take her up on it.
Six grabbed me by the shoulder. "Go ahead, Grandpa," he said. "Say something. Please."
My first instinct was to yank my arm away in shock, but I managed to stop myself. I stared at the young man, trying to see if he was toying with me. The facade of lightheartedness he'd shown before the funeral had melted away. A boy who'd lost his father stood before me now, the ceremony having stripped away his false bravado.
"But he…"
I had been about to say that Five had hated me, but then I glanced past Six to see Lexa standing behind him. I could barely see her face behind the black veil that covered it. Her voice was lower than a whisper, but I heard it as plain as a shout.
"Please," she said.
I opened my mouth to say that I was sure that Five would have appreciated it far more if his wife or son were to speak at his funeral instead of me. Then I closed it when I realized that they weren't able to manage that. They couldn't bring themselves to stand up there – not yet – and they needed someone to represent Five's family here for them. That duty fell to me.
I thought that I should beg off in honor of the fact that Five hadn't cared for me at all, but then I remembered something I'd learned long ago. Funerals aren't for the dead. They're for the survivors. And these two people, the ones who'd been closer to Five than anyone, needed me to step up for them.
I nodded, and Lexa and Six stepped out into the main aisle to allow me to walk past them. As I did, Lexa reached out and squeezed my hand in gratitude, and that proved to be enough to steel my resolve.
I walked up to the pulpit, a massive thing of white stone on which someone had long ago carved a scene showing the signing of the Magna Carta. I ascended the stairs, and the bishop stepped back from the front of the pulpit and motioned for me to move forward.
I cleared my throat as I took the bishop's place, and the hidden microphone pickups grabbed that sound and amplified it so that it echoed along the cathedral's stone walls. I blushed as I gazed out over the small group of people assembled there for Five's funeral. Every set of eyes looked up at me, their owners ready to absorb whatever wisdom I could impart to them that might help them understand the tragedy that had taken Five from us before his time.
I spotted the Secret Service agents standing there – plus another one standing in the darkness in the cathedral's far corner. For all I knew, they had us surrounded, and at that moment I wanted little more than the thinnest excuse to chase them all out of the place with their tails between their legs.
Then I looked down at Lexa and Six, though, and I knew that I could not do that to them. They had no real idea of what Five had been wrapped up in – just that it had been bad enough to get him killed – and I didn't think they could bear having a fight break out in the middle of his funeral. No matter what else Five had done in his life, to them he'd been a loving husband and father, and that's what I needed to honor today.
I cleared my throat again and began to speak.
"I don't have anything prepared to say today," I said. "I didn't ever think I would wind up here, at this pulpit, talking to you about my great-great-great-grandson."
I faltered for a moment. I bowed my head and tried to collect my thoughts, but it was like trying to put back together a shattered vase – or to collect a dying man's last breath.
I rubbed my eyes then tried again.
"Despite the fact that he's my direct descendant and bears my name, I didn't know this Ronan Dooley all that well. It's a miracle of sorts that I was ever able to know him at all.
"When I say that, I'm not talking about the miracle of amortality. I'm speaking about the way that a family can drift apart. It's hard enough, it seems, for one generation to be able to relate to the next, so you can imagine what sort of distance the years put between me and Five, as I called him.
"I treasure the fact that I did manage to meet him and talk with him before his death. 'Untimely' is about the kindest way you can speak of his demise. I'd only just started to get to know him when he was taken from us. I'd never even talked with his father – who died several years ago – at all.
"I can't say that we reunited and it was perfect from the first word between us. More like the opposite of that. But it was something. It was a contact of some sort when we'd had none at all before. It may not have been an auspicious start, but it was at least a start.
"I do know this. From even the little time we were able to share, I know that Ronan Dooley the Fifth was a good man and that he cared for his wife and his son more than anything in the world. He and his son may not have always seen eye to eye, but that's because they both cared so deeply, each in their own ways, but always for each other.
"I only wish that he had been with us for longer."
I paused there, unsure if I should say more. But I couldn't help myself.
