In the Echo of this Ghost Town

by CL Walters

  “I’ll put it on at the church.” I stare at my reflection. Old. When I’m old, I wonder if I’ll recognize myself. If I’ll stare at my reflection and think: Hey. We met fifty-three years ago.

  Max walks up behind me and wraps her arms around me from behind, laying her cheek between my shoulder blades. She doesn’t say anything, and I appreciate it. There is nothing to be said. Her arms constrict as though she’s trying to offer me her strength. It’s nice to have her back since the end of her term.

  I cover her hand with mine, draw it up over my heart, take a deep breath, and let my chin fall to the top of the tie. “I don’t know if I can do this,” I tell her.

  She takes a deep breath, waits, then says, “Words. Words. Words. More words. Words. Words.” She peeks round my shoulder at me in the mirror and offers me a dim smile. “Did that help?”

  I give her a slight smile and turn in her embrace to hold her. “You, being here, helps,” I say against her neck.

  Later, at the grave site, I sit next to Mom and Phoenix. Bella is with her mom and sister. We are all faded roses, somehow. I think we must be beautiful in our grief, but broken and withered too, folded in on ourselves. The pastor says the words over the tiny casket. When it’s time, he calls April’s parents forward. I stand and offer Bella my hand. She takes it, and we stand together, side by side one more time. One time, really the only time, we’ll ever have something to do as parents together. Behind us, the plethora of people whose collective love and generosity helped us have this opportunity to say goodbye.

  As empty as my heart feels, it feels expansive in that emptiness.

  Bella cries next to me, her head bent forward, a handkerchief pressed to her face.

  I wrap an arm around her shoulders.

  She leans against me and reaches out to touch the casket. “I’m sorry,” she whispers. Only I can hear it. We set our flowers down and move to allow others the opportunity to come forward. People have already offered sympathies at the church service. Now, it’s a private moment before April is buried. Bella and I wait at the edge of the harness holding the casket above ground.

  People make their way up to drape the casket in flowers. Each of them is here for us, Bella and me. They never knew April, and yet here they are here to express their love and sympathy for us. It’s humbling. My family is here including my dad and Mara. Cal and Max. Tanner is here, and Emma is with him. Josh. Atticus. Danny. Friends of Bella’s. So many people here, to offer their support during our tragedy.

  A year ago, we were getting ready to graduate. I sat with Tanner at graduation practice and needled him into partying. I figured that was all there was moving forward. The thought makes me look at the casket holding my girl. It’s heavy. I remembered thinking then that my life was defined by the parties, the sex, my friends. Now, it feels defined by the moment when I lost someone I hadn’t known I would want until she wasn’t there anymore.

  I glance at my father. He said something like that to me a while ago. The awareness that he’d been young and stupid in his youth, and it wasn’t until everything was stripped from him that he understood what it meant to face regret.

  I squeeze Bella’s hand.

  She lays her head on my shoulder.

  And together we watch as our daughter’s casket is piled with flowers to say goodbye.

  2

  Our house is filled with people, and I wish they were gone. I’m tired of being polite. My mom offered to host the luncheon after the funeral, and I’m grateful for her, for her generosity, but I’m bone tired.

  I leave the confines of the overly full living room and walk out to the backyard to lean against the shed all the way in the back. The tears are gone, but the anger isn’t, though it isn’t as acute now that time as passed. I’m not angry at anyone specifically, just pissed. The levity of rage feels better than the weight of sadness.

  Bella walks across the yard toward me. She stops a few paces away and holds out a silver flask.

  I shake my head. Today might be a day I would drink enough to just float away when I know I need to be present.

  She takes a sip and scrunches her nose with the burn. “The last time we drank this, we didn’t make the best decisions.” She moves to lean against the shed next to me.

  Silence takes over. I’m pretty sure she’s remembering that our bad decisions made April. I’m in pain now, and I will be forever at this loss, but I can’t honestly say that I regret what happened because it would be negating the importance of my baby in my life, even if I didn’t get to meet her.

