“We’re not lost,” Sean said, then thought, But if you had read the fuckin’ map correctly earlier, we’d be a lot further down the road. “You need to take exit 53 South when you come to it.” He looked up to see the ramp for exit 53 pass by.
“Dammit!” Mick said, pulling hard to the right and onto the shoulder. Horns blared all around like the trumpets of Jericho. Tires squealed as a car eked by their fender. The driver flipped Mick the finger as he roared past them.
Mick stomped hard on the brakes, shaking his fist at the other driver, and almost scraping the guardrail.
Sean pitched forward, his hands smashing into the dashboard, crumpling the map. He choked as the seatbelt caught him on the side of his neck.
“Jesus, Mick! Calm down, will you? You nearly strangled me.”
“I’d have bloodied your nose if you weren’t wearing the belt,” Mick said, laughing. “Aren’t you glad I made you wear it?”
“And you’d be laughing then, too, you moron.” Sean shook his wrists, willed the tingling to stop. “You’re going to get us killed. Quit driving like a maniac.”
Mick shoved the gear stick into reverse and turned around in his seat, left hand on the wheel. With his right, he pushed Sean’s duffel out of his field of vision and started backing up.
“What are you doing?”
“Going back to take the turn we missed, thanks to you, fuck-up.” Mick jammed his foot down on the accelerator and reversed up the soft shoulder.
“Don’t be an ass, Mick. Just play the clover.”
“Take the wrong ramp twice over just to get back on this road? No way. Reversing it is faster.” He punched the accelerator again and the car leapt backward. Rocks kicked out from under the front tires and a plume of dust rose up.
“And illegal,” Sean said. “Not to mention dangerous.” He folded the map and shoved it into the door-panel pocket. “Play the clover, Mick.”
“No way,” Mick said, shaking his head. “No cop, no stop.” The car rumbled backward up the shoulder, dipping to the right once as it swagged off the tar-and-chip pavement and onto rutted dirt before Mick corrected.
Sean crossed his arms on his chest. “I’m not paying the fine this time if you get another ticket. Besides, it’s lucky to drive around a clover.”
Mick slammed on the brakes again, saying something under his breath. Sean thought he heard “pussy” but wasn’t sure. Joey Ramone screamed that he wanted to be sedated. Sean thought he wouldn’t mind a little of that himself. The road trip wasn’t going at all like they’d planned, and he didn’t know how much more of Mick’s attitude he could take.
“You and your damned Irish superstition,” Mick said.
“You’re Irish, too.”
Mick stared straight ahead, his face as hard as fossilized limestone from County Clare. He said, “Faith, hope, or love?”
“It’s a four-leaf clover. Don’t forget luck. Make a wish on your way around.”
Mick shook another Camel out of the soft pack and pulled it out with his lips. He pushed the cigarette lighter in, and without even looking, merged back into westbound traffic—accompanied by the sound of horns.
Sean grabbed the dashboard and screamed, “Are you trying to get us killed? Or just trying to piss me off?”
The lighter clicked. Mick leaned forward and grabbed it, moving the cylinder to his face. He angled the cigarette down with his teeth and pressed the tip of it against the glowing brand. The sweet scent of fresh-lit tobacco filled the car. Mick filled his lungs and pushed the lighter back into place. When he exhaled, slowly, he blew the smoke in Sean’s face.
“You’re a dick,” Mick said. “You know that?” He leaned forward and cranked the volume knob all the way to the right.
“Me?” Sean had to shout to be heard over the music. “I’m a dick because I don’t want to get killed? Or am I a dick because I don’t want to break the law?" He waved a pointed finger toward the back of the car. “Maybe I’m a dick because I don’t want to piss off the guy behind us, just in case he has a gun!”
“Right,” Mick said, “you’re a triple dick. A real prize for the ladies.” He blew more smoke in Sean’s direction. “It would have been so much easier to back up and take the ramp. We’d have been on our way by now. Instead, we’ve got to play the clover leaf, round and round, to get back where we started. What a waste of time.”
Mick laid on the horn as a driver merging onto the highway cut him off. “Asshole!” Mick yelled, merging onto the exit ramp. He sped up, turning into the curve.
