"If
I didn't know better," Mike told her now, "I'd have said you planned it
that way." He paused, absently touching the grass. "Course, like I told
you then, Benjy and Cate adjusted much better than I did. That's what kids
do, I suppose, though for a while I had to sit with Cate until she went
to sleep, but Benjy seemed fine. Don't know why, really, cause I know he
really missed you too, but I think Ben talked him through a lot of it.
They always could talk together better than I could to either of them,
but the longer I lived there the more I understood it. By the time Benjy
was having his big teenage fits, I think you could say I knew how to relate
to him pretty good. But you not being there...it was almost like they never
had true wild periods, like the worst had already happened to them, so
there was no point in rebelling against the unfairness of the world."
Not
that there weren't some difficult times or awkward moments. It took Mike
and Ben a long time to rationalize the fact that they now shared living
quarters as well as Benjy, yet had lost Alexa, whom they had never been
able to share. Although they still had little in common outside their circumstances,
they continued their long walks, and in their own way found them therapeutic.
Arguing in the midst of a forest their words could be swallowed up and
left there, so neither Benjy nor Caitlin ever heard some of the bile that
came out in those early days.
Mike
could recall one particularly ugly incident, where he had told Ben much
more than he meant to. They had been walking along a familiar path to the
reservoir, about halfway there, one early October, and had just passed
three deer grazing several yards from where they stood. Before that they
had walked in silence punctuated by occasional thoughts, but a quiet they
were comfortable with whether it was shattered or intact, and during the
silence Mike had seen the animals first, resting a hand on Ben's forearm,
and pointing. "There," he had said softly, and both had stopped to watch.
The deer, two bucks and one doe, had continued grazing at the bark on the
trees and pulling at the occasional still green leaf, gnawing in silence,
methodical and graceful. The doe had lifted her head after a moment and
turned to face Mike and Ben, took one step towards them as if to test the
water, then bounded away in the other direction. The bucks had stared at
Mike and Ben, sizing them up, and for a brief moment Mike had felt threatened
by the larger one's expansive antlers, but then they too had leaped away
after the doe. Neither of them had commented, and they had moved on a few
minutes later. And then Ben had started to speak. "Mike," he had said,
hesitantly.
"Hmm?"
Mike asked, his mind full of long brown limbs and sturdy, barkcovered branches,
the two somehow intertwined.
"Did
you ever talk about what happened, those few weeks you were in the basement...did
you ever talk about it?"
They
talked around her at this stage; they hadn't quite approached speaking
of Alexa directly, and in truth this wasn't about her, not really. Mike
knew who Ben meant; Mike would have only spoken about it to Alexa, adding
her name to the question was unnecessarily roiling. But Mike heard the
question in two ways; he heard the implied 'Alexa' and knew there were
two very different stories that had gone on during those weeks he had been
separated from her, and neither had been very much worth discussing once
they had reunited. He knew Alexa had been curious about how Mike had survived
down there all that time, and though he had fought being interested Mike
had longed to know just how Ben had ended up getting in her pants. Inwardly,
Mike winced; it felt vulgar thinking that way, he knew it hadn't been like
that, but he almost wished it had. If they had had just a one night stand
it would have laid to rest so many of his doubts in later years, but Mike
had always known it was much more than just that. So the question, as posed
by Ben, was a double-edged sword. He treated it that way. "Would that be,"
Mike asked him back after a time, "my version of what happened, or her
version of what happened, that we would have discussed, Ben?"
Ben
saw his blunder, and tried to recant the question. "Never mind," he had
said, irritated. "Forget I asked."
"Of
course," said Mike, speaking more loudly, as if Ben had not withdrawn his
request, "I would find it strange that you would want me to recall for
you secondhand something that was so personally experienced by my wife
and yourself, her interpretations and how she cushioned them for my benefit.
But then I'd also have to find it strange that you would think I might
want to tell you about some of the most horrendous weeks of my own personal
life, my interpretations, cushioning them for your benefit. How
while I was down in a cold damp hole with my feet starting to rot and my
hands being eaten by rodents, while all that was going on the one reason
I was holding on to getting out alive was above ground, in the light and
the sun, and was doing her damnedest to move on with her life, and forget
I'd even existed, to the point of finding herself a new..."he spat,"boyfriend."
