Static Shock Fan Fiction ❯ Lachrymose ❯ Lachrymose ( One-Shot )
[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]
By: Manga-Chick 
When one's Purpose was completed, what happened next?
Non Anime: Static Shock Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Drama / Angst | Type: One Shot | Uploaded On: 11.14.2006 | Pages: 5 | Words: 8.7K | Visits: 795 | Status: Completed
When one's Purpose was completed, what happened next?
Non Anime: Static Shock Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Drama / Angst | Type: One Shot | Uploaded On: 11.14.2006 | Pages: 5 | Words: 8.7K | Visits: 795 | Status: Completed
Disclaimer: I don’t own Static and associated characters! ‘Your Star’, is owned by Evanescence
Warnings: Angst, death of characters
A/N: I sooooo apologize for the lack of updates! >.< I've been having a tough time with ye wretched case of...WRITER'S BLOCK, and it's seriuosly yuckles. Cuz...I can't seem able to write. And it took a long time to WRITE. Dammit. ANYWAY! This is set in the timeline of 'Banditos', from Junior's POV. Just a sad little piece...hopefully it gets my creative juices going, cuz...damn
Lachrymose
Your Star
“...I can’t see your star
I can’t see your star
how can the darkness feel so wrong?
I’m all alone now
me and all I stood for
we’re wandering alone now
all in parts in pieces, swim lonely
find your own way out...”
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
“I...I’ve been thinking...”
I looked up from unloading wood into the box set inside the shelter. Nina Crocker was standing nearby, her yellow dress dingy with wear and tear, her apron stained with various mixtures of the things she cooked. She weren’t wearing a coat, and I could tell she was cold. She wasn’t looking at me. I couldn’t help but think how lovely she was. For a couple of years now, I had allowed myself to think that things would continue to go good with us. She knew of my past, but she knew that I weren’t that person no more.
“‘Bout what?” I asked, glancing over at the house. She lived with her family; a mom and pops, two little sisters. The family didn’t really accept me, bein’ who I was; but she did. And that was all that mattered.
“When...I...” She trailed off an’ took a deep breath. The horses shuffled nearby, chewing on their bits. The buckboard was full of wood I’d chopped for her family, and for my own residence. Winter was fast approaching, and people all out Luna were trying to get their places stocked with supplies. I waited for her to continue. “I...was wondering if...when we leave Luna to start our own lives, would...would he have to come with us?”
I didn’t have to ask who she meant by ‘he’. I shrugged as continued to unload the Crockers’ pile of wood into the shelter. “He ain’t gonna live long,” I said, used to the fact. “He’ll die before we leave.”
She winced. “You speak so easily of his death.”
“It’s inevitable,” I said. “Ain’t no use cryin’ about it. He knows it, an’ I know it.”
She fell silent. After I was done, I took off my gloves, shifting my hat atop of my head. I leaned in to kiss her, but she stepped back, murmuring, “Don’t.”
I was kinda puzzled at that, and looked around. It weren’t inappropriate behavior, cuz she’d already agreed to marry me and we’d done more than kissing. She sighed, fiddling with her apron. “I...I just don’t think that this is a good idea.”
“What ain’t?” I asked, looking at her.
“I...I’m sorry. I spent a lot of time thinking, and...and I know you aren’t the same person as you were before settling in Luna, but–I can’t help it whenever you talk so coldly of...of him. I can’t help but think that–that this is–that you’d start to treat me that very same way. And I can’t take the thought that when we leave Luna, you’ll go back to your old ways,” she said.
I just kept quiet, kinda wondering what she was going to say next.
“I...I’m sorry. I won’t marry you. I can’t–this won’t work out. I spoke with my daddy about this, and...and he thought so, too. We–I appreciate everything you’ve done for us. But, I don’t want us to part on bad feelings...”
I went numb, staring at her in silence. I registered her words, but it felt like...like I wasn’t absorbing them as properly. But at the same time, it was sorta like I knew already. Things had been going so good, and I was starting to think that they’d continue to do so. She was just too pretty, too nice, and much too accepting of who I was. It had been really silly of me to think that she’d stick around to getting married.
My past was catching up to me. I had been just too evil of a person to deserve that nice ending.
She finally looked up at me, but I looked away. I didn’t know what to say, so I didn’t say anything. I didn’t even try to argue because once a woman made up her mind, there weren’t no way she was gonna change it back.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I wish there was another way. I don’t regret our time together, nor anything else. I just–”
I grunted something, climbing onto the buckboard. I didn’t look at her as I urged the horses on.
I tried not to think of it when I got to the house and unloaded the firewood there. The house was quiet; a two bedroom place that felt empty and impersonal cuz we barely spent time there. I usually spent my time taking care of the psycho and doin’ things ‘round Luna and the house than sitting inside the place.
Speaking of the psycho, I separated the horses from the buckboard, storing that away next to the horse stalls. It wasn’t all fancy, the stalls, but they was some place I could put the horses in. I combed down the one I wasn’t taking, and fed her before heading back into Luna for some things. I’d chopped enough wood to barter for another wool blanket for the incoming winter, and some thick socks. I didn’t have any money. But when it came to us Thirteen, most people in Luna treated us with far more respect and attention than Alva liked. If we had to barter for some things, then everybody was willin’ to trade. I usually worked hard to get some things to trade for supplies, and did my own hunting to get us food. Sometimes, though, people like Nina always left food around where we could use it.
After coming back to the house and combing down the horse I’d used, I walked up the back porch to see that there was a steaming pie sitting atop of stairs. I put the blanket and bundle of socks away in the house, then went into the kitchen to pick up some things to eat the pie with.
I then walked over to the aptly named Slaughterhouse. Like the stalls, it was set up out of the way, to the side of the house. It had an entrance above ground, a shack-like setup that was inconspicious. Almost like an outhouse. But there was a stairway leading down into the gritty darkness, where various rooms were built. It had been easier keeping demonic creatures underground rather than above, and the noises were muffled that way.
It was getting harder and harder to come down here. To pretend that the epitome of my evil weren’t bothering me none. Every time I came to the door, that burning feeling in my gut seemed to flare; like someone had just tossed gas into the fire. I hated coming here like everyone else. But there weren’t no excuses I could use to turn away and avoid it.
I kicked the door open, squinting into the darkness. Since Madelyn was all gone, the Slaughterhouse didn’t need all the experiments and shit that were held here. All them cages that held the creatures were empty; I’d been given the task to destroy everything of importance, and evidence of my hard work lay in smoldering messes outside, from when I burnt them earlier that morning before leaving Luna to chop some wood. It seemed kinda a shame that after all that time spent on shit, all that effort in learnin’ how things worked should be burned immediately. I reeked of smoke and sweat, but there weren’t nobody to impress.
Nina’d decided that someone like me weren’t good enough to settle down with. It was kinda hard pretending that it didn’t hurt.
The wooden stairs creaked as I walked down, eyeing the pie in one hand and figuring that I could probably get half a slice down the psycho’s throat.
“There ain’t no arguments,” I said, spying said kid sitting nearby. He’d been sitting on the couch in the former cot room, going through various documents for me to burn. From the look of the pile nearby, it didn’t look as through anything was going to be saved. It just looked as if he were reading everything once last time. Which was questionable because the dude was blind–I watched a little more and saw him just holding each individual paper, running his fingers over everything. Like he could feel the words he’d written himself.
Setting the pie down on the rickety table that held that morning’s breakfast–untouched–and glaring at the vitamins that were still were I’d left them, I frowned at him. “Just off the stove.”
He glared at the pie like it was gonna get up and bite him. He pulled the wool throw around him, like it was gonna protect him from the pie. The doc said he was down to forty-nine pounds. It wouldn’t be too long, now, he’d said. He’d long ago given up on trying to make Richard gain weight. Just make him as comfortable as possible until then...
“You’re gonna die anyway!” I snapped, shoving a spoon into the pie and separating a messy blob from the pan to plop it onto the cup saucer I’d had tucked in my shirt pocket. “Might as well as die with somethin’ in yer stomach.”
“I don’t want it.”
“I don’t care. It ain’t gonna hurt. You ain’t ever gonna get the chance again!” I put both saucer and spoon on the table, next to the pan.
Shuffling past the table, I reached for the blanket. The kid–well, he ain’t been a kid for three years–managed to get untangled from the wool. Forty-nine pounds. He’d lost two inches because of osteoporosis –whatever that was. Something to do with calcium. He was blind due to some vitamin deficiency and various fevers. He lost a few teeth, and his skin was dry and flaky; he didn’t look twenty-three–he looked years older. He’d starved away muscles, and his limbs were skeletal–there were huge protuberances where the joints connected. I could count every knob in his spine, every ridge of his ribs. His hair was thin and limp; he was too tired to walk unassisted, and he always had headaches. Shortness of breath. The doc said anytime...
I ended up being the only one to eat, anyway. After I was finished, I rose from my chair. “C’mon...we’re going outside.”
