by Dan Mooney
His grandparents were buried here. And possibly Eddie. Most important, Jules was buried here. He had never visited her. He listened for Plasterer’s condemnation, but the clown remained silent. He walked through the gate tentatively and appraised the many hundreds of rows of the dead. Here, death was everywhere, old death and new, but for some reason it lacked the bitter sting of fresh mourning. In its place was a feeling of sadness mixed with something else he couldn’t quite identify. He didn’t know where her grave was, but knowing his mother and father, it would be by his grandparents. They had loved Jules. Him too. Both of them as a pair, really. His feet guided him as he took in the coldly beautiful headstones. Some were decorated with fresh flowers that seemed quietly dignified; others had the carcasses of long-dead petals sitting nearby, and Denis thought they painted an almost unbearably sad picture. He took it in as he walked, his head turning, hoping that no one else would see him in all his ridiculousness.
He found her grave before he knew what it was. Standing where he thought he might find it, with several bunches of beautiful, fresh, purple flowers nearby.
“Julianne...” he whispered at her gravestone as he sat down. “I’m so sorry.”
The first sob broke through his crude clown mouth, spraying spittle on the headstone. He reached out with his hands to clean the spit.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to...”
The gravestone said nothing. That’s the way of gravestones. It didn’t judge him either though.
“They wouldn’t let me go to the funeral. I was still in the hospital. After that I couldn’t. I just couldn’t. I’m so sorry.”
If she was replying to him, her voice couldn’t reach. The gravestone was certainly not giving anything away.
“Please forgive me.”
He knew she couldn’t answer. He figured she wouldn’t have been mad at him anyway. She forgave him most things. Once she had been angry with him for a week after he and Eddie had fought. A full week. He had ignored her anger, and eventually she had come into his bedroom and thrown a shoe at him. When he laughed at her, she had laughed back. Just like that her anger vanished, and they talked that night, almost all night. He had apologized to Eddie the next day.
That had been the way with her. Often as reckless and stupid as he was, but with a bigger heart. She had guided him and in turn leaned on him for guidance. They had been a team. It had never been the standard older brother, little sister relationship. They were twins as far as he was concerned. Then he killed her.
Something about that thought stirred the ball of uneasiness and made him queasy again. He sat on her grave and thought about it. The tears were still coming, but slowly, not in the great rush he expected.
“I should have come here sooner,” he whispered at her grave. “I’ll do better.”
The knot in his stomach loosened. Something was giving way. He paused to think about it again. He was responding to the first thought, and focusing on fixing it. It loosened some more.
“I want to tell you that I’ve been busy, but we both know that’s not true. I haven’t. I’ve been...sort of hiding. You’d hardly believe it. I used to hate staying home, you know. I always wanted to be around people, now I just... I...”
His words failed him for a moment.
The grave waited patiently. Her name was all he could look at; it filled up his eyes.
“I don’t really do anything, do I?” he asked the silent gravestone. “I mean, I just sort of exist. It’s not really living.”
He had stopped crying now.
“Fuck me!” he exclaimed with half a chuckle. “You’d hate it.”
He sighed.
“You’d hate what I’ve become. God knows I do... Funny that. I didn’t know I hated it until just now. Until I came to see you. But there it is. Still guiding me, I see...” He smiled at her and thought about her lovely smile. This time he didn’t think about the blood and the shattered glass. He just thought about her lovely smile and her grumpiness in the mornings and how serious she could be sometimes.
“It’s just such work all the time. And all the fear. I hate it. I hate that I gave in to it. I hate that I let them push me around. I hate myself for what I’ve done to you and Eddie and Mom and everyone. Most of all, I hate what I’ve done to Rebecca. And to myself. Sometimes I’m such an asshole.”
If Jules had been there, she would have laughed at him.
He looked across the graveyard and admired the orderliness of it all. The rows and rows of graves, the uniformity of it. The grass between the graves was neatly trimmed, meticulously maintained. The walkways were swept.
A cool breeze brushed his face through his makeup and stirred his hair. There was a peace and quiet about the place that he admired. A reverential silence as if breathing too loud might offend the dead. He looked back at her headstone; funny how a piece of granite could appear friendly and familiar. He reached out to it and traced her name, and then he sighed.
“I guess I know what I have to do,” he told her, climbing to his feet. “I’ll see you again real soon. Thanks for the advice.”
The cloud of despair was gone. Just like that. Perhaps it was hovering over someone else’s head. The Professor’s maybe, but Denis didn’t care. Gone is gone. The uneasiness in his stomach had left with the cloud. He knew what must be done. He would do it. It would not be an easy thing, though he suspected that he was not special in this regard. It seemed like the kind of thing that anyone who did it found hard, but it was something that needed doing. For the first time in a long time, drunk but unconcerned by this, Denis Murphy had a purpose that fit him.
