by Adam Rapp
I sort of limped over to him.
“Who are you?” I asked.
He stood up and offered his hand.
“Samuel Dames,” he replied. “I’m a representative from the funeral home,” he added. He was wearing so much cologne I could almost taste it.
I shook his hand. It was cold and hairy.
“You must be Welton,” Samuel Dames said. His eyes were all downcast in what seemed like some feeble attempt at humility or compassion or whatever attitude of kindness they try to teach you in funeral school. I didn’t even feel like correcting him about mistaking me for my brother.
“I’m very sorry about your mother,” he added. “It must have been a long night.”
I nodded again.
I could just nod all afternoon and everyone from the hospice center and the funeral home and the morgue and wherever else these people were from would just leave me alone. There must be some unwritten law that says about fifty people have to move into your house when somebody dies. If it weren’t for the smell of death clinging to the walls, you might think it was your family’s turn to host the monthly neighborhood potluck supper. A little beef and bingo at the Nugents’.
Samuel Dames finally released my hand.
Then all of a sudden I was desperate for a cigarette.
“Hey, do you have a cigarette?” I asked.
“I’m sorry, Welton, but I don’t smoke,” he replied. I thought it was strange that he hadn’t remarked on my shin yet. I mean, even though I was still wearing those corduroys, it was pretty gory. The bloodstain was like a continent on my leg.
Samuel Dames’s teeth were so white they resembled bathroom tiling. And his eyebrows looked like they might spring off of his forehead and start running across the carpet. I think he might have been wearing a subtle amount of eyeliner, too, but I can’t be sure about that.
“Have you seen my dad?” I asked.
“I think he’s upstairs talking to the police.”
“What are they doing here?” I asked.
“I’m not sure,” he replied.
The paper around the flowers crinkled in his hand. I suddenly had this weird thought that Samuel Dames was going to take my dad on a date. I don’t know why I thought that. Maybe it was the eyeliner.
I had to leave after I imagined that, so I turned and headed for the kitchen.
“Nice to meet you, Welton,” Samuel Dames called after me.
In the kitchen, I opened the fridge and grabbed a can of Coke. I tried to pound it, but I had to stop because I felt like I was going to puke again. It took a minute but I was eventually able to swallow that feeling.
Somehow it was nice in the kitchen. There was the hum of the fridge. And running water. And dishes in the sink. I closed my eyes and tried to focus on that refrigerator hum for a second, but those walkie-talkies kept interrupting.
In the hallway these totally stoic hospital officials were carrying medical equipment out of the house. Their uniforms were so white you had to almost squint. They lugged walkers and IV hangers and those kidney-shaped dishes that you vomit in. There were tubes and chutes and these weird, skin-colored things that looked like they had no purpose whatsoever. They hauled monitors and bedside rails and machines that looked more like they belonged in a mechanic’s garage than in someone’s bedroom.
Man, my head was pounding.
A few of the hospice nurses squeezed my shoulder as I passed them on the way to the staircase. One of them pointed to my bloody shin and I nodded. They were like these big sad dolphins gliding around on Rollerblades or something. What’s weird is that I don’t think I ever knew their names. Not even one. They would say these totally selfless things to me, like, “If you ever need anything, dot, dot, dot,” or, “You look tired, sweetheart. Can I get you a blah, blah, blah?” I’d never spoken to them, though. Instead I’d count the weird hairs on their chins or I’d imagine them blow-drying their armpits in the nude or whatever. I know that’s horrible, but this is about being honest, right?
Welton was downstairs blaring Bottomside. It was so loud you could practically feel it vibrating in the soles of your feet. He was probably going against the computer on PlayStation. I imagined him playing this snowboard game. I could just see it: he had burned his daily wake-and-bake and turned on Bottomside with the remote and dug out the joystick thing from underneath his laundry heap. I thought about going down there, but I didn’t. For some reason I was afraid that it was actually Dantly down in the basement, that Dantly was my brother now. The thought made me so tired I had to lean against the railing in the stairwell.