He immediately protested, shaking his head. With that action, it was almost as if it’d roll right off his shoulders. He couldn’t fight back the way that he used to, so when I picked him up, he just gave up. I grabbed the blanket on the couch, pulling it awkwardly over him. Dunno why he’d be so embarrassed to be seen by the others in Luna when he did this to himself. Ain’t nobody held a gun to his head and told him to starve himself.
I walked up the stairs into the house that me and a few men had constructed years earlier, fumbling my way into the kitchen. There were covered plates of food atop of the counter. Along with a note. I wondered when she’d come by.
I set Richard down, and he held onto the counter, all the blood rushing from his face. I hoped he didn’t pass out on me as I examined the contents that made the kitchen seemed well used.
I hurriedly scanned the paper, feeling annoyed that Nina had left dinner for the both of us. What was she bein’ all nice for? The bitch just dumped me! Why she wanted to rub salt in the wound was something beyond me. I set both plates outside, on the porch. Some loose dogs caught the scent immediately and demolished what had been on them as I walked back inside.
I found the wheelchair that Frank had made for Richard, and with easy maneuvering had it unfolded and ready for him. He immediately complained of how hard the seat was, so I grabbed the nearby cushion–something that Goren chick had made in her free time–and maneuvered that under his bony ass. I then arranged the blanket over him, then pushed him outside.
“I hate going outside,” he muttered as I kicked the door open, and clumsily maneuvered the chair out onto the porch. “It’s pointless. Everyone will stare at me. Everyone’s looking at me. I can feel their eyes on me.”
“Deal with it,”I announced, pushing him toward the end of the porch. That overlooked some crop-domes. We lived in a part of Luna that wasn’t rightly occupied by everyone. At the time, no one wanted to be near a place where demonic animals were being held. “‘Sides, there’s some sorta party goin’ on in the center, and everyone’s there.”
Richard was silent for a few moments as I set the brakes on the ‘chair, turning him so that he was facing the crop-domes. Not exactly a pretty sight, being that the domes looked dusty and dingy, and they hummed noisily due to their individual generators, but they were dark. You could see the stars poppin’ out in the sky just above their curved tops. He couldn’t see them, o’course, but he was comforted by the fact that no one could look at him if his back was facing them.
Since Madelyn’s defeat, the skies had cleared; ain’t no clouds come by, but the winds blew harsh and cold, signaling the approach of winter. I tried hard to appreciate the visible skies before they was covered up by the nature of snow.
I stared up at the stars that began to glow, unable to fathom just how many there were. I could hear all the music and voices of the party in the distance; the occasional gunshot as some excited cowboy shot at the sky.
“Don’t you want to go?”
I barely heard him speak. When I did register the words, I looked away from the sky. I had to consider the question, wondering why he’d ask. It was just sorta given that I didn’t.
“Nah,” I said, sitting in the chair nearby. I swept off my hat and wiped at my forehead. Leaning back in the chair, I looked back up at the sky. It was a pretty sight; it just went on forever. I couldn’t help but wonder where everyone went when their time was due–would it be up there? Mingling among the twinkling lights?
We sat there in silence, listening to all the commotion in the center of town. When it got darker, I left the porch to turn on the lights inside the house. I made sure his bedroom was warm, and set some things up so that when I put him to bed, I wouldn’t be all fumbling with things. Before I headed back out onto the porch, I grabbed some fruit from the bowl atop of the counter and grabbed a paring knife.
Outside, I cut the apple up, removing the skin. This time, he didn’t fight me like he normally did; he took the cut pieces of fruit and ate three of them while I ate my own apple. I continued to stare up at the stars.
Where was I going to go when it was my time? I wasn’t a very good person. I done my share of evil before being forced along this road with the others. I could remember almost everything I’d done up until now. All the beatings, all the drinking, all the stuff that I could now look back upon and realize what wrong I did. How wrong I thought. It was rightly sick what I did to people. I sure as hell weren’t destined for something nice later on.
My stomach began to burn again, making me curl up slightly. I felt like I was going to get sick, my throat burning with bile. I wrapped my arms around my stomach and closed my eyes, concentrating on the darkness and the urge not to throw up. But it burned; it twisted and it hurt.
When the wave of pain subsided, I decided that we’d had enough of the night air. I sat up, stilling when I realized Richard was looking right at me. But he weren’t looking at me–just beyond me.
“What?” I snapped, rising. I grabbed his chair, pullin’ the brakes off, and turned him around to wheel it back toward the back door.
“Nothing,” he muttered.
“You ain’t seein’ nothin’, are ya?”
“...Your way of talking really irritates me,” he said grumpily.
“Good! Making you all irritated makes me happy!” I declared, kicking the door open and wheeling him inside. “Let’s get ya ta bed. I feel the need to buy a whore, tonight.”
He snorted, curling his arms around my neck when I bent to lift him from the chair. With one hand, I folded the contraption and kicked it against the wall. It was a slow process to help him walk, but the doc said that it was good for him. “You’re all talk, Junior. You haven’t bought a whore since you started spending time with Nina.”
“Shut up, you grumpy twat,” I muttered, heading for the stairway. I didn’t feel like telling him that Nina didn’t want anything to do with me anymore. “That ain’t true.”
“Just because I can’t see doesn’t mean that I can’t hear. Your tone changes when you talk to her.”
“That ain’t true!”
“I don’t know why you think she’ll take you,” he declared. “People like her never fall for people like you. You’re dirty and tainted; she’ll find somebody better and replace you.”
That hurt because it was damn true. But I didn’t have to hear it from him. I shoved him on his bed, making him grunt. “You keep talkin’ shit, you can just take care of your own damn self.”
“I didn’t ask or want your help!” he snapped, grossly thin limbs untangling themselves to sit up straight.
“Fine. Take care o’ yer own damn self,” I muttered, walking out of his room, incensed by his words. How dare he talk to me that way! He was just damn lucky I settled down some, an’ wasn’t eating my fist like he used to.
That night, I found myself unable to sleep. I wouldn’t want to admit it out loud, but this thing with Nina was hurting me pretty bad. I’d really grown to like–no, love the girl, and she got me all hyped up on thinking that everything would be better cuz...cuz I’d changed. She was always about the fact that I weren’t being mean to nobody; that I kept myself out of trouble. Even with the alcohol! Sure, I had an occasional, but it weren’t all the time...
I didn’t want anybody to know it was bothering me, though. They’d agree that it weren’t meant to be, and...and I wasn’t about to hear what they had to say. Especially my daddy. If he even knew that me an’ Nina had a thing, he’d go straight to her parents and talk some shit. Because he knew personally what sorta person I was; he’s always looking to hurt me in some way, and to do that, he’d get right at her.
Best to let them all know that it weren’t hurting me a bit.
...But it was awfully hard.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
I woke up one morning feeling as if something was amiss. I couldn’t know what it was, blinking my eyes open as if I hadn’t slept at all. The darkness seemed infinite, cold; the ticking of the various clocks throughout the house was a staid fighter against the heavy silence. I listened to that for a few moments, my brain slowly registering my wakefulness.
I stared up at the ceiling, listing off the things that I had to do today. The clock on the nightstand told me that it was just after four a.m. Just about the right time that I woke up everyday, so it weren’t nothing unusual about the hour.
I got up from bed, feeling immensely heavy in the chest. A little foggy, like I was dazed. Movement was slow as I scanned the darkness, inwardly wondering what it was that had me so fuzzy. The feeling that something wasn’t right had my entire balance off. Things seemed...entirely too quiet, this morning. As if all that lived in Luna had picked themselves up in the night and left; it gave me some bad memories of that aloneness, that solitude, and I had to spend a few moments in telling myself that it weren’t true.
That everything was as I’d left it after going to sleep.
I dressed in a clean pair of trousers and a nice shirt–I had to go into Luna for business, and I didn’t want to look so rugged. I crossed the hall to Richard’s room and paused next to the bed, straining my ears to hear him breathing.
I caught myself doing this a lot. It was hard to hear him breathe, sometimes. There were definite moments where I’d come into his room and thought he was dead.
“What?” he asked crankily, just as awake as I. Without saying anything, I crawled into his bed, feeling him pull away. I just didn’t feel like standing, and I found no shame laying on his bed. He did the same to me, sometimes. We weren’t touchin’, or nothing.
“When Virgil and them come back, what’re yer plans?” I asked, rolling onto my back and folding my hands behind my head to face the ceiling. “You ain’t gonna want to stay in Luna forever, huh?”
The room was quiet for a few moments before he shifted, pulling the blankets over him tightly. “I’ll be dead,” he muttered. It sounded as if he were facing the ceiling as I was. Those words rang in the unnatural silence, but the subject had already been discussed and accepted. It weren’t nothing jarring, anymore. It was inevitable. “I don’t have any plans.”
“Still,” I said, just wanting to hear our voices in the dark. It was too damn quiet. “If’n there was a chance ya’ll live...”
“There isn’t going to be a chance! There isn’t anything on this planet I need to stay here, for!” he snapped.
“Your parents?”
“I’ve long ago accepted that they...” He then sighed, trailing off. The darkness and silence of the place was heavy. His bed was too stiff, and I shifted restlessly. I stared into the black of his room, unable to discern anything.
It was awhile before he spoke again. “I’m really tired...I find myself surprised that I still wake up morning after morning.”
