Tethered

by Amy MacKinnon

  I bring a stainless-steel bowl over to the sink and the cake of soap I stole from the master bathroom. It’s a rich brown, yellowed around the edges where his hands wore away the best of it. It smells of cocoa butter and honey. It smells of Linus. I carry the bowl back to the worktable and begin working a lather against the washcloth.

  The medical examiner, Richard, was careful to close his incisions with fine stitches to match Linus’s flesh, a gesture of respect for his old friend. Of course an autopsy was required because of the nature of his death. There were many allowances, however. Mike and I were permitted to wheel his body through the hospital’s warrens the dead are required to travel, underground tunnels hidden away from other patients and their families, all leading to dreary caves where hearses can slip in and out unseen. Mike covered my hand with his own where they met at the handle of the stretcher. Alma walked behind us, her chin aloft and face clear, Richard a discreet ten paces behind. Though it’s forbidden to disturb a body in the care of the medical examiner, still she unzipped the body bag and kissed Linus’s lips before we loaded him into the car. No one dared protest. I followed Richard the few miles to his office while Mike drove Alma home. I promised her I wouldn’t leave Linus. It didn’t take long.

  The music pauses before the tentative strings of Lacrymosa flow into this room. My hands start at Linus’s feet, swirling upward, leaving a trail of soap in their wake. His legs, then I trace the cloth along his stomach, starting at the center and waking in an ever-widening spiral. Where it’s wet, his skin is darker, purely glistening. I dip the cloth back into the scalding water, rubbing what’s left of the soap against it, and then cleanse his arms and the crevices of his neck. I hesitate before washing his face. His eyes are now forever closed to this world and the people in it. They will never catch me again, hold me there. It was as close to an embrace as I permitted. I study the crease of his lips, the way the bottom one protrudes just beyond the top. What would it have cost me to have allowed a kiss to the top of my head, to my cheek? The utter smoothness of his skin, like a baby’s, all gone to me now.

  I look at his hand and remember the one concession I made, how I reached for it in the car and held it in my own. How I felt something true there. It’s all I have.

  I’m gentle with the cloth, careful to keep his eyebrows aligned, his lashes separated. When I’m done, I pull a soft blue blanket up to his neck, tucking it under the width of his shoulders. It was in their linen closet; it smells of Alma’s detergent. I couldn’t allow her to see him covered in a common plastic sheet.

  There’s nothing left for me to do. Over the years, Linus spoke of his death often. His instructions were always clear: He wanted his face in a natural state. Once he’s dressed, I’ll transfer him to the casket and lay him out upstairs. It occurs to me that this will be one of the last moments I have alone with him.

  “Linus.” I bend to his ear, my voice unnatural in this space. “I know you’re dead and can’t hear me. But I want to say . . .”

  I lift his hand, stiff from the formaldehyde. It moves only slightly, just enough for me to wrap my own around it. It’s swollen and cold, unnatural, not at all the way I remember it. Now it’s like those of all the other bodies I’ve prepared. I let it go before the memory of that touch overtakes the way I remember it in life.

  I whisper the rest. There’s more, but words are difficult things. They choke my throat and bind my chest. So instead I do what I wish I had done during Linus’s life. I bow over his great chest and lay my head there. Soon my arms find their way around him, embracing this man who would have been my father if only I’d allowed it. If he had a lap, I’d climb onto it. I stay like that until my back aches, until the silence where his heartbeat should have been becomes unbearable.

  Before I smooth the balm on his lips, I bend to kiss him. I could stand here, lose the day in his face, but Alma is waiting upstairs. She intends to dress him alone. Later, when it’s time to bring him upstairs to the mourning room, I’ll bring all of the irises (faith, hope, wisdom) from my greenhouse to make a bed for him in the casket. Only I will know the fleurs-de-lis are there.

  Stepping outside, I phone Alma, but there’s no answer, so I’ll have to leave her a note, let her know her husband is ready. How does one word such a thing?

  I walk the flight of stairs up to the mourning room. When I open the door, Alma looks up from one of the leather wingbacks, her ankles crossed, a garment bag draped across her lap. Her back is rigid and her face clear.