Ben's
face had turned from pale white to blasted red, shocked by Mike's anger.
How could he bear to live in the house of someone he detested this much?
He was silent for a long time, gathering up his words, breathing deeply.
"It wasn't like that," Ben gritted his teeth. "She was her own person but
it was me, I pushed her along. For God's sake, Logan, I told you this years
ago. Maybe it really was inevitable, maybe there was no preventing it,
because if she hadn't come to me, if we hadn't found the bookshelf, if
we hadn't been spending so much goddamn time together looking for you probably
you wouldn't have been found at all. How can you possibly run her down
like that now, after all this time? I did it because it was my job, I did
it because she asked me to, but she only did it because she was in love
with you. That was her only reason." He lowered his voice, which had begun
spiraling upwards. "Jesus, was I sick of hearing about you after a week
or two. So don't even dare start with that garbage about her moving on
with her life. I won't believe it. I was there."
Mike
had folded his arms and had a strange expression on his face. "Are you
done?"
Ben
frowned and in surprise lost his anger. "That would depend on what you
say next."
"Come
on," said Mike. "Let's keep walking."
"Why."
"Because
we'll never make the reservoir and back before dark if we don't. Come on."
They
started walking again, but Ben had kept his distance.
"I
know all of that, too," Mike told him after they had gone a little further.
"What I just said...it did seem like that was the truth a long time ago."
He paused and took a breath. "Can I tell you something? Here you are, in
a hospital bed. Antiseptic, chilly, nothing but machines and those nurses.
They come in and out like ghosts. They're clinical and sometimes kind,
but when you're out cold they just see you as dead weight. They're not
anyone you can really interact with. Who wants to come back to that world?"
Ben
gave him a slightly openmouthed stare. "Are you saying you were aware,
that you remember your coma?"
Mike
shook his head. "No. Not like that kind of remembering." He took another
deep breath. "When you've been in a hole for two weeks and all you can
ever seem to remember is the world having a low ceiling and smelling musty,
it's like your senses shut off. I felt things, and I saw things, down there
but... I forgot how to smell. And I forgot how to taste. And then I forgot
how to stay awake, that was when I went into that coma, or whatever it
was...the doctors really called it just an extended dream-state. Comas
are deeper, I read about this later. I was somewhere between being asleep
and being awake, neither, and nothing quite like unconscious. And what
I pieced together, while I was dreaming, was how to, er, come back to my
senses. In that hospital there was nothing to smell and nothing to taste,
so when something outside of the hospital came inside, and came right up
to me, it was sharp and sweet and pungent and fragrant, it was like
I was breathing and tasting at the same time. I knew when Alexa came to
visit me. I knew when my family came to visit me. I knew when you came
to visit me. I knew when Cragen, and Briscoe, and the guys from the old
neighborhood came to visit. Cragen smelled like that cologne he wears,
cologne and ink, like a pen had exploded in his pocket. Lennie had an old
smell to him, not bad, but slightly musty like the basement, which was
bad, and I felt like someone had wadded up his overcoat, with the gunpowder
still on it, and shoved it down my throat. But I didn't care, it was a
feeling, it was something that broke up the day."
He
paused a moment. "My family, Christ, they smelled like they always had,
there was this cabbagy tang, too sweet, and it was like I could smell Mom's
fear. I couldn't see her but I immediately knew when she was close. She'd
kiss me and I wanted to retch, it was so strong, but that's the thing,
when you're dreaming, you can't do a hell of a lot. And the funny thing,
Stone, was I knew when you were there too. There was some of my family
on you, God only knows how, not so much the cabbagy but it was there --
maybe all of us Micks have the smell of shredded cabbage on us -- but you
smelled like you were drinking, I knew the gin, that clear, awful gin smell,
and you were the only person I knew who'd drink that crap. It's not like
anyone came in soaked in this smell, but I could sense it because I'd had
mine blocked so long. I've lost it since then, you know, I just smell normal
things, like when Cate's making cookies or Benjy's sautering yet another
of those model planes, I smell that stuff. I don't smell people any more.
