RB 01 Through Flesh & Bone

by Frederick S dela Cruz

  The night of the funeral was the birth of his nightly drinking, and since then, he had never slept sober.

  Remembering his life from that time on, he saw himself trying to cope after the accident and struggling to decide whether to sell his family’s three-bedroom home in San Diego. He didn’t want to leave the memories in that house, but it was the memories that started to give him sorrow and pain, instead of the natural feelings of fondness and longing. Exasperated, he sold the house and rented this apartment in the city’s North County.

  Afterwards, he believed he could go on and start anew, but his heart did not allow it; it held on passionately to the past. At work, he saw that he could no longer focus, and as one day melted into the next, the consoling words from friends started to lose their meaning. Eventually, as he continued to struggle, kind words of support became platitudes and irritations to him that raised his anger. He remembered his deep remorse when he began to find it difficult to keep from lashing out at people who truly cared. At that time, he had said in frustration, “They just need to stop. Even if they’re concerned, I don’t want to hear it anymore! I can’t handle this anymore.”

  Then, no longer wanting to contend with the world, he decided to retreat from it and keep himself in seclusion. He remembered and relived the day when he finally walked into his apartment, somberly and in resignation, closed the door to the outside world, and then drank his bottles of alcohol until he could escape in dreamless sleep.

  After a month of never returning to work and never answering the calls from concerned co-workers, he was fired. He had never held a job since. His wife’s life insurance and the profit from the sale of his house were his only finances. They paid for the tiny apartment and for his minuscule daily needs. He didn’t know how long the money would last and never wanted to know, but he had a feeling it would soon run out.

  At the beginning of his withdrawal from the world, he used to say, “This is an extended vacation. I can refocus.” But he knew it was pathetic, because he could never refocus, and he did not wish to change. This path in his life required no planning, no thought, no effort, and more importantly no risk.

  For the past five years, he had spent every night in drunken slumber, and either the sofa or the living room floor had functioned as his bed. He would wake up the next day, mid-day, disappointed that his eyes opened yet one more time.

  The anniversaries of the passing of his wife and son were the most difficult to live through. Later, however, as the days went on, most of the pain would eventually subside, but the drinking remained.

  While the rain continued to drench the night, grief, alcohol, and sleep soon overcame him. His body slowly slumped down, fell, and then glanced off the couch. As his knees dropped, his entire body gradually slid down to the floor. There he lay, curled up and motionless.

  The next day, he woke at mid-day.

  The rain had stopped.

  On the floor and on his side, he stared at nothing in particular underneath the couch, just rarely blinking. After about fifteen minutes, he finally said, “Still alive?” Then, he raised his hands up to grasp the couch and drew himself up, limb by limb, to his feet. As his body began to move, his mind seemed to dissolve some of its sorrow from the previous night.

  With movements all mechanical and nothing at all in his thoughts, he put on some clothes, took his keys, made his way out of the apartment, and walked step by step downstairs to his car. As he started his red “65 Mustang, he gazed up at the warm sun shining through the partly cloudy sky. Then, still feeling a bit morose, he said his next thoughts, ‘Another dark day in paradise. Now, here I go in my pathetic daily routine.’

  After going to a fast food drive-thru, he then drove a short distance to Powerhouse Park beach where he parked and dashboard-dined. When done eating, he looked out to the calm waves and thought, Well, I’ve got nothing else to do. How about just staying here and watching the surfers bleed what they can from the one-foot waves? Almost cracking a grin, he said, “Now that’s cheap entertainment.”

  At night, he sat on his couch, turned on the small TV at the other side of the coffee table, and put the volume down. After popping open a can of beer, he used the coffee table to eat over, and had some leftover food. Mulling over his day, he thought, Eat…beach…grocery store. He had gone to his usual store, where he had walked his familiar path through the aisles, not wanting to look at anyone, not wanting to connect with anyone, and just picked up a pack of beer. Beer…and now this. As he stared blankly at the images on the screen, he acknowledged to himself with momentary regret, “This is me. This is me every day.”

  Later, he lay down on his couch and started to fall asleep, with the TV still on. His favorite picture of his family was facedown on his chest, and it rose and fell with the steady, strong rhythm of his lungs. His thoughts were again remembering his wife, remembering his son, and remembering what they had. Quietly, he said, “I wish we could have had so much more.” He dearly missed them, and his heart struggled desperately, unwilling to let them go.

  Before falling asleep, his last thought came to him in a whisper, “It’s been five years and a day.”

  The next morning, his mood improved significantly, and with some energy pumping through his veins, he decided to shower, shave, and cut his hair.

  After grazing his electric shaver over his neck and over his well-defined jawline, he lightly trimmed his black goatee, which could never grow thick, but he preferred it as such. Then, his piercing green eyes looked over his work. With his slim well-structured face reflecting from the mirror, he commented, “Finally, I look decent. Well, I look like a bum, but I’m a decent-looking bum.”

  Standing at maybe five-feet-ten or -eleven inches tall, he had a slim build and still had well-toned muscles. He used to question why he oddly never gained any more weight and didn’t turn soft, due to all the beer and alcohol he drank. But, he really didn’t eat much food, and eventually, he just decided to attribute it to the genes he inherited.

