Halfway Down the Stairs

by Gary A Braunbeck

It takes Mom two hours and seventeen minutes to die. It is slow and painful to watch, but you never once look away.

  When it is over and everyone begins to leave, you are the one who closes her eyes the rest of the way.

  You wait until you are alone in the room with her, then lean down and kiss her. “I will miss you every day for the rest of my life,” you say. “I loved you, Mom. I’m sorry for every bad thing I ever said to you. I’m sorry for all the times I forgot to do something for you, for all the times I could have called you but didn’t, for every time you felt lonely and forgotten. Is that all right? Is it all right for me to say these things to you? It’s just the two of us now, so I think it must be all right.” Then something small bursts inside you and you’re crying again. “I’m sorry I wasn’t a better son, a better man, a better husband and father. But Lisbeth and Eric, they gave you two wonderful grandchildren, didn’t they? And they never let them ride their bikes too far from the house, you can count on that. They never get so busy with work that they just tell their kids it’s okay, ride wherever you want, it’ll be fine. They never do that. They never leave the bottle of prescription sleeping pills setting out open so that their Dad can sneak them into the toilet at the nursing home. They never will. They’ll never disappoint you. Never.

  “I have to go now, Mom, because there’s a lot to do for your funeral. But I just wanted you to know that I always had the best intentions. In my heart, I always meant well. I love you. You should rest now, you’ve earned it.”

  You make sure no one is watching from outside, and you observe the moment as it passes; you can do this now, because the outcome is given. You move to one of the corners, and you take something, and then you leave.

  Warm Fingers smiles sadly at you as you walk past the desk. She looks like she might cry herself. You wish she’d touch you again. Warm Fingers would forgive you all your trespasses and mistakes. Warm Fingers would understand.

  * * *

  You park outside your house and see that all the lights are on. You look up at the windows and see the Guests moving around. One of them is playing the stereo. NIN. “Head Like A Hole.” Too loud for this hour.

  You smoke three cigarettes before going inside. The Guests don’t like it when you smoke inside, and you are nothing if not a gracious host.

  They’re all waiting for you when you come inside. All of them have their props at the ready. None of them speak to you now. They never talk to you when you’re here, only when you’re gone, only when you’re performing a duty like the one tonight.

  One of them comes up to you, empty-handed. He’s the new one. The one behind him, he arrived the day you buried Dad. His is the face you wore the night you walked out of the nursing home knowing what Dad intended to do with those pills.

  Lurking in a corner near the stereo is another guest. He showed up the night your ex-wife came over after little Andrew’s funeral to slap you in the face yet again. You had been brewing water for tea and after she slapped you, you pushed her away and she fell against the stove and spilled the scalding water all over her arm. This Guest is holding the boiling kettle and wears the face you wore that night. Just like all of them. Wearing the faces you happened to have on when committing your trespasses.

  The new Guest is still standing there, holding out his hand. You reach into your pocket and remove the coiled ventilator tube. He takes it with a smile and points to the chair. You remove your coat and sit down.

  Other guests—the one who arrived after you had that brief affair with that temp before Andrew was born, for instance—bind your wrists and ankles to the chair.

  The music changes. The James Gang. “Ashes, the Rain and I.” The saddest song you’ve ever heard. It’s important that you have sad music now.

  One Guest has the pills. One the boiling water. One has the dart you stuck Johnny Sawyer with when you were six and you got mad because you thought Johnny was cheating.

  There are pins. And burning cigarettes. And pieces of broken glass.

  You wish you didn’t remember what every last one of these items means, but you do, you remember so very, very clearly.

  The phone rings. No one moves to answer it.

  The answering machine picks up, gives its banal greeting, then a beep. A woman says your name. Her voice is soft and warm, just like her fingers. “This is Daphne. I’m the nurse who gave your mom the shots today. Listen, we’re never supposed to do this—call patients’ families personally like this—but, well...I just wanted to make sure you were all right. You didn’t look good when you left and I was...oh, okay, I was worried. I hope you’re not angry. I just thought that maybe you, y’know...needed to talk to someone. So I was wondering...”

  Joe Walsh’s voice drowns out the rest of the message. You almost smile. Maybe after all of this is over—a few weeks or however long it takes for you to heal this time—maybe you’ll give her a call. Warm Fingers would be sympathetic. Warm Finger would listen. Warm Fingers would understand and squeeze your hand.

  The new Guest stands in front of you, reaches out, and forces your mouth open. He has lubricated the ventilator tube with Vaseline. You remind yourself that it’s important to swallow as the tube goes down. You just hope the Guest with the boiling water remembers his proper place in line.

  You open wide your mouth and close your eyes. It is important for a Good Boy to remember things. Remembering, that’s a duty, as well.

  And you are nothing if not dutiful.

  Nothing at all.

  All Over, All Gone, Bye-Bye

  Thus let me live, unseen, unknown;

  Thus unlamented let me die;

  Steal from the world, and not a stone

  Tell where I lie.

