Never Wake the Dead

by Bajaña, Edgar

  Why should I care about what happened to you, Jesse. It's over. I found you and I'm done with the case and you will cross to that other side too.

  I wished that I could be more like the other cops on the force. They were indifferent about everything that they came into contact with on the job. For the most part, they were meat heads with a license to shoot anyone that they wanted. They were the kind of guys that had no problem keeping their food down after seeing a body torn apart by wild dogs.

  They were the kind of guys that could walk over a murdered body and not feel a thing for the departed.

  They were ignorant, but blissful. They were nothing like me.

  Surprisingly, I envied them because their methods afforded them a certain kind of peace from the violence, that I could never find. Along time ago, a part me of wanted to believe that I was special.

  That time has left.

  Again, I grabbed the binoculars off the roof of the car and stared into the cemetery. I wanted to search for the thing among the tombstones again, the thing that I had seen moments ago. I did not have to search long. Instantly, my eyes locked onto the spot where Jesse stood. The thing appeared in plain sight, unashamed of what he had become.

  "There you are...you bastard. What do you want from me?"

  That was when I saw something in the cemetery.

  Suddenly, James spotted a small group of people walking through the middle of the cemetery. He cringed. They should have known that no one was allowed in the cemetery after dark. There were signs posted at the main entrance.

  "Jesus. Help me." James muttered under his breath.

  It was getting late and he figured that they would not make it out before dark. He thought twice about reporting what he saw to dispatch because he didn't want to stir anything up. It wasn't a big deal. It was just a hassle. But, he changed his mind and stuck to the truth. He took a closer look in his binoculars and reported what he saw.

  "Dispatch...I got something here. I have a female and two young girls inside Calvary. Over."

  Dispatch responded, "Make sure that they are out before nightfall. Over."

  James looked at the digital clock on his watch and then at the evening sun. It was falling pretty quickly. In less than 5 minutes, the night should be here. Whatever those women had planned, he would have to ruin it.

  "Shit." He muttered to himself. Then he spoke into the receiver. "Not a problem. Over."

  Again, he stared at the women through the binoculars. He thought about sitting back and letting them leave on their own. They would eventually leave when night came. Besides, he would keep an eye on them the whole time. But, he knew that wasn't the route to take. That was easy. He knew that he would have to go inside the cemetery to escort them back out.

  Officer Guzman jumped off the roof of the car and into the driver's seat. He turned on emergency lights, pressed on the gas and headed toward the main gates of the cemetery.

  24

  The Dead Speak at Calvary Cemetery

  Inside Calvary Cemetery, Mary's throat felt hot and muggy, which was strange because it was late November. The air was chill. In fact, her breath trailed behind and over her shoulders. It must have been something else that was drying out her throat. It must have been something about the place where she walked. Calvary Cemetery.

  How strange, she thought.

  As the afternoon light lost its color, Mary's twin girls ran toward an open grave. The sun slowly faded, and the leaves were yellow and dry.

  She came with the twins. There they go. The twins ran through the cemetery pass a row of tombstones and pass the forgotten bouquet of flowers sitting on mounds of dirt. Behind the twin girls, their mother, Mary Cardenas followed.

  Mary never hesitated or wavered when she saw someone who needed help. She was solid as oak. It was this evening when Mary felt that Joe needed her the most. But, she wasn't sure, if it was her help that he needed. All Mary knew was that he was calling to her, like a beacon pulsing in her heart.

  For some reason beyond her comprehension, Mary brought the girls to the grave of a dead man, a dead man whose name she could not get out of her head. Since Joe died, Mary wanted to forget him more than anything. But, she could not.

  The whole time, Mary kept an eye on her girls, making sure that they did not get too far ahead.

  "Be careful girls. Look at where you're going. The cemetery isn't a playground."

  Mary yelled at them. But, the girls kept running without turning back to acknowledge her.