I listened to his words, feeling a prick of panic in my chest. But I said anyway, “Well, just give up the ghost. Quit fightin’.”
He snorted. The faint light of dawn began to lighten things up a little–shifting, I turned toward the window. I could see the stars; blinking feverishly as the skies began to lighten. I still couldn’t hear Richard breathe, and I was lying right next to him. Sometimes, I wondered if he’d actually died a long time ago, and in his place was some sorta super-zombie.
Reaching out, I gently placed my hand on his bony chest. He flinched; I felt the movement, but I didn’t remove my hand. I felt the slight rise and fall of his sternum, the feel of his cold body temperature against my palm. I wondered how it’d be when he finally passed.
I’d been looking forward to it, eagerly awaiting my life to re-start with Nina, but now...now when I knew I was gonna be alone, something felt...wrong.
All my life, I’d had something to do. Richard had been under my care since we left Wyoming for Luna. Every day had been filled with the things meant to sway me from drinking, from going back to my daddy’s thumb with my tail tucked ‘tween my legs.
So...so when Richard died...what would I do?
“You ever think about where yer goin’ when you pass?” I asked, watching my hand rise and fall with each of his weak breath.
Richard stared up at the ceiling. I could tell he’d thought about it. It showed in his strained features.
“I’ll find out when I’m there,” he muttered. There was something in his tone I caught immediately.
“You scared?” I asked, removing my hand and tucking it under my pillow as I turned to face him.
He was quiet for awhile before saying, “It’s almost the very same way I’d felt when I realized I’d be on my own.”
I could recall that feeling; remembering powerful bouts of loneliness back before I knew what I had to do. It was a potent feeling; something that had reduced me to bouts of insecurity and...and fear.
“But at the same time...I’m just so...tired. It would be so nice to be free...to not have to think or feel or remember.”
I took his words in consideration, able to catch the faint wheeze of his breath. I thought about last night, when I’d stared at the night sky, contemplating its wonders.
“Think you’ll be up there?” I mumbled, not looking at him. “With all them stars? An’ don’t you be thinkin’ on comin’ back, either. Cuz I’d kill myself just to kick your ass.”
He thought about it, then chuckled. “You’re the last person I’d waste my afterlife on. I think I’ve had enough of you.”
I grunted, feeling sleepy all over again. Suddenly, all those pressing matters I’d listed earlier weren’t important at all.
“Junior?”
“What?” I muttered crankily, closing my eyes and breathing real slow to somehow match his. Feeling for sleep, but still wondering where he was going when he died.
He was quiet, the silence broken by the sound of cows braying for food. As I waited, I once again wondered what life would be like without him. I’d be relieved, o’course. No more feeling as if I were tied down.
I thought of Nina, and wondered why she’d changed her mind. Hadn’t I proved that I was different, now? Haven’t touched a drop in months. I’d done my part when it came to Madelyn.
Why didn’t she want me anymore?
I felt my body jerk in startle when Richard’s voice broke through my thoughts.
“Can you touch me again?” Richard asked, a sort of sheepish whisper.
I felt my brow furrow. It was weird–especially when he’d fought touch so violently. But I complied, once again resting my palm over his chest as I had earlier. “Why?” I asked, feeling awkward.
He leaned toward the sound of my voice. His brow furrowed, mirroring mine, his sightless eyes taking in something beyond my head. But he didn’t answer my question. He drifted off to sleep, and I continued to lay where I had been.
Wondering if I was ready to let him go.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Virgil and the others came back a few days later, and Luna erupted into celebration. But I didn’t feel any of that. That continued sense of fogginess and displacement kept on pestering me. I felt as if I were doing everything mechanically, as if I weren’t rightly there. I think, somewhere on me, I was cheered that they’d all come back alive and well.
Virgil Hawkins, Kangorr, Carter Something or Other, that Ebon and his bitch Shiv, and Jessie. All of them were consequential to efforts against Madelyn. And they did their part successfully...so all of Luna was showing their appreciation towards them with food, needed supplies and shelter. All that good stuff.
I wasn’t part of that stuff; even though I knew that I would have been, had I not been occupied with other things. Nina kept coming ‘round to talk, and I was in no mood to talk to the woman. Not after what she’d decided–it was hard talking to a person one had feelings for, and just knowing that they couldn’t return those same things. It just weren’t right.
Virgil kept appearing at the door, but it felt odd to talk to him when the man had grown into a big and mighty hero. Cuz despite his maturity and battle experience, he was still that same, nice guy that one could get along with easily. And...and I couldn’t quite open myself up to him.
That foggy cloud that had been hanging around me kept me from reaching out. It felt as if someone had just locked me into a glass room–where I could look out just fine, but I was unable to touch anybody that passed on by. Furthermore, there weren’t no efforts to do so.
And then...one murky morning, things changed once more.
There was a certain heaviness in the atmosphere, an unnatural stillness in Richard’s room. It shifted the air, made it different. As if I were walking into somebody’s else’s room. And every movement was heavy as dread settled in my chest like a harsh sickness; turning on the lights, straining my ears, I slowly walked up to the bed and stared down at the still form atop of the mattress. It didn’t take a genius to know that he’d finally died.
Death weren’t ever pretty. Ain’t such a thing as a beautiful corpse. I took in his slightly opened mouth, half closed eyes, the intense relaxation of his jaw and cheeks. It didn’t look like him at all. And for a moment, I thought I was being played a trick upon.
But as I lifted my head and glanced around the room, that heavy numbness and dazed feeling intensified. Nothing came to mind as I looked at the armoire, the desk of medical journals. It felt as if no one else was in the room–as if I were standing there by myself, but at the same time...it was a feelin’ that whispered up my neck that told me there was something strange and foreign that stood there with me.
For the first time in a long time, I didn’t know what to do.
I stared once more at the still form, and found myself clumsily pulling up the blankets so that at least he’d be warm. I started thinking about adding more wood to the fire so that the house would warm up some, then left his room. Mechanically, I went through the entire process of bringing in wood from the shelter despite having a supply near the wood stove, and I took some time to boil some coffee.
I started to plan out today’s menu, wondering what I could do to get him to eat breakfast, and started looking for the box of tea that he always drank. I set myself upon takin’ him to the doctor today, because his breathing had been wheezier lately. Maybe have Virgil talk to him about what he’d seen during their final battles.
It was as if I’d just woke up from a heavy dream; that as I wandered through the kitchen and living room, it became nothing but fuzzy as I tried to recall what I did when I woke up earlier. Eventually, I ‘forgot’ what I’d found in his room, and went on thinking normally. Went on doing things as I would any other day.
I had things to do today; so my mind was set on that as I dumped some vitamins into a saucer, along with a pared apple and a cup of tea. I set it all on a tray and took it upstairs. Setting it on his nightstand, I checked to make sure his blankets were still in place, and despite feeling the heavy coldness emanating from his form, I kept thinking he was just...asleep. That when I came back to make sure he was getting out of bed and getting ready for the day, things were all right.
I left the house to feed the horses, and puttered around the place, during various things until Luna was rightly moving with normal activity.
I bartered for some tea bags, some food stuffs, for a haircut. I met with Virgil over breakfast, assuring him that Richard didn’t like coming into town for things, and that I’d take him some soup or something. I ignored Nina when she tried to speak with me. I glanced at the saloon with a sort of desperate thirst on the back of my tongue, but grew distracted when Josey Walker and Carter came up with some stupid scheme to hook me up with some girl they knew.
By the time I’d come back to the house, that emanating coldness had penetrated all the walls of the house. In a daze, even while my mind continued to reject what I inwardly knew, I kept telling myself that it was silly of me to think all that when I knew it weren’t true.
I climbed the stairs, hearing each step resounding heavily throughout the place. The air up here was still and cold–as if abandoned for months. The darkness of the outside–cloudy, signaling incoming snow–made the place dreary and empty. My skin broke out in goosepimples, and I registered my heart starting to slow; as if unconsciously trying to match the tempo that had been Richard’s.
Sluggishly, I walked into his room. The tray was still where I’d left it. He hadn’t moved at all. The room was still silent...cold...empty.
It didn’t feel right.
It shouldn’t have been that way.
I stood in silence for several long moments, eyes locked on the still form. I didn’t know why I wasn’t reacting properly. I knew, within the back of my mind, that I should have notified someone earlier on. I knew that it had been coming; I knew I should have gotten things cleared away the moment Luna woke up.
But it weren’t like that at all.
Dumbly, I walked with gentle steps toward the bed, as if I were trying to be quiet. Listening for his too quiet breath. I imagined hearing it, hearing that faint wheeze and catch as lungs strained to work. I imagined that he was lying there, right awake, wishing for me to go away. I imagined that I was just dreaming of all of this–everything had a dream-like quality to it that just didn’t fit with what I was seeing...with what I was doing.
For a moment, my brain just–stopped working. Thoughts left me, then; I stared in helpless, numb feeling at the still form, my arms hanging uselessly at my sides. Even when gunfire erupted outside, cowboys going on about something or another outside, I stood there.
