West of You

by Christina Metcalf

  I know my big, fat tears didn’t help the guilt he felt but I wasn’t crying because of what I read. People on Twitter, the news, social media...whatever would always tell you about how suicides lose to their demons. They just couldn't beat them. They succumbed as if they’re fighting some valiant fight. There’s nothing valiant about giving up. Nothing.

  M left a loving boyfriend who bought her tampons when she asked...well, all the time but one. She lived on a gorgeous ranch with animals and plants that rivaled Eden. She had a bestie who, although slightly neurotic, loved her. Her parents and siblings adored her. Everyone who met her talked about her generosity and humor and in the end it wasn’t “demons” that killed her. It was selfishness. How else do you explain wrecking countless lives like this?

  Death is hard enough but when someone commits suicide, the survivors (those left behind) will always wonder what they could have done differently. For me, I wonder if I had just asked her how she was, would she still be alive? If I had talked about something other than Walsey for the 83rd time in a week, would she have admitted something was bothering her? When she reminded me of her suicidal past and how she was “over that now” was I supposed to recognize that as a cry for help?

  You see it falls on the survivors’ shoulders. I think about her every day and I know Luke does too. But she didn’t think about us. Because if she had, she wouldn’t have done this.

  Don’t lecture me about mental illness and struggles. Survivors have two burdens to struggle underneath. They must deal with the sadness of losing someone and they must wake up every morning with the guilt of not recognizing and helping with their loved ones’ pain.

  Hemingway blew his head off in the hallway of his home in the early morning only a handful of days after returning from the Mayo Clinic where his brain was fried under electroshock therapy. I blamed his fourth wife. She knew he had access to guns and he had already made at least one attempt. How could she let one of the greatest authors take his own life? I blamed her until M. Now I know that suicides are liars and the ones who really want to do it make everyone believe they’re just fine.

  In the desert of my dreams my soul will find comfort

  I found him out at the barn staring at the rafters. He hadn’t killed my best friend but nothing I verbalized would convince him otherwise. He had tried himself as his own crummy jury because that’s what suicides make us do. No court of law. Only our brains that are in session every minute of the day and night.

  I wanted to run away and never look back. Join a commune in California, one that takes a vow of silence and pot smoking or maybe one that advocates sex with patchouli-smelling strangers and accepts penance through bad decisions.

  He turned to face me.

  “Well?” He asked.

  I knew why she loved him. He was broken but steady. These past few months he had been in denial not because he didn’t believe she had killed herself but because to admit that meant--in his mind--admitting he had pushed her to it. But I wasn’t convinced an argument over feminine hygiene products had anything to do with her decision.

  I didn’t know what to say just yet so I shrugged wishing I liked patchouli more and I could run off now without saying a word.

  “They’ll be here soon. Are you ready?”

  I wasn’t sure if he was asking me or himself. My lower lip pressed in on itself and tears welled up in my eyes. The sound of my breathing was louder than anything I had ever heard outside of my ex’s snoring.

  “I don’t think so.”

  He nodded and turned to look up at the rope again.

  “Do you think she felt it?”

  I wiped my nose with my fingers and lacking anywhere else to rub it, I wiped it onto my black Mothman t-shirt’s hem, hoping he didn’t notice, and shook my head. I was pretty sure Mothman was not appropriate attire for a dinner party in Texas.

  The elevator is the size of a phone booth and she and I are uncomfortably close. She presses the number five without asking and I wonder why since we’re staying on two. When we get to the fifth level, she pushes toward the door and it’s then I can see the gym behind her.

  “You know M, you’re really a selfish bitch sometimes.”

  She looks at me over her shoulder, her body still facing where she will inevitably head in a moment or two leaving me alone with my thoughts.

  “Are you serious?” she asks.

  “Why wouldn’t I be?” and I point to what lays in wait for her.

  She seems confused but exits anyway.

  I mutter “but you didn’t even ask” as I watch her disappear into the forest of machines and I try to stub out the button to take me back down.

  I opened the closet in their room and found the dress she wore to my wedding. It was wildly out of date. One of those floral, maternity-style dresses so popular in the ‘90s and so unlike her. I slipped it on anyway. The free flowing form meant I could fit into it even though she was probably a good three sizes smaller than me when she died.

  I was hoping she had never worn it in front of Luke. I didn’t want him to think I was trying to be her but I had nothing that wasn’t a t-shirt and jeans.

  A small crowd had amassed by the time I came down. As I descended the stairs and everyone looked up I wished I had completed my ensemble with a scrunchie. It seemed only fitting. As it was I had forgotten shoes, or more truthfully opted not to wear my hiking boots.

  Luke introduced me in a way that made me want to immediately announce we weren’t dating. He left off exactly who I was and considering I was coming down from the bedroom without foot attire, I certainly didn’t give the appearance of a lady. I wanted to smile and politely keep walking past the paunchy middle-aged guy with the nice smile and out into the barn where that friendly rafter was waiting.