  “Is he ready?” Her voice is so firmly tethered to this world, solid and familiar.

  “Yes.”

  She stands, sighing as she does. “I turned the ringer off. Reporters keep calling, one after another. I’m ignoring the doorbell for now too. Besides, this place will be filled the next few days. I don’t think we can take on any new business just yet.”

  “Of course,” I say. Still she doesn’t move.

  “It’s a shame, you know? I have all this meat in the freezer. I was saving the rack of lamb for Sunday dinner; you know how it was his favorite. I don’t know what I’m going to do with the mint jelly, either. Seems a waste, cooking for just one.” Alma stops, lost in thought. I catch a glimpse of the woman she’ll become in the next few years: heavily lined, her mahogany skin grown ashen and slack. She’s never appeared fragile before this. I think of how she held me at the hospital when my legs began to give and I wish I knew how to go to her. But I don’t, of course I don’t, and she regains herself anyway.

  “Clara,” she says, steady again. “We need to talk.”

  There is no way to tell her no, so instead I stand several feet before her and wait.

  “All of this is yours now.” She sweeps her free arm. “This house, this business, everything.”

  “Alma—”

  “I’ll continue living here, for as long as that will be.” Her expression is perfectly serene. “I’ve lost all of my sisters over the years, and of course, my son. Now I’ve lost my husband—”

  “Please don’t.” This was never my plan. True, I don’t have one, but I cannot be responsible for all that she’s giving me. I don’t know how.

  “I don’t expect you to take care of me, that’s not what I’m saying.” She stands and walks toward me. “You’re all the family I have left. Whether you know it or not, whether you like it or not, we’re family here.” She grabs my hand and slams it against her heart. “I need you to stay.”

  I look away at first, but am pulled back. It’s unbearable, how I ache to turn, but she won’t let go. Again and again my eyes wander.

  “Look at me, Clara.” I think of Linus lying one floor below us and summon all the will I have. I meet her and, when I do, feel a loosening within. Her heart pounds under my hand and her eyes are soft.

  “I’ll stay,” I finally say.

  Her lips tremble toward a smile. She cups my chin, holds my gaze, and then brushes past me to the basement door, hugging the garment bag to her.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  Whorls unfurled themselves while I neglected my garden; ivory, crimson, pink confetti petals celebrating their debut. Though I was no longer mindful of their need to be showered twice daily and bathed for eight full hours under the solar heat lamps, still my flowers survived. Buoyant poppies (consolation from beyond) hover in a scarlet wave at the back of the room. There they mingle with gladioli (ready-armed), upright stalks heavy with periwinkle bells, caught in midair, ringing out proclamations of life and promise. Coneflowers huddle in the corner, lost among themselves.

  Outside, the skies remain their foreboding gray while snow continues to fall, first drowning out the sun and now moon, yet still the flowers blossomed. My garden will be more dependent on me during the cold months. This past week has seen the weather turn from our crisp, glaring autumn to New England’s brittle winter. Soon the ground will be too hard to bury the dead; the bodies will be stacked until spring, when the earth is yielding and tender again. It’s life’s eternal pledge to rejuvenate i
tself, but now that hope seems distant.

  It would be unbearable to intern Linus’s body in the basement all winter alongside those yet to come. I called the caretaker of Colebrook Cemetery yesterday while I waited outside the medical examiner’s office and had him dig the plot before the snow fell.

  I close my greenhouse door behind me. Reaching for the switch along the wall, I turn the dimmer low so that only those lights set into the steps and along my path glow a bare white.

  I need to cleanse myself of the ugliness of the past few days, bathe in the beauty of my garden. My shoes slip off easily and with them, my woolen socks. The tiles are warm, almost hot against my skin. I drop my sweater on top of my things, pull free the elastic that restrains my hair, then walk down to meet my flowers. Each step is careful, deliberate; my joints are still thick from the cold basement, the rest of me numb from preparing Linus’s body. As I unbutton my blouse, I think of Alma next door, struggling to pull on his shirt. I slip off my pants and know how it can be to drag trousers over inflexible limbs. But I must wash away these thoughts.