Sean grabbed the door’s armrest and pressed his left hand against the dash, bracing himself into the seat, wrist white with the pressure.
“Get your hand off the dash,” Mick said, smashing his fist down on Sean’s splayed fingers.
“Dammit,” Sean said, pulling his hand back.
“I am not going to get us killed,” Mick said, pulling the car back onto the highway. He sucked on his Camel, then, with an expert hand, guided the cigarette into the stream of air rushing by outside the rolled-down window, close enough to whip the ash off, but far enough not to rip out the cherry. He returned it to his mouth, letting saliva stick it to his bottom lip. “This is the last trip we’re taking together,” he said. “After this, I’m through with you. Pussy.”
Sean laughed. “You think that’s some kind of punishment? Depriving me of your sainted company? What a joke. You’re damned right this is the last trip we’re taking together. Just get me home in one piece so we can go our separate ways. The last thing we need is a freakin’ accident that smears us together for eternity. You know?” Sean shook his head. “Sometimes…”
Mick accelerated sharply, slamming Sean back against the seat. He laughed, then did it again. “Sometimes, what?”
“Sometimes…” Sean grabbed the dashboard again. “Slow down, man. You are so going to get us killed.”
Mick laughed and floored the accelerator around the final ramp of the clover.
The Ford’s tires squealed.
Joey Ramone yelled right along with them.
“Sometimes, what?” Mick screamed.
Sean said, “You’re a real prick! You can’t see how stupid the shit you do is. I wish…” He shook his head, knowing that what he said wouldn’t make a difference to Mick no matter what. “You are so blind…”
The turn faced them into the setting sun, and blinding light blazed in through the windshield.
Mick shielded his eyes with his left hand and stomped on the brakes.
The car careened around the bend of the clover loop, tires hiccupping across pavement, grasping for purchase, as forward momentum pushed the car in a straight line. They hit the short curb and jumped off the road, shearing through the guardrail.
The Ford Escort turned over and over into oncoming traffic.
◙
“You still feel guilt over your friend’s death,” the doctor said, pulling the avocado-green visitor chair closer to Sean’s hospital bed. He propped a wire-bound notebook on his knee and pulled out a mechanical pencil.
“I could have done more,” Sean said, picking at the hospital-white blanket. “I could have tried harder to stop him.”
“You said he was driving recklessly. What could you have done? Grabbed the wheel? Put your foot over his on the brake?”
Sean sat silent for several moments. The doctor ceased writing in his tablet and waited.
“I wished him dead.”
“Your best friend?” The doctor raised his eyebrows.
“Yeah,” he nodded. “We’ve been best buds since fifth grade when Mr. Baker gave us detention together.”
“There’s nothing like shared misery to bond friendships,” the doctor said. “But there was more than that, no?”
Sean nodded. “Sure. Class projects, sleep-overs.” He laughed. “Sock fights.” He lifted a hand to mimic a throw, then winced at the pain in his ribs.
“But you grew out of that.”
“Mm-hmm,” Sean said with a smir
k. “Got our first jobs together at Jack-in-the-Box. And got fired from there together, too. Girl chasing on Friday nights. Summer vacations.” Sean sobered. “He saved my life once, at the pool. I dove in and pushed off the bottom…but my foot went through the filter grate and got stuck. He jumped in and dragged me to the surface.”
The doctor looked at him with an expectant expression, waiting for Sean to continue.
Sean just closed his eyes and leaned back against the pillows.
“Well,” the doctor said, laying down his pencil. “It seems we’ve come to the heart of it. It’s not the guilt of Mick’s death that’s causing you grief; it’s betrayal: he saved your life once, and you feel as though you’ve taken his.”
Sean whispered, “What should I do?”
Was he dreaming, or did he hear the doctor say, “Wish him back,” before sleep claimed him?
◙
Sunlight glared off row after row of monuments in the Catholic graveyard. Sean squinted his eyes, feeling the skin pull taut on the right side of his face where black stitches pulled the ruined skin together. He laid a bruised hand atop the carved lamb on Mick’s tombstone.
