Smoke and Mirrors

by Lillian T. MacGowan

  “I don’t fucking care. Cook fucking snails if you want. I don’t. Fucking. Care.” His face split into a giant ridiculous grin.

  “Will you eat them?”

  “If you want me to.”

  Naim trembled, thinking back to the night of their first real conversation when he’d mortified himself by telling Deck he needed a gag, and then decided that his mind had come unglued and he was entirely mad when Deck fist-bumped him.

  He had indeed, he concluded, gone entirely mad. He sighed out a breath, his eyes huge, and he shrugged. “Okay.”

  “Okay?”

  Naim nodded, terrified and a little dizzy and bone-jarringly happy. “Okay.” He looked at Deck, kneeling on the floor on the other side of the coffee table. “You can’t bring the grandpa chair though.”

  Deck leaped over the coffee table, flung himself onto Naim, and they didn’t finish their dinner for another two hours.

  Chapter Fifteen

  February 14th

  The snow came heavily again. Four inches had fallen overnight, and the clay-colored sky softened and blurred the world. The drifts fell, building silence upon silence, trying not to disturb the muffled peace they’d created throughout the long winter night. The ground gave way under his feet as he walked off the road, his boots sinking into the spongy grass and earth beneath the snow. Everything looked ghostly; crystalline snow reflecting the ashy sky and settling gently on the gray stone wings of the angels and weeping effigies all around him.

  There wasn’t another living soul in sight, and he was grateful for the silence and solitude. He walked slowly, feeling the peace and thinking of the days like this, many years past, when they would wrestle and play and leave sopping, muddy trails from the front of the small house, roughhousing their way to the kitchen, frozen red hands grabbing for mugs of the cheap, instant cocoa their father or uncle made for them.

  He would still only allow himself to remember when he was alone, and today he needed to remember, so he needed this isolation. He couldn’t bring anyone with him to this place, not yet. Not today.

  He cut across the winding road, seeing that glaring, stark black, nestled back under a skeletal and snowy leafless tree at the top of a small rise in the rounded field of the dead. He stopped for a few seconds, then approached, mournful and heavy, the tears rising as he got closer.

  “Hey.”

  He wiped snow off the top of his brother’s plain black headstone with bare, frozen hands, his throat aching and tight. It had been since he got up this morning.

  “I brought you something.” He reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a wad of paper napkins. “Bosko made cupcakes.” He snorted sadly as he unwrapped the bundle. “I know you know that. Probably been laughing your ass off about it.” He placed an angel food cupcake on top of the headstone. “Asshole,” he muttered.

  “Figured you’d…I dunno. Want one.” He let the tears fall.

  He felt Adam’s presence, and his laughing mockery.

  “Look, I know a fucking bird or squirrel or something is gonna fucking eat it. I’m not totally fucking nuts,” he grumbled at the headstone, crouching and wiping snow from the letters of Adam’s name. He ran his cold fingers along the engraving, feeling the permanence of it, his baby brother’s name and his death, carved into stone.

  “But it’s angel food. Ya know?” He sniffled loudly, his face contorting with the effort not to sob. He fell more than sat into the cold snow covering the grave.

  This was the sixth time he’d done this. He never came to the cemetery but for Adam’s birthday and…that other day. It hurt too much, too hard. But today belonged to Adam, and Deck would spend it with him. He reached into his pocket again and pulled out a simple blue candle and a packet of matches. Kneeling above the headstone, his body blocking the light wind, he placed the candle into the cupcake and lit it.

  Snow glinted against the flame, and it danced against the soft flurry but stayed lit. Deck stared into the small yellow fire and helplessly saw another fire in his mind’s eye.

  Lying on his back where Adam had thrown him to the floor, watching the savage red and orange demon explode out of the doorway, and Adam just…disappeared. Swallowed alive and whole by the fire.

  His memory from that moment on never fully returned to him. He remembered screaming, but it may not have been him. He remembered Keller shouting and pulling at him, pounding at the flames in his hair, trying to shove his helmet on and his rebreather back onto his face. He remembered carrying the black, flaking body out of the building and refusing to let go.

  He remembered the smell of roasting meat.