LIFE IS HARD
He walked home with the single-minded drive of a man on a mission. There was a blessed absence of thought, no confusion in his head, no part of him that told him he was going the wrong way or doing the wrong thing. He didn’t think of what Plasterer would say, or how the Professor might react. His will was iron. Nothing was going to knock him from the path he had set himself. His housemates never even popped into his head; they didn’t factor in this decision. The only thing distracting from his determination was a slight sense of euphoria. It might have been all the drinks. To be able to walk from here to there without a cacophony of contradictory thoughts was something of a novelty for Denis Murphy. The day seemed a little brighter now, the noise of the traffic less of an intrusion and more of a kind of energy, as though the world going about its business was a good thing for once. He tried to absorb as much as he could; it would help him do what needed to be done.
He walked through his gate, leaving it open, hoping the neighbors didn’t see his horrible painted face. He unlocked the door and stepped inside. Plasterer was smirking at him from the hallway. Ignoring the clown, he made his way to the bathroom. His reflection looked perplexed and, for some reason, slightly bored. Then he went to the living room, where he took the DIY materials still strewn about from the days before and began to tidy up. He changed into some old jeans and a T-shirt in his room, the greasepaint smudging his clothes as he changed. He didn’t care. Plasterer followed silently, with Penny O’Neill and the Professor in tow. He brushed by them as he headed back to the living room. A thought occurred to him as he walked: they were being too quiet.
He glanced at them to see Plasterer’s jaw working furiously. His face was contorted in its now all-too-familiar mockery, but there was no sound coming out of his mouth, as though his rage was too great for words.
No sound at all. Just silence.
Denis decided not to think on it too much. There were things to do, if he could keep his will. He opened the paint cans and stirred them with a wooden spoon collected from the kitchen en route. Penny O’Neill stood there, concern painted on her face as she watched his every move. Still, no sound emerged. The Professor was gesticulating wildly, and he opened and closed his mouth as though he couldn’t find the words. He looked more alarmed than the re
animated dead had the right to look. Curious, Denis paused his stirring to regard them casually. He waited for one of them to say something, but they just stood there, gesturing and scowling and jawing. No one spoke. He shrugged and returned to the task at hand. After carefully removing the decorations and fixtures from the wall, he set about painting. All the while they moved, stalking and circling him silently. Penny O’Neill even began weeping, without making a single sound.
He painted until the damage done by the Professor’s outburst had been undone. With the wall slick and clean again, he began to tidy up. He wasn’t going to leave a mess behind for anyone else. Plasterer stepped in front of him, his face a mask of pure rage.
“You fucking listen to me, you worm. You don’t get to ignore me. I tell you what’s what and you listen.” His words came out, but they seemed to be coming from far away.
“No,” Denis replied.
Plasterer brought his hands up. The red-gloved one looked like blood, and he pushed Denis in the chest. It seemed ineffectual for such a big man. Denis carefully put the cans and brushes down and shoved back.
Plasterer reeled back and tumbled to the ground with a yelp and a curse, his big frame hitting the living-room floor harder than it had a right to. He decided not to force the issue, but simply picked up his belongings and stepped past the shocked clown. Penny O’Neill was staring at him, dumbfounded. The Professor trembled a little.
“Don’t you fucking walk away from me,” Plasterer called out. “You need me. You need all of us. You try this crap, and you just wait and see if we don’t fuck off and leave you to deal with this on your own. Picture that world, Denis—nobody to help you make sense of it all, just you, all alone. Terribly, terrifyingly alone.”
Denis paused. He had been alone for such a long time. Even when he was completely surrounded. Not for much longer though. He walked upstairs, with the big clown struggling to his feet behind him.
“Don’t you fucking walk away from me. Do you hear me?”
“Please, Denis, don’t make him angry...” Penny O’Neill chimed in.
“This is a poor course of action.” The Professor almost whispered.
Denis walked to the bathroom and ran a facecloth under the warm tap.
“What are you doing, you little shit?” Plasterer asked from the doorway.
“Please be quiet. I’m so utterly sick of listening to you.”
He hadn’t really expected the clown to stop talking, but when he did, Denis didn’t think about it, he just enjoyed the momentary silence.
* * *
He was fed up of listening to the clown. Fed up of hearing what he was supposed to do and think. Plasterer had become irrelevant.
He looked at them, all three of them standing there. They were trying to talk to him, their mouths working furiously, but no sound was coming out. He watched them impassively as they stood there. Plasterer was the most frantic, his face contorted, wrinkling his makeup. Denis took a step toward them, and they shrank back. They seemed smaller now. Plasterer made a final futile attempt to block the door, his mouth still moving dumbly. Without thinking, Denis pushed him. The effect of the shove seemed disproportionate to the effort he had put in, as the big clown was lifted from his feet. Plasterer sailed through the air and slammed with force into the corridor wall. The Professor and Penny O’Neill stopped trying to talk and looked at Denis in fear. He brushed past them and made his way back downstairs, his face still wet and slightly red from his scrubbing. They followed him silently, almost sheepishly to the kitchen.
He turned on them once more, testing to see if they would flinch from him again. They stood, almost shoulder to shoulder, staring at him. Plasterer was no longer frantic; he looked docile. Denis shook his head at them and turned away.