Things just didn’t rightly process. With that continued numb sort of feeling, I turned and left the room. Walking in that daze, working in mechanized reaction kept me from thinking too much. I changed out of my clothes, shifting into something warmer. Heavier. I had to chop some wood, later. I had to cook dinner. I thought I’d make a couple of steaks. I figured I’d find the horse blankets I’d stored away for the horses outside. I’d do a little darning on a pair of jeans I’d ripped when I’d wandered too close to a barb-wire fence.
But it didn’t work out that way.
After I’d redressed, I left the house, and walked outside. My mind still wasn’t working properly, and I walked about in a daze. I wasn’t sure where I was going, what I was looking for. A couple of times, riders had to keep their animals from running into me, and I was sure I bumped into a few people here and there. But it was as if someone had swept my mind clean; kept me from thinking.
I found myself in the saloon, gulping down drinks that I couldn’t even taste. It was only when Virgil and Adam Evans popped up at each arm, their faces hushed with unreadable expressions, that things started to speed up a bit. They tugged me away from the bar while I drunkenly cursed each one from denying me my vice. Virgil was talking to me, but I honestly couldn’t tell what he was saying. It was as if he were speaking in a whole new language, and I dumbly repeated everything he was saying, as if that would help me understand better.
In looking for the both of us, Virgil had found dead Richard, and had taken care of that while Adam went looking for me. I couldn’t draw enough clarity to tell them what had happened, that I’d known he was dead hours earlier. It just didn’t feel right–this death and my freedom. I’d known it was coming. I anticipated it eagerly. But...instead...things were opposite.
It knocked my world off-kilter.
It felt like the days drew by in a daze. Like I was moving about in a dream; doing things that I had to because I’d done them millions of times before. I worked, I cleaned, I cooked, I fixed–I argued with Nina over the broken engagement, and started a fight with Alva because I hadn’t spoken to him in a while. I tossed slurs at Adam when the man brought over food, and tried to kick Virgil because he suggested that I leave my own house–that I’d constructed with my own hands–to stay with them.
At the same time, I was lost. It felt like I hadn’t anymore purpose in the world. Even when I knew I didn’t have to, anymore, I was preparing Richard’s breakfast and setting out his vitamins, cleaning his clothes, arguing with thin air over his stubborn refusals to eat. It felt wrong in that I couldn’t do any of that stuff, no more. So I kept doing it.
When it came down to it, I decided against cremation and burial. I set myself on a mission to find the Foleys’ to come get their dead kid. ‘Least I could do; I mean, daddy brought him out from the East to have him teach, and had him whoring instead. Out of all the evils that I contributed to, I could at least find his kin to take him home.
Somewhere between that and my own fixings, Virgil had that man come out from whatever hole he was hiding in. For whatever reason, Virgil wanted that man to know what had happened to Richard. I didn’t agree with the idea–Richard hated the man’s guts. It was HIS fault that this happened; HIS fault Richard turned out to be so weird. How Virgil could bring that man to see Richard in his death was beyond me, but I didn’t say anything.
-Let him see, I figured. Let him see what he did.-
And it weren’t even bad at all–the man came and left. I went back to looking for the Foleys, but it was all just a failed effort. They weren’t no where to be found.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
“You have to decide, man,” Virgil was saying. It was almost a week after that man left, and I was staring sightlessly at a telegram that informed me another dead end was just that, concerning the Foleys. “Even embalmed, an’ kept cool, his body ain’t gonna keep!”
I crumpled the telegram, flinging that over my shoulder as I left the post office where it’d arrived. Virgil’s words registered, and all I could think was those big piles of paper that I had to burn at Richard’s request. I kept picturing them in my mind as I walked back to the house, Virgil at my side.
“Burn it,” I said. “Just burn it. Leave nothin’ important behind. In the wrong hands, wrong things can occur.”
“Uh...uh, all right,” Virgil said with hesitation. “I–I’ll have the guys come over to pick up th’ casket. What next? Do you want to keep it? I mean...”
It was then that something hit me. I stopped short in my tracks, something in my memory popping up at his words. With a jerk, I hurried toward the house, mind finally focused on something. That dazed feeling left me for that moment as I made my way to my room, lifting my mattress. There, I grabbed a large envelope.
Richard had asked that I distribute the letters when the others had come back, and I’d completely forgotten about them. Virgil was still there, watching me as I ripped the envelope open and removed several by the handful. There were no names on any of the envelopes, so I figured that it was okay to just hand them out.
“His last project,” I explained. I, myself, hadn’t any idea as to what they were. Virgil took the one I was holding out, and I dropped the rest where I stood. We opened our envelopes, and began to read the carefully written letters. By the time I was finished, a quiet sort of rage was making my arms shake; the paper vibrated with movement. A crashing wave of unfairness swept through my entire being.
“This ain’t right!” Virgil exclaimed, startling me. He looked up with an incredulous expression. “This can’t be true, Junior! When did he write this?!”
“Some time after th’ translation o’th’ book,” I muttered, remembering that day exactly. I’d teased him about writing love letters and he’d gotten pissed at me; pissed enough to throw a cleaver at my head. Sightlessly, I stared at the floor of my room.
-But it would make sense, a small voice said in my mind. Why live with all that pain? Why live to look back and remember?-
“This ain’t right!” Virgil erupted again, re-reading the letter. His face was furious, and he looked seconds away from rippin’ the thing to shreds. “That ain’t fair! We couldn’t’ve done alla that just ta get killed right off! That ain’t right! He misinterpreted somethin’ wrong! Cuz this ain’t right! I ain’t gonna accept this–!”
“He was never wrong,” I said, in a daze. Thinking of all my past crimes. Would I be absolved of them? What was going to happen to me? Was I gonna go to where Richard was? Or was I gonna be lookin’ down at everything from the sky?
“NO! I don’t want this!” Virgil snapped, crumpling the letter away, and tossing it. “I ain’t gonna accept it. He was mad, Junior! He weren’t thinkin’ right by the time he died!”
“You don’t know,” I said, but I wasn’t aware that I had. I kept thinking of the stars. Feeling hellish for thinkin’ that I had a chance at absolution.
“It’s just another mad ramble!” Virgil insisted. “We ain’t gonna die! We did our parts! We don’t deserve that!”
I licked my lips. How much time did I have? Would we die in systematic order?
“I need a drink,” I decided.
“No,” Virgil said on a sigh, shaking his head. “You don’t need that.”
Frantic need poured through every bit of me. My fingers began to shake, like I was going through immense withdrawal. My throat tightened. I could see the saloon in my mind’s eye, beckoning me.
Virgil grabbed my arm. Looking me straight in the eye, he stressed, “Don’t do it. You don’t need it. It’s just all this stress that’s gettin’ ta ya. Everythin’s settlin’.”
I jerked my arm away. “Burn it,” I said again, thinking of the casket. “Nothin’ to be left behind. We all need ta disappear so’s that nobody could use us. Wrong things in the wrong hands can be the undoing...”
“Junior...don’t talk like that...” But Virgil sighed again.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
In the end, my vices got to me. I had nothin’ else to live for, to do; ain’t nobody to convince me any different. I kinda had to wonder what would do me in; our definite early deaths for a ‘job well done’, or the liquor? So I just sped up the process, doin’ what I hadn’t for a long time.
I spent my time locked up in my own house, staring out at the stars for hours. Just...just thinking. Feeling that powerful bout of fear and loneliness all over again as I searched for answers among those blinking lights. I tried to imagine what would happen when I left my body; wondered if I would even know. Would it be just like a dream? Or would it be...or would it be a different sense of unfeeling reality?
It sure would be more comfortable; after Richard died, my stomach felt like it was eating all over itself. Gnawing at everything, the pain much worse than before. I caught myself coughing up blood, but attributed that sorta thing to something sickly. It didn't matter, anyway. I kept thinking about what lay ahead of me.
Would I watch myself die? Should I be scared of death itself, or the beyond? I had no way of knowing where I was going, or what I was gonna be due.
Was there a hell? Would I burn continously in that agony, unmindful of all my human thoughts and feelings? Being prodded by ugly demons, walking through all the things that I’d inflicted on others? I kept thinking that death would happen to me in my sleep; like Richard’s. Just...go to sleep, and never wake up.
But would I be aware? Would I be aware that I was dead?
Would I see beyond the closing of my own eyes, and think see hear feel while I left?
...So I drank. And I thought. And I stared out at the sky, trying to count all the blurry little stars that blended in with each other, and sometimes zigzagged through various things. I ignored all the people that tried to talk to me; they weren’t important no more. Nothin’ I could do for them, and there weren’t nothing for them to do for me.
As far as I was concerned, nothing existed but me an’ my thoughts.
I took a long swig of whisky, and took in the brilliant trail of pink that coursed through the sky. I hoped I knew what to do when I walked. I hope I knew what turn to take. I had to wonder if I was gonna be all alone; or if there was gonna be someone there.
But who? Ain’t nobody liked me in the first place.
Things blurred to a grey fog, and I set my bottle down. As I settled into my bed, numb to the cold air, oblivious of life beyond my drunken haze, I had to wonder if I’d wake up in the morning. I felt indifferent to realizing I was still alive, more curious in what it was like after than anything else.