  And he remembered his little brother, charred and unrecognizable, the plastic of his helmet cover half melted onto the crumbling coal that had once been his face. A few tufts of blond hair, liquefied, then solidified into cotton, stuck to his head. He didn’t know how it got there, but months later, he’d found a small cluster of the distorted parody of his dead brother’s hair in a pocket of his turnout coat.

  It now lived in the soft leather pouch that Adam had tooled for him after their father died, meant to keep Dad’s wedding ring; one of the few remains that had been found of him weeks after the Ground Zero cleanup.

  Dad had given Adam their mother’s engagement and wedding rings when he turned eighteen, telling him they were to be used when the time came, but only for a woman who deserved him. Deck had smiled and teased him.

  Seven months later, when they found Dad’s remains—a few bones, pieces of his uniform, and his gold leaf badge—they’d also, miraculously, found the wedding ring that he still wore, over fifteen years after his wife’s death. Deck had intended to bury it all, feeling a sense of relief that they could now properly grieve.

  But Adam had taken the ring without his knowledge, had it cleaned and the engraving inside recarved, having been worn smooth by their father’s thick, strong hands. After the funeral, they’d stood alone, not far from where Deck now sat, and Adam presented the ring to Deck along with the hand-tooled pouch. “When the time comes, you should use this,” he’d said. “But only for a guy that deserves you.”

  They sat together, here in this same cemetery, on top of their parents’ graves, in the cool October air, Deck’s strong arm around Adam’s shoulder, and they wept together.

  Now, today, Adam should be twenty-eight. He should be a lot of things, Deck thought, as he wept openly, still mesmerized by the tiny candle.

  He should be alive.

  “Fucking asshole,” Deck muttered gruffly, wiping at his cold, wet face, crossing his legs, and leaning on his knees, his jeans already wet from the snow.

  He looked to the right, to the gravestone over his parents’ remains, as though searching for some kind of agreement. He turned away after a few seconds, unable to look at their names for long. The guilt and shame of having let them down so terribly made it difficult to talk to them. He’d made it his willing responsibility to mind Adam; particularly in a job Dad had never been fully convinced Adam was cut out for, and his stupid mistake had got his brother killed.

  “Shoulda’ been me, fucker.” His voice cracked. “I fucking told you to stay the fuck behind me.” He raised his voice, needing to hear himself in the silent snow. He heard Adam laugh and call him an asshole. He saw Adam’s rich hazel eyes twinkling, never quite serious as he shook his head at his pathetic, sniveling brother.

  “I know,” he argued. “I know you thought you could handle it, but you were fucking wrong, weren’t you! ’Cause you’re fucking dead now.” He breathed heavily against the growing hysteria, trying to calm the trembling and choking in his chest, and turned silent for a few minutes, still watching the candle burn.

  “Sorry,” he mumbled, remorseful and wiping at tears. “I’m sorry.” He did this every time. He came to visit Adam’s grave on his birthday and that other day, but he just ended up yelling at him, angry and broken by regret.

  He took another deep breath and rubbed at the scar on his chest, sore, still adjusting to n
ormal activity again.

  “D’ja see what happened to me?” he asked, scooping snow from the bottom of the gravestone. “Gotta pipe through me. Fucking impaled.” He snorted a watery laugh. “That was nuts.” He made a snowball and fiddled with it.

  “Kinda turned out okay though.” He laughed sadly again. “But you know that already.” He gave the silent, carved name a wry look and blinked at more tears.

  “I hope you like him.” He looked at the headstone from under lowered eyes, and the candle flickered in the breeze. He heard Adam laugh again. “I know you like him.” His voice cracked.

  It was hard to talk. His throat kept closing, and he coughed against the thick, solid lump.

  “I…I’m gonna give him Dad’s ring. Ya know?” He slumped and fiddled with the snowball, smiling a little, feeling his brother’s approval. “Not yet…not…ya know.” Deck sighed, trying to loosen his cramped chest, and it only caused more tears. “But someday.” He nodded at the black stone.

  Deck dropped the snowball and began picking at his fingernails, his hands raw and red and wet. “He’s great.” He glanced up, speaking to Adam’s name, feeling him in his head and heart, choking on the need to actually hear his voice and his laugh. “He’s fucking amazing.”