He went to the utility room with the painting supplies, and when he came back, they were gone. He hadn’t stepped out of the room for that long; it seemed impossible for them to have just vanished. Deano was waiting instead. The fur ball stepped to one side to allow Denis in.
“Where did they go?” Denis asked.
The fur ball shrugged at him. He didn’t seem concerned and, consequently, neither was Denis, who sat down to write out his farewells. There were people who had to be addressed and loose ends to be tied up. He was going to have to tell the people he worked for, so they could start looking for a replacement. It was only fair, really. Denis was nothing if not considerate. The calm that had settled on him had all the sedative force of a drug. He was composed. He was ready. At least, he thought he was.
His first email, his most important, was the hardest to write. How to put right several years of wrong. He wrote and rewrote several times. He tried not to cry as he typed the words. Short and to the point. That’s how she would prefer it. When finished it read:
Mother,
I’m sorry, more than you can know, for what I’ve put you through. I went to see Jules. It’s funny, she’s been gone for so long and yet I still feel like she’s here with me, showing me the way. I needed her.
You probably already know, but I’ve become terribly lost, and something has to be done about that.
I wanted to keep myself apart. I wanted to be on my own. Where I can’t hurt anyone. Somehow I’ve ended up here, and everyone I love is hurt by me. I’m sorry your marriage ended. I’m sorry I did that to Dad. I’m sorry Uncle Jack has to deal with guilt even though he never did anything wrong to anyone. I’m sorry I took Jules from you, sorry that I took Eddie from Ned and Ann. I’m sorry for poor Rick and his family. I guess I can’t say enough how sorry I am.
I see now where I’ve gone wrong. It’s taken me too long to see it, and you all had to suffer for that. I’ll be grateful to you, to Rebecca, to Ollie and Frank, to Ned and Ann, to all the people who have tolerated what I am, until the end of my days.
If I could trouble you for another favor, please take care of the house when I’m gone. I think it’ll be very empty without me, and I wouldn’t like to see it fall into disrepair.
I know what I have to do. Too late I see it. I hope you can forgive me.
Your ever-loving son,
Denis
It seemed to Denis that the words were perhaps overly pompous, but at the best of times there’s a little of the Professor in everyone. He sent the email and switched off the computer lest she reply.
You’re doing the right thing, Deano told him as he sat on the couch in the office.
“You can talk?” Denis replied, though for some reason he wasn’t surprised.
Sort of. This might be the first time you’ve listened.
“But you can now?”
You’ve given me a voice. It should be familiar to you. It’s your voice.
He wasn’t wrong. Deano’s voice was coming to him as if he had recorded it himself.
“How did I give it to you? I never heard you speak before, ever. I wouldn’t even know where to start with a voice for you,” Denis replied, confused.
First time you’ve ever not ignored me actually, Deano shot back.
Denis was puzzled. Reading the body language of a ball of fur is no easy task.
“I didn’t realize I’d been ignoring you before.”
I tried to tell you many things in many ways. Unfortunately for us both, you’re remarkably stupid for such a smart man.
“Tell me what? In what ways?” Denis asked.
It was always me being restrained, Denis. I was always being tied up. If anyone was cowed down or being bullied, it was me. I’m sure you noticed that, but I don’t think you ever wondered why. I’m the one that was on your side, and for that, I rebelled when you rebelled. I fought when you fought, and when you were happy, I was happy.
Denis shook his head. Deano wasn’t wrong; there was no question that he might be, but one must always find it difficult to trust a hair ball that talks to you in your own voice.
&
nbsp; “I’m insane, aren’t I?” he asked.
You’re not well is how I’d put it. And by the way, I wouldn’t trust me either. You’re going to fix it now though, because this isn’t sustainable. You can’t keep going like this, and while you’re fine for the moment, you know as well as I do that another day will come when something else happens, and suddenly you’ll be listening to them again, and then when they want to they’ll break you just like they did before.
“Where did they go?”
They’re taking a break. Well-deserved if you ask me. You’ve been working them pretty hard recently.
“How do you mean?”
You’ll get it eventually.
“Did you read my email?”
I did.
“Your thoughts?”
You write like the Professor talks.
“But it was good?”
I never said he didn’t talk well.
“I’m doing the right thing?”
Well, first, you can’t trust what I say, because I’m part of your problem. Second, you can’t trust yourself because you’re part of your problem too, and that’s the problem. For what it’s worth though, yes. I do think you’re doing the right thing.
“Do you think they’ll ever forgive me?” Denis asked. He could feel his anxiety rising up against his sense of determination.
Who?
“Rebecca. Mom. Ollie and Frank. Ned and Ann.”
I don’t think it’s in any of them not to. They’re good people. Did you know that you were surrounded by good people all of the time?
“Of course I didn’t. I was too busy feeling sorry for myself.”
Liar. Now I shouldn’t be trusting you. Introspection is not one of your strong suits, Denis. If it was, then you’d hardly be in this mess.
“I don’t want them to hate me forever.”
I don’t think they’re capable of that. You see how they’ve always cared. All of them. How they never gave up on you?