I positioned myself so that I could still see the stars. I tried to count them, but the damn things kept moving. So I stared upward...feeling myself relax. Feeling as if all my limbs were going to sleep. I belched hot liquor and winced at the aftertaste.
I closed my eyes to sleep, still seeing the stars against the back of my eyelids.
Warnings: Angst, death of characters
A/N: I sooooo apologize for the lack of updates! >.< I've been having a tough time with ye wretched case of...WRITER'S BLOCK, and it's seriuosly yuckles. Cuz...I can't seem able to write. And it took a long time to WRITE. Dammit. ANYWAY! This is set in the timeline of 'Banditos', from Junior's POV. Just a sad little piece...hopefully it gets my creative juices going, cuz...damn
Lachrymose
Your Star
“...I can’t see your star
I can’t see your star
how can the darkness feel so wrong?
I’m all alone now
me and all I stood for
we’re wandering alone now
all in parts in pieces, swim lonely
find your own way out...”
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
“I...I’ve been thinking...”
I looked up from unloading wood into the box set inside the shelter. Nina Crocker was standing nearby, her yellow dress dingy with wear and tear, her apron stained with various mixtures of the things she cooked. She weren’t wearing a coat, and I could tell she was cold. She wasn’t looking at me. I couldn’t help but think how lovely she was. For a couple of years now, I had allowed myself to think that things would continue to go good with us. She knew of my past, but she knew that I weren’t that person no more.
“‘Bout what?” I asked, glancing over at the house. She lived with her family; a mom and pops, two little sisters. The family didn’t really accept me, bein’ who I was; but she did. And that was all that mattered.
“When...I...” She trailed off an’ took a deep breath. The horses shuffled nearby, chewing on their bits. The buckboard was full of wood I’d chopped for her family, and for my own residence. Winter was fast approaching, and people all out Luna were trying to get their places stocked with supplies. I waited for her to continue. “I...was wondering if...when we leave Luna to start our own lives, would...would he have to come with us?”
I didn’t have to ask who she meant by ‘he’. I shrugged as continued to unload the Crockers’ pile of wood into the shelter. “He ain’t gonna live long,” I said, used to the fact. “He’ll die before we leave.”
She winced. “You speak so easily of his death.”
“It’s inevitable,” I said. “Ain’t no use cryin’ about it. He knows it, an’ I know it.”
She fell silent. After I was done, I took off my gloves, shifting my hat atop of my head. I leaned in to kiss her, but she stepped back, murmuring, “Don’t.”
I was kinda puzzled at that, and looked around. It weren’t inappropriate behavior, cuz she’d already agreed to marry me and we’d done more than kissing. She sighed, fiddling with her apron. “I...I just don’t think that this is a good idea.”
“What ain’t?” I asked, looking at her.
“I...I’m sorry. I spent a lot of time thinking, and...and I know you aren’t the same person as you were before settling in Luna, but–I can’t help it whenever you talk so coldly of...of him. I can’t help but think that–that this is–that you’d start to treat me that very same way. And I can’t take the thought that when we leave Luna, you’ll go back to your old ways,” she said.
I just kept quiet, kinda wondering what she was going to say next.
“I...I’m sorry. I won’t marry you. I can’t–this won’t work out. I spoke with my daddy about this, and...and he thought so, too. We–I appreciate everything you’ve done for us. But, I don’t want us to part on bad feelings...”
I went numb, staring at her in silence. I registered her words, but it felt like...like I wasn’t absorbing them as properly. But at the same time, it was sorta like I knew already. Things had been going so good, and I was starting to think that they’d continue to do so. She was just too pretty, too nice, and much too accepting of who I was. It had been really silly of me to think that she’d stick around to getting married.
My past was catching up to me. I had been just too evil of a person to deserve that nice ending.
She finally looked up at me, but I looked away. I didn’t know what to say, so I didn’t say anything. I didn’t even try to argue because once a woman made up her mind, there weren’t no way she was gonna change it back.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I wish there was another way. I don’t regret our time together, nor anything else. I just–”
I grunted something, climbing onto the buckboard. I didn’t look at her as I urged the horses on.
I tried not to think of it when I got to the house and unloaded the firewood there. The house was quiet; a two bedroom place that felt empty and impersonal cuz we barely spent time there. I usually spent my time taking care of the psycho and doin’ things ‘round Luna and the house than sitting inside the place.
Speaking of the psycho, I separated the horses from the buckboard, storing that away next to the horse stalls. It wasn’t all fancy, the stalls, but they was some place I could put the horses in. I combed down the one I wasn’t taking, and fed her before heading back into Luna for some things. I’d chopped enough wood to barter for another wool blanket for the incoming winter, and some thick socks. I didn’t have any money. But when it came to us Thirteen, most people in Luna treated us with far more respect and attention than Alva liked. If we had to barter for some things, then everybody was willin’ to trade. I usually worked hard to get some things to trade for supplies, and did my own hunting to get us food. Sometimes, though, people like Nina always left food around where we could use it.
After coming back to the house and combing down the horse I’d used, I walked up the back porch to see that there was a steaming pie sitting atop of stairs. I put the blanket and bundle of socks away in the house, then went into the kitchen to pick up some things to eat the pie with.
I then walked over to the aptly named Slaughterhouse. Like the stalls, it was set up out of the way, to the side of the house. It had an entrance above ground, a shack-like setup that was inconspicious. Almost like an outhouse. But there was a stairway leading down into the gritty darkness, where various rooms were built. It had been easier keeping demonic creatures underground rather than above, and the noises were muffled that way.
It was getting harder and harder to come down here. To pretend that the epitome of my evil weren’t bothering me none. Every time I came to the door, that burning feeling in my gut seemed to flare; like someone had just tossed gas into the fire. I hated coming here like everyone else. But there weren’t no excuses I could use to turn away and avoid it.
I kicked the door open, squinting into the darkness. Since Madelyn was all gone, the Slaughterhouse didn’t need all the experiments and shit that were held here. All them cages that held the creatures were empty; I’d been given the task to destroy everything of importance, and evidence of my hard work lay in smoldering messes outside, from when I burnt them earlier that morning before leaving Luna to chop some wood. It seemed kinda a shame that after all that time spent on shit, all that effort in learnin’ how things worked should be burned immediately. I reeked of smoke and sweat, but there weren’t nobody to impress.
Nina’d decided that someone like me weren’t good enough to settle down with. It was kinda hard pretending that it didn’t hurt.
The wooden stairs creaked as I walked down, eyeing the pie in one hand and figuring that I could probably get half a slice down the psycho’s throat.
“There ain’t no arguments,” I said, spying said kid sitting nearby. He’d been sitting on the couch in the former cot room, going through various documents for me to burn. From the look of the pile nearby, it didn’t look as through anything was going to be saved. It just looked as if he were reading everything once last time. Which was questionable because the dude was blind–I watched a little more and saw him just holding each individual paper, running his fingers over everything. Like he could feel the words he’d written himself.
Setting the pie down on the rickety table that held that morning’s breakfast–untouched–and glaring at the vitamins that were still were I’d left them, I frowned at him. “Just off the stove.”
He glared at the pie like it was gonna get up and bite him. He pulled the wool throw around him, like it was gonna protect him from the pie. The doc said he was down to forty-nine pounds. It wouldn’t be too long, now, he’d said. He’d long ago given up on trying to make Richard gain weight. Just make him as comfortable as possible until then...
“You’re gonna die anyway!” I snapped, shoving a spoon into the pie and separating a messy blob from the pan to plop it onto the cup saucer I’d had tucked in my shirt pocket. “Might as well as die with somethin’ in yer stomach.”
“I don’t want it.”
“I don’t care. It ain’t gonna hurt. You ain’t ever gonna get the chance again!” I put both saucer and spoon on the table, next to the pan.
Shuffling past the table, I reached for the blanket. The kid–well, he ain’t been a kid for three years–managed to get untangled from the wool. Forty-nine pounds. He’d lost two inches because of osteoporosis –whatever that was. Something to do with calcium. He was blind due to some vitamin deficiency and various fevers. He lost a few teeth, and his skin was dry and flaky; he didn’t look twenty-three–he looked years older. He’d starved away muscles, and his limbs were skeletal–there were huge protuberances where the joints connected. I could count every knob in his spine, every ridge of his ribs. His hair was thin and limp; he was too tired to walk unassisted, and he always had headaches. Shortness of breath. The doc said anytime...
I ended up being the only one to eat, anyway. After I was finished, I rose from my chair. “C’mon...we’re going outside.”
He immediately protested, shaking his head. With that action, it was almost as if it’d roll right off his shoulders. He couldn’t fight back the way that he used to, so when I picked him up, he just gave up. I grabbed the blanket on the couch, pulling it awkwardly over him. Dunno why he’d be so embarrassed to be seen by the others in Luna when he did this to himself. Ain’t nobody held a gun to his head and told him to starve himself.
I walked up the stairs into the house that me and a few men had constructed years earlier, fumbling my way into the kitchen. There were covered plates of food atop of the counter. Along with a note. I wondered when she’d come by.