  "Look out!" She yelled again, and the twins kept running. The girls kept running without a care in the world, through the field of the dead.

  Mary was in her mid-forties, a tall woman with long black hair, parted in the middle. The evening sun spilled across her face, then went cold blue. None of this was normal. None of the reason that brought her to these stone littered fields was sane.

  But, she didn't notice a thing.

  All she saw were her girls. Since Mary arrived at the cemetery, she watched the girls zig zag around, having fun, while she walked toward Joe's grave. "Poor Joe," she said. "He was too young to be taken away from me, too young."

  Joe was probably the most romantic man that she had ever met. The times that she spent with him were the best that she ever had.

  "Why did he have to leave? Who took him away from me."

  With every step, Mary became worried for the twins, and bad thoughts started to flood her mind. What if the girls died, today? She thought. Anything could happen in this place, anything.

  She walked a little further and remembered that Joe's grave was by the white marble mausoleum.

  Then, she heard him, "Your right Mary. Anything can happen in this place." "Joe?" "Your right Mary, listen to your heart."

  For a moment, Mary wasn't sure that the voice she heard was real or whether it was a memory. To her, it felt like both. "You have to think Mary. The twins can get hurt out here in this old place where people leave all sort of things lying around on the ground. Remember Mary." In this part of the cemetery, the graves were closer to each other. "You are right Joe. Running around like that, the girls could accidentally trip over something and hit their heads on a rock or something worse. Jesus."

  "Damn, Mary. That would be such a terrible thing if that happened. Don't you think." "Yes." "Yes. But, do me a favor," asked Joe. "Stop yelling at them. Don't keep them from running toward me. I'm their father." Mary heard his voice in her right ear as if he were right beside her. But, he wasn't. He was just a voice in her ear. And that was all, for now.

  "Yes, Mary. That would be a terrible thing, Awful, crushing. I don't even want to think of it, anymore. Stop thinking about it."

  But, she could not stop. Suddenly, she felt Joe's smile, as if he didn't care what happened to the girls.

  But, it was his smile that she remembered. Once again he had her, with only a memory of his smile. It was his smile that she loved the most. It always felt like something warm and familiar.

  Like Love. That was what she felt when she thought of him and his smile.

  Love.

  They had kept each other's love safe in each other's arms for such a long time. The memories lingered like a particular smell that would not easily wash away.

  "Yes, it would be terrible, if something happened to the twins. Don't do anything bad to them, Joe."

  "I love my girls, Mary, as much as I love you. But, I can't promise that."

  Mary wouldn't be able to go on if something terrible happened to the girls. Just thinking about it filled her with a sense of loneliness, a deep hole.

  If the girls were to die, she saw herself, alone, in a cold apartment, without her daughters to keep her company and without her husband to love her. Her life would be no more. She wouldn't know what to do with her, time, in such a space. In an attempt to stay sane, she would most likely start drinking, like when she was younger. She always liked a good drink, and Joe knew that one fact very well.

  "You're almost there, Mary," Joe w
hispered in her right ear.

  "Get a hold of yourself, Mary. The girls are doing fine. Look at them. They're having the time of their lives. And the good times will never end for them. I promise."

  "You promise Joe?"

  "Yes."

  The twins were the only thing that kept her going, since Joe died, her beautiful twin girls, Candice and Aubrey.

  The last image Mary had of Joe was when she peered outside their second-floor apartment to watch Joe work. There was a mountain of black bags in front of their apartment building. She hid behind the blue curtains of her bedroom, just to watch him.

  That day, Joe looked so content.

  The night before, they had gotten into a small fight.

  Off the truck and on the truck, Joe went on his route.

  The thing she remembered most about Joe was that he always carried a smile on his face. He was a happy man while everything around him smelled like shit. But, that was Joe's way. He made the best out of any situation.