  He felt Adam laughing at him again. “Hey, fuck you,” he mumbled. “I know. I know. I shouldn’t have made fun of you.”

  Adam had fallen in love twice a month, every month, beginning when he was thirteen, and Deck had mocked him relentlessly. “How the fuck was I supposed to know.” He paused and looked away. “I’m an asshole, right?”

  Silence fell again. Deck looked up at the sky, snowflakes drifting soft and sharp into his hot, swollen eyes. It felt good, so he looked down again.

  Adam had always told him, “Just wait. Just you fucking wait, asshole. Someday, some dude is gonna fall out of the sky, outta fucking nowhere, and he’s gonna fucking own you like a dog. Just wait, fucker. Watch how hard I laugh.”

  Deck looked at the stone again and blinked, surprised. “Did…” He gave his brother’s name a suspicious look. “Did you have something to do with this?” He squinted, and the candle flickered lightly. He breathed, his expression once again collapsing into grief.

  He probably did. It was something Adam would do.

  Deck picked at his fingers again. After a minute he remembered something. “Freya says hi. And happy birthday.” His chest crawled into his throat, and it closed more, and he had to release the sob.

  “I miss you.” He started to weep heavily. “I just fucking miss you,” Deck sobbed, clenching his fists. “All the fucking time.” He spoke like a child, confused and afraid of the world. “I keep thinking…like…you’ll come back, ya know? Like, eventually it’ll have been long enough, and you’ll come back.” Tears and snot froze on his face, just like it did every year on this day, and he knew it would never change, and his brother was dead and gone and never coming back.

  He sat with his head in his hands and wept for a long time.

  The falling snow lightened, and he thought how badly he wanted Naim to be with him right now. He didn’t care if Naim saw him like this, crying and heaving like a blubbering infant. Naim knew. He understood, and he’d hold Deck and cry with him. But he’d felt guilty and told him not to come. Deck didn’t deserve comfort in this place; where his disappointed parents lay, and his brother rotted in the ground because Deck was stupid and careless. And Adam deserved to have him to himself on his birthday. Naim understood that too, as much as he hated it.

  He lifted his head slowly and wiped at his face, forgetting the napkins in his pocket, smearing snot on his coat sleeve and his jeans.

  He took a deep breath, always conflicted and torn between feeling that he owed it to Adam to hate himself and knowing Adam wanted him to be happy. He tried to explain, suddenly afraid that Adam would be offended by Naim not coming to see him on his birthday.

  “He asked,” Deck said thickly. “He wanted to come. He really did.” He wiped at his nose again. “That was me. I told him not to. ’Cause I knew, ya know, I knew he’d end up being here for me. I didn’t think that was right.” The candle burned low.

  “I didn’t tell him at first.” He couldn’t look at the gravestone, ashamed that he’d kept this day from Naim. That he was too selfish and too much of a coward to share Adam’s birthday when it was the least Adam deserved. “Then he asked me about Valentine’s Day and all that shit. Like if we were supposed to do some big romantic thing.” He tried to breathe again, snorting at his stuffed nose, and looked at his hands. “I felt shitty. ’Cause he should have that. He should have all that romantic shit, ya know. He deserves it.” He stopped for a long moment.

  “So I felt shitty,” he repeated, still looking at his hands.

  After a minute, he looked at the stone again. “But he knows shit,” Deck told his brother. “Like, he knew something was up. All I said was that we never really did Valentine’s Day, and he gives me that fucking look, all ‘tell me your shit, asshole.’ So I told him. Ya know, just that it was your birthday.” Deck glanced over at their parents again and then looked back. “He knew, right away. Just said, ‘Can I come with?’”

  He thought for a while, smiling sadly to himself. “But you know all that.” He paused and considered the way he spoke with Adam every single day.

  “You can either hear me and see me, or you can’t. It’s not like it’s just here. I dunno why I…” He always spoke to Adam in a different way at his grave. Telling him stories, giving him news, sharing the act of being alive with him. He didn’t know why; it really wasn’t any different from the way he talked to him everywhere else. “That’s weird, right?” he asked the cold, black marble. “Like it makes a difference just because your body…you’re buried here.”

