riotheclown

“How does it open?”

Darling you have to be more specific. How does what open?

The pale grey eyes of the dying man search the room for free floating words that might compassionately fall into his mouth so he can speak them to her.  

She is so strong, her edges so clear, grief over his dying has not softened her at all, and in fact she seems stronger now than ever, her steel grey coiffure, her posture so erect and her face lovelier than he had ever known it to be. He wants to tell her but the words…

“How does it open?” 

That’s not what he wanted to say. He feels as if he is screaming but he knows what comes out is a barely audible whisper. She bends close and puts her ear next to his mouth to catch the wind of these meaningless words with the fine hairs and tiny drum in the channel of her ear, the Morse code of electrical impulses heading to her brain and landing there, meaningless.

They are the wrong words. Even if they were the right words he had no idea what she would do with them. She seems so very far away.

He can hear her say to someone, “I don’t think he can understand you but you can talk to him. He’s not in any pain. Go on. This might be your last chance.”

A new face comes into his field of vision; it is a face very much like his wife’s but younger. He knows who she is but he can’t quite recall her name.

She is not beautiful like her mother. She looks worn out. She looks like a shabby middle-aged woman who has been crying all night. 

Well, she started out that way didn’t she? She kept us up nights for weeks on end with her crying: Colic. Everything we did for her was a wrong it seemed: Allergies to everything and so many trips to the doctor.  A father can’t take so much difficulty with a child. A child is supposed to bring joy not trouble. I never had tender feelings for her.  I was always too afraid she was going to die. 

His daughter’s face fills his entire field of vision, he wrestles to move his head enough to see his wife.

“Dad. Can you hear me? It’s Angie. I’m here. I didn’t bring the boys. I didn’t think I should but if you tell me you want to see them I will. I don’t care what Scott says about it.”

That useless husband of hers, well at least he gave her beautiful boys, his grandson’s: golden hair, sweet, always smiling, so happy to go fishing, rough and tumble boys. His grandsons are his joy. What had she said about them? He wanted to see them. They always make him laugh.

“How does…?”

“What dad? I can’t hear you?” his daughter asks.

“He keeps saying over and over. ‘How does it open?’ I don’t think it means anything and don’t worry about bringing the boys. They should not see him like this. They have so many good memories at the lake.”

At least his daughter now moves out of the way so he can see his wife. She is moving around the room with purpose arranging things neatly. 

Marry a nurse and you can die at home… 

He is dying. He knows it. He has spent his entire life keeping it together and now after weeks of losing one dignity after another he knows the question that has bothered him his entire life.

He glances at the vase full of red tulips. They have just been cut from the garden that morning and placed beside his bed. His bed is a hospital bed and is raised high to make it easier for his wife, the visiting care nurse and the doctor to get at him. He looks down at the tightly closed petals. 

Tulips always seem like the no-nonsense flowers of the garden, they have no pleasant, sentimental fragrance, they are so clean. When they finally open they splay their petals in a disturbingly unabashed fashion, like someone’s horny drunken old aunt. 

He moves his tongue around in his mouth. Opening his mouth his dry lips seem to tear apart. He wants to tell her that he should have allowed himself to feel more and he should have found the words when they might still have mattered to her.

“My heart.” was all that came out.

“What daddy? Mom! I think he needs you! I think he is having a heart attack!” His daughters face contorts with pain. 

“How does it open…” That’s not what he means to say! His eyes wander around the room wildly. 

“I’m here darling. Calm yourself.” his wife says.

“How does it open…” he closes his eyes in frustration. The pain is unbearable but there is no drug that will ease it. He is at the bottom of a deep well. The question settles on the light coming from the top of this well.  It comes from a vast sky outside his loss and isolation like some cheesy dove in Papist black and white movie from the 50's.  

His body rattles with his breath.   

"How...
does a heart
open...
without
breaking?"

She straightens. To his daughter she says,  "He's fine.  He rambles that's all.  It doesn't mean anything."  She is crying but he can't see her face, she has turned away. 

The light blinks shut.