Lives Paris Took

by Rachael Wright

  THE TROOP OF WOMEN strode through the hospital corridors quite unlike how they normally travelled. Vera, Lola, and Doris Golike were quiet; they glanced shiftily at the nurses and bit their lips in fear.

  “Do you think he’s awake?” Doris asked as they sat at the far end of the private room.

  The chairs scratched and scraped across the tiled floor as they maneuvered closer to the bed, displeased at their distance.

  “How could he not be with the racket you three make?” David quipped.

  The sisters smiled and laughed. David opened his eyes.

  Hien Due watched from across the hall. David’s visitors didn’t stay long and the patient didn’t move from his pillow. Although his sisters clutched at his hand with pleading faces, David gave them only half-smiles in return.

  “Mrs. Doris?” Hien Due called out, as the women exited the room.

  All three turned to look at him and smiled with genuine affection. Doris walked forward and grasped Hien Due’s hand.

  “I know we have you to thank for being here,” she said.

  “It is a small thing.”

  “It isn’t.”

  “He is a son to me.”

  Hien Due couldn’t remember how much he’d said this over the past few days. Only now, that David was slipping away, did he feel the weight of such love.

  “Thank you,” Doris said.

  “There is something troubling him, a secret. I must ask, has he told you what it was?”

  Hien Due grasped Doris’ hand so tight she winced.

  “No,” she said, surprised. “He’d be more likely to tell you. What secret?”

  “I don’t know; it’s something from before I met him. Maybe Paris?”

  Doris’ face fell into planes of misery. “I don’t know anything about France. No one does. He’s never spoken of it.”

  “He must speak.”

  “He won’t! Hien Due, you are closer to him than anyone. If he didn’t tell you, I doubt he will tell anyone else. It is a secret he will take to his grave.”

  “But secrets do not stay hidden. He should have the chance to tell his side of the story.”

  “David is … his own person. He’s always done things his own way. Forgive me if I seem fatalistic, but he won’t tell. Not even here.”

  “He’s going to die, Mrs. Doris.”

  Hien Due’s words may as well have been bombs from Doris bewildered expression.

  “Surely he’s–”

  “No, he’s going to die. I know this. He doesn’t care to live anymore. The disease is killing him.”

  “I wish I could do more.”

  Doris looked horrified at the thought of her brother’s death. They were the closest in age. Losing him was inconceivable.

  “Then one more time, please ask him?” Hien Due pleaded.

  Doris stared at him for a moment, and then did what neither of them could have foreseen: she walked back into the room. Hien Due watched her from the glass partition as she took David’s hand in her own, and spoke softly to him. But even as he peered in, David closed his eyes, and turned to the wall. Doris left not two minutes later.

  “I tried,” she said.

  Hien Due gazed mournfully as Doris rejoined her sisters, before they rounded the corner all three burst into wretched tears.

  “Again with the secrets,” David croaked from his bed as the older man walked back in, sighing as he took his usual seat.

  “I only want the best for you.”

  “My life has changed so much. Age five. Being put on perpetual house duty. College. Moving to France. Finding my new people,” David winked at Hien Due, “… and now here. Texas. On my deathbed. I didn’t think any of it would happen. The road twisted more times than I could see or keep track of.”

  “You must tell me. You must,” Hien Due pleaded.

  “You’ll have my effects, when it happens. Take them. Save them. If anyone comes looking for them, give them away,” David said, as though he had not heard a word the older man had spoken.

  “David, what on Earth are you talking about?”

  “Just do what I ask, please. It’s not much.”

  The two men surveyed each other. David thought about how very much alike they must look now. Backs curved with age and disease. Heads both a clear, clean shock of white. Lines of care about the eyes.

  David stared until Hien Due nodded slowly and minutely. It wasn’t another moment before David closed his eyes, and asked to be left alone. The doctors wandered the corridors, making their rounds.