I could hear walkie-talkies again. They were coming from behind the door to my dad’s room. I put my ear to the door and listened.
A cop was talking. He was saying how strange it was that there was no destruction to the lock on the front door to the electronics shop. No evidence of breaking and entering. Only seventeen busted TVs, some point-of-sale graffiti, and a smashed bird from a cuckoo clock. No apparent theft. No damage to the cash register. Only vandalism.
My dad kept saying, “I know, I know. I don’t understand,” and things of that nature.
I opened the door and there were like four cops standing around. Man, they didn’t look like cops. They looked more like guys who were pretending to be cops. Like community theater cops or something.
My dad was sitting on the end of his bed with his face in his hands. He was still wearing his moth-eaten suit with the yellow tie. And there were still the bits of bloody toilet paper scabbed on his jaws from where he had cut himself shaving. It sort of looked like flies were eating his face. The bed was so perfect it seemed like the cops had forced him to make it at gunpoint.
Above the bed there was this totally haunted-looking painting of a clown with balloons in its cheeks. The clown had an upside-down smile, and he was holding this huge umbrella. It was raining sideways, so the umbrella was useless. I had never seen the painting before.
The plate from Mary’s house had been set on top of my parents’ dresser. There was a rubber band and some loose change scattered in the middle.
The cops stared at me and I stared back at them. The four of them looked the same to me. Same haircuts. Same meaty forearms. Same blank white faces.
My dad was now staring at me like he was hungry, like they had been starving him or something. Then this one cop spoke.
“Son,” he said, “are you aware that your leg is bleeding?”
“Yes,” I said.
The cops all looked at each other, all concerned and suspicious. One of them turned his walkie-talkie off and went, “Son, where were you last night?” I thought it was funny how they were all calling me son. My dad didn’t even have the balls to use my name or even some sort of lame, sexless pronoun, but those cops could totally like rattle off son.
“I did it,” I said.
I figured I’d cut to the chase.
I turned to my dad. His mouth looked collapsed, like one of the cops had smashed it in with the butt of his gun. He was making these weird noises like he was choking to death, but he wasn’t. He was actually crying.
“What did you do exactly?” another cop asked. His voice was higher than the first one’s.
“I kicked the TVs in,” I said. “All seventeen of ’em.” Man, my hands were shaking like crazy. “So take me away,” I added.
But no one would move. The cops just stood there with their hands on their belts.
So I just stood there too.
The fact was it was four-thirty in the afternoon and my mom was dead.
I never even saw them wheel her out.
11.
So before I continue with the story part, I have to tell you about something weird that happened last night with Shannon.
We were sitting at this table in the TV lounge and it was pretty late. We had been talking about this play he gave me by Sam Shepard called Buried Child. It was a pretty intense play that deals with this family in southern Illinois and all of their creepy secrets.
I was telling him how I thought it was actually the corn that was beckoning Vince, the young hero of the play, homeward. I was explaining my theory in great detail when Shannon leaned forward and kissed me on the mouth. It wasn’t just like something men do in Europe, either, where I understand a kiss hello and goodbye happens all the time — this was different. It involved an open mouth and his tongue and saliva and it lasted like ten seconds, which is sort of an eternity when it comes to a kiss.
The first thing I said when it was over was, “Whoa.”
Then he said, “Yeah, whoa.”
“Um. Are you like gay?” I asked, wiping my mouth.
“Nuh-uh,” he said. “Are you?”
“Nuh-uh,” I answered.
Then we just sat there for a second. The new Blue Grouper named Daryl Francis was asleep on the sofa in front of the TV and this Claymation Christmas special was on about this elf named Herbie who wants to grow up to be a dentist. I watched Daryl for a second to make sure that he wasn’t just fake-sleeping and he wasn’t, thank God.
“Well, that was weird,” Shannon said. “See you tomorrow.” Then he got up from the table and walked away.