  ✽✽✽

  Item #1,284.5: she would never have to listen to gossip again or wonder if that lingering glance of her man on a stranger meant anything. Nevermind, I’m projecting. That was not M’s life.

  #666: she would never feel the wind in her face as she soared through the air on a swing or dangling from a rafter.

  ✽✽✽

  As if he sensed my inability to cope, Luke placed a beer in my hand and molded my fingers around it.

  The guy with the cute smile and extra luggage around the middle was introduced as Larry. I immediately recognized his mate as the pinched looking one who spent her whole day exercising and assuming that would hold Larry’s interest. Or so my damaged brain told me.

  My head felt heavy with the need to sleep but Luke kept whispering that these people knew her best in this town and if I didn’t know and he didn’t know why she did it, one of them would or could. I can’t be sure of his assurity.

  But I didn’t want to talk to them. I wanted to Google “why people kill themselves” and serve up the top result as the reason why she did it. I was out of answers. I don’t know. Mental health? Demons. Yes, it was demons. No one can fight demons, zombies, vampires, or Scientologists. They’re all unstoppable.

  I made small talk the best I could, which is at about kindergarten level of nodding and smiling a lot. And then I slunk off to text Walsey.

  Me: Hi

  Him: Hey. What are you up to?

  Me: Pretending to be my dead friend with all of her friends.

  Him: That sounds weird

  Me: No kidding. What are you doing?

  Him: Learning about sculpture

  Me: WHY? Ooops. Sorry for caps. Not yelling.

  Him: so I understand what you do better

  Me: I make clay goats. there’s not much more to understand than that

  Before he could respond, Larry came up behind me and I shoved my connection to the real world into my flowered pocket.

  “Luke says you were Marin’s best friend from college.”

  “I am.”

  “Oh, right. You are.”

  “Was.”

  We look at each other and then fixate on our drinks.

  “When someone�
�s dead are you still? I mean I’m still living. She’s my best friend but am I hers?”

  He smiles that polite people you save for the really old who can’t hear and the criminally insane that you’re trying not to irritate.

  “They were...are...were, I don’t know a great couple.” He offered.

  I nod. “I never saw them together.”

  “They would’ve done anything for each other but the cool thing was neither would’ve ever asked.”

  I nod again thinking about tampons. My neck was getting sore, almost as sore as my face from fake smiling. I felt a buzz in my pocket and hoped it was Walsey, not Mike.

  “Are you married?”

  I shake my head.

  He shakes his in the opposite direction.

  “Have you ever been?”

  I shake mine like his now.

  “It’s hard isn’t it?”

  He doesn’t wait for my response.

  “Luke asked me to tell you everything I could remember about her.”

  “Okay. Good.” I said but I was hoping that didn’t mean every detail of every interaction. I was already feeling uneasy about Larry.

  He scanned the room. We were alone in the dining room and I worried his owl-like woman would snatch me up like a bird of prey. But I didn’t see her. Still, his apparent paranoia left me uneasy. I never liked boiled bunnies.

  “I have an Etsy shop where I sell crafts. M started selling her scarves on my site.”

  His admission made my head hurt. Scarves? When did she design scarves? Did she make them or buy them? My friend was feeling less and less like a BFF.

  I’ve Never Been to Spain filled the house with drunken singing and revelry.

  “I like this song,” he shared.

  “Why do you think she killed herself?” I asked with much less patience than the scenario required.

  He made a face like I had hit him.

  I’m a decent sculptor. I have a head for facts. I’m reasonably obsessed with bridge collapses and shipwrecks caused by storms and icebergs. I’m a good swimmer. I rarely get bitten by a mosquito. I never get a flu shot and have never had the flu. I don’t get seasick or jet lagged but no matter how long I live I will never know how to say the appropriate thing in emotionally-charged situations.

  When I was 15, my father told me my grandmother had stage four lung cancer. I cried. Through my tears I asked if she planned on dying at home or in the hospital. My father sent me to my room without dinner. The next morning he came in to check on me and I apologized because it seemed like what kids should do when they get in trouble. And he accepted my apology but his eyes were still red from crying.

  For good measure I tacked on, “Sorry, I just thought you knew there was no stage five.” and I was grounded through the end of the weekend. Tact is not my forte.

  This felt just like that. I wanted to ask him how I could cut to the chase without scaring him emotionally but that sounded a bit weird in my head so I sat there and waited instead. I watched his watery blue eyes scan my face and I assumed he must have been a fairly good-looking catch when his owlish girl landed him 50 pounds ago. A smile broke through.

  “Luke said you had a quirky sense of humor. Dark, he said, I think.”

  I smiled back. Best thing a girl can be is pretty and stupid. I long to be both.

  “I like pina coladas…” played in the background. Who was the DJ tonight? Dick Clark?

  “Are you happy Larry?”

  He bit his lower lip and looked up at the ceiling. Body language specialists would tell you to prepare for a lie coming on but I was willing to give good old Larry the benefit of the doubt.

  “Is anyone?” a perfect match volley to bring out the romantic in me.

  “I think there’s someone out there who is. Were Luke and M...Marin happy?”

  “Do happy people drive into trains?”