  One time, Mary got into a fight with him, like how married people sometimes do. She wanted to hurt him that night. So, she asked him out of the blue, "How can you be so fucking content doing that kind of work, picking up people's shit? Don't you want to do something more for yourself, Joe? Don't you want something more for us?" Mary challenged him because she was frustrated with him. She didn't remember why anymore. It wasn't important.

  Joe looked at her with a subtle look of disappointing. Then, he quickly replaced it with a smile that eclipsed the negative feelings in the room. He replied, "No baby. That's not how I look at it. Not at all, cause one day. I'm going to buy you the nicest house that you've ever seen. It'll have one of those wrap-around-porches that you always wanted and a big backyard, the size of a private park. It doesn't matter how I get there, to our house, as long as I do. And that's all that I think. I don't give another thought about the trash. Every bag of trash is like one brick I need to build our house. That's all that matters to me. I want you and the kids to have a good home if anything should happen to me. That's all that a good husband can do. And one day you'll own a house free and clear. That's all I want. That's all I've ever wanted for you."

  Mary missed Joe a lot. He had a good heart, the best that she'd ever known in this world. Ever since Joe died a year ago today, Mary could not get him out of her head.

  There was a hole in her stomach. And in that darkness, there was a question lingering about Joe's death that was never quite answered. The doctors never explained to her how he died. They said it was a virus that he must have picked up along the way, somewhere, from someone. They didn't even have a name for what he had.

  Mary received a call from Joe's boss and got the name of the hospital. She hurried over and wasn't even allowed to touch him. He was in a coma, and the doctors were running all sorts of test on his body. She looked at him from the opposite side of an observation window, waiting for him to open his eyes, waiting for his smile to light up the room. She begged God to bring him back to her. But, he looked different now. His face was bone white, and his hair was now gray. He looked as if he were getting older, before her eyes.

  In the end, the doctors ran their tests and found nothing. Finally, they allowed her to take the body.

  "What do you mean you found nothing?" She pointed at her dead husband, "He had nothing that we could detect." The doctors had nothing else to say to her. They acted indifferent to her and left her alone in the hospital hallway, sobbing.

  After Joe had died, Mary heard a faint sound in her head that resembled her husband's voice. She spoke to her sister about what she heard. But they told her that it's just a delusion from all the drink that she has had done.

  They warned her, "Mary. Drinking in isolation is no way to deal with Joe's death. You have to think of yourself. Stop it, before you can't. You have to think of the twins."

  After her sister had talked to her, she kept going. She said fuck it. But one night, she did stop. It was the night she heard Joe's voice. She couldn't quite understand what he was saying, though. It was as if he spoke to her with a mouthful of dry soil. It's a delusion; the doctors kept telling her. It's a delusion; she kept telling herself. After a couple more months, the doctor placed her on medication.

  She needed to keep active for the twins.

  After the ceremony this evening. Mary hoped that she could finally be more at peace.

  It had been a year since Joe died. But, she felt the need to bury him again. It took a little bit of money to dig him back up. But, that was what she needed to find a peace of mind. She needed to stop hearing Joe's voice in the wind.

  Mary walked alone among the tombstones and statues that seemed to go on forever. But, she wasn't alone. Following behind her was a small procession of friends, except for her two sisters, Margret and Beatrice.

  She had invited most of her family members to Joe's second funeral. But, they thought that another funeral was a waste of time and money.

  "Joe's gone, Mary." They told her. "Let him, rest in peace.

  Besides, there was a police curfew, in effect and most people would not make it back home in time. Some family members would have gone if she had rescheduled the event sooner in the day. But, Mary was stubborn. She wanted it to happen at the golden hour, just like last year. With the police curfew

  In the last couple of months, there had been a string of homicides in the surrounding neighborhood, about two or five unexplained killings a night. But, Mary didn't care. She wanted Joe's funeral to happen at the same time and in the same way.

  Mary, the twins, and a small procession walked through Calvary Cemetary, the largest cemetery in the US with over 3 million graves and a crematorium that reminded the twins of a medieval castle they saw in a library book.