  A Dying Day

  DAVID’S WEARY HAND MOVED across a sheet of paper, covered in an unsteady writing. The plastic tubing of the IV caught on the side of the hospital bed. He tugged to free it and cocked his head to look out of the window. Dark fell with indecent haste as the red leaves on the trees rippled and twisted in the breeze.

  He turned back to the letter. A gurgling rose in his throat and a hacking cough tore its way out of his body. The fit tossed him forward and back, untill he was little more than a rag doll in its clutches. With a thud he fell against the bed, sweat beaded on his forehead and dripped into his eyes.

  The paper was wrinkled from the fit. He sighed, flattened it, and began to write again. Shoulder length strands of pure white hair fell across his face and obscured his vision. The mottled hand holding the pen shook and the letters became illegible. He wrote the last lines, frowning, his face the same color as the flimsy sheets.

  I was wrong, forgive me, if you can.

  His tongue shot out to flick over parched lips as he clumsily folded the letter into an envelope. Thus finished, he laid back and stared unseeing at the beige walls of the room. The hospital trundled on, nurses ran hither and thither while doctors sauntered from one room to the next.

  He was a pale man with overlarge eyebrows, ears that stuck out from his head, and a thick square jaw. He closed his greying eyes, massaged the crater where his right arm used to be, and forced his mind not to dwell on death. It was all around him in this stagnant room. It lay across everything like a layer of snow. It was death, which rose regrets from their long graves, casting off the layers of years, which covered them. Regrets, like a disease, chipped away at his mind, and turned every good memory sour.

  The door opened with a whine.

  “David, how are you this evening?” A fresh-faced doctor stood on the threshold. The preppy air of an Ivy League education soured the room.

  “Fine.”

  “It looks like the nurses have increased the dose of morphine,” he says, checking the line of the IV.

  “Yes.”

  “It won’t be long now.”

  “Won’t be long for what?”

  “I apologize, that was,” the doctor said, backing up and tripping.

  “I need to send a letter. Its urgent.” David motioned to the envelope on his bedside table.

  “Let me finish my rounds. I’ll get someone in here to post it for you.”

  “You don’t understand, I don’t know her address. I need help.”

  “Of course, of course, Mr. Golike,” he said with a blank smile and slunk from the room.

  David looked at the white envelope. A smile flitted across his face as the memories assailed him. It was just as autumn touched Paris and the first of the leaves had started to change, draping the Seine and Versailles and the cobblestoned streets in reds and orange and green. Great clouds rolled across the sky, carrying the city smells away on the wind. It was then that he met her, touched her cheek, and smiled at the wideness of her brown eyes. And the feel of her hand in his … she was close–so close. Now, at the end of his life, after so many years working to forget her, she came. Her memory so strong she might be sitting in the uncomfortable and worn leather chair in the corner.

  David’s eyes popped open. Paris was gone. A quiet breeze trickled through the room, a rush of wings, fluttering the blue privacy curtain. The heart rate monitor angrily beeped faster and faster. In the far corner of the room, someone smiled
at him: a man with a familiar smile and twinkling eyes.

  “Father?” David whispered and reached out.

  In a moment, misery and pain left his face. He smiled and sunk into the warmth swirling around him and the breathless feeling of a galloping heart. It was quick, the sigh, and the last breath. The easiest he had ever taken. He fell, through time and space, and landed with a muffled thump on the pillow, his hand mere inches from the letter.

  “Alright, Mr. Golike. Let’s work on that letter,” the doctor said, pushing his way into the room, his gaze intent on the brand new clipboard in his hand.

  The smile dropped off of his face, like honey from a spoon. The arm flung off the bed. A small, boyish grin played on the cracked lips. The long incessant tone of the monitor. He blinked. Blinked again.

  And there it was, a white envelope lying innocently next to the dead man. Unaddressed.

  THE COFFIN CARRYING THE remains of David Golike, the body decayed beyond the horror inflicted in his last days, wound its way through the streets of Bunker Hill. The hearse bumped over and across a leaf choked parking lot. Cars lined both sides of the road for a mile. The doors to the school were hung with black ribbons, tied into bows. Six men, clad in black, with bowed heads, stood outside the brick building, their black coats swaying in the wind. Each face mirrored the next, masks of pain.