  “Touche.”

  Larry smiled a smile of the overly proud.

  “But erasing that...did they seem happy? Because let’s be honest. Marin was a selfish bitch to have done that. Unhappy or not.”

  His smile evaporated.

  “Wow.”

  “What?” I asked, realizing my beer was approaching a dangerously empty level.

  “Nothing. I just thought she was your best friend.”

  “She is. You think at 45 I’m ever going to find another best friend? Christ! They’re harder to find than a husband. At least a girl can find some lonely guy out there willing to slip a ring on your finger for a nightly blow job.”

  I could tell by his scrunched up face that I may have gone too far. I cocked my head to the side like a dog who doesn’t understand the conversation. Luke comes to my rescue with another beer and the owl is on his tail. I expect Larry and she will quickly disappear into the ether but instead Larry gets up close to my face where I can tell exactly which of the homemade appetizers he’s tried. Okay, I’m lying. They weren’t homemade.

  He pointed a finger at my nose, the only thing of lasting substance my mother ever gave me.

  “I have known couples far less happy who are together much longer.”

  He accused me of something just below the surface. It bubbled up like a challenge. Luke looked back and forth at us like it was the French Open but with less class and more alcohol. Larry’s accusatory look reminded me of my dad the day I handed him the last note he’d receive from my mom. It said only three words in her flowery script:

  Raise her well.

  He never was the kind of guy to follow orders.

  You can’t make your heart like mondays

  So the summary of the night goes like this:

  Blake and Sherry will most likely be divorced before next year’s calves are born. She spent most of our time together recounting in lurid detail all of the gifts she’s received this year for “no reason” other than Blake is the “most amazing husband ev-ah.” She thought Luke loved M but M never really confided in her about her feelings, probably because she couldn’t get a word in.

  Adam and Susan-Sante seemed like the kind of couple two grandmas would’ve arranged over a game of bunko. Or perhaps they met as the last two to pair off at a lonely-hearts club meeting. Either way nothing would ever separate them because they knew nothing else and so could not desire anything else. To them, everyone else had exactly what they did. They were the kind of couple M and I would’ve joked about back in our twenties. She would’ve bet me her paycheck to walk by him a little too closely with octopus hands. And I likely would’ve taken her money to pay our bar tab.

  Dustin and Mary Beth were probably Ken and Barbie twenty years ago but the years had not been good to them. He was paunchy and she was too thin, a reaction to one another’s infidelity. I remembered this couple from a few conversations with M earlier this year. She cheated on him with a guy she used to work with. He put a hole in the wall of the feed store where she worked. She gave him a “pass” to go have sex with someone else so they could get back together. And he did for several months, which was several months longer than she had expected. So she stopped eating and I wasn’t sure she had eaten anything since then. It didn’t look like she had although some of you might argue with me that it is physically impossible to live for several years on nothing but air and hope. While I was standing next to them, she took at least two pictures of the two of them and posted it to Facebook in the middle of our conversation. The captions, which I looked up later read “ma babe” and “he’s still cute.”

  Larry found me later to tell me he had consumed half a fermented grain silo (okay, he didn’t really tell me that but he sure smelled like it). He told me owl girl was just a rebound for the woman who had left him at 20. He’d never loved anyone like her but he swore he’d never get himself into that kind of addictive love again so he married a very respectable, albeit bird-like woman to see to his needs. I wondered if their children resembled his sheepdog qualities or their mama’s avian looks.

  “You know, Marin did seem a little weird at
the end of the night. Of course, we were all pretty hammered by then.” Larry offered.

  “Weird how?”

  “Well, she disappeared for a long time. Luke said she might be in the barn, one of the cows was due. She mighta been checkin’ on her. When she came back, her hair was messed up like bed head.”

  “Okay. Maybe she and Luke had a little fun.”

  “He was here the whole time because he had challenged us all to a shooting contest, bottles on the fence. I’m not saying she’s cheatin’. We were all here. All guys at the fence. Unless she cheated with someone who snuck in here. But you know Marin, her hair’s alway perfect.”

  Larry had a point. Marin didn’t need much. She was naturally beautiful, but even so, she was never the girl to pull her hair back in a ponytail. She was always put together. If she even thought her hair was out of place she would’ve seen to it that it wasn’t even if it meant leaving in the middle of a conversation.

  “What happened after that?” I asked.

  “Luke won the shooting contest.”

  “No, I mean with Marin.”

  He looked to the side as if the answer was over there and pursed his lips.

  “I can’t really remember. I know Travis threatened to arrest us all.”

  “Travis was there?”

  “Of course. He’s Luke’s brother.”

  “I know that. It’s just they don’t seem so close.”

  “Oh, no. They’re really close. They’re twins.”

  “Yeah, but they just seem to nod, not really talk to each other.”

  “When?” Larry asked.

  “Since I’ve been here.”

  “Naw, Travis is always here. It’s like he lives here practically. He’s the only Jessup kid left in town besides Luke. All the rest moved away. Marin used to joke sometimes that she had two boyfriends.”