“You shit,” he said. “This wasn’t supposed to happen. We were supposed to part ways, like a divorce. Irreconcilable differences.” He swallowed hard. “Death is bullshit.”
Sean had missed the funeral, so doped for pain from his shattered left leg that he couldn’t leave the hospital. Five days of his life gone that he’d never get back.
Getting past Mick’s death was going to be mighty hard. A fancy new stone and fresh-turned earth didn’t feel real enough.
Michael Casey Dunn
b. July 17, 1991 - d. September 23, 2009
Death is not a foe, but an inevitable adventure.
The chiseled words—created deep shadows on the face of the stone in the harsh glare of the afternoon sun. No comfort in that epitaph; Mick’s father had probably chosen it. He’d remarked on more than one occasion that their road trips would get them into trouble. This kind of trouble, he probably hadn’t considered.
Sean wiped his eyes, careful not to touch his broken nose.
“I didn’t even get a chance to say goodbye,” he said. “They told me you died on impact—no pain. I hope so, buddy, ‘cause I can tell you, pain sucks.
“I hope your cloud is comfortable. It’s just one more thing to pin on me if it’s not. That’s all I’ve been thinking about: you condemning me for this. Ever since they told me you were dead, it’s played through my mind like a movie on repeat. That and the fact that I’ll never see your ugly mug again.
“I’ve been giving this a lot of thought. I think you may be partly right. The accident is sort of my fault. I mean, you were driving way too fast. But, I did make the wish. Though, I didn’t realize what it was at the time.”
Sean brushed aside a speck of dirt. “It all comes down to the clover, Mick. Four-leaf clovers make wishes come true. I’ll do what I can to make it right, man. I’ll do what I can.”
Sean limped to his car and got in.
All night and half the next morning, he drove, a newly-purchased Best of the Ramones recording in the CD player. When he got to exit 53 on I-70, he took the westbound loop of the clover.
The skid marks were still there, as was the new guardrail the state had made Mick’s parents pay for.
Sean said aloud, “I wish Mick were alive.” He drove all the way around, back to eastbound exit 53.
Then, he drove the clover again, “I wish Mick were alive.”
By the time he made the third loop, Sean was crying. “Son-of-a-bitch!” he yelled before, more quietly, “I wish Mick were alive…”
…so they could kill Mick’s old man, and then Sean’s. Teach them a lesson. No kid should grow up with a drunk for a father, especially a drunken cop with handcuffs and a nightstick, like Mick’s dad. Or like his own, a longshoreman with fists like hammers.
“Goddammit!” Sean yelled. That was never going to happen. Wouldn’t have happened, even if Mick had lived. But they could dream. And keep their secrets. Together. Just the two of them, against the world.
Because, when you had a friend like Mick, you couldn’t have any other friends.
Now what was he going to do?
After the fourth loop, Sean made fists and pounded them on the steering wheel. He cried, “Why? Why did you fucking have to die?”
He drove the loop again, hands tight on the wheel, Ramones turned up loud like Mick used to like it. Joey screamed for sedation as the car approached the westbound ramp, and Sean accelerated into the turn.
The sun burned his eyes as he shouted, “I wish you were here, you stupid son-of-a-bitch! I wish you were here!”
The temperature in the car dropped ten degrees. A shiver ran up Sean’s spine, and the hair on his neck stood on end. His hands started shaking on the wheel.
Yet, there was no sign of Mick.
Sean took a deep breath through his mouth, exhaled with an audible sigh as he weighed his options. He was tired. He was hungry. And he was disappointed.
He turned off the Ramones. Inside the car, there was silence, with only the monotonous sound of the tires on the pavement to mar the simplicity of it. Sean stared straight ahead. A moment later, he smiled. He followed that with a half-muttered, “Heh,” then a chuckle, and finished with a stream of laughter. Once he’d started laughing, he almost couldn’t stop.
Had he been expecting Mick to appear in the seat next to him? What if he had just popped out of thin air? Jesus! That would have scared him to death. He might have had an accident. Might have killed Mick all over again. Might have killed himself.