"But
of course, I remember smelling Alexa the most. She'd come in and that was
the closest I'd ever come to getting out of that hellish dream I was in,
like wading through water, because I'd smell the perfume she always used,
and the shampoo she used, and there was this underlying smell of her that
wasn't from anything manmade, it was just this open clean feeling, like
when you're in the middle of a forest and there's no other sound around."
Here he had stopped abruptly, thinking of what he'd just said, and there
they were. The forest said nothing. In the near distance the reservoir
lapped at its edges, but everything was still and silent.
Ben's
heart clutched. "Don't, Mike, that's enough..." he had said faintly.
But
Mike had never heard him. He stood, profoundly affected, and turned slowly,
staring up at the orange- and red-leafed trees, never having connected
the memory of her smell with this place, and knowing he always would from
here on out. He hugged his arms to his chest and said, "Like this. Just
like this."
Finally
his head darted up again and he started walking, speaking in spite of Ben.
"So I knew when she came. There were a few long days when she would be
there so long, and I could just breathe her in all day long. And then one
day she came in and her smell was different, it was similar to what I recalled
from the day before -- I know it was her -- but there was something else,
something sooty, something like grapes, or wine. And I knew she had done
something different, something she had not done in the past days of visiting,
she had been somewhere new.
"When
I woke up, I didn't really remember any of this. lt had to come back to
me day after day as everyone came to see me alive again, and I remembered
them by smelling them first, like a bright flash of deja-vu, and then it
would go away again. That was how I figured out what had happened while
I was asleep, that was how I knew who had come and who had not. That was
how I knew it was you seeing me first thing when I woke up, almost before
I even had my eyes open, I just knew it was you. And I remembered, this
tiny thing, I remembered the smells. And then Alexa came in and came right
over to me and she didn't smell like herself any more...she smelled like
another person, there was this soot and this wine and this dog smell to
her, and I wanted to just come out and say 'who do we know that has a fireplace,
likes wine and has a dog?' but it wasn't that clear, it wasn't that simple.
And it ruined everything. Seeing her again...but seeing her .... it was
like she was wearing someone else's clothes."
"Oh,
Mike, you're inventing this," Ben said quietly. "No one remembers what
they think in a coma, or a dream state, or whatever you're calling it.
You just took this from later and guessed. You know you were confused and
addled and thought she'd been a part of her family's design to get you
in the basement, that was why you were so cruel to her."
"Was
it?" Mike wondered, not in the least bothered by Ben's doubts. "Like I
say, it never was that easy to pin down, it took me years to really sort
through everything, and by then, well, yes, I did know everything. Maybe
it was more like this; when you dream, you may not remember your dream
but you have an afterimage, a picture, a word, a thought, a feeling
that you carry over with you. Even if you can't remember a single thing
about a bad dream you still can feel uneasy. Maybe it was more like that.
lt wasn't so much that I remembered her exact specific smell, but it all
wound together so that when I came out I knew something was amiss. I had
that after-image, that uneasy feeling after a very bad dream. And she was
the cause of it. Sure, yes, the whole notion of her being in league with
her family...maybe I believed that for a day or two, but I know that wasn't
it. It was stupid, it was too easy. lt was a smell. I wanted to provoke
her into telling me what had really happened, since I was obviously so
far off track. But you know, she never did, She just ran away, something
she did really well, just got up and left, no argument. After all, what
can you say -- 'I know you cheated on me because I smell it?' That made
no sense at all. And then...she told me there had been someone else as
soon as I came back to her, so could I really blame her? All of a sudden
she was the honest one, I was the one who'd been holding out. So I let
it go."
They
arrived at the entrance to the reservoir and paused as the trees widened.
"I don't believe a word of it," said Ben.
Mike
shrugged. "If you like it that way, fine. But you asked, so I told you."
Ben
thought a moment. "No, you didn't. I just asked it you'd ever discussed
it. You didn't answer that part."
He
shook his head. "No, Stone," he said. "I came to terms with it in New Mexico,
but we never discussed it. So I didn't ask her about her dead time, either.
So that was our impasse, and I let it go. One thing I learned about being
married; absolute honesty at all costs sometimes comes very high-priced.
And after a few years, once we had both kids and our careers and Rochester
was our place to be, well, none of that really mattered any more. It was
just ghosts. Places we didn't need to visit any more."