  I’m here to savor the warmth, find some semblance of order that doesn’t really exist. I reach between a grove of copper ambrosia (love returned) and find the faucet. With effort, the knob finally gives and the overhead sprinklers fill. Raising my face to catch the rain, I cup the head of a red-hot poker (fierce in life).

  The water is cold, the air stifling, and together they prick my skin. My bra and panties and hair cling to me. I push back the strands covering my eyes and catch sight of something wondrous. The daisies are growing. I go to them, marvel at the ridged leaves of the infant flowers, so close to the earth in their terra-cotta pots, pressing, their stems still hidden beneath the soil. Beads of water pool and then run down them, and I can feel the same on me. The odor of wet dirt is familiar in too many ways.

  I need time to think. Everything needs to stop so I can be here among my flowers and listen, allow my thoughts to wander. I lower myself onto the tile floor and feel its hardness penetrate me. Towers of aster loom; one catches the strap along my shoulder, caresses the length of my throat. Their marmalade scent and lavender faces soothe me. I rest my cheek against them.

  It will be safe to cry here.

  It’s then I hear it: a knock at the back door leading out to the yard. The windows of my greenhouse rattle with it. My legs won’t move, my eyes won’t blink. And then I see him, pushing open the door.

  “Clara?”

  Mike doesn’t notice me sitting here, hidden by my garden. I’ve faded into my surroundings, translucent as water; invisible like so many other times in my life.

  He closes the door behind him, ignoring the showers overhead. His shoes slap at the puddles. “Clara?”

  His voice is louder now and there’s a catch to it as he reaches under his suit coat. A snap and then his gun is out. He lowers himself behind a cluster of black-eyed Susans (warm remembrance) set upon a bench.

  Both hands are wrapped around the gun as he sidles toward the door to my bedroom. This is a man I’ve never seen before: primal, capable of violence. Somehow it reassures me. He squats close to the ground as he approaches the two steps leading out of the greenhouse, his head swiveling as he moves. When he reaches for the door, I step out from my spot.

  “Mike.”

  In an instant he is upright and spun around, his gun locked on me. I can already feel a bullet burning a path through my chest. I wait for it, ready to fall.

  “Jesus Christ!” Mike cries, lowering both hands before him. He doubles over, gasping. “What the hell are you doing?”

  I should feel naked, cover myself; I expect modesty to overcome me, the way my body has grown visible through the white cotton. Instead I’m suddenly alive. “Why are you here?”

  He holsters his gun and walks toward me, wiping the water from his face as he does. “Your hearse was outside but you weren’t at the funeral home, and when I rang the bell here, you didn’t answer.”

  I take a step. “And?”

  “I was worried, after what happened to Linus.” His eyes fall to my breasts and stomach, then lower. Streams that sluice within the lines around his eyes, the creases along his nose, shift with his expression. Droplets catch on his lips and then fall before he speaks again. “I couldn’t find you.”

  I nod. He appears strong. His suit jacket darkens under the weight of water, his white shirt plastered to his chest reveals a rise of muscle across his stomach, a glance of bare flesh, and there’s the hint of something more, something indistinguishable. I take another step.

  “You’re okay,” he whispers.

  All I can do is shake my head. A part of me begs to cover my nakedness, hide the naked patches along my skull, create more, but, no, I won’t go back. I continue toward him, watching his eyes dart around the room and then back to me.

  Another step and the corner of his jacket grazes my navel. I arch my neck to meet his face.

  “You’re okay,” he whispers against my lips.

  I continue shaking my head no, feeling my mouth brush his as I do. He reaches for my face and stills me. We could stop here. I could step away, walk to my room—he out the back door—and I could find comfort in my robe. Instead, I press myself into him.

