Winter Wake

by Rick Hautala

John smiled grimly, watching Randy carefully for any sign that would reveal what he was really thinking.

  Is he watching me … waiting to see if I’m starting to crack? he wondered as Randy’s car pulled away slowly. The blue cloud of car exhaust drifted heavily in the cold air, like sea smoke rising.

  “Who was that?” Julia asked.

  Her voice caught John by surprise, and he let out a startled yelp as he wheeled around.

  “Jesus! You scared the shit out of me!”

  He eased the door shut and then walked over to where he had left the casserole dish.

  “Randy,” he said, letting his hand rest on the still-warm dish cover. “Ellie sent over a dish of lasagna.”

  “Oh, isn’t that sweet,” Julia said. She picked up the dish and lifted the cover, sniffing of the contents. “Umm — as lousy as I feel, this smells great.”

  “I’ll just bet it does,” John said, his voice taking on an little kid’s sing-song tone. “It’s so sweet of him to bring it over.”

  Julia placed the casserole on the counter, all the while frowning. When she looked at John again, her frown deepened. He glared back at her.

  “What the hell is wrong with you?” Her body was still feeling limp from throwing up so hard, and the last thing she wanted was an argument with John.

  “Oh, nothing … nothing’s the matter. I’m feeling great. My father’s going to be buried this morning, and dear, sweet Randy is running over to do these darling little favors for us. ‘Would you like me to drive you to the funeral today?’ … ‘Here’s something the little lady cooked up for you.’ Goddamn! I don’t need this horseshit!”

  “He’s a friend. He’s trying to help,” Julia said as she pulled a chair away from the table and sat down. The backs of her legs were throbbing, and her stomach was churning.

  “A friend? ... Right!” John practically snarled.

  And is it friendly to be popping your best friend’s wife?

  Is it friendly to leave notes around, intending to drive that same friend out of his mind with guilt?

  “I’m sure if it had been his father instead of yours, you would want to help any way we could,” Julia said. “Come on. He was your best friend in high school, for crying out loud.”

  “High school was along time ago.”

  Julia smiled and shook her head. She didn’t want to fight, but she couldn’t let him feel and say such things unchallenged.

  “Those days are dead and gone,” John said, pointing at her. “Randy and I don’t have a goddamned thing in common anymore.”

  Or do we? his mind whispered, filling in the brief pause. Maybe we have you in common …

  “He doesn’t know me any more than I know him. And for all I care, that’s the way it can stay.”

  Julia wished this wasn’t happening … especially now. She was sure Bri, who was still up in her bedroom, could hear every word they were saying. This might be how John was expressing his grief, but it wasn’t healthy.

  “Who the fuck does he think he is?” John shouted. “He comes here, acting all best buddies or whatever.”

  Even buddies don’t share wives, he thought. That’s called “buddy-fucking.”

  “We — I don’t fucking need his goddamned help. I can handle this by myself, so fuck him!”

  If you’ re not already fucking him, a small voice whispered in his mind.

  “Keep it down,” Julia said as mildly as she could. “I don’t Bri upset any more than she already is.”

  John started to say something, but the only sound he made was a loud snort. He fixed his eyes on the casserole dish, walked over to it, and picked it up. Hefting it with both hands, he raised over his head, spun around, and flung it as hard as he could against the kitchen wall. There was a loud crash and a sickening splat as glass and lasagna exploded everywhere. The mess slid slowly down the wall to the floor, leaving a bloody-looking asterisk and streak on the wall beside the phone.

  For a sickening instant, when she looked at the bright red mess on the floor, Julia had the impression it was flesh and blood, not tomatoes and noodles. Her stomach tightened again, threatening to heave.

  “John! … Stop it!”

  It was frightening to watch as he closed his eyes tightly and, clenching his fists, shook them in front of him. His lower lip was pale and trembling, and his breath came in short, stuttering gasps. For a short while, she waited to see if his rage had passed or if he was going to do something else. But then, exhaling with a sagging of his shoulders, he unclenched his fists, brought his hands down, and slammed them hard against his legs. He threw his head back and let out a long, low wail.