"Until,"
said Ben, "You had to visit them again."
Mike
looked at him. "Yeah," he said, nodding. "We forgot that ghosts haunt."
Ben's
house continued to feel like a clubhouse sanctuary frozen in time, but
the world continued around them, information filtering to their enclave
like messages from nearby planets. There was always Claire, who at first
dropped in, randomly, with news from the outside. After she and Caleb had
moved from their co-op, by sheer coincidence they had found a large home
a few miles from where Ben lived, which had put her three boys in the public
school system with Benjy and Caitlin. But as DA she had to maintain a residence
in the city proper -- circumvented during Ben's years by his naming Barney
Hoskyn's apartment, which in fact had always been Ben's second home --
and she was either late or away or had to be up early often. On nights
she and Caleb had to work late Benjy would stop by the elementary school
and pick them up on his way home. The Duffy children would stay at Ben's
until she or Caleb got out of work, and when Claire or Caleb or either
tore themselves away Ben would invite them to stay and have a drink. Invariably
the whole clan would eat dinner over. As the years went on, the nights
the Duffy children were over increased, and the more Claire and Caleb came
to rely on stopping off at Ben's on their way home after a long day. It
made for a hectic household, but neither Ben nor Mike protested having
three extra boys over.
"Three,"
Mike had marveled to Claire once as they sat around the porch drinking
tea, waiting for Caleb to arrive for dinner, watching Benjy kick a ball
around with her sons, "we never thought you had it in you," and he had
winked lasciviously at her.
"Cool
it, Commissioner," she had told him, her style of addressing people by
their positions never altering, although Ben had insisted she never call
him Retiree, or Ex-DA. "After all, you never know what you have in you
until you try."
"You
just want a girl, don'tcha," Mike had asked, "Keep on trying till you get
one, right?"
Claire
had shrugged. "I think at forty-five I'm done. Girls or no girls. I wouldn't
trade any of them."
"Sure,"
Ben had leaned across the railing, "but you never had any compunction about
calling one Jack?"
Claire
had folded her arms. "You're a laugh riot, Ben. I noticed you never brought
this up when you first heard his name."
Ben
had shrugged. "Well, it hardly seemed appropriate."
"If
you must know, Caleb's father is John, and everyone calls him Jack. We
had no choice."
But
at the time the mere attempt at connecting Claire's Jack with McCoy had
made them all fall silent; no one had been able to avoid mentally rehashing
how, after a particularly brutal and ugly campaign for an office most New
Yorkers barely knew the function of, Claire had been victorious over Jack
McCoy and slid into her District Attorney seat with the aplomb of someone
born for the job. Jack had resigned after she won, and been appointed a
position in the Mayor's office, staying there for one term, after which
he retired and seemed to disappear from the face of the earth. There had
been rumors here and there of McCoy doing this, or being there, but nothing
concrete. As Mike had once said, "Like rumors of the devil. Something's
always on fire but nobody knows who set it."
Claire
had shaken her head sadly at the time. "Aw, Mike, now, that's not entirely
fair. Jack wasn't the devil. He was many things but not that. He was good
at what he did. The problem was, he was a much better lawyer than a person."
Claire
remained District Attorney for twelve years, then stepped down graciously
and took a position at NYU Law as a visiting professor, which finally gave
her the chance to come home more regularly, but for a long time, out of
habit, her children still gravitated to Ben's after school. From three
in the afternoon through nine at night the Stone house was a hive of activity.
Benjy rarely had homework, so on the nights he didn't have soccer practice
(he was on the varsity team by tenth grade) or a date he stayed in and
helped tutor; Caitlin, with a much more active social life would flutter
in and out, and when she could be pinned down long enough he tried to give
her a hand with her homework, too. Mike kept few late nights if he could
avoid it; it was one of the privileges of finally reaching a position like
Commissioner, which had come very much from out of the blue not long after
Alexa had died. He would come home and play ball with the boys who had
finished their homework, running until all hours in the backyard, and their
presence seemed to keep him young and busy enough to avoid the dark and
heavy days. Benjy joined them sometimes, but often he took that opportunity
to walk with his other father, if not so far as the reservoir, perhaps
around the block, or down to the convenience store. Ben had become quite
a walker, and even Benjy sometimes had to wonder where he got his stamina,
but it was no matter: as he mentioned to Mike once, they had long, involved
discussions on these treks, concentrating their time as much as possible
amidst their busy lives, still trying to make up for the absent first decade
of Benjy's life. They would come back with ice cream or sodas and everyone
would pile into the living room for cards, or a board game, or television
-- Benjy was still very much a fan of the X-Files, young Jack was
enamored with the latest version of Star Trek, Caitlin was becoming
a journalist and insisted on focusing in on all of the prime newscasts.