  The hearse stopped; gravel splaying out as the tires ground to a stop. The air was crisp, the surrounding trees shook in the wind as their last remaining leaves shuddered at their moorings. The six men, who resembled the dead man in so many ways, moved forward. The doors of the vehicle opened to reveal a simple pine box. With linked arms, they raised the coffin, hoisted it on their shoulders, and took a hesitant step.

  Their heel strikes echoed across the courtyard like some pitiful farewell salute. They walked through the hall, turning at a doorway where a bated silence awaited them. With reverence, they placed the coffin on a waiting table.

  One man did not retreat to a seat. He was less tall than the others with greying hair that was parted and combed to the left, his ears stuck out from his head. He walked to the podium with heavy steps, tears upon his kind and honest face. It was the kind of face that, upon looking at it, one couldn’t help but smile. It was an open honest face that promised a world where nothing bad ever happened and love would never die. But somehow death had come to this face. The blue eyes were red. The long, thin lips were pressed together to stop their shaking.

  “Good afternoon,” he said.

  The listening crowd had literally squashed into the gymnasium of the elementary school. It was so full that the closest row sat only a foot away from the coffin. Row upon row of chairs stretched out beyond, filled with many a mournful face. Others stood at the back, shuffling from foot to foot.

  “We have come together this day to remember the life of David Golike. There is no one who would be more surprised than David to see the number gathered here. I am Delbert, one of David’s older brothers, and was I asked to speak today on behalf of our family.

  “In 1939, David was taken to a hospital to have his arm amputated. An aggressive form of cancer had ravaged it. As we waited, my family and I, we never thought we’d see him again. The surgery was risky even if he survived it was likely he wouldn’t see another five years. Cancer was an enigma, and usually a death sentence. Miraculously, David lived. He came home. Our mother refused to leave his bedside for weeks, checking on him minute after minute to make sure he was still breathing.

  “David lived far beyond those five years. He did far more than anyone expected. Seeing him, you’d never imagine that he was anything less than capable. He was immensely talented, intelligent, and had a beautiful voice. While his life did not take him into missions work, as so many of ours did, he was of immense service to the community. Mai?” Delbert said, motioning for a young woman in the second row to come forward.

  She smiled. Mai’s hair was longer than when David had left and her face thinner. She slid quietly out of her seat as Delbert took his.

  “Good afternoon. November is the time of preparation for Thanksgiving and the arrival of winter,” she said. “We get ready for Christmas. It is a time of cheer, of expectation, and of family gathered close. November holds much the same feeling for me. I was once a simple, ordinary member of the Vietnamese community in Bunker Hill.

  “Our community had no teachers. To say it was difficult for our elders, our parents, even the children to learn English properly is a gross understatement. We could not communicate, and we felt the divide between our white American neighbors and us. Our wonderful Hien Due, he did what he could for us.

  “He opened The Center, which gave us a focal point where we might help each other. But we were in need of more help than even he could give. Then Mr. David came. He was our white horse–our knight. I have counted two hundred gathered here today, a small fraction of those who can read because of him, who have burgeoning careers because of him, and who, like me, have college degrees because of him.

  “One November, a few years ago, I was destitute. I was behind on my tuition bill at community college. I worked so much I never had time to study. My grades dropped. I told David. He said, “Mai, quit your job. Only by finishing college will you truly be able to take care of your family.” It took me a week to work up the courage to do so. The next day I found all my bills were paid and so was the last year of school. It was an anonymous donor. This donor told only one other person what he did. He said that he did not wish me “to feel indebted or obligated in any way.

  “This anonymous donor was David Golike. But David went further than paying for my education. He set up a scholarship fund with his own savings. It was money he had accumulated from the fees we paid for lessons. On a November day, an ordinary day, my life changed. David changed it. I thank you for your brother, for your uncle, for your cousin.”