  —Alexander Pope, “Solitude”

  There should have been more left once the children were gone, more than just empty bedrooms, broken toys discovered in the back of closets, the occasional pair of gym socks or pantyhose found hiding under furniture, collecting dust like the little ones used to collect dolls or model cars.

  There should have been more, but Frank and Mary quickly discovered otherwise. The children were gone and they were alone for the first time in thirty years. Their conversations were short; too short. Their eyes didn’t meet as much as they once had. Frank cleared his throat a lot in order to break the silence and often read the same newspaper page three times in a row because he couldn’t think of anything else to do. Mary kept telling herself there was a ton of laundry and cleaning to do because she was used to working from morning till bedtime, but the truth was that hardly any of it needed doing.

  Not now.

  Now that the children had left.

  Always smiling, never any tears as they hauled themselves and their stuff out the door.

  All over.

  All gone.

  Bye-bye.

  Frank tried taking up a hobby, but found he hadn’t the patience for anything that demanded he sit still for more than twenty minutes at a time.

  Mary joined a card playing club but the women in the group were always talking about their own children and how proud they were of them and took care not to ask Mary about hers because it was common knowledge that Mary’s children never wrote or visited and seldom called. She quit going after three weeks. The other women were too obviously being courteous to her.

  And so they were alone for the first time in thirty years, not knowing what to do or say because they’d rarely spared any thought for themselves; the children had been their pleasure and their purpose.

  The rooms of the house should have grown larger but they didn’t. Frank took to opening the windows even in cold weather; the place was too stuffy. Mary took to watching television in the mornings before working on her latest cross-stitch project for an hour, then she cleaned for two hours before preparing lunch, then it was her daily walk around the neighborhood before it was time to start dinner; later, after the dishes were washed and put away (a task both she and Frank performed, taking as much time as possible) she
would return to the television and watch her evening programs until sleep claimed her.

  Then one afternoon, struck by a now rare desire to rearrange one of the old rooms, Frank discovered something from his days as a younger man. He showed it to Mary.

  For the rest of that afternoon and well into the evening they sat at the kitchen table recalling all the old memories they’d shared many times before, never embellishing them for each would know if the other was fibbing, and it should have been a fine time for them, talking about the old days while eating popcorn and drinking coffee (Mary) and beer (Frank was a devout Blatz man), but their words rang hollow, their eyes met too rarely, and when Frank reached over to take Mary’s hand it was more the gesture of a drowning man clutching at a life preserver than a loving husband trying to take comfort in his wife’s touch.

  At last, after refilling her coffee cup and fetching another beer for her husband, Mary cleared her throat and said, “Why don’t they ever call or write or visit?”

  “I don’t know,” said Frank.

  Then, and only then, did their eyes meet and stay fixed.

  “I was a good mother, wasn’t I?”

  “You were grand. A wonderful mother. You really were.”

  “I mean we never...we never let them go without, did we?”

  “Whatta you mean by that?” His face said that he’d been thinking the same thing but since she’d mentioned it first the responsibility of talking about it was hers.

  “I just keep thinking about some things, you know? Like that prom dress I made for Beth.”

  “It was a beautiful dress. I remember how hard you worked on it.”

  “But she didn’t like it, remember? She said it didn’t match her favorite shoes.”

  “Well, we got her a new pair, didn’t we? And they matched the dress all right. I thought she looked lovely.”

  Mary dug a cigarette out of her purse and lit up. Even though he was trying to get her to quit, Frank didn’t say anything.

  “What is it?” asked Mary.

  “I’s just thinking that cigarette smoke don’t smell half-bad. Makes me wished I smoked a pipe or something.”

  “We could always go out to the shopping center tomorrow and look in that new smoke shop. I’ll bet they got real nice pipes in there. We could pick one out.”

  “Place’s pretty expensive, from what I hear.”

  “I suppose, but you’d be getting a good pipe for the money. You could even maybe start yourself a little collection. We can afford it, hon, really we can. We could even get you one of them wood display cases so you can put them all out and then....” She sat staring at her husband, her mouth working to form sounds, words, sentences; all that came out was cigarette smoke.

  “We could always go to the movies or something,” said Frank.

  “Could you sit still that long?”

  “I don’t know. I suppose I could give it a try.”

  Mary found the movie listings in the paper and called the theater to check on show times and prices.

  “Seven dollars apiece?” said Frank.

  “That’s what they said.”

  “Christ! Fourteen dollars to see a movie! We can’t afford that—I mean, not that and dinner, too. Ain’t a proper movie night without stopping for dinner while you’re out.”

  Mary put a hand on his shoulder. “Once every couple of weeks wouldn’t be so bad, would it? We don’t have to go to a fancy place to eat, just some hamburgers or something.”

  “I don’t know. I don’t got any real nice clothes—you know, nothing that you’d wear out on a date.”

  “We could always go out and buy you some new clothes.”

  “I don’t know,” he said. “I don’t much feel...”

  “Me, neither,” said Mary.

  “Really? I thought it was just me.”

  “Nope.”

  They sat in silence for a little while longer as the night drifted in around them.