  Julia forgot her own raging nausea as she went to him and threw her arms around him. He felt as limp as a scarecrow in her arms as he sobbed, his body shaking uncontrollably. She braced the back of his head with a gentle but firm grip and, because words failed her, she simply breathed deeply and evenly as she cried.

  TWENTY

  Suspicions

  I

  John decided to have Frank’s funeral service at the funeral home instead of at church, but he did ask Pastor Vernon to conduct the service. He, Julia, and Bri were sitting in the front row as people quietly entered and took their seats. A small, white lectern was set up at the front near the open casket, where Frank lay, his hands folded across his chest, the harsh lines of his face smoothed and softened by the mortician’s art. Frank wore the same suit he had worn to church on Christmas Eve. With the curtains drawn, the lights dimmed, and organ music playing softly in the background, he could easily imagine that they were at the church.

  I’m not dead ... but I’m dying!

  Bri sat at her mother’s right-hand side. From time to time, she clenched her mother’s hand tightly — especially whenever she looked at her grandfather’s body. She kept telling herself this was it — this is real … he’s dead and soon to be buried.

  But every time she looked at her grandfather, she could have sworn his frail chest was rising and falling with shallow breaths. The illusion — that’s all it is … an illusion — was convincing… and terrifying. She tried not to think it, but she couldn’t stop imagining her grandfather was going to sit up in the casket and shout, “Hey, everyone! Surprise!”

  John, on Julia’s left, kept his head bowed and his hands clasped together in his lap. His eyes were closed more often than not. Whenever he looked at his father’s body —

  That’s all it is … an empty shell …

  — waves of guilt and regret swept over him, almost too much to bear. He wanted to stand up and scream to release the tension inside him.

  He also still regretted the scene he had pulled in the kitchen this morning, throwing Ellie’s dish of lasagna against the wall. Even though Julia told him dozens of times that she understood and forgave him, in the center of his darkening heart he knew that she didn’t know why he was upset and she could never know.

  I WON’T FORGET WHAT YOU DID TO ME!

  At precisely ten o’clock, Pastor Vernon, who was seated across the aisle from John, stood and walked to the podium. His forefinger was stuck inside his hymnal, marking his place. After clearing his throat and smiling benevolently at John and Julia, he signaled for the organ music to stop and began the service with a brief eulogy. Unlike that given the day before by Frenchie —”He was one helluva card player!” — Pastor Vernon’s focused on Frank’s faith, his regular attendance at church, and his belief in a better world to come.

  Bri and Julia, both teary-eyed, listened to Pastor Vernon, and at first John did; but after a while, he noticed that he began to feel uncomfortable. It wasn’t the simple fact of his father’s funeral … or that all the people sitting behind him were, no doubt, watching him as much as they were Frank … or the knowledge that Randy was sitting behind them, no doubt his eyes glued to Julia.

  It was more than that … It was a feeling of being watched.

  Cold, clammy fingers brushed against the back of his neck and scalp to the top of his head. The
words Pastor Vernon was saying faded until they were nothing more than a distant, droning buzz. The air in the room, already thick with the scent of flowers, thickened and tightened around his throat until he couldn’t breathe deeply enough.

  John glanced at Julia and shifted in his seat, trying to break the creeping sensation that somebody was watching him, but nothing he did, short of standing up and turning around to confront whomever it was, would rid him of the feeling.

  It was like a dark presence, hovering in the corner of the dim room, flitting in and out of sight in the corner of his eye.

  I WON’T FORGET WHAT YOU DID TO ME!

  Suddenly, everyone in the room began to recite the Lord’s Prayer, which was printed in the funeral service handout. The sudden sound of everyone speaking in unison caught John by surprise. He tensed, his eyes flitting to the piece of paper in his hand. He had been holding it so tightly it was limp in his hands.

  “Our Father … who art in heaven ...”