  He was a good-looking man, a good talker, and more importantly, a good listener. The combination of the three made him rather successful with the opposite sex. In high school and college, he was never without a date or a girlfriend. On the other hand, his college friends jeered at him for being a one-woman man.

  With his intelligence, he attained multiple college degrees, all in the sciences.

  Above all, he was faithful and trustworthy. When he had asked his wife to marry him, she had no hesitation in saying “Yes.”

  As he glanced at his hair, he couldn’t remember when he last put scissors to it, and he thought, Hmm. How long has it been since I cut my hair? Months? Or months and months? It reached down almost to his shoulders, and it was mostly black with some brown and rust colored strands. As it grew longer it began to curve and wave, and with some strands more tightly waving than others, it gave him an unkempt look.

  Teasing himself, he said, “Whoa, look at that mop.” It wasn’t that bad, but he said it anyway.

  He no longer wanted anyone to cut his hair, much less pay someone to do it. There was a time when he cared enough and tried to cut and shape his hair by himself, but it was just too difficult and too complicated.

  With certain things in his life, in order to simplify decisions, he made a point to bottom-line his options. When options were reduced to their bare essentials, it helped him un-complicate the complicated.

  Unfortunately, when it came to cutting his hair, he had at first devised an overly complicated means to a simple end. It involved two mirrors, the tilting of his head in many unnatural angles, and the requirement of eye-hand-coordination that he certainly didn’t have. Surprisingly, he had performed his hair-cutting procedure for a complete year.

  These days and this morning, he did his bottom-line haircut. With one hand, he bound together his hair, in his fist, making a ponytail. With his other hand, he then unceremoniously cut the hair just after his fist.

  Examining his image in the mirror and admiring the si
mplicity of his success, he said, “Voila! A hair perfect cut.”

  A couple of days later, he sat in the driver seat of his red “65 Mustang, with the convertible top down. It was 4:40 p.m. in the middle of autumn, and the San Diego sun was bright and warm. The sky shimmered light green with rare thin streaks of light blue.

  In San Diego’s North County, he was in a parking lot, as far away as possible from a long and narrow one-story building, from where slightly audible music played. With other cars coming in and people making their way into the building, something was about to start.

  Having felt a bit positive that day, he decided to attempt something once again, something over the years he had not been able to accomplish. I just need to get out and walk. Get out and walk, he thought, trying to coax himself out of the car. Then, he slowly moved his head down to gaze at a book on his lap, and he asked himself, “So, why can’t I do that?”

  Moments went by while he sought an answer. Finally, he said under his breath, “How about a drink first? I’m ready for a drink.” As he shook his head, his forefinger began to trace the silver letters on the title of the book.

  The earbuds from his phone were loosely in his ears, and from it, he began to listen closely to a song. As a music lover, certain songs could immediately change his mood especially when the lyrics meant something to him, like the one he listened to. Soon, its words and tone began to make him a bit pensive.

  As he paused to give himself a little more time, he looked up and breathed in the warm air. After a few moments, the sun’s heat on his face prompted his mind to draw, from deep within, a memory of when he was four years old.

  It was the only memory he had from his early childhood.

  It was a memory that allowed him - for just a moment - to escape what he had become, because in it, as a very ill child, he believed he had done something extraordinary.

  During that summer afternoon, the sun had already heated the streets. The air seemed too thin to breathe. His head was hot but his body was cold. As his panicked mother carried him in her arms, she ran hurriedly through the streets, sidewalks, and intersections. With his feet and hands hanging almost lifelessly below him, they wagged and swayed in the rhythm of his mother’s strides. Something was very wrong with him; he was weak, pale, and couldn’t stay awake.

  His mother quickly looked down at him. “Baby, wake up!” she nervously blurted. “Wake up! Wake up! Look at me! Look at me!”

  Attempting to make an effort for his mother, and with as much energy as he could muster, he took control of one arm and slowly lifted it up around his mother’s neck. Similarly, he raised his other arm, and then locked his hands together. His head still flopped down from his body, but he was able to keep his eyes open, seeing his mother’s panicked face. As faces of people flash by, he noticed they looked at him with concern.

  Now and then, his mother would abruptly slow her stride in order to ask people an urgent question, but they were unable to help her. Then, in her mind, she tried to reconstruct what she believed had happened to her child. Blaming herself, she painfully recalled, We were at the park. He was playing only a few feet away from me, on the grass. I turned away for just a second. Just a second! Then, out of nowhere, that bright light quickly covered us. As it went away, I turned to find him, but he was already sprawled out and unconscious. She was stunned and couldn’t figure out what had happened to him or from where that briefly appearing light came.

  But there was something else. With her mind going to it, she continued, I don’t know if I should call it strange or incredible or what…but I have to force myself to believe that I actually saw it. Something was there standing with him. Someone was there. At the very instant she had turned to look at her son, she had seen a shadowed being standing in the light, as if it were drawing light to itself, and then turning the light into black emptiness. Then, as the light quickly disappeared, that shadowy form vanished with it.