I said, “See you tomorrow,” too and just sat there listening to the lights buzzing above me.
Jesus, that was weird.
When I got back to my room, I brushed my teeth like four times and I couldn’t stop touching my lips.
So I have no idea what to think about all of that. I mean, that sort of changes everything between me and Shannon, right? In a way I hope it doesn’t, because he’s my best friend at Burnstone Grove, but how could it not?
“Anything new?” Mrs. Leene asked at our session this morning, and I almost told her, I really did, but I couldn’t. Instead of telling her about what happened, I made up some story about how I walked in on this Gray Grouper named Mike Seminaro masturbating in the men’s bathroom.
“Did it upset you?” Mrs. Leene asked.
“No,” I said. “I just wish he would do that in his room.”
I’m such a liar, it makes me sick. But I promise I’m not lying about any of the stuff that happened — I swear I’m not.
I wonder what it’s going to be like at dinner when I see Shannon Lynch again. Maybe we’ll just act like nothing happened at all. And then again maybe he’ll try to kiss me with romantic force or something.
So back to my mom’s death.
My mom my mom my mom my mom my mom . . .
The day after she died, the cops took me to the hospital and this totally detached, nonchalant plastic surgeon removed about twenty pieces of glass from my right shin. The pain was like something mechanical boring through my body. I had to get a tetanus shot, too, which made my shoulder sore for like three days.
At the funeral my stitches were itching like crazy, but it didn’t bother me much because I was like totally tripping on the codeine they’d prescribed for the pain.
They cremated my mom and stuffed her ashes into a pine box and put an eight-by-ten photo next to it. In the photo she was wearing too much makeup and it made me want to smash it with my fist.
During the service, everyone talked about all the things she had done for the pediatrics ward at the hospital.
“She helped my boy Brian,” one anonymous woman said.
One man directed his testimonial to my dad. He said, “I lost my little girl to leukemia and your wife really helped us through a difficult time. Elizabeth passed in peace and Mary Lee Nugent was a big part of that.”
Once I looked over at Welton and he was wiping his nose. I couldn’t tell if he was crying or on nasal spray.
When the priest announced that there would be a moment of silence for those of us who were too shy to share a special memory or speak on Mary’s behalf, Welton started singing “The Star-Spangled Banner.” He like sang the entire song and everyone just let him do it. When he was finished, the priest made the sign of the cross and said something about grief and how through prayer Jesus and His Holy Father and all the other various gods and monsters of Catholicism would eventually lead everyone who loved my mom to a place of peace. Like if we did our Catholic duty to suffer and pray and take communion, we’d all wind up in some sacred pasture with cows and turtledoves and picnic baskets.
Aunt Ricky — my mom’s overweight, hard-core Christian sister — was crying so hard you would’ve thought she was being attacked by wasps.
After his rendition of “The Star-Spangled Banner,” Welton just stared straight ahead at the altar as if he were waiting for Jesus to climb down off the cross and escape with him. They would load up in Dantly’s Skylark and the three of them would go score some Ex in Cedar Rapids. Jesus would like totally ride shotgun and scout for cops.
At the banquet hall, everyone was gorging themselves. My aunt Ricky ate about four plates of roast beef with horseradish. Lyman Singer never actually sat down. He just stood by the pan of chicken wings, refilling his plate. His whole beard was totally slathered with barbecue sauce. Even the priest couldn’t get enough of the baked beans. I’d never seen someone eat so many baked beans in my life. And he dumped about half a bottle of ketchup on them, too. Man, there’s nothing like a funeral to get the old salivary glands juiced up.
On our way home, my dad handed me this letter that he’d received from the gifted school. It was addressed to him and my mom, and it said that I was eligible to graduate early if I took a summer English course. According to the letter, it had to be a creative writing course offered by one of the local high schools. The gifted school is weird like that. If they think you’re ready to graduate, they’ll let you out early. To tell you the truth, I think it’s all based on your SATs, because I took them spring of my sophomore year and I pretty much topped the charts, thus the letter. They probably figured I would get into Harvard or Dartmouth or one of those schools with vines all over the walls.