  I pull off his suit jacket, the sleeves turn inside out, and it drops to the floor. Of the thousands of buttons I’ve undone in my work, none have come so easily as those of his shirt. It’s then I see it. A Celtic cross, lines of gold and red ink staining his flesh, an intricate expression of devotion. It lies across his chest, dropping as low as his waist. I press my fingers to it, to its north, south, east, and west, to its mind, body, heart, and soul. His stomach tenses under my touch. So thin. He lifts my chin with the barest caress and we regard each other. I imagine my gaze is as certain as his. When he breaks it to glance down and unclip his gun belt, it’s as if the sun has gone down and my body wilts against his, straining for its warmth.

  My hands are not my own; my hands would never reach for a man’s belt, eager and impatient to loosen it, and then unfasten the pants button beneath it. When I feel his fingers on me, trailing up my back, fumbling before releasing the clasp of my bra, the urgency within me quickens. His breathing is jagged, but his fingers are smooth against my hips as they hook the sides of my panties. He slips them down my legs, kneeling before me, and I step out of them. He kisses my thighs, presses his face there, inhales deeply, and then stands again. He works his fingers through my hair, finding my shame, each of his fingers tracing the ridges of sores, his eyes never leaving mine. He pulls me closer.

  Then my arms are around his neck and he lifts me onto the edge of my potting table. He is taut and flexed, hard under me. I curve myself around him, bury my nose in his hair. My mouth tastes the back of his neck: salt and sweat and life.

  It’s frantic, impatient; there’s neither the time nor the desire to finesse a moment before it’s over. When he lowers me to my feet, I feel the muscles of his arms shake. He collapses against me, each of us trembling. We stay like that with my ear pressed to his chest, until his heart no longer pounds, until it returns to a constant beat.

  He lifts his head from mine, taking my face within both his hands. He tilts my mouth toward his, pausing to look at me first, probing, as if seeking a refuge within me.

  And then we kiss.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  I dried his clothes while he slept. When they were done, I pressed his suit and then hung everything from the back of my bedroom door. He’ll see them when he wakes. When I look quickly, it’s as if there are two of him here.

  He’s stretched out, facedown, a naked calf resting outside of the blankets. My sheets have been pulled free from their snug hospital corners, my down comforter fluffed from his restless sleep. He spoke once as if from a dream, but the only word I could make out was “sorry.”

  After . . . well, after the greenhouse, we came here.

  With my head against his shoulder, our limbs spun one round another, we found refug
e in the dark. It wasn’t until I started to fall toward sleep that he spoke.

  “I asked her to get an abortion, but she wouldn’t.” There was nothing to say, so I listened. “You know I actually prayed she’d lose the baby? I did.”

  Several minutes went by, his breathing was regular. He’s asleep, I thought.

  “Guess my prayers were answered.”

  We didn’t speak again, just held each other against the night. When he finally drifted off, I slipped away. I’ve sat in this chair most of the night, sliding between vivid dreams and surreal wakefulness, my thoughts turning again and again to Linus, until the tears finally came. There was enough time to bury the rest of myself before the sun rose.

  It’s been a comfort to watch Mike, to have had this one night. He’ll be awake soon and it will be over; dawn is beginning to seep through. There’s the gentle catch of his snore before he stretches and turns. The red and gold inks crisscross his belly, a patchwork of betrayal. No sense attaching myself to the moment; I don’t have any expectations that there will be more like this.

  I dressed hours earlier; there’s much to be done. Linus’s wake is in three days, on Christmas Eve, no less. Enough time to allow his family in Alabama to make arrangements to travel here and then stay on for the holiday. Alma said she couldn’t imagine waking to a quiet house on Christmas morning. But I need to concern myself with now.

  Without realizing it, I stand, take the few steps to Mike’s side, and kneel there. He is truly asleep. I allow myself to smell his hair, that spot on his neck; how I ache to touch him. Instead I whisper.

  “When I was in tenth grade, there was a boy who sat in front of me in math. I didn’t know him, really. I knew he played hockey and that he liked geometry, but we didn’t talk. Each time he passed back papers, he’d smile at me. Just to be nice—he didn’t like me. Sometimes, when he came to class he’d say ‘Hi, Clara’ loud enough for the other kids to hear. Everyone liked him.”