There were quiet nights without the Duffys around, but most of the evenings
seemed to end up this way, with three families joined together: four adults,
five children filling up the house which once had had too much empty space
for Ben. Somehow, in the fifteen years since her death, Alexa's legacy
was to have brought together a group of people who might never shared this
kind of closeness otherwise.
It
had taken many years for Mike to completely grasp the implications all
of these changes had wrought in their lives, and then one night, like many
others, they were gathered around the television for another X-Files,
and he had looked over the odd collection of them. Caitlin usually sat
near her daddy, and Caitlin's friend Samantha had come for dinner, but
Sam was maneuvering herself expertly towards Benjy, who she had a bit of
a crush on. The funny thing about Benjy was that as a boy he had looked
very much like Ben; as a young adult he had gotten quite tall and lanky
and resembled more of his mother than anyone else, and the combination,
even with glasses, had made him handsome in an unusual way. Next to Benjy
could always be found Ben, who sometimes read during the show, but who
was always there and accounted for. On the floor were Claire's kids, the
twins and Jack, and Caleb and Claire themselves nestled in the loveseat.
In another part of the room Mike had seen a half-finished Scrabble game,
and when his gaze came back around he saw himself reflected in the television
set, at the other end of the circle. He felt warm, and cozy, and secure,
and realized the moment as one of those times when he wanted to bottle
it all up and keep it for when inevitably everything had changed beyond
recognition. A moment had come in the show where the kids had been repelled,
and at that second Samantha had yelped and shrunk against Benjy, and Mike
had taken a glimpse over at Ben, who looked over at him at the same time.
And they had both smiled, small faint upraisings of their lips, at each
other.
It
was the first, and possibly only incidence where Mike would ever decide
the two of them had the same thought at the same time: that this was, if
not happily ever after, at was least reasonably so.
But
time passed, and not long after that rare moment the house never felt as
full again. Benjy came home directly after school less often, and was home
fewer nights, Caitlin began hanging out at the mall with her friends, and
the Duffy children, realizing their heroes were no longer around, started
going to their own house after school, where Claire would meet them. The
slow change left Mike and Ben to realize a bizarre fact: that as the house
emptied out, what they were left with was each other.
He
had mentioned this to Stone on one of their walks to the reservoir. "Talk
about the Odd Couple."
Ben
had tapped his walking stick on the path. "I guess that makes me Jack Lemmon."
There was no laughter, and for a moment they let it drop, but then Ben
had said, "You know what? This is exactly what she wanted all along."
Mike's
ears had burned; at the unexpected mention of Alexa, and from Ben, he still
felt the emptiness. "What, us walking in the woods?"
Ben
had taken a deep breath. "She said to me once that a dream of hers was
to have both of us around, always. She did get it. What a wish to have
come true."
"If
I'd have known..." Mike had trailed off, unable to complete the thought.
"No
you wouldn't," Ben had contradicted, hearing the unspoken. "You hated me
as long as you needed to, and when you didn't need to any more, you stopped.
And changing any of that wouldn't have kept her from getting sick."
"I
didn't hate you, Ben."
Ben
had shrugged. "You did. And at times, I hated you, or at least I hated
your actions. But us living in peace and harmony?" He sighed. "She was
such a child, sometimes."
"I
wouldn't have had it any other way," Mike had said in a gentle voice he
didn't know he had.