  Mai took a step back, and turned slowly in the direction of the Golike family. She looked on the faces of his brothers and sisters with their freely flowing tears. She looked back at her own family, each face heavy with sorrow. She looked down at the casket, at David’s shock white hair, at his kind pale face, and the boring black suit he would have hated. She looked back at the family, and gracefully sank into a bow to them.

  Mai shuddered. Across the room, mouths hung open. She cleared her throat once more, shaking with sobs and bowed once more in the direction of the casket.

  “I honor you, David.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  Rachael - May 2017

  WE WENT TO THE opera one evening, Jared and I, as my late birthday present: Georges Bizet’s Carmen. I hadn’t opened the email. I languished in my inbox, under promotional emails and coupons for photo books. From the moment the music started and the peals of music and laughter rolled into our box seats, I couldn’t help but imagine David and Catherine. I wasn’t sure whether it was the pain of knowing what David and Catherine had lost or the pain evoked by the opera, but a heavy cloud settled over me. I ran my fingers over the black stones on my embroidered gown and my mind circled the unopened email like a vulture.

  When the curtain fell for intermission, I flung myself out of the seat and whispered “bathroom” before I hiked up my dress and joined the ever-growing line for the ladies’. The other women looked sideways at me as I stood in line, trying not to shift from leg to leg. Everyone hurried out as quickly as they could, so as to take advantage of the cocktails being served outside. When my turn came, I locked the door and pulled my phone out of the minuscule clutch my motherin-law had purpose bought me.

  The email was right where it was supposed to be. I looked down. A sense of change flew over me. The voices of the preening women beyond the door faded away. I tried to read slowly, so that the words might sink in.

  Here is literally the very first email and her reactions to finding about her father.

  I informed her of his death in 1988

  -Rick Golike

  Underneath Rick’s opening l
ine was:

  Je vous remercie pour votre réponse. Je vous prie de m’excuser de ma réponse tardive mais votre message était noyer au milieu d’autre courrier publicitaire. C’est en faisant le ménage dans ma boîte que je l’ai enfin trouvé. Je ne sais pas quoi penser de cette nouvelle j’ai passé des années à me demander comment faire pour le retrouver, quoi lui dire… je reprendrai sans doute plus tard contact avec vous. Pouvez-vous me dire où il a été enterrer? S’il a été marié ou s’il a eu des enfants?

  Merci pour ces informations. J’ai une foule d’autres questions dans lesquelles je dois mettre bonnes ordres.

  Dans l’attente de votre prochain message…..

  Zoya

  I cursed my very unwelcome lack of French. I opened a translation app and copied the text. The moments passed slowly. Toilets flushed. Taps ran. Paper towels dispensed. And then silently, without any fanfare, the translation appeared underneath.

  Thank you for your answer. Please excuse me for my late reply but your message was drowned amidst other advertising mail. It’s doing the housework in my inbox that I’ve finally found it. I do not know what to think of this news, I spent years wondering how to find it, what to say … I probably will resume contact with you later. Can you tell me where he was buried? If he was married or had children?

  Thanks for this information. I have a host of other issues I have to put in order.

  In anticipation of your next message…

  Zoya

  It was rough, the translation, but in the text, I read Zoya’s disbelief. The quiet sadness. The pain. The slim hope that she might have half-siblings out there in the world. I shut off the phone. Left my stall. Dutifully washed my hands. Ascended the stairs–dress pulled up. I found Jared standing off to the side of the bar with two glasses of red wine in his hands.

  He offered one to me. I took it, in a daze.

  “What’s wrong?” he said. He looked as though he was afraid it wasn’t the time to interrupt.

  “It has to be to her,” I gasp.

  “What?”

  “The letter David wrote…it’s not to Catherine. There’s a line: ‘… I shall go to my grave remembering that for the smallest moment I did have you and that in that moment we were together,” I said. “‘The smallest moment,’ he doesn’t mean Catherine. A decade isn’t the smallest moment. It has to be her.”