  There was no way to give it voice. There was no way one of them could look at the other and say, We did it all for them. All the work, all the worrying, paying the bills and keeping the house up, it was all for the kids. Never for us. I love you, hon, I really do, but we lost each other somewhere along the way. Sometime in there when we weren’t looking we stopped being Frank and Mary and became their parents. And now what? I love them with all my heart but they ain’t part of us anymore, not really. I don’t think it’s because they’re ashamed of us or anything—I’m sure they still love us and all—but they got families of their own now. They’re not our children anymore, they’re Gayle and Gary and Eric and Kylie. And they’re not here. It’s just us now and we let ourselves slip away in there someplace. We’re not what we wanted to be when we were young. When they left they took their parents with them and left us in their place, and we don’t know much about these people, not anymore.

  Because there were no children left to care for. They’d hauled themselves and all their stuff out the door.

  All over.

  All gone.

  Bye-bye.

  Soon, when the kitchen became so dark they almost couldn’t see, they rose and went into the living room and sat very near one another on the sofa. Frank placed the keepsake from his youth on the floor by his feet and lovingly put his arm around Mary. Breathing slowly, she put her head against his shoulder, one of her hands dropping down to hold one of his.

  “Will they ever visit?” she asked, knowing what they were going to do.

  “I think so. I think they’re coming right now.”

  They sat in silence as the shadows of night came into the room and made themselves at home.

  “Do you hear them?” said Mary, smiling.

  “Yes, I do. See there, hon? They didn’t forget us.”

  “They’re not ashamed of us, are they?”

  “Nosiree,” said Frank. “Listen to them talk. They’re proud of their workin’ folks.”

  “Never a king’s castle, but a good home.”

  “A fine home. Damn fine. They never wanted for a thing.”

  Mary touched her husband’s cheek. “That’s on account of you bein’ such a good, hard worker. Always providing for us.”

  “I did my best.”

  “Your best was just fine, it was.” She smiled, eyes wide, and pointed in front of them. “Look, there’s Gary.”

  “My God,” said Frank. “Look at what a fine man he’s become. So strong and sure of himself.”

  “You always said that he had a good head on his shoulders.”

  “They all did. I told them that.”

  “Oh my, there’s Gayle and Danny—aren’t they a handsome couple? And—look! Oh, they brought the baby with them! Isn’t he beautiful?”

  “Do you think he knows we’re his Grandma and Grandpa?”

  “Of course he does. Look at him giggle at your big hands.”

  “Yeah, and he’s—aw, did you hear that? Danny said they named him after my dad. They call him Joseph.”

  “And there’s Kylie with little Sophia!”

  “And Eric brought his kids, too!”

  “Makes you proud, don’t it?”

  “It wasn’t all for nothing.”

  And time stood still for them for a little while, as it will for everyone at least once in a lifetime, if only at the end.

  But soon the visit was over. The children left, hauling themselves and their families out the door.

  “All over,” whispered Frank.

  “All gone,” said Mary.

  “Bye-bye,” said both to the darkness.

  Frank leaned over and kissed Mary.

  “I love you,” she said to him. “What a fine family.”

  “Yeah. I guess maybe it was worth losing us, after all. They’re a fine bunch. But I still miss them.”

  Mary hugged him. “We mustn’t harp on things, hon. The children are safe and happy and they love us and remember us. You heard for yourself.”

  “They make a body proud.”

&
nbsp; “Isn’t our new grandson wonderful?” she whispered in his ear, pressing herself close to him.

  “I love you so much,” said Frank. “I’ve given you a good life, haven’t I?”

  “A woman would be foolish to ask for one better.”

  “We’ll babysit Joseph, won’t we?”

  “You bet.”

  “Here he is now, all fussy and hungry.”

  “I should change his diaper, don’t you think?”

  “Hell, yes! Look at him kicking up his legs.”

  “That giggle!”

  “Oh, now he wants to chew on my finger.”

  “He’ll outgrow that.”

  And he did.

  “Graduating college,” said Frank. “Didn’t think I’d ever live to see the day one of my grandkids graduated college, let alone all of ‘em.”

  “And Joseph is so handsome in his cap and gown.”

  “A heartbreaker.”

  “Just like his grandpa.”

  “A good life,” said Frank.

  “A fine life,” said Mary, her hand reaching down to brush against Frank’s keepsake. “Your father gave that to you, you say?”

  “Yeah. He loved to go hunting.”

  “You miss him, don’t you?”

  “That I do. That I do.”

  Mary kissed his cheek as the glare of a car’s headlight beams filled the living room. The engine clattered as the ignition was turned off.

  “We should go now,” said Mary. “The children will be expecting us for a visit.”

  “Okay,” said Frank, digging two shells out of his pocket.

  They held hands as they walked upstairs to their bedroom, but before vanishing into the darkness they turned and looked at their home, each remembering some moment from their family’s life together.

  But that was done now.

  All over.

  All gone.

  Bye-bye.

  As they rounded the landing and started up the second, darker flight of stairs, the lock on the front door jiggled, then turned. The door opened and a harried-looking young man in a business suit entered, fumbled around until he found the light switch, and turned on the overhead lights.