"People often ask me what it's like to be amortal, to know that no matter what happens, no matter what I do, I'll always get another chance. And I usually give them a pat story, something about how it's wonderful to know that I'll always live to screw it up even worse."
A few people chuckled at that. The bishop standing behind me was one of them. None of the Secret Service agents showed any emotion at all.
"But today I'll tell you the truth. It feels awful.
"It feels like cheating. It feels like someone slipped me a 'get out of jail free' card when I have to watch everyone I ever cared about get marched off to prison.
"Some people might call it survivor's guilt, sure, but it's more than that. It's the feeling I get when I look down at a casket like Five's and I can't say, 'It should have been me.' After all, I should have been dead a century ago."
I stopped for a moment there, afraid I'd been rambling. I looked down at the Bible sitting closed on the pulpit in front of me, a massive tome of gilt-edged pages bound in crinkled red leather.
It didn't have any answers for me. It never had.
I looked back up and saw Six staring up at me, holding his mother's hand as they mourned the man who had meant everything to them both. I wanted to stop there, but I knew I had to say something more.
I cleared my throat and tried again.
"When I was a boy, which was during a period you probably read about in your history books when you were in school, I complained to my father once that he wasn't being fair. 'Life i
sn't fair,' he told me.
"I thought about that for a long time. Life isn't fair. He was right about that. But I didn't understand why people used that as an excuse to make it worse for each other instead of better.
"Then I realized that complaining about it was silly, childish even. Life isn't fair. Fairness has nothing to do with life. We here, all of us, nothing is fair among us. Some of us are born smarter, some faster, some friendlier, some meaner, some wealthier, some poorer. There's no control over that. It's mostly genetics and history mixed in with a healthy dose of random chance.
"It's not about fair or unfair. It's about doing the right thing. About being good to people and making the lives of those around you not fairer but better. That's really all you can hope for out of life, no matter how long it might be.
"I know that Five spent his life trying to make things better for his wife and their son. He had ideals, and he strove to live up to them. No matter how tragically that may have ended, I respect that, and I love him for it.
"I only hope that when I finally do meet my end – and because nothing lasts forever, I someday will – I hope that someone can step up to my casket and say the same about me."
I gazed out at the people in the pews, all of them looking right back at me.
"We should all be so lucky," I said.
With that, I turned and left the pulpit. The bishop shook my hand as I headed for the staircase and gave me a friendly clap on my shoulder.
As I walked back to the front pew, I stopped at Five's coffin and placed my hand on it. I had only planned to rest it there for a second, but I found I could not leave. I stared at my hand as if it were stuck there.
Then I bowed down and kissed the coffin gently. It smelled of fresh lilies.
When I got back to the pew, Lexa and Six both hugged me, and I sat down between them. No one else got up to speak.
The bishop wrapped up the ceremony soon after that. I stood in the cathedral's entryway with Lexa and Six and helped them accept condolences from Five's friends as they left. The entire time, I felt like it should have been Five standing there at my funeral instead.
If I'd had a choice, I would have walked away, but I couldn't leave Lexa and Six there to handle this alone. When it was over, Lexa embraced me again. Then she stepped back, holding me by my elbows and looked up into my face.
"I have Ron's will," she said as she lifted the black veil from her face. "You should read it."
I waited for it to appear in my nanoserver, but she reached into her pocket and pulled out a few folded pieces of paper instead. I took them from her, feeling the smooth texture of the paper's surface in my hand.
"Should I read this now?" I asked.
She nodded, her resolve bracing her cheeks and eyes.
I unfolded the papers and scanned them. They started out with the standard stuff: "I, Ronan Dooley V, being of sound mind and body," etc. Then they segued into what he wanted to have done in the case of his demise.
None of it surprised me at first. His requests included a funeral at the National Cathedral. He gave most of his worldly goods to Lexa, with a few personal items culled out for Six. It was all as I expected, as straightforward as could be.
Then I reached my name.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
"To Ronan Dooley, Sr, I do hereby bequeath the property on Madeline Island and all of the contents therein. He is to scatter my ashes there after my cremation, and this is to be accomplished as soon as possible after my death."
I read the passage three times, just to make sure I had it right.