  Mechanically, John moved his mouth along with the words, but even as he listened to the dull rattle of his own voice, he heard something else …something that sent a cold wave through his body. From behind him, faintly, came the same sound he’d heard on Christmas Eve during the candlelight service … a faint ripple of –

  Laughter!

  Beads of sweat broke out on his brow as everyone continued with the prayer.

  “ … on earth … as it is in heaven …”

  It felt like a hot coal was lodged in his windpipe, blocking the air he was trying to draw into his lungs. A scream began to build up inside him, seeking an opportunity to break out.

  I’m not dead ... but I’m dying!

  With steadily mounting fear, he looked at Julia, but she seemed not to notice his rising state of panic.

  “ … as we forgive those … who trespass against us …”

  Below the sounds of everyone reciting the prayer, like a frigid current of air, the other sound — the laughter! — gathered strength until there was no doubt in John’s mind.

  Someone is laughing …

  At me!

  Finally, when he couldn’t stand it any longer, he kept his head low and turned around to scan the crowd. Everyone seemed to be intent on what he or she was saying — some read from the paper; others had their eyes closed and their heads bowed. But then, at the back of the room beside one of the two doors leading into the room, he saw her.

  The young woman with long, black hair and still wearing a heavy, gray sweater was standing by the wall. Her head was bowed, so he couldn’t see her face, but he recognized her as the same person he had seen briefly at the candlelight service. Her shoulders were shaking, and it appeared as if she was sobbing, but then a realization hit John with a force that was almost physical.

  Her shoulders are shaking because she’s laughing.

  “ … for Thine is the kingdom … and the power …”

  It can’t be!

  John turned back around so quickly he almost lost his balance.

  That cold, cruel laughter filled his ears —

  Or is it in my head?

  Every nerve and muscle in his body was frozen as the soft, almost feathery sound hit his ears like vagrant puffs of wind. Barely aware that he was moving, he lurched to the side, bumping into Julia.

  “… forever and ever … Amen.”

  “John?” Julia leaned close, her eyes wide. “Are you all right?”

  He was suddenly afraid that he was going to pass out. His face paled, and he couldn’t focus his eyes on anything. He felt unsteady on his feet.

  For a moment, he locked eyes with her. In the silence that followed the prayer, he could hear it even better — low, wicked laughter.

  “Yeah, I ... I’m okay.” He forced himself to smile even though it was more of a grimace. His mind filled with an image that his face was nothing more than a grinning skull. He was convinced the young woman had raised her face and was looking at his back, drilling him with her cold, piercing, dead eyes. He was also convinced that, if he turned and looked at her, she would lower her face, hiding it behind the cascade of long, dark hair.

  The service was nearing an end. As organ music swelled once again, people began filing forward to pay their last respects to Frank while John, Julia, and Bri stood and shook hands with the people as they moved slowly past the casket. Other than Frenchie and the Chadwicks, Julia didn’t know anyone other a couple of people she had noticed in passing. John introduced her to several people, including his friend from work, Barry Cummings, who had taken time off to be here. Bri did her best not to break down and cry, but her face glistened with tears, and she furiously wiped her eyes with a sodden handkerchief.

  John shook hands with everyone who went by. Most of them addressed him by first name. He accepted their expression of sadness with a curt nod of the head — particularly, Julia noticed, when Randy and Ellie filed past. Julia whispered her thanks for the lasagna and, wincing with the lie, told Ellie they would have it for supper tonight. She was already trying to concoct another lie to explain how the casserole dish broke when it was time to return it.

  The whole time they were standing there greeting people, the back of John’s neck prickled. He was desperate to turn and see if that girl was waiting in line to walk by and shake hands with the family … or if she had left following the service. John couldn’t shake the sensation that her cold eyes were still boring into him, but at least

  — Thank God!

  — he didn’t still hear her laughing any longer.

  He wondered why no one else seemed to have noticed it during the service, but he wasn’t about to mention it to Julia.