They
were alone together, and while it was strange, Mike didn't mind it as much
as he thought he would. With Benjy and Cate both soon to be out of the
house he had other options, had had even more in the earlier years, but
the notion of diving back into dating had never really appealed to him,
and the idea of remarrying seemed as foreign as...well, as the notion that
he and Ben might share a home had once been. Not to say that he had not
thought about it; one irrepressible thing about Mike Logan was his appreciation
for the wide variety of women in the world, but he did not like them as
much as he once had. The effort to be expended did not seem to equal the
possible benefits; he did not think he could ever love someone again as
he did Alexa, and why would he want to try? So although his Commissioner
position had put him in a place to meet some interesting and sophisticated
women, he never really considered taking their flirtations seriously. He
also, as much as he did not want to admit it, still felt in competition
with Ben on a level he could not explain. To begin a new relationship with
a stranger would almost have been admitting that he could not hold out
as long as Stone could, that in some way he loved Alexa less than Stone,
because Mike knew Ben had never even considered dating anyone else.
But
they were alone more and more as the years went on, and Mike began to ruminate
on exactly what it was that would make him stick around once Cate and Benjy
were in college. He hoped he was not just a creature of habit, lulled into
the safety of living in a house that was not his own. Another time, another
walk, several weeks after the Odd Couple reference, Mike had said, "You
know, I was thinking."
"Admirable."
"Watch
yourself or I'll kick that walking stick out from under you."
Ben
hadn't responded.
"What
the hell are we, anyway?"
Ben
had raised his eyebrows. "How specific do you mean for the answer to be,
Mike? Human organisms? The Police Commissioner and a former DA? Two old
guys wandering the woods? Try to stratify your thought processes, Mike.
I don't always follow."
Mike
had let the sarcasm wash over him, and paused to let the words fade. Then
he said, "You never really cared all that much about being my friend, did
you, Stone."
"Oh...well..."
Ben had begun. "I don't know about that. Just because there's two people
in the world put together doesn't mean they have to go the proscribed route
to arrive at the same location in the end. You and I started out in two
very different places, and here we are. I suppose I've grown accustomed
to having you around."
Mike
had let out a broad burst of laughter, straight from his chest, one that
he had not made in a very long time, and it had felt wonderful. "Thanks,
I think, Ben. That's great. I suppose I've gotten used to having you around,
too."
That
had been about a week before, on one of the walks, Ben had stumbled, which
was not entirely unusual, but this time he had fallen down hard and injured
his knee. Mike had helped him hobble back home, then took him to the hospital,
where they had reset the kneecap and braced him up, telling him to watch
it and not do much walking for a few weeks. Mike had slipped into the role
of caretaker more easily than he thought he would, coming home early from
the office, and Benjy and Cate were enlisted to do what they could on weekends
home from school to keep Ben, now immobilized, happy. He had read a lot,
and once the knee was good enough to stand on again, had immediately resumed
his walks. But though the injury had been relatively minor, Mike noticed
something was missing. Ben's energy, always seemingly endless, was sapped,
and the walks, which had once been brisk and refreshing, turned slow and
meandering. Mike wanted to rush ahead, get to the reservoir in the pace
he had grown accustomed to, but held back. Finally, he had asked Stone
about it.
Ben
had shrugged, limping as he would for the rest of his life. "Damnable thing.
You'd think the walking stick would have helped."
"No,
Ben, I meant how are you feeling...in your head."
"Well,
I'm not senile, Mike, thanks very much."
"No,
I meant...you seem a little depressed."
"Is
that a clinical diagnosis, Mister Commissioner?"
Mike
had rolled his eyes. "Come on, Ben. This isn't like you."
Ben
had been quiet a long time after that, but Mike knew from experience that
this was just his prelude to explaining, a shifting of his gears. "It wasn't
the fall, not really, Mike," he said after a while. "I just had a lot of
time sitting in the house, time to think, and I've come to feel like I'm
close to being done now. That's all."
Mike
felt a sharp sense of sorrow mixed with desperation, and he was bemused
by his reaction. "Come on, Ben, don't leave me now."
Ben
had paused and leaned on his good leg, surprised. "There's not a hell of
a lot I can do about it. You're nearly fifteen years younger than I am;
you're not even as old as I was when...." he turned his head away a minute.
"When Alexa died. So please, don't. Just don't. When I'm done, I'm done,
and there isn't anything to do about it. I'm just more aware of it now.