  I got to see April on the monitor.

  I got to hear her heartbeat.

  I got to feel her move inside Bella’s body.

  I got to fall in love with a daughter I never met.

  I got to fix a closet for her, build a crib, help Bella prepare for her arrival.

  I got to make a friend in Bella.

  I got to begin to feel a little like a father.

  I got to become a better version of myself.

  Sure, losing April, this aftermath, is hell on earth, but calling that night a mistake would somehow take away from the way she impacted my life. I wouldn’t trade that for anything.

  Just like Tanner said.

  “We weren’t numbing our feelings for the right reason then,” I say.

  She gives me a wry look and holds out the flask again.

  I take it and hold it up. “To April.” I sip, then hand it back to Bella, content to feel this pain rather than numb it.

  “You think she’s scared?” Bella asks. “In the dark?”

  Before, I didn’t think much about the afterlife. If it exists. Now though, I can’t think about anything so hopeless. It only fills me with more anger, thinking at the unfairness of it all. Instead of hurting Bella with my philosophical meanderings, I just take hold of her hand and squeeze. “I don’t think she’s in the dark. I think she’s with angels. It’s bright and happy there.”

  Bella nods, and I release her hand. “I like that.” She leans her head back against the building and helps me continue holding it up.

  Eventually, Max walks out.

  “Hi,” I tell her when she gets closer after working her way across the lawn that Phoenix and I mowed the day before. It smells fresh and green, like life, and on such a dark day. Max looks beautiful—like life—and I want to touch her.

  “Hi.” She smiles at me. I’m so grateful she’s still smiling at me even with as much of a shit as I am. “Hi, Bella.”

  Bella smiles at Max, greets her. “I’m going to go find Minny.” She gives me a teary smile and walks back to the house.

  I hold my hand out to Max.

  She takes it.

  I draw her against me and drop my head into the space between her neck and shoulder.

  “Is that whiskey I smell?”

  I nod. “Yeah.”

  “Drunk?”

  I shake my head. “The thought did cross my mind.”

  “And?”

  “And my judgement is never very good when I go there. Probably better not to.” I kiss her neck again. “Is it really bad that what I want to do right now is have sex with you?” I kiss her neck.

  “Is that the whiskey talking or you?”

  “Just me.” I smile at her and then nip at her neck.

  She offers a sweet sound like laughter held in a pretty jar. “Is it bad that I’m super insecure about you and Bella? Even though I totally don’t want to be.”

  I lift my head and search her face. “Really?”

  Max reaches up and swipes a lock of my hair away from my face, trapping it in her fingers. She nods. “I hate it, but it’s there in all of its ugliness. And on such a day, too. It makes me feel like a petty bitch.” She offers a wan smile.

  I use both arms to squeeze her close. “I think we should organize a mud wrestling match. Two beautiful women fighting over me—Griffin Nichols. That would be a first.” I smile.

  She swats my chest. “You are sexist.”

 
I continue smiling. “Except, two conditions aren’t being met to make it a worthy contest.”

  Her eyebrow shifts over her eye, and her mouth thins out with that look of irritation. “Which are?”

  “The first is that both girls would need to want said guy, and at last count only one inexplicably does.”

  “And the second?”

  “The said guy would need to be interested in seeing who the victor would be, but this guy is already standing here holding her.” It’s my turn to touch her hair, skimming it over her skin and hooking it behind her ear. “She won his heart a long time ago.”

  Max smiles, a blush staining her cheeks. “When did you become such a quasi-romantic?” she asks.

  “You, Maxwell Wallace, bring that out in me.”

  She kisses me on the mouth, fully, draws back, and says, “Is it really bad that I would like to have sex with you right now?” She smiles.

  I grin at her. “Let’s sneak away,” I whisper in her ear. “Your house is empty.”

