Or Not to Be

by Laura Lanni

  55

  Eddie: Too Late

  Anna

  My poor, sweet Eddie stands at the podium, trying to compose himself and continue speaking. He holds his head up and speaks in his calm bedside voice, as though to himself.

  “The last time I spoke to my wife, we argued. I tried to keep her from going to work. I knew she should stay home. Safe. With me. She refused.” Eddie draws in a deep breath before he confesses, “Later that afternoon, I begged Anna to come back to me, and she refused. Again.

  “On our first date, my wife Anna told me we would not be seeing each other again. I had said something stupid about her hair and hurt her feelings, and she milked me for a free steak dinner and intended to get away, to never see me again.” He shakes his head and grins. “But, somehow, I convinced her to take a walk with me. I won our first argument and lost our last. On our first date, I even got a kiss. I was in love with Anna before she knew me. I will be in love with her long after I die.

  “How is it possible to love someone before they know you? I can’t explain it to you. Not because I don’t know the answer, but because you wouldn’t understand it. But that’s okay. You don’t need to understand. I’m saying these things, in front of all of you today, but I’m not saying them for you. Not for her friends, or her family, or even for me. No, I’m saying all of this so Anna can hear me. I know she’s here with us. I know she’s watching. I don’t just believe she is, or think she is. I know Anna is here.

  “Let me tell you some things about Anna and me. We had a good marriage. She was my favorite person and best friend. Like most married people, we had problems. But unlike normal people, our problems were cyclic, and I knew why they were happening. Cyclic. Every year, at the same time, I would emotionally and physically ache—knowing that Anna might die. Knowing precisely when Anna might die. This year I was right, and it happened. But I could never explain to Anna why I was so sad and desperate, so she invented all kinds of possible scenarios to explain what she called my funk. She thought I stopped loving her. We fell apart. She fell apart, and I didn’t help her stay together. I didn’t love her like I should, not enough or well enough. I didn’t take care of her like I should have—like I promised I always would. I know she was hurt by my behavior. But I was so sad and crippled by the thought that she might leave me. I was overwhelmed. Helpless. Hopeless.

  “People say, ‘Everyone will eventually die.’ And ‘We can’t live in perpetual fear of death.’ I would answer that I have no fear of my own death. I know that death is not unpleasant, and the future of our souls, our antimatter, will be incredible. I dreaded how I could live the rest of my life without my Anna, while knowing my greatest mistake was not convincing her that I loved her, not encouraging her to live.

  “Anna, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

  Then, Eddie loses all control. He leans both hands on the podium and, elbows locked, he hangs his head and cries like a baby.

  Joey’s cleats go click-clack in the weeping church as he walks up the three marble steps to his dad. Eddie hears him and looks up as Joey takes his hand and leads him to his seat. Eddie walks in a trance, and Joey is his guide.

  I never realized we had guides in life.

  56

  Dying, Finally

  Eddie

  In the early morning on the second day of April, many decades later, I awoke with a sharp pain in my right arm. Oh, I thought, heart attack. What a cliché way to die. How clever.

  I didn’t call for help. I remained on my back and let death take me. Take me to Anna, I thought. It was an agonizing process to wait for my heart to stop, for the pain to stop, for my last breath. I was impatient to have it over so I could get on with the death I was sure to enjoy. I’d looked forward to it for too long without Anna. I expected she’d be my guide.

  While I waited to die, I flashed onto memories of my life, good times and bad. I’d helped my children survive without their mother, attended their graduations, and helped move them out of our house. I’d walked Bethany down the aisle and delivered my five grandchildren. Those were the best times. I recognized that I’d lived a good long life, yet I hadn’t done and accomplished all I’d set out to do. I’d been fearfully anticipating the fall of our country. It never happened. I never walked in fear on a city street beside Bethany. I’d never fought for her life. That future scene, which haunted me from my death, never came to pass. With so many humans making choices every minute of every day, the future I saw from the dead side was a series of what-if scenes. Not to be feared or anticipated. The one thing humans know for certain is that life is not eternal. Only death is.

  I looked forward to my final death. I let my body slowly die. Because it took a long time, the scientist in me agreed with the doctor in me that I was living in my own time hitch. If I wanted to return, I knew my body would take me back. But I knew I wouldn’t come back. Once I found her, I would never leave my Anna again.

  In the instant that I passed through my space-time gap, I was wrapped in a feeling of peace, so much like coming home. I was annoyed to find my guide was Anna’s mother.