Clovers. Wishes. Mick had just lost control. Sean’s wish hadn’t caused anything, and another wish couldn’t undo it. Stupid, lunatic idea.
Mick would have laughed his ass off at such a lame idea, and then, he’d have lit a Camel and called Sean an idiot.
Sean exited the clover and headed for home.
◙
At the used record shop, rap music blasted from the speakers placed at the end of each aisle, and the teen-star wannabes gyrated to the pounding bass beat stolen from some ‘80s top-10 song Sean couldn’t remember the name of.
No originality, Sean thought. He tuned it out, wishing the store would play something more to his taste. He plucked a Smithereens CD off a shelf and studied it.
A figure in the corner of the cover art caught his attention.
Mick? Impossible.
He dropped the CD back onto the shelf as if it had burned him. Then, looking up, he saw Mick hurry down the aisle on the other side of the CD bins.
“Mick!” he called, but Mick continued down the aisle as if he hadn’t heard.
Sean hurried after him, but his bum leg prevented him from catching up.
Had it been Mick? Or a guy who looked a lot like Mick?
Sean paused at the end of the row and looked left, then right.
Where had he gone? Sean could have sworn he saw Mick go that way. He searched down a few more aisles.
“Mick?”
Sean checked the Country and Western aisle, but Mick wasn’t there.
Of course, he isn’t, Sean thought. Mick wouldn’t have been caught dead in the Country-Western aisle when he was alive. A hysterical giggle bubbled up from Sean’s chest, and he felt a surge of panic.
“Mick!” he yelled.
Several people gave him strange looks.
Sean left the store and headed for his car, pulling his cell phone from his pocket and hitting the speed dial for Mick. After a moment, he heard the three-tone intro and the monotone announcement that the number had been disconnected.
◙
Sean pulled into the driveway and pushed the gearshift into park. The car ran by automatic transmission; no more shifting his own gears, thanks to Mick. He struggled with the parking brake, his left leg shaking with the effort of pressing the pedal, then he laid his head back and closed his eyes.
The Smithereens blasted
out of the speakers—new speakers, no buzz here, not like in Mick’s rattletrap.
Sean pounded his good thigh with a clenched fist. When would his mind stop making the comparisons? All roads led to Mick, it seemed.
He clicked off the radio, threw open the door, and pushed himself up from the seat. No more low-riding cars either, he thought, struggling to stand on his weak leg. Eighteen years old and half broken, like an old man.
At least, he was alive. Unlike Mick.
Sean looked up at the front porch and his heart began a wild beat, thumping like a fist against his breastbone.
Mick sat on the front steps of the house, smoking a cigarette.
Sean felt himself trembling. The short walk across the lawn took longer than usual.
Dried blood streaked Mick’s blond hair brown and splattered over his left shoulder, nearly obliterating the Ramones logo on his t-shirt.
Sean tried to keep the quaver from his voice. “Mick? What are you doing here?” The purple bruise straddling Mick’s forehead appeared vivid, almost fresh.
Sean felt himself tremble, even as he explored the possibilities. Mick was dead. He was never coming back, which meant this visitor was a ghost, or Sean was going crazy.
“I’m here to collect.” Mick sucked on the end of the cigarette, the tip burning bright scarlet in the shade of the porch awning. He smiled that I’m-right-and-you’re-wrong smile Sean had always hated.
“Collect what?” Sean limped closer, pocketed his keys. “You’re dead.”
Mick’s smile deepened. “Do I look dead? I’m just a little banged up.” He pointed at Sean with the cigarette. “That was some stunt you pulled, driving us into the sun like that.”
“You’re not blaming the accident on me.”
“But I am, Sean,” Mick said, putting the Camel to his lips.
“You were driving too fast.”
“You forced me to take the clover, and then you wished me blind. Of course the accident was your fault.”
Sean felt a twinge of pain behind his forehead. He lifted his right hand and rubbed, sliding three fingers up the center and down the bridge of his nose. He shook his head. Released the breath he’d been holding. “Get lost, Mick. You’re a fucking hallucination. I’m not up for this right now.”
Deep Cuts Page 21