  Finally, the last few stragglers went past the casket, shook hands and hugged the family, and walked out into the cold, clear morning. John and Julia, with Bri between them, went to their car and brought it around to wait in line behind the hearse while Chuck Lang and his assistants carried the coffin out the back door of the funeral home.

  “I can’t believe he’s gone,” Bri said, sniffling as she watched the men slide the casket into the back of the black limo. Sunlight glinted off the polished wood and metal. The men’s breath shot out like smoke in the cold air.

  “I mean … whenever I think about how we used to play checkers and stuff, I —” Her voice caught with a wrenching intake of air.

  “Take it easy, sweetheart” Julia said, patting the back of her daughter’s hand. “You have to remember that for the last few years, he wasn’t very happy. He wasn’t himself.

  You don’t know the half of it, John thought but didn’t say.

  “Once he wasn’t able to get around and visit with friends as easily as he used to — He didn’t like living like that.”

  “I wish I’d known him before,” Bri said.

  She couldn’t accept that anyone could be better off dead. As gruff as her grandfather could be at times, all she could remember were the good times they’d had, and although she had certainly been aware of the tension between Frank and John, she never had any bad feelings about the former.

  A few other cars lined up behind theirs as they waited to begin the procession out to Whispering Pines Cemetery. Once the casket and flowers were loaded into the hearse, they drove slowly out of the funeral home parking lot. At the cemetery, Pastor Vernon read a few more passages from his hymnal, took a handful of frozen earth in hand, and sprinkled it onto the coffin. The dirt rattled like hail on the coffin lid. Bri was so emotionally drained she went back to the car to wait while several men lowered the casket into the ground. While the cemetery work crew waited to one side for everyone to leave so they could fill in the grave, John and Julia thanked Pastor Vernon and walked slowly back to the car.

  “Well, I guess that’s that.” John took a deep breath and blinked his eyes to fight back tears as he looked up at the sky. He lit a cigarette and inhaled.

  Julia grunted and nodded, then opened the car door and slid into the front seat. John came around to the driver’s side, got in, a
nd started up the car. After a few puffs, he crushed the cigarette out in the ashtray.

  “Seeing as how we don’t have that lasagna for dinner anymore, what do you say we go in town for supper?” Julia asked. Her voice was tight with suppressed anger. John grunted agreement as he pulled slowly away from the gravesite. Beneath her own feelings about death and funerals and grief, Julia was satisfied with herself for having the courage to mention John’s outburst this morning.

  I said it … It’s over …

  As John turned from the cemetery drive onto Route One, she looked over her shoulder at the gravesite. Unconsciously, her hand was stroking Bri’s hair.

  It sure is over, she thought … especially for Frank …

  II

  On the drive home from Frank’s funeral, the mood in the car was understandably somber. As the car pulled into the driveway, John was surprised by how small the house appeared to him. Maybe it was his child’s perspective, but the house had always seemed so big.

  Until now …

  Knowing that his father was dead made the house — his house — look and feel small. Everything about it was diminished with his father’s death.

  “I’ll tell you what I think,” John said as he cut the engine and looked at Julia with a long, cold stare. “I think we should sell out now. Get out while we can and move back to Vermont. I’ll bet I could get my old job back at —”

  “Did you leave the door unlocked?” Julia asked. Her voice had a sharp edge of sudden worry.

  “Umm …Yeah,” John said. “I was the last to leave. I’m positive I locked it.”

  “We’ve got trouble,” Julia said.

  John looked past her to the kitchen door and saw that it was hanging open, swinging back and forth in the breeze.

  “Wait here,” he said as he got out of the car, slid the car keys into his coat pocket, and started up the walkway to the house.

  “Hello! … Anyone here!” he called when he got to the door.

  His eyes darted from side to side, taking in as much as he could without entering. He saw right away that there was trouble — big trouble. The kitchen table and chairs were overturned. Plates, glasses, pots, and pans were scattered about on the floor. The refrigerator door was open, and fruits and vegetables had been scooped out onto the floor. A gallon of milk was tipped over, and mile gurgled onto the floor, leaving a wide, white puddle.