  "This place is so damn big," Mary thought. "They're probably a dead people in this cemetery than there are in a small third world country. I bet."

  "You're probably right, Mary" whispered Joe.

  Mary checked on the twins again. They wore identical dresses, black and straightforward. They had their mother's pale white skin and their fathers pitch black hair. Mary wore the same black dress as the twins, except she wore a thin white belt that glowed with candlelight in her hands.

  Both girls were skipping in and out the cascading evening light. The shadows were long and profound. And both girls sometimes seemed to disappear out of sight.

  "Candice! Aubrey! Slow down, girls. Slow down..." Mary tried to get the girls to listen. But, her words fell flat, inaudible. Her will was so weak when it came to the girls, who quickly ran through the row of headstones and headed straight for their father's grave by the mound of black dirt.

  "It's no damn use, is it?" Mary said to herself.

  "Girls will be girls," Joe answered. That was Joe's reason for whatever the girls did when he was alive. He loved and spoiled them as much as he could.

  Mary's eyes dropped to the ground, and she kept walking slowly behind the girls. When she looked up at the girls again, they were already gone and the sharp evening light made her eyes squint even more than before.

  Mary paused for a moment, and she heard her dead husband's voice. It was as if he were floating right by her, whispering things to her, in her good ear.

  "I know you can do this one thing for me, Mary." He said to her. "Bring the girls back to me. Let me see them one more time. Bring everyone back to me. Just one more time." That had been his one request since he died.

  Mary didn't think much of her dead husband's voice, though. It felt warm and inviting. It was harmless. Besides, Mary thought that she was just making up the whole thing as she went along. It was a delusion. That's all, a harmless delusion.

  Since her husband Joe died a year ago, her mind lost in a fog. She hoped that this ceremony would finally give her the peace of mind that she had been looking for all along.

  Mary had sent out the invitation for Joe's funeral to everyone that she and her husband knew. She wanted everyone to attend the funeral. Not many show
ed. But, she was sure there were enough people to make Joe happy.

  Mary looked at the twins, as spoke to Joe. "Don't worry baby. I'm bringing everyone to you, once and for all. And then, you'll finally rest in peace."

  "Of course, baby. Of course." Mary quickly snapped out of it and wiped the evil thoughts away. She warned the girls again. This time, it was more for herself, than for them.

  "Slow down. Slow the hell down!" she tried again. But her voice did not to carry the same weight as it did before. It seemed as if the sound of her voice had collapsed midway, between her and them. In the end, the girls didn't pay attention to her, and she didn't try again.

  Alone, Mary walked through the cemetery, thinking about her late husband, Joe. She carried a lit candle, protected by a tube of rice paper. She had lighted hers before she was supposed too, and it glowed as evening sun fell for the night.

  Her husband, Joe, always occupied her thoughts, like a record skipping in place. Good old Joe. He was a good man and down to earth. He was a hardworking man who worked for the City of New York as a sanitation worker. Her husband wore dirty green overalls and rode around the neighborhood on the back of a truck, picking up one garbage bag after another. His work was steady and predictable, just like his love.

  But, his kind of love had hurt.

  Mary walked alone among the tombstones and statues that seemed to go on forever. But, she wasn't alone. Following behind her was a small procession of friends, except for her two sisters, Margret and Beatrice.

  She had invited most of her family members to Joe's second funeral.

  "Joe's gone, Mary." They told her. "Let him, rest in peace.

  Besides, there was a police curfew, in effect and most people would not make it back home in time.

  Some family members would have gone if she had rescheduled the event sooner in the day. But, Mary was stubborn. She wanted it to happen at the golden hour, just like last year. With the police curfew

  In the last couple of months, there had been a string of homicides in the surrounding neighborhood, about two or five unexplained killings a night. But, Mary didn't care. She wanted Joe's funeral to happen at the same time and in the same way.