  Nevertheless, she found comfort and relief in being able to bring her son back to consciousness. She thought, It didn’t seem like he would ever wake up, but thank God I was finally able to have him open his eyes.

  At that moment, a mantis, in its circuitous path in the air, collided with his mother’s shoulder and rested itself there. His mother continued her frantic run, not noticing the insect as it slowly began to inch its way from her shoulder, onto his hand, then stopping on his forearm.

  The mantis was covered in a glistening light-green hardened shell, and the ends of its legs were speckled with tiny black dots. Slowly, it turned its head a quarter turn and peered its black-dot eyes into his weak and groggy eyes. With four legs gripping into his skin, its two front legs bent up towards its head, touching each other at their ends, and strangely looking as if it prayed for him.

  Feeling the pinch on his forearm, he slowly lifted his head to see what was causing the sting. He saw the mantis. Initially, it didn’t bother him; he had no strength to care. However, a few seconds later, it began to annoy him, and he wanted it gone. Feebly, he raised his head and tried to shoo it away with puffs of air from his mouth.

  Yet the insect did not move.

  Weakened, he dropped his head, while his mother continued her frantic pace.

  Moments later, not willing to give up, he lifted his head and concentrated. He furrowed his brow, wrinkled his forehead, and stared intently at his mother’s face, attempting to draw strength from her. Then, he intently focused on the mantis. With all his might, he wished the insect gone. His head stiffened and quivered, as his neck muscles tensed and tightened with energy. The temperature in his head began to rise.

  Strangely, something began to occur.

  Before he lost all consciousness, before he saw the last images of his mother’s tearful eyes darting to and fro down the street, and before the intense heat he felt in his head increased to the point at which he could no longer bear, he felt the mantis begin to lift its legs from his forearm and release itself. It had barely disengaged its pinch when he thought he saw its form change into very fine, green, swirling dust and black, misty air.

  He was losing consciousness, and his mind may have been imagining it. But he saw green and black dust swirl away across his weakened eyes as the mantis, piece by piece, disappeared.

  Suddenly, his head dropped, and his arms lost their grip from his mother. He faded away.

  Looking down, his mother lifted his head to see his face. Nervously and desperately she cried, “Baby, baby! Baby?”

  As the longhaired man lifted his head and opened his eyes to look through the car’s windshield, the memory quickly vanished. Breathing in deeply and slowly, he thought about it for quite a while.

  He wasn’t sure why that particular memory stayed with him all these years. Maybe because even though the event was seen through the eyes of a weak and almost lifeless child, in the back of his mind, he had some belief that he had made the unimaginable happen: he had made the mantis disappear.

  Now and again, just as he did this day, he used the memory as an escape, an escape from a five-year prison of his own making. It allowed him to believe that there was a time in his life when he was more than what a human being could be and more than what he had made himself to be.

  Is it possible that I could be something else? he asked himself in the solitude of his thoughts. Could I be someone else - not what I am today? Can this memory give me just a bit of hope to change what I am?

  But then, afterwards, he always retreated back into the walls of his mental cell, and he discarded the only possible hope he could hold on to. As he did, he grasped the book from his lap. It was a Bible. Gently, he set it on the passenger’s seat. Leaning back, he started the engine of the Mustang. A moment later, he began to make his way out of the church parking lot.

  He had failed once again. There was no way he would go in sober.

  As he steered away, he sighed in resignation, “I need a drink.”

  * * * * * * *

  Later that night, the sun had just set beh
ind a grocery store in the small town of Jerusalem, Indiana. Since then, a young man in his early twenties, with strong chiseled facial features, stood behind a tree across the street.

  Reaching up, he rubbed the cropped hair on his head, which if he had grown out longer, it would have shown its dusty-blond color. With his tight gray t-shirt tucked into his blue jeans, it revealed his muscular almost six-feet tall frame.

  His name was Sik.

  “This is where I need to be,” he said quietly to himself. “This is where they told me to be. And I already saw her get in. Now, I just need to wait until she gets out.”

  The particular young woman he waited for had earlier driven up alone in a sedan and parked immediately at a space closer toward the street. The sparsely staggered street lampposts shined minimal light that strained to reach her blue vehicle.

  After parking, the casually dressed woman exited her car. As she closed the door and clicked the remote to lock it, the earbud in one ear slid out of place and flopped down, becoming suspended in the air by the one inside the opposite ear. After pushing her keys into the small clutch in her hand, she lifted the earbud and put it back in place. Then, she strode forward, slightly nodding her head to the beat of a song.

  Sik patiently waited in darkness. She’ll be coming out soon, he thought, as he tried to keep himself calm. I just need to relax and wait. Everything’s already prepared.

  Moments later, the woman appeared across the distance, exiting the store with a plastic bag of groceries hanging from one hand and her clutch in the other.

  Pushing away from the tree, Sik said, coaxing himself, “Let’s go. I need to do this.” He began to stride across the street, measuring and timing their encounter.

  Casually, he hopped up from the street onto the concrete sidewalk. A few strides later, he reached the parking lot. The sound of his black boots grinding scattered dirt and dust into the warm asphalt surface reached his ears.