Besides which, while I may have grown used to having you around, I am not
about to postpone the inevitable because you ask it. Sorry, Logan, this
may hurt, but I've never lived for you."
Mike
had nodded, a small smile on his face. "I'll recover from the insult. I
guess I'm just envious again."
"Envious?"
Mike
had shrugged. "That you get to go first."
Ben
had slapped a pile of debris on the ground with his stick. "Oh, that's
nonsense, Mike. Don't go envying me my age, for crying out loud. You'll
get to see Caitlin, you'll get to see Benjy do all these things. Get married,
have grandkids, Jesus, Mike, you'll get to have grandkids. Melissa never
had any; I've never been a grandfather. You want to talk about envy? Go
find it in my backyard."
Mike
hadn't known how to answer that.
Now
at the gravesite, Mike focused in, sensing movement in the distance. He
looked over the stones and saw Benjy, tall and lean, his darkening reddish-blond
hair wispy in the breeze, climbing out of the car. "They must think I've
grown roots out here," he told Alexa. "But I had to figure this whole thing
out. See, Alexa, as I'm sure you know, he died just a few weeks ago. That
knee thing...he never really was the same again. I guess it got Ben started
on thinking about dying, not just thinking about living, and once he was
on that road, I couldn't keep up to stop him. It was kind of nice, actually,
as far as that kind of thing goes, he went quiet, like he had planned the
whole thing out. If anyone could decide on the day he was going to go to
sleep and not wake up, I'd think old Ben could do it. That's how I'd like
to go. Thing is, I'm really interested in seeing life still. But Ben...I
think he wanted to see Benjy finish law school, and then it didn't really
matter after. So Benjy graduated in June, Caitlin's starting her masters
in the fall at Syracuse, and Ben goes to sleep on me three weeks ago and
doesn't wake up. Asshole. But here I am, talking to you, for the first
time since we met I'm truly all by myself. And like Ben said, I get the
chance to see all this stuff he'll never know about. I still miss you,
Alexa, I always will, but I'm just not ready to be there with you yet.
I'm too curious to see what the world has to offer still. Have some fun
with Ben, hold a seat on the swing for me, but I know you're in good hands
now."
And
then it came to him.
Benjy
stopped in front of his father, who shielded his eyes to look up. "Hey,
Dad. Not to rush you but...Cate's talking my ear off about this date she
has and she swears she's going to be late. So can we, um..."
"Yeah,
we can um, Benjy. Just a minute."
Benjy
didn't respond right away, just stared at the grave and the space next
to it, recently uprooted and replanted, and folded his arms across his
chest, one hand over his mouth, thinking. "I should come out here regularly,
like you do. I should do that."
"Don't
be preoccupied with graveyards yet, Benjy," Mike told him. "Not this early."
He offered his hand. "Give me a lift up."
Benjy
thrust his arm out and Mike grappled onto it, the younger man pulling him
to a standing position easily. "Getting old, Dad," Benjy teased.
Mike
shrugged it off. "Not really," he said. "Not compared to how long I intend
to be around." He paused. "I'll be over in a minute. Tell Caitlin that
if you keep the guy waiting that's a good thing."
Benjy
tapped two fingers to his forehead in a mock-salute. "You would know, Dad,"
and he headed back to the car.
Alone
again, Mike stared down at Alexa's grave, next to which was the fresh one
Benjy had been staring at, only about three weeks old. There was space
for a third, for when it was needed. So that's it, he thought, that's
why I don't feel like crying this time around. In his mind, Mike could
visualize Alexa no longer by herself, wherever she was, he could see Ben
being there, sitting down, communing with her, and that felt so comforting
and familiar that he began to feel all right with not weeping. How odd,
he thought, realizing there was a time in his life, there was a person
he once was who could not have stood that thought, and how now the image
made the person he had become feel better. The breeze that had been blowing
all afternoon caressed his cheek again, ruffling his hair and he could
not help but feel that it was a hand, reassuring him.
Or
some such bullshit, he laughed in his mind.
Then
he kissed his fingers like he did every month and rested them on Alexa's
gravestone, gave Ben's site one more long glance, then turned and started
back to the main road, which suddenly held all of the world's possibilities
on it.
The End