  But before we can make it a reality, Tanner walks over with Emma, Josh, Danny, and Atticus. Max straightens up, smoothing out her black dress.

  “Thanks for being here,” I tell my friends, looking at each of them. My eyes stall on Emma. She and I haven’t ever been friends. I was a jerk to her, but she offers a kind look, then glances at Tanner. They’re holding hands. I understand now, with Max’s hand in mine, what he was trying to hold onto. They look right together. I resolve that I need to take time to apologize to Emma.

  Each of them talks at the same time.

  “Of course.”

  “Are you kidding?”

  “What are friends for?”

  They situate themselves in a semicircle around Max and me and talk. It isn’t about deep stuff like life and death, but rather the simple joys of experience and memory. The laughs and jokes of a year spent apart. I pull Max closer, and listen, not in a mental space to share. Grief is like a black hole sucking everything in and nothing gets out of its gravity. But I am content to be surrounded by people I know that I can say I love.

  1

  A year ago, at Senior Send-Off, my friends and I were at the Quarry, partying, facing graduation. After the norm of jumping from the rock, I’d gotten so drunk, I’d woken up in a lawn chair at Bella’s camp freezing my balls off in the cold. The campfire was barely embers, and my head pounded with a raging hangover. I’d thought that was living. Back then, I’d thought Tanner was being a jerk, pulling away from his bros. Now, sitting and watching the campfire, I know the asshole wasn’t him. It had always been me.

  We’ve returned to the Quarry, no longer seniors but a year removed from it. The vibe at the current Senior Send-Off isn’t different. The music of the various parties, the sound of people jumping from the rock, the singing and laughter from distant campsites remains much the same. It’s a rite of passage between the end of something and the beginning of something else—if you’re lucky to recognize it. The vibe around our campfire now reminds me of that year of experience stretched behind me, and how different I feel now.

  My old friends made new are here: Tanner, Josh, and Danny. They have been here since the funeral, though Danny has been back and forth between his post, he was able to get leave again to be with us this weekend. There are also new relationships: Max, Emma, Atticus, and Ginny. Their friend, Liam, Facetimed in from New York where he couldn’t get away from an internship. A year ago, I wouldn’t have associated with people like Max, or Emma and her friends. I would have used people like Atticus and did use my own friends to get what I wanted. A year ago, I was looking for my next party and my next lay and murdering the vulnerable part of myself to stop feeling weak.

  I see the truth, now: being vulnerable is strength.

  It’s hard to take my eyes away from the flames of the campfire. It moves in the darkness like it’s doing a dance. Sparks shoot off into the sky like fireworks, adding to the din of the voices of my friends, talking around me. I glance away from the flames to find Max, suddenly needing to see her, to reassure myself that she’s real and there, and remind myself I’m not the same Griffin I once was.

  She’s on the other side of the fire, talking with Emma. Smiling. The good one, though it isn’t quite the same as the one she gives to me, and that makes me feel special. She tells me I am every day without ever saying a word. She believes in me, and her love has made me believe in me too.

  She draws a lock of her straight honey hair with her finger and hooks it around her ear, then tilts her head and leans forward a touch as if to hear Emma better. She’s taller than Emma who’s also leaning toward her, talking as if they’re telling secrets.

  I don’t know why this makes my heart race.

  I suppose Emma could be telling Max what a dick I was—am—was. Maybe her stories could scare Max away from me forever. I would deserve that.

  My heartbeat isn’t fearful though. Instead, the rhythm is rooted in something different, like contentment and joy. Feelings Max has inspired in me to grasp and keep. Feelings I’ve discovered grow when nurtured.

  Max turns and looks at me as if she can feel my stare. She smiles. The good one.

  My heart speeds up even more with the physical and emotional connection I have with her.

  She says something to Emma, then walks around the fire to me and perches on my lap, leaning forward to press her mouth to my jaw. “I missed you.”

  “I’m right here,” I tell her.

