Alone

The eyes opened slowly.

The lids fluttered as the iris slowly focused. Ahead was something faded, perhaps beige or light brown in color. The fog slowly cleared and the mind began to engage. Moment by moment, consciousness returned. Memory resurfaced. Soon Matt remembered his name, his life, his identity.

He knew that the lights were off in the room. He knew the ceiling looked that way because it was dark. Wait a minute, he thought. The ceiling above our bed is eggshell white.

He sat up. It wasn’t a gradual rise as it usually was. He knew his stomach muscles had gone soft since so much of his working time had been spent behind a desk. But at that moment he underwent a transformation. One moment he was flat on his back, the next he was bolt upright. He didn’t need his arms to support his growing bulk. He looked down to see that his right hand clasped his left together at his belt.

He turned his head and scanned the room. It was large, perhaps forty feet square. Directly in his line of sight, the walls were the same color of beige as the ceiling. To his right were rows and rows of folding chairs. At his right elbow was padding and soft white fabric. On the other side was more padding and the outline of a rectangular box.

Recognition and revulsion overwhelmed him. He swore and scrambled out. His feet thudded on the carpeted floor and his legs almost collapsed beneath him. It was as if they were unaccustomed to carrying his weight. Only his strong hands, gripped on the sides of the coffin, held him upright.

When he finally was able to stand erect, he looked at his hands, clasped on the rim of the coffin, then yanked them away. The casket had suddenly become a overheated stove. He looked at his hands reflexively and expected to see burned skin. But his palms were clean and dry and perfect.

“What the . . . ?”

He turned to face the rows of chairs. In the dark room he could almost see the faces of people who might sit there. Images of friends and relatives floated in his mind, then dissipated in the mists of his imagination.

Full recognition hit him squarely in the center of his being. This was the mortuary run by his father in law. Outside, on a monument sign, was the name Smith and Sons Funeral Home. Old Howard was a third generation undertaker who followed his father George and his grandfather Cyrus into the business. And his sons, Sam and Rick, had followed in the tradition. Sam was married with an infant son. The expectation had already been placed on the little tyke to follow suit.

Matthew John Wright stood and stared at the congregation of chairs and saw the familiar pattern on the carpet. The reality of the moment hammered him. Sorrow, regret, indignation, frustration, anger, then rationalization struck him in turn. Finally, he came to know for certain that, if he was here, he must be dead. It was why he was in the coffin. With his right index finger he touched his left wrist. No pulse. The finger went to the throat and hunted for the carotid artery. There was no rhythm, no movement. He tried to draw breath but could not. His lungs would not respond. He commanded his diaphragm to move but it would not. He bent far over to try to get air into his lungs, but to no avail.

“I must be dead,” he said.

He stared at the rows of chairs before him and those faces reappeared. Had so many people come to pay their respects? He didn’t know that many people, well, at least in that town. And his wife knew more people from her work. Maybe they came to support her despite their unfamiliarity with him. Maybe her father, the undertaker, and her mother, the former Marine, brought people in to fill out the audience. He would never know.

“But how am I able to speak?”

He knew the physics of it. Air must be forced through the larynx to cause the vocal folds to vibrate. But if he could draw no air, how was he able to make sound? And, come to think of it, how was he able to stand? Or move at all? If his heart was still, then his muscles weren’t getting the necessary oxygen to help them move.

Yet there he was.

And what of his wife? Then a thought passed through his mind. “Lisa.”

They had shared an apartment not a block from the funeral home. 278 Walnut Street, second floor. The entire second floor for was theirs, and it was perfect for their needs. She worked second, and sometimes third shift at the hospital. Nurses sometimes had to cover for each other when the need arose. He ran an internet site and did most of the writing and programming. With the advertising it paid a pretty small salary to it’s one and only employee, but there was plenty of potential. And in the small town where they lived, the cost of living was low and relatives were nearby. It had been a good place to start their marriage.

“But that must be all over,” he said. His voice was but a whisper.

He took a step, then another, and another. His legs were stiff but responded to his commands. By the time he reached the door to the outdoors, he was walking somewhat normally. To his surprise the door was unlocked. With the security systems and motion detectors available on the open market, Matt was surprised that no alarms had sounded. He opened the door and looked out onto the back parking lot. No police cars waited there for him.

He stepped out and closed the door behind him. There was a gentle breeze that rustled his hair, but he did not notice. He was dressed in his favorite suit, but was not bothered when his tie flapped about his chest and face and his jacket billowed around him. And he didn’t feel the cold that was in the wind. His body could not detect any more signals sent from the extremities to the brain.

Yet he walked through the parking lot and across the side street.

An alleyway led directly to the house. He crossed it as the wind tugged at his hair and his clothes. A moan as loud as a whisper echoed among the houses and he did not hear it. On his feet were pair of leather-soled dress shoes. The noise they made as he walked along the asphalt caused sharp reverberations between the buildings. He had learned to be light on his feet when he and Lisa took a dance class in college, but at that moment his footfalls were unusually heavy. His mind ignored it.

His eyes were focused on the house where his beloved lay, no doubt sleepless, in that brass bed borrowed from her parents. The mattress was new but the flat springs were not. The frame was rigid but there was a distinct sag in the middle. They hadn’t cared. They slept like spoons in a drawer and felt closer to one another.

But that night, no doubt, she wasn’t sleeping. No doubt she wished for his presence in that bed, his arm around her, his warm body for comfort. That night she was alone.

The apartment had a decent sized sitting room at the side of the house. There was a large picture window, complete with a padded window seat, where she loved to sit and read in the sunshine. The view below showed only the funeral home and the parking lot, but she sat there because the cushions were comfortable. He often sat there and searched for ideas for the blog he wrote for his website. And sometimes they sat together and snuggled.

He walked to the end of the alley and looked left, then right. No cars were out at that hour. In such a small town there were not many residents who ventured out in the very late of the night. He stepped into the street and looked up at the picture window. His mind was filled with memories. Scenes from his life, his work, his childhood, and his marriage filled his eyes. He smiled when he thought of her. Their wedding day. And their wedding night. And their honeymoon. Her eyes were blue and bottomless. Her skin was clear and had a taste he often craved but could never define.

Her face appeared at the window and their eyes met.

They each stood, dumbfounded. Her eyes were red, her face filled with the sorrow and loneliness she felt. For a brief instant he longed to hold her and feel the warmth of her body and the scent of her hair. For but a moment he wished he were alive again.

Then terror gripped him.

He turned and raced back the way he had come. His arms and legs pumped in perfect timing as he sprinted across the street and through the parking lot. He reached the back door and threw it open. Matt was so filled with fear that he didn’t think to close it behind him. He zipped through the hall and back into the room where he had just awakened. Without a conscious thought he leaped back into the coffin and clasped his hands over his navel. A moment later his body was still. To him the coffin, and death, were a refuge.

A long minute later she came into the room. In his mind’s eye he saw her in a romantic notion, her billowing nightgown of diaphanous material, her long hair tailed behind her. But he knew better. As the weather had turned cooler she had taken to wearing long sleeved t-shirts and pajama pants. That night she had on matching garments of light blue. Her hair was just long enough to reach her shoulders. On her feet were the socks with the grippy dots on the bottom that she favored.

She padded to his side and stared down on