I gaped at Lexa and Six. "He's giving me the Shack?"
They both nodded, a ghost of a smile weakening the grief on their faces.
"I used to take Colleen and Cal up there when we were young." I thought back about the place, confused. I hadn't been there in years, and I'd even forgotten why. "I – I gave it to Cal."
"And he gave it to his son, and to his, and so on," said Lexa. She put a hand on my arm. "Now Ron would like for it to come back to you."
I turned to Six. "I can't accept this," I said. "It should go to you."
Six shook his head. "If Dad wanted you to have it, then he had his reasons." He allowed the clouds hanging over him to part just a bit. "Besides, you can give it to me in your next will."
"How long will it take for the cremation?" I asked Lexa.
She bowed her head for a moment, battling her grief. When she raised her chin, she was ready to talk about any details that I needed.
"The funeral home said they could have it done by late tomorrow," she said.
I stared down at the paper again and discovered I was smiling.
"I can't wait to get back there," I said. "It's been far too long."
Six craned back his neck to peer into the sky. "It's July. The weather there should be just about perfect. Much better than the sweaty shit we get around here."
"Ronan!" Lexa shot him an exasperated snort, but he just rolled his eyes. "Not in front of your grandpa," she said.
"I'm sure he's heard much worse," Six said.
"See," I said, "this part of family I don't miss."
Both Lexa and Six froze. Then they burst out laughing so hard that fat tears soon rolled down their flushed cheeks. I joined with them. I couldn't help it.
"That's just what Ron liked to say," Lexa said once she could catch her breath.
I sighed. "I suppose we don't just hand down our genes," I said.
Something over Lexa's shoulder caught my eye. One of the Secret Service agents was climbing into a hovercar parked on Wisconsin Avenue. Seeing that gutted the good humor I'd found right out of me.
"I'm going to leave for the Shack immediately," I said. "Can you two follow me up there once you have Five's ashes?"
"I want to go with you," Six said. "How long has it been since you've been up there? I could show you around."
I shook my head, thinking about that mysterious locked room Six had discovered. "This is something I need to do alone. We don't know everything about what Five was involved with – or who. I could be walking into a trap."
"But, Grandpa, I can help."
He seemed even more pained than he had been at the funeral. There he'd tried to keep himself together in front of all those people. Here, though, with just his mother and me around, he looked like he might crack.
Lexa wrapped an arm around him. "No," she said softly. "You can't."
He looked at her and started to protest, but she shushed him with a finger on his lips.
"No," she said, tears welling in her eyes too. "I just lost your father. I can't lose you too. It would be too much for me to take."
"It's all right," I said to Six. "I can handle this. And even if I can't, I what's the worst that could happen to me?"
Six wiped his eyes. "You could come back and not remember us at all."
The kid had a point.
"No problem," I said. "I'll back myself up before I leave."
"Promise?"
I grabbed the young man by his shoulders and put my arms around him. "Yes," I said as I kissed the top of his head. "I don't want to lose you either. I promise."
I said my good-byes then, and made my way back to my hovercar. I had it fly me back to Blair House, where the government was still letting me stay. I might have been on a leave of absence, but that didn't mean I had another place to live yet. Since I'd lost my condo in the line of duty, President Oberon had made it clear that I could stay in Blair House as long as I liked. I intended to like it for a long time.
While I was packing for the trip, Patrón pinged me. I took the call, and his image leaped into my vision. He looked both determined and flustered.
"I don't work for you anymore," I said, hoping he'd take the hint.
"I didn't accept your resignation."
"But I'm not taking your orders any more. Call it what you like."
He did not seem pleased. "I hear you might be leaving town, Ronan."
"Your agents stuck out
at the funeral like piñatas, Patrón. Didn't anyone ever tell them that eavesdropping is rude?"
I kept packing, tossing the few clothes the Blair House staff had scrounged up for me into a duffel bag I'd taken from the place's lost-and-found locker. It had been sitting there for over a decade, and the Czech diplomat it had once belonged to wouldn't miss it.
"Where are you going?"
"I'm getting the hell out of DC for a while. I've been here too long."
"Do you mean in DC or on the planet?"