  She leans back and studies my face as if memorizing it. “I know.” She sweeps a lock of my hair off my forehead. Her touch ignites sparks that explode like fireworks in my chest, like the spark of the fire a moment ago. “You were just too far away.”

  I squeeze her with my arms.

  “Would you like to roast some marshmallows?” she asks.

  I chuckle. “Do you?”

  She grins. “Yes.”

  I kiss her dimple. “Okay.”

  “Would you find me a stick?”

  “I’ll do you one better,” I tell her. “I brought roasting sticks. But you’re going to have to let me get up.”

  She smacks me with a quick kiss, stands, then holds out her hands to help me up from the chair. She smacks my ass and giggles as I walk away.

  When I make it to the table, I look around the items. Packages of chips and cookies, hot dog buns, coolers, paper products.

  “Griffin?”

  I glance away from the stuff on the table.

  Emma is standing next to me.

  I straighten. “Oh. Hi, Emma.” I glance at the campfire to look for Max, feeling like perhaps I’ve been set up. She’s sitting in the chair I’d occupied, listening to something Danny is telling her. She nods, focused on his words.

  I swallow and look back at Emma.

  Her head tilts up to study me with her big eyes and a neutral expression. I can’t tell if she still hates me, and I wouldn’t blame her. I was awful to her about Tanner. I used my words to hurt her and my actions to sabotage their relationship. I know I need to apologize to her for how I treated her, if not just for her and Tanner, but because like Phoenix said, making amends is important to getting better for myself. “I’m glad you’re here,” I say and want to cringe. It sounds stupid.

  “Before you say anything,” she says and looks down at her feet. “I want to apologize.”

  Wait. “What? That’s–” I pause and physically take a step away from her. I shake my head. What’s with her and Tanner?

  “Hear me out,” she says, then meets my gaze.

  “I’m the one who needs to be saying sorry.”

  She gives me a tentative smile and holds up her hand. “I judged you. Unfairly. And I’m sorry for that because I’ve come to know you better since I’ve been back. I wrote you off. I’m so sorry.”

  I open my mouth, and nothing comes out. I’m not sure what to say to that so instead of thinking about it, I say, “I deserved it, Matthews. I wasn’t very nice to you. Before.”

  “Well, I
knew better than to judge someone else,” she says and moves some packages on the table, rearranging them. “I did it anyway.”

  “You weren’t the only one. And–” I say before she can interrupt me– “I never made it easy on anyone not to judge me. I wanted to apologize to you. I said some messed up things.” I don’t tell her I was afraid of her. Afraid of what she meant and that I was losing Tanner. I glance across the campsite to find him. He’s roasting a marshmallow, trying to get it what he calls golden-perfection. He doesn’t like them burnt. I didn’t lose him. Or Josh, who’s talking with Atticus and Ginny. Or Danny, who’s laughing with Max. My friends are here. I’m here.

  I look at Emma again. “I’m sorry for that.”

  She nods. “I accept it.” She glances at the campfire, then back at me. “Can you forgive me?”

  I smile then but can’t quite look at her. “Of course, Matthews.”

  “I’d like us to maybe try to be friends too.” She holds out her hand.

  I take it. “Me too.”

  “That’s for me,” she says, “but it’s also because I really like Max. She’s great, and mostly because I love Tanner so darned much, and he loves you.”

  I like the way Emma’s thoughts sort of run together like she’s thinking aloud. I grin and feel the glow of warmth at her declaration of feelings for Tanner, as if making an announcement like that is common and easy. I suppose declarations of love should be, expressing the truth of what stitches together your heart.

  So I clear my throat and draw the parts of me together so that there’s only one of me. “I love him too, so I think that’s a good idea.”

  Before I know it, Emma’s arms are around me in a hug. She laughs. “I’m so relieved.” She pulls away, looking away as if she’s nervous.

  I follow her gaze to Tanner.

  “I’ve got it!” he says to us and holds up his marshmallow stick. “Golden perfection, Matthews! Get over here.”