  Deck turned his head and looked at the stretch of grave behind and beneath him. “Is that rude?” He looked up at the sky, glanced at his parents again, then turned back to the stone, the name and the cake and candle. “That I’m like, sitting on you? I hope that’s not rude. I like sitting here. I dunno… I’m fuckin nuts, right?”

  He sat in silence for a minute. Helpless and lonely.

  “Hey, ya know what’s crazy?” He smiled. “Freya said if me and Naim wanna have a kid, she’d do it. How fucked up is that.” He laughed and shook his head, hearing Adam chuckle as well. “It’s kinda cool, but ya know, it’s Freya. Kid’d have enough problems with me as a dad. Its first word’ll be ‘fuck’ one way or the other, won’t it.”

  The sky grew darker. They forecast more heavy snow, and Naim had fretted about him driving, afraid he wouldn’t focus. He’d offered to drive and wait in the car, but Deck wouldn’t allow it. “I don’t care if he sees me cry, ya know? And I need him. I really, really need him.” He sighed. “I just…I want him here, and I know he’d…he’d… I’d feel better if he was with me, but I think it would hurt him, ya know?” He shifted, bending his knees and wrapping his arms around them.

  “You know what I mean. You know about him.” His voice cracked, harsh and very sad again. “You know what he’s lived through. All the shit he lives with.”

  A car sounded in the distance, the engine catching, tires crunching in the snow, someone leaving a loved one behind, going back to life and the living.

  “I don’t want him to feel like he has to comfort me. I know that’s part of it all, this relationship shit. We’re supposed to do that for each other but…well, you know about Étienne too, I guess.” He paused and breathed heavily. “He’s just had too much. More than anyone’s fair share of shit. I don’t wanna…” Adam knew. He didn’t have to finish his thoughts if he couldn’t.

  “I don’t wanna fuck up again.” The tears returned, fast and hot, and slid down his face, stinging. “I don’t wanna let him down like I did with you.” The candle started to sputter, and snow dusted the cupcake, oddly beautiful over the stark white frosting and soft, delicate cake.

  Deck watched the candle and made Adam’s birthday wish f
or him, the same one he made every year when he did this. “I wish you can hear me.”

  A soft, cold wind dried the tears on his face, and the candle smoked out.

  Naim couldn’t sit still, anxious and afraid for Deck. Deck hadn’t slept well the night before, and Naim had been helpless to do anything but hold him and talk nonsense. He’d asked if it was like this every time, and Deck said no, that he didn’t have Naim before. Then he smiled. But Naim didn’t buy it. He knew Deck wanted to keep him from worrying and feeling sad for him. It frustrated the hell out of him, but he knew he couldn’t blame Deck. He’d done the same and worse.

  When he’d left a few hours ago, Naim begged him to be careful and only drive with a clear head. He told Deck to call or text, and he’d come get him if necessary. Deck agreed, thinking it a compromise since he wouldn’t let Naim drive him. But Naim knew better than to believe he’d actually do it.

  So he called Liebgott, then Peyton, and finally, out of sheer desperation and the inability to just sit and wait, he called Freya. They all told him the same thing. Let it go. Deck had been to the cemetery five times since Adam’s death, and he came back each time, and life went on. They all understood and handled Naim’s anxiety with kindness, sad in their own right for the loss of their friend, and Naim apologized, feeling shittier with each phone call.

  He thought maybe he could make dinner—something Adam would have liked. Maybe Deck would appreciate that, but Freya told him not to, that Deck tended not to have an appetite on these days, and that would only make him sadder. Of course it would, Naim replied to her, apologizing again and wanting to chew his tongue out of his head. She laughed quietly at him and told him to cut that shit out. His concern for Deck and his anger at himself grew exponentially as he realized that was the only time she swore throughout their entire conversation. Freya hadn’t said fuck once, and it sent him into both a panic and a shame spiral. He hated himself more for intruding upon her grief, thanked her, then sat on the balcony and chain-smoked, waiting to see Deck’s car and mentally abusing himself.