Answering Machine Messages
The red light flashing on the answering machine says there are three messages. This is unusual, and you play them with trepidation, your mother has left all three messages, desperately urging you to call back as soon as you can. With trembling hands you manage to call her back, expecting the worse. Expectation does not disappoint. Birds twitter outside as you receive the news of your grandfather's death. A crazy urge to do lawn work, and tear down all the birds' nests, strikes. You burst into helpless tears, and your cat stares at you.
Traffic is light on the drive home two days later. The cars seem to pass, uncaringly, their drivers oblivious to your pain. The car ahead, the one with the "ask me about my grandchildren" bumper sticker is probably driven by an eighty year old woman on the way to see her grand kids in Rode Island, but you don't care. The trees are brilliantly colored, reds, golds and oranges, Autumn in all its splendor, but you don't care about that either. You're more concerned about fighting down the urge to scream, long and hopelessly.
Five cars line the driveway of your parents' house, and you have to maneuver the car carefully to get it to fit off the road. Sad aunts, uncles and cousins occupy every chair in the house, making the house seem unnaturally crowded, and stuffy. After fighting your way to the phone, you call your boss to remind her that you're not going to be in for a couple of days. She makes sympathetic clucking noises, and you have the urge to hang up on her before she says goodbye.
Next you carry your bag up to your old room, and set it on your bed oh so carefully, but its contents are far less likely to break than you are. A bit of wrapping paper sticking out from under the corner of the bed reminds you that you haven't been home since Christmas, which was the last time you saw your grandfather. Pages of the journal get filled with fragments "I didn't think he'd go so fast. I never said good-bye. He meant so much but I never told him. They say the good die young, right?" the entry won't make sense six months from now when you re-read it, the ink is all smeared from tears. Your mother comes in and asks you to come with her to the wake. You take her hand.
The funeral home is the same as it was last time. The white paint outside just a little too cheery, the inside the inevitable somber maroon that it was when they buried your grandmother three years ago. The guest book sits with its pen on a podium, and you still don't know who takes that home, or who would even want to. The building stinks of flowers, and the practice of sending the deceased flora is another morbid thing to wonder about. You're glad that there is a name plate to tell where you need to go, but the idea of wandering in on the wrong dead person makes you giggle quietly if a bit hysterically. Your mother asks you what's wrong, but feeling foolish, you don't answer.
A flowery jungle confronts you as you walk into the room, and now at least you know where the sickenly sweet smell is coming from. The room is empty, except for a small child who looks into the shiny veneer of the coffin, fascinated to see his reflection. Your mother takes him by the hand and leads him back to whomever he belongs to, an aunt or a cousin. You find the coffin fascinating too, but not for the same reasons. That a box, an open one at that, could hold such a strong man without even his protesting, seems a marvelous impossibility. He's so still, bringing those wax works in New York to mind. He even seems nearly waxy, utterly pale and still, you hardly recognize him without a tan. You'll nod in stupid agreement when asked if he looks well preserved.
Many come in and say a prayer for him, but you don't. It's been ten years since you and God were on speaking terms, and you can't even break the silence now. You just stand, looking down at the shell of the man who used to be your hero. This was the man who used to pick you up after school on Friday and stop for ice cream before going back to his house to see your grandmother. Even though you were only six or seven when he did that, the memory seems more clear than the present reality. Someone whispers about how long you've been standing there, but you don't have the energy to give a damn.
It's raining during the service the next day, or at least that's how you'll remember it; you always remember drizzle at time of death. There's something about rain and dying that is inalterably connected in your mind, perhaps it was being told that killing spiders bring showers that fastened it in your brain. Maybe the tears of the mourners are the real showers. You won't cry though, not in public. They taught you that tears were for private, and for some reason you still believe that so many years later, feeling contempt mingling with pity for those who were never taught the way to act in public. The area around the grave is a raw open wound in the slightly browning ground, excess dirt bleeds onto the grass. They start to lower the coffin (they told you to say casket, but you know it's really a coffin) into the ground, this is the part you hate. This is when it all become inevitable, when it no longer has the caliber of a horrific fantasy. The dead are really dead when they return to the ground. "Ashes to ashes, dust to dust," the preacher intones. You remind yourself to be cremated.
You follow your parents back to the cars. Lights on during the day, you wonder why death has to be so conspicuous. The drive is quiet, except for the sound of sniffling which is coming from your older brother. You almost resent his pain, he never made the effort to get to know your grandfather, not like you did. No one speaks until you get home.
The night brings odd dreams with it, mingling your grandfather's life with his death, and you wonder if a psychiatrist would have anything to say about that. When your dad confesses to similar dreams in the morning, you feel better. After you put your bag, and the food your mom has pressed onto you, into the car, you hug your parents goodbye and leave. Only their car is in the driveway now, so there's no more careful maneuvering involved.
The trees look exactly the same as they did on the drive home, almost as if some deity super-glued the leaves to the trees so nothing would change. You find it almost comforting. No cars with bumper stickers about grand kids get in front of you this time, and you are glad.
The first thing you do when you walk into the house is look at the answering machine, daring it to contain any more despairing messages. There's only one message, this one from your best friend, asking how you are. You decide to call him, telling him that the two of you should rent a movie and talk. You're going to spend the night drinking and telling your best friend what a great guy your grandfather was. Your best friend won't even mind.
main pagestory time