When I got home, I went down to the basement and stood in front of Welton’s door. I knew he was in there again, because you could hear Bottomside playing. He had walked home by himself, ignoring all of our relatives’ offers to give him a ride. He was probably in there getting stoned and playing Sims. I almost knocked like thirty times — I would raise my hand and everything — but for some reason I couldn’t make a fist. I have no idea what I was going to say to him.
I don’t know what I felt at my mom’s funeral. I was pretty sad, I’ll admit that, but I wasn’t like bereft or anything. Like my aunt Ricky was bereft. After the service, she couldn’t even get herself out of the pew. My dad and his brother Truman had to lift her out like she was an elk they’d shot up in Canada or something. Mrs. Leene says that everyone grieves differently, that sorrow and anger manifest themselves in strange ways because of how our minds are actually designed to protect us from those feelings. I will say this: I wish I could have cried then. I think if I could have had a good cry, things might have gotten better somehow.
12.
So it was Christmas yesterday, and this Blue Grouper named Trevor Butz led an hour of caroling with his acoustic guitar. He’s not a bad guitarist. He exhibited several different strumming techniques, and I was impressed.
“He can do bar chords,” Shannon noticed, and he’s the one who would know.
I was surprised about how many kids actually sang along. “The Little Drummer Boy” was like this huge hit.
I basically sat next to Shannon and sort of sang under my breath. He sang louder, as he seems to be afraid of nothing.
We didn’t talk about the kiss, and things actually felt sort of normal between us.
Two days ago, they gave everyone forty dollars and loaded us up on a chartered school bus and took us to this mall in the middle of nowhere to purchase a Secret Santa gift. While we were on the bus, Dr. Shays passed around a backpack that had everyone’s names written on individual pieces of paper. We all reached into it and selected a name, and that’s who we had to buy a present for. Of all people, I selected Silent Starla, who, for some reason I still can’t quite fathom,
hates me with a vengeance.
In the mall I was surprised to discover that there was a pretty decent indie-rock record store and I wound up buying her two CDs by this band called Cat Power and that Interpol CD that I was telling you about before. Cat Power’s really this woman Chan Marshall, and she has this beautiful voice and sings these sad songs that will melt just about anyone.
After the caroling, everyone exchanged Secret Santa gifts. This Red Grouper named Barry Castro gave me an electric toothbrush, which is cool, except now I’m paranoid that I have bad breath or something.
“It’s s’posed to be really good for your gums,” Barry said after he watched me open it. He’s sort of chubby and has this black hair that somehow looks more like a wig than hair. He also stutters occasionally, which makes me feel sorry for him.
“Thanks,” I said to him.
“It really is s’posed to be good for your gums,” he said, and then headed toward this white-chocolate sculpture Nativity scene.
When Silent Starla opened her CDs, she looked at them for a moment and said, “Who’s this?”
I said, “Just these bands I like.”
She studied the CD covers for a second, and said, “Then you should have gotten them for yourself,” and handed them back to me.
What a fucking bitch, I thought. What a fucking ungrateful, mean-spirited bitch!
Later on at the eggnog bowl, I went up to her. “I thought maybe you’d like these,” I said, reoffering the CDs. To be honest, I wanted to say something like four thousand times more potent than that, but I couldn’t for some reason. Maybe it was the Christmas spirit holding me back.
Then Starla said something weird. She said, “Killers listen to that kind of music.”
I said, “They do?”
“Killers and speed skaters.”
Speed skaters? I thought, and I was going to ask her about what that meant, but then she took the CDs back and there was even one moment where I think she was trying to be nice to me because she said something else, which was, “You remind me of this guy I used to know in Gary who said interesting things once in a while. He was tall too.”