  Not the best welcoming committee, she greeted me with, “Oh, it’s you. Hello, Mr. Ed.”

  “Dr. McElveen, you may call me Dr. Wixim.” The woman was always so crotchety to me.

  “Right, Ed. Had a good heart attack, did you?”

  “So it seems.” Could I ditch her? I didn’t need a guide anyway.

  “Can’t go back to that body—no heart, no life. You’re stuck on the dead side this time.”

  “I think you’re wrong,” I told her. “But I’m staying. No need to hash it out. I understand how things work here, so I’ll just say it: I’m ready to depart.”

  She chuckled. “Know-it-all. I know everything, and you know nothing. There was no hitch, Ed. It just took you a long time to die. No choices for you. When you die with no choices, you’re departed as soon as you arrive here.”

  “I don’t want choices. I’m done with my life. Why are you my guide?”

  “I was sent to give you the news.”

  “News?”

  “Yes, but I can’t give it until you ask The Question.”

  “I have lots of questions,” I insisted, a bit peeved by her unfriendly tone.

  “Ask the big one, Ed. We already know what it’ll be. The same one Joey asked you in the car after Anna died. Go ahead.” The bitch was gloating. Something was wrong.

  “Why isn’t Anna my guide? Where is she?” Maybe Anna didn’t want to see me, even on the dead side.

  “Anna isn’t here,” her mother revealed, somewhat gleefully.

  57

  To Be

  Anna

  The sun is coming up on a house that I don’t recognize.

  “Annie!” a woman screams. “Wake up! Oh, my God,” she wails. “No!”

  When Joey gets to her, she’s on her knees holding the tiny infant in her pink blanket.

  Every single time I watched this scene in my nightmares it was different. Sometimes, the woman was me and the baby girl was Bethany. Another time, Bethany was the mom. Every time it changed. But every single time, at the end of the dream, the baby died. There was never a thing I could do about it.

  “No!” Joe is in a rage. He pushes the woman aside and begins CPR. I watch for endless minutes as he breathes into the baby’s tiny face.

  Nothing.

  Just as expected, we’ve lost another one.

  | | | |

  The light. The bright whiteness of it. I haven’t seen this since I departed.

  A tiny soul is with me. My granddaughter. I know it’s her, and I want her to go back. Her space-time gap is still wide open. It’s a gigantic, gaping hole that delineates the link between her life and her death. I can feel it. I nudge her toward it, and she bounces back to me. She is feeling the pull of the universe to take her away.

  I wrap myself around her and give a push.

  It takes all of my energy to make her move toward the gap, but together we make some p
rogress. Then there’s a perceptible shift, and I don’t have to push anymore because she is being pulled back to her life. The attraction of her matter for her antimatter exceeds the pull of the universe once she gets close enough to the passageway.

  With a whoosh, she is gone. With another whoosh, as if the edge of a black hole had been formed to add to my momentum, I get pulled in, too.

  And then the feeling of earthly love surrounds me. I look up through the eyes of my granddaughter into the loving eyes of her father, my son.

  It is, of course, November eleventh.

  Acknowledgements

  This story was written over many years in multiple layers and would not exist without the love and support of my family and friends. My infinite appreciation goes to all of these people.

  My daughters, Lea Lanni Buck and Kate Lanni, were the first souls to whom I fearfully confessed that I’d written a novel. They were my first brave readers so many years ago that they might not remember the story. Linda Klebanow loved the story of Anna and Eddie in its rawest form and never hesitated to point out when revisions veered from the original journey, which she cherished. Meg Murphy and Jim Malone read early versions and encouraged me to revise, seek publication, and share with readers. A special group of writers at the Chapin section of the South Carolina Writers Workshop never tired of listening to chapters, queries, rejections, and offers during my rollercoaster years of submissions.

  Judy Arabian, Caryn Karmatz Rudy, and Candace Johnson all worked with me through more revisions than I’d ever imagined, and tirelessly offered insight to tighten the story, reorganize, revise, delete parts, and develop the characters.

  And finally, I thank my husband, Mike Lanni, for always supporting and believing in me, forever showing his love, and for never laughing aloud when I marched away from my writing desk and announced dozens of times that my book was finished, again.

  About the Author

  By day, Laura Lanni teaches organic chemistry and oversees her undergraduate research laboratory. When not teaching or writing, she can be found working with writers in her critique group, running, hugging her grandchildren, riding a jet-ski, blogging, and baking.

  Visit Laura’s blog at www.lauralanni.com or chat on Twitter @lauralanni.