I set Richard down, and he held onto the counter, all the blood rushing from his face. I hoped he didn’t pass out on me as I examined the contents that made the kitchen seemed well used.
I hurriedly scanned the paper, feeling annoyed that Nina had left dinner for the both of us. What was she bein’ all nice for? The bitch just dumped me! Why she wanted to rub salt in the wound was something beyond me. I set both plates outside, on the porch. Some loose dogs caught the scent immediately and demolished what had been on them as I walked back inside.
I found the wheelchair that Frank had made for Richard, and with easy maneuvering had it unfolded and ready for him. He immediately complained of how hard the seat was, so I grabbed the nearby cushion–something that Goren chick had made in her free time–and maneuvered that under his bony ass. I then arranged the blanket over him, then pushed him outside.
“I hate going outside,” he muttered as I kicked the door open, and clumsily maneuvered the chair out onto the porch. “It’s pointless. Everyone will stare at me. Everyone’s looking at me. I can feel their eyes on me.”
“Deal with it,”I announced, pushing him toward the end of the porch. That overlooked some crop-domes. We lived in a part of Luna that wasn’t rightly occupied by everyone. At the time, no one wanted to be near a place where demonic animals were being held. “‘Sides, there’s some sorta party goin’ on in the center, and everyone’s there.”
Richard was silent for a few moments as I set the brakes on the ‘chair, turning him so that he was facing the crop-domes. Not exactly a pretty sight, being that the domes looked dusty and dingy, and they hummed noisily due to their individual generators, but they were dark. You could see the stars poppin’ out in the sky just above their curved tops. He couldn’t see them, o’course, but he was comforted by the fact that no one could look at him if his back was facing them.
Since Madelyn’s defeat, the skies had cleared; ain’t no clouds come by, but the winds blew harsh and cold, signaling the approach of winter. I tried hard to appreciate the visible skies before they was covered up by the nature of snow.
I stared up at the stars that began to glow, unable to fathom just how many there were. I could hear all the music and voices of the party in the distance; the occasional gunshot as some excited cowboy shot at the sky.
“Don’t you want to go?”
I barely heard him speak. When I did register the words, I looked away from the sky. I had to consider the question, wondering why he’d ask. It was just sorta given that I didn’t.
“Nah,” I said, sitting in the chair nearby. I swept off my hat and wiped at my forehead. Leaning back in the chair, I looked back up at the sky. It was a pretty sight; it just went on forever. I couldn’t help but wonder where everyone went when their time was due–would it be up there? Mingling among the twinkling lights?
We sat there in silence, listening to all the commotion in the center of town. When it got darker, I left the porch to turn on the lights inside the house. I made sure his bedroom was warm, and set some things up so that when I put him to bed, I wouldn’t be all fumbling with things. Before I headed back out onto the porch, I grabbed some fruit from the bowl atop of the counter and grabbed a paring knife.
Outside, I cut the apple up, removing the skin. This time, he didn’t fight me like he normally did; he took the cut pieces of fruit and ate three of them while I ate my own apple. I continued to stare up at the stars.
Where was I going to go when it was my time? I wasn’t a very good person. I done my share of evil before being forced along this road with the others. I could remember almost everything I’d done up until now. All the beatings, all the drinking, all the stuff that I could now look back upon and realize what wrong I did. How wrong I thought. It was rightly sick what I did to people. I sure as hell weren’t destined for something nice later on.
My stomach began to burn again, making me curl up slightly. I felt like I was going to get sick, my throat burning with bile. I wrapped my arms around my stomach and closed my eyes, concentrating on the darkness and the urge not to throw up. But it burned; it twisted and it hurt.
When the wave of pain subsided, I decided that we’d had enough of the night air. I sat up, stilling when I realized Richard was looking right at me. But he weren’t looking at me–just beyond me.
“What?” I snapped, rising. I grabbed his chair, pullin’ the brakes off, and turned him around to wheel it back toward the back door.
“Nothing,” he muttered.
“You ain’t seein’ nothin’, are ya?”
“...Your way of talking really irritates me,” he said grumpily.
“Good! Making you all irritated makes me happy!” I declared, kicking the door open and wheeling him inside. “Let’s get ya ta bed. I feel the need to buy a whore, tonight.”
He snorted, curling his arms around my neck when I bent to lift him from the chair. With one hand, I folded the contraption and kicked it against the wall. It was a slow process to help him walk, but the doc said that it was good for him. “You’re all talk, Junior. You haven’t bought a whore since you started spending time with Nina.”
“Shut up, you grumpy twat,” I muttered, heading for the stairway. I didn’t feel like telling him that Nina didn’t want anything to do with me anymore. “That ain’t true.”
“Just because I can’t see doesn’t mean that I can’t hear. Your tone changes when you talk to her.”
“That ain’t true!”
“I don’t know why you think she’ll take you,” he declared. “People like her never fall for people like you. You’re dirty and tainted; she’ll find somebody better and replace you.”
That hurt because it was damn true. But I didn’t have to hear it from him. I shoved him on his bed, making him grunt. “You keep talkin’ shit, you can just take care of your own damn self.”
“I didn’t ask or want your help!” he snapped, grossly thin limbs untangling themselves to sit up straight.
“Fine. Take care o’ yer own damn self,” I muttered, walking out of his room, incensed by his words. How dare he talk to me that way! He was just damn lucky I settled down some, an’ wasn’t eating my fist like he used to.
That night, I found myself unable to sleep. I wouldn’t want to admit it out loud, but this thing with Nina was hurting me pretty bad. I’d really grown to like–no, love the girl, and she got me all hyped up on thinking that everything would be better cuz...cuz I’d changed. She was always about the fact that I weren’t being mean to nobody; that I kept myself out of trouble. Even with the alcohol! Sure, I had an occasional, but it weren’t all the time...
I didn’t want anybody to know it was bothering me, though. They’d agree that it weren’t meant to be, and...and I wasn’t about to hear what they had to say. Especially my daddy. If he even knew that me an’ Nina had a thing, he’d go straight to her parents and talk some shit. Because he knew personally what sorta person I was; he’s always looking to hurt me in some way, and to do that, he’d get right at her.
Best to let them all know that it weren’t hurting me a bit.
...But it was awfully hard.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
I woke up one morning feeling as if something was amiss. I couldn’t know what it was, blinking my eyes open as if I hadn’t slept at all. The darkness seemed infinite, cold; the ticking of the various clocks throughout the house was a staid fighter against the heavy silence. I listened to that for a few moments, my brain slowly registering my wakefulness.
I stared up at the ceiling, listing off the things that I had to do today. The clock on the nightstand told me that it was just after four a.m. Just about the right time that I woke up everyday, so it weren’t nothing unusual about the hour.
I got up from bed, feeling immensely heavy in the chest. A little foggy, like I was dazed. Movement was slow as I scanned the darkness, inwardly wondering what it was that had me so fuzzy. The feeling that something wasn’t right had my entire balance off. Things seemed...entirely too quiet, this morning. As if all that lived in Luna had picked themselves up in the night and left; it gave me some bad memories of that aloneness, that solitude, and I had to spend a few moments in telling myself that it weren’t true.
That everything was as I’d left it after going to sleep.
I dressed in a clean pair of trousers and a nice shirt–I had to go into Luna for business, and I didn’t want to look so rugged. I crossed the hall to Richard’s room and paused next to the bed, straining my ears to hear him breathing.
I caught myself doing this a lot. It was hard to hear him breathe, sometimes. There were definite moments where I’d come into his room and thought he was dead.
“What?” he asked crankily, just as awake as I. Without saying anything, I crawled into his bed, feeling him pull away. I just didn’t feel like standing, and I found no shame laying on his bed. He did the same to me, sometimes. We weren’t touchin’, or nothing.
“When Virgil and them come back, what’re yer plans?” I asked, rolling onto my back and folding my hands behind my head to face the ceiling. “You ain’t gonna want to stay in Luna forever, huh?”
The room was quiet for a few moments before he shifted, pulling the blankets over him tightly. “I’ll be dead,” he muttered. It sounded as if he were facing the ceiling as I was. Those words rang in the unnatural silence, but the subject had already been discussed and accepted. It weren’t nothing jarring, anymore. It was inevitable. “I don’t have any plans.”
“Still,” I said, just wanting to hear our voices in the dark. It was too damn quiet. “If’n there was a chance ya’ll live...”
“There isn’t going to be a chance! There isn’t anything on this planet I need to stay here, for!” he snapped.
“Your parents?”
“I’ve long ago accepted that they...” He then sighed, trailing off. The darkness and silence of the place was heavy. His bed was too stiff, and I shifted restlessly. I stared into the black of his room, unable to discern anything.
It was awhile before he spoke again. “I’m really tired...I find myself surprised that I still wake up morning after morning.”
I listened to his words, feeling a prick of panic in my chest. But I said anyway, “Well, just give up the ghost. Quit fightin’.”
He snorted. The faint light of dawn began to lighten things up a little–shifting, I turned toward the window. I could see the stars; blinking feverishly as the skies began to lighten. I still couldn’t hear Richard breathe, and I was lying right next to him. Sometimes, I wondered if he’d actually died a long time ago, and in his place was some sorta super-zombie.
Reaching out, I gently placed my hand on his bony chest. He flinched; I felt the movement, but I didn’t remove my hand. I felt the slight rise and fall of his sternum, the feel of his cold body temperature against my palm. I wondered how it’d be when he finally passed.
I’d been looking forward to it, eagerly awaiting my life to re-start with Nina, but now...now when I knew I was gonna be alone, something felt...wrong.
All my life, I’d had something to do. Richard had been under my care since we left Wyoming for Luna. Every day had been filled with the things meant to sway me from drinking, from going back to my daddy’s thumb with my tail tucked ‘tween my legs.
So...so when Richard died...what would I do?
“You ever think about where yer goin’ when you pass?” I asked, watching my hand rise and fall with each of his weak breath.
Richard stared up at the ceiling. I could tell he’d thought about it. It showed in his strained features.
“I’ll find out when I’m there,” he muttered. There was something in his tone I caught immediately.
“You scared?” I asked, removing my hand and tucking it under my pillow as I turned to face him.
He was quiet for awhile before saying, “It’s almost the very same way I’d felt when I realized I’d be on my own.”
I could recall that feeling; remembering powerful bouts of loneliness back before I knew what I had to do. It was a potent feeling; something that had reduced me to bouts of insecurity and...and fear.
“But at the same time...I’m just so...tired. It would be so nice to be free...to not have to think or feel or remember.”
I took his words in consideration, able to catch the faint wheeze of his breath. I thought about last night, when I’d stared at the night sky, contemplating its wonders.
“Think you’ll be up there?” I mumbled, not looking at him. “With all them stars? An’ don’t you be thinkin’ on comin’ back, either. Cuz I’d kill myself just to kick your ass.”
He thought about it, then chuckled. “You’re the last person I’d waste my afterlife on. I think I’ve had enough of you.”
I grunted, feeling sleepy all over again. Suddenly, all those pressing matters I’d listed earlier weren’t important at all.
“Junior?”
“What?” I muttered crankily, closing my eyes and breathing real slow to somehow match his. Feeling for sleep, but still wondering where he was going when he died.
He was quiet, the silence broken by the sound of cows braying for food. As I waited, I once again wondered what life would be like without him. I’d be relieved, o’course. No more feeling as if I were tied down.
I thought of Nina, and wondered why she’d changed her mind. Hadn’t I proved that I was different, now? Haven’t touched a drop in months. I’d done my part when it came to Madelyn.
Why didn’t she want me anymore?
I felt my body jerk in startle when Richard’s voice broke through my thoughts.
“Can you touch me again?” Richard asked, a sort of sheepish whisper.
I felt my brow furrow. It was weird–especially when he’d fought touch so violently. But I complied, once again resting my palm over his chest as I had earlier. “Why?” I asked, feeling awkward.
He leaned toward the sound of my voice. His brow furrowed, mirroring mine, his sightless eyes taking in something beyond my head. But he didn’t answer my question. He drifted off to sleep, and I continued to lay where I had been.
Wondering if I was ready to let him go.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Virgil and the others came back a few days later, and Luna erupted into celebration. But I didn’t feel any of that. That continued sense of fogginess and displacement kept on pestering me. I felt as if I were doing everything mechanically, as if I weren’t rightly there. I think, somewhere on me, I was cheered that they’d all come back alive and well.
Virgil Hawkins, Kangorr, Carter Something or Other, that Ebon and his bitch Shiv, and Jessie. All of them were consequential to efforts against Madelyn. And they did their part successfully...so all of Luna was showing their appreciation towards them with food, needed supplies and shelter. All that good stuff.
I wasn’t part of that stuff; even though I knew that I would have been, had I not been occupied with other things. Nina kept coming ‘round to talk, and I was in no mood to talk to the woman. Not after what she’d decided–it was hard talking to a person one had feelings for, and just knowing that they couldn’t return those same things. It just weren’t right.
Virgil kept appearing at the door, but it felt odd to talk to him when the man had grown into a big and mighty hero. Cuz despite his maturity and battle experience, he was still that same, nice guy that one could get along with easily. And...and I couldn’t quite open myself up to him.
That foggy cloud that had been hanging around me kept me from reaching out. It felt as if someone had just locked me into a glass room–where I could look out just fine, but I was unable to touch anybody that passed on by. Furthermore, there weren’t no efforts to do so.
And then...one murky morning, things changed once more.
There was a certain heaviness in the atmosphere, an unnatural stillness in Richard’s room. It shifted the air, made it different. As if I were walking into somebody’s else’s room. And every movement was heavy as dread settled in my chest like a harsh sickness; turning on the lights, straining my ears, I slowly walked up to the bed and stared down at the still form atop of the mattress. It didn’t take a genius to know that he’d finally died.
Death weren’t ever pretty. Ain’t such a thing as a beautiful corpse. I took in his slightly opened mouth, half closed eyes, the intense relaxation of his jaw and cheeks. It didn’t look like him at all. And for a moment, I thought I was being played a trick upon.
But as I lifted my head and glanced around the room, that heavy numbness and dazed feeling intensified. Nothing came to mind as I looked at the armoire, the desk of medical journals. It felt as if no one else was in the room–as if I were standing there by myself, but at the same time...it was a feelin’ that whispered up my neck that told me there was something strange and foreign that stood there with me.
For the first time in a long time, I didn’t know what to do.
I stared once more at the still form, and found myself clumsily pulling up the blankets so that at least he’d be warm. I started thinking about adding more wood to the fire so that the house would warm up some, then left his room. Mechanically, I went through the entire process of bringing in wood from the shelter despite having a supply near the wood stove, and I took some time to boil some coffee.
I started to plan out today’s menu, wondering what I could do to get him to eat breakfast, and started looking for the box of tea that he always drank. I set myself upon takin’ him to the doctor today, because his breathing had been wheezier lately. Maybe have Virgil talk to him about what he’d seen during their final battles.
It was as if I’d just woke up from a heavy dream; that as I wandered through the kitchen and living room, it became nothing but fuzzy as I tried to recall what I did when I woke up earlier. Eventually, I ‘forgot’ what I’d found in his room, and went on thinking normally. Went on doing things as I would any other day.
I had things to do today; so my mind was set on that as I dumped some vitamins into a saucer, along with a pared apple and a cup of tea. I set it all on a tray and took it upstairs. Setting it on his nightstand, I checked to make sure his blankets were still in place, and despite feeling the heavy coldness emanating from his form, I kept thinking he was just...asleep. That when I came back to make sure he was getting out of bed and getting ready for the day, things were all right.
I left the house to feed the horses, and puttered around the place, during various things until Luna was rightly moving with normal activity.
I bartered for some tea bags, some food stuffs, for a haircut. I met with Virgil over breakfast, assuring him that Richard didn’t like coming into town for things, and that I’d take him some soup or something. I ignored Nina when she tried to speak with me. I glanced at the saloon with a sort of desperate thirst on the back of my tongue, but grew distracted when Josey Walker and Carter came up with some stupid scheme to hook me up with some girl they knew.
By the time I’d come back to the house, that emanating coldness had penetrated all the walls of the house. In a daze, even while my mind continued to reject what I inwardly knew, I kept telling myself that it was silly of me to think all that when I knew it weren’t true.
I climbed the stairs, hearing each step resounding heavily throughout the place. The air up here was still and cold–as if abandoned for months. The darkness of the outside–cloudy, signaling incoming snow–made the place dreary and empty. My skin broke out in goosepimples, and I registered my heart starting to slow; as if unconsciously trying to match the tempo that had been Richard’s.
Sluggishly, I walked into his room. The tray was still where I’d left it. He hadn’t moved at all. The room was still silent...cold...empty.
It didn’t feel right.
It shouldn’t have been that way.
I stood in silence for several long moments, eyes locked on the still form. I didn’t know why I wasn’t reacting properly. I knew, within the back of my mind, that I should have notified someone earlier on. I knew that it had been coming; I knew I should have gotten things cleared away the moment Luna woke up.
But it weren’t like that at all.
Dumbly, I walked with gentle steps toward the bed, as if I were trying to be quiet. Listening for his too quiet breath. I imagined hearing it, hearing that faint wheeze and catch as lungs strained to work. I imagined that he was lying there, right awake, wishing for me to go away. I imagined that I was just dreaming of all of this–everything had a dream-like quality to it that just didn’t fit with what I was seeing...with what I was doing.
For a moment, my brain just–stopped working. Thoughts left me, then; I stared in helpless, numb feeling at the still form, my arms hanging uselessly at my sides. Even when gunfire erupted outside, cowboys going on about something or another outside, I stood there.
Things just didn’t rightly process. With that continued numb sort of feeling, I turned and left the room. Walking in that daze, working in mechanized reaction kept me from thinking too much. I changed out of my clothes, shifting into something warmer. Heavier. I had to chop some wood, later. I had to cook dinner. I thought I’d make a couple of steaks. I figured I’d find the horse blankets I’d stored away for the horses outside. I’d do a little darning on a pair of jeans I’d ripped when I’d wandered too close to a barb-wire fence.
But it didn’t work out that way.
After I’d redressed, I left the house, and walked outside. My mind still wasn’t working properly, and I walked about in a daze. I wasn’t sure where I was going, what I was looking for. A couple of times, riders had to keep their animals from running into me, and I was sure I bumped into a few people here and there. But it was as if someone had swept my mind clean; kept me from thinking.
I found myself in the saloon, gulping down drinks that I couldn’t even taste. It was only when Virgil and Adam Evans popped up at each arm, their faces hushed with unreadable expressions, that things started to speed up a bit. They tugged me away from the bar while I drunkenly cursed each one from denying me my vice. Virgil was talking to me, but I honestly couldn’t tell what he was saying. It was as if he were speaking in a whole new language, and I dumbly repeated everything he was saying, as if that would help me understand better.
In looking for the both of us, Virgil had found dead Richard, and had taken care of that while Adam went looking for me. I couldn’t draw enough clarity to tell them what had happened, that I’d known he was dead hours earlier. It just didn’t feel right–this death and my freedom. I’d known it was coming. I anticipated it eagerly. But...instead...things were opposite.
It knocked my world off-kilter.
It felt like the days drew by in a daze. Like I was moving about in a dream; doing things that I had to because I’d done them millions of times before. I worked, I cleaned, I cooked, I fixed–I argued with Nina over the broken engagement, and started a fight with Alva because I hadn’t spoken to him in a while. I tossed slurs at Adam when the man brought over food, and tried to kick Virgil because he suggested that I leave my own house–that I’d constructed with my own hands–to stay with them.
At the same time, I was lost. It felt like I hadn’t anymore purpose in the world. Even when I knew I didn’t have to, anymore, I was preparing Richard’s breakfast and setting out his vitamins, cleaning his clothes, arguing with thin air over his stubborn refusals to eat. It felt wrong in that I couldn’t do any of that stuff, no more. So I kept doing it.
When it came down to it, I decided against cremation and burial. I set myself on a mission to find the Foleys’ to come get their dead kid. ‘Least I could do; I mean, daddy brought him out from the East to have him teach, and had him whoring instead. Out of all the evils that I contributed to, I could at least find his kin to take him home.
Somewhere between that and my own fixings, Virgil had that man come out from whatever hole he was hiding in. For whatever reason, Virgil wanted that man to know what had happened to Richard. I didn’t agree with the idea–Richard hated the man’s guts. It was HIS fault that this happened; HIS fault Richard turned out to be so weird. How Virgil could bring that man to see Richard in his death was beyond me, but I didn’t say anything.
-Let him see, I figured. Let him see what he did.-
And it weren’t even bad at all–the man came and left. I went back to looking for the Foleys, but it was all just a failed effort. They weren’t no where to be found.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
“You have to decide, man,” Virgil was saying. It was almost a week after that man left, and I was staring sightlessly at a telegram that informed me another dead end was just that, concerning the Foleys. “Even embalmed, an’ kept cool, his body ain’t gonna keep!”
I crumpled the telegram, flinging that over my shoulder as I left the post office where it’d arrived. Virgil’s words registered, and all I could think was those big piles of paper that I had to burn at Richard’s request. I kept picturing them in my mind as I walked back to the house, Virgil at my side.
“Burn it,” I said. “Just burn it. Leave nothin’ important behind. In the wrong hands, wrong things can occur.”
“Uh...uh, all right,” Virgil said with hesitation. “I–I’ll have the guys come over to pick up th’ casket. What next? Do you want to keep it? I mean...”
It was then that something hit me. I stopped short in my tracks, something in my memory popping up at his words. With a jerk, I hurried toward the house, mind finally focused on something. That dazed feeling left me for that moment as I made my way to my room, lifting my mattress. There, I grabbed a large envelope.
Richard had asked that I distribute the letters when the others had come back, and I’d completely forgotten about them. Virgil was still there, watching me as I ripped the envelope open and removed several by the handful. There were no names on any of the envelopes, so I figured that it was okay to just hand them out.
“His last project,” I explained. I, myself, hadn’t any idea as to what they were. Virgil took the one I was holding out, and I dropped the rest where I stood. We opened our envelopes, and began to read the carefully written letters. By the time I was finished, a quiet sort of rage was making my arms shake; the paper vibrated with movement. A crashing wave of unfairness swept through my entire being.
“This ain’t right!” Virgil exclaimed, startling me. He looked up with an incredulous expression. “This can’t be true, Junior! When did he write this?!”
“Some time after th’ translation o’th’ book,” I muttered, remembering that day exactly. I’d teased him about writing love letters and he’d gotten pissed at me; pissed enough to throw a cleaver at my head. Sightlessly, I stared at the floor of my room.
-But it would make sense, a small voice said in my mind. Why live with all that pain? Why live to look back and remember?-
“This ain’t right!” Virgil erupted again, re-reading the letter. His face was furious, and he looked seconds away from rippin’ the thing to shreds. “That ain’t fair! We couldn’t’ve done alla that just ta get killed right off! That ain’t right! He misinterpreted somethin’ wrong! Cuz this ain’t right! I ain’t gonna accept this–!”
“He was never wrong,” I said, in a daze. Thinking of all my past crimes. Would I be absolved of them? What was going to happen to me? Was I gonna go to where Richard was? Or was I gonna be lookin’ down at everything from the sky?
“NO! I don’t want this!” Virgil snapped, crumpling the letter away, and tossing it. “I ain’t gonna accept it. He was mad, Junior! He weren’t thinkin’ right by the time he died!”
“You don’t know,” I said, but I wasn’t aware that I had. I kept thinking of the stars. Feeling hellish for thinkin’ that I had a chance at absolution.
“It’s just another mad ramble!” Virgil insisted. “We ain’t gonna die! We did our parts! We don’t deserve that!”
I licked my lips. How much time did I have? Would we die in systematic order?
“I need a drink,” I decided.
“No,” Virgil said on a sigh, shaking his head. “You don’t need that.”
Frantic need poured through every bit of me. My fingers began to shake, like I was going through immense withdrawal. My throat tightened. I could see the saloon in my mind’s eye, beckoning me.
Virgil grabbed my arm. Looking me straight in the eye, he stressed, “Don’t do it. You don’t need it. It’s just all this stress that’s gettin’ ta ya. Everythin’s settlin’.”
I jerked my arm away. “Burn it,” I said again, thinking of the casket. “Nothin’ to be left behind. We all need ta disappear so’s that nobody could use us. Wrong things in the wrong hands can be the undoing...”
“Junior...don’t talk like that...” But Virgil sighed again.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
In the end, my vices got to me. I had nothin’ else to live for, to do; ain’t nobody to convince me any different. I kinda had to wonder what would do me in; our definite early deaths for a ‘job well done’, or the liquor? So I just sped up the process, doin’ what I hadn’t for a long time.
I spent my time locked up in my own house, staring out at the stars for hours. Just...just thinking. Feeling that powerful bout of fear and loneliness all over again as I searched for answers among those blinking lights. I tried to imagine what would happen when I left my body; wondered if I would even know. Would it be just like a dream? Or would it be...or would it be a different sense of unfeeling reality?
It sure would be more comfortable; after Richard died, my stomach felt like it was eating all over itself. Gnawing at everything, the pain much worse than before. I caught myself coughing up blood, but attributed that sorta thing to something sickly. It didn't matter, anyway. I kept thinking about what lay ahead of me.
Would I watch myself die? Should I be scared of death itself, or the beyond? I had no way of knowing where I was going, or what I was gonna be due.
Was there a hell? Would I burn continously in that agony, unmindful of all my human thoughts and feelings? Being prodded by ugly demons, walking through all the things that I’d inflicted on others? I kept thinking that death would happen to me in my sleep; like Richard’s. Just...go to sleep, and never wake up.
But would I be aware? Would I be aware that I was dead?
Would I see beyond the closing of my own eyes, and think see hear feel while I left?
...So I drank. And I thought. And I stared out at the sky, trying to count all the blurry little stars that blended in with each other, and sometimes zigzagged through various things. I ignored all the people that tried to talk to me; they weren’t important no more. Nothin’ I could do for them, and there weren’t nothing for them to do for me.
As far as I was concerned, nothing existed but me an’ my thoughts.
I took a long swig of whisky, and took in the brilliant trail of pink that coursed through the sky. I hoped I knew what to do when I walked. I hope I knew what turn to take. I had to wonder if I was gonna be all alone; or if there was gonna be someone there.
But who? Ain’t nobody liked me in the first place.
Things blurred to a grey fog, and I set my bottle down. As I settled into my bed, numb to the cold air, oblivious of life beyond my drunken haze, I had to wonder if I’d wake up in the morning. I felt indifferent to realizing I was still alive, more curious in what it was like after than anything else.
I positioned myself so that I could still see the stars. I tried to count them, but the damn things kept moving. So I stared upward...feeling myself relax. Feeling as if all my limbs were going to sleep. I belched hot liquor and winced at the aftertaste.
I closed my eyes to sleep, still seeing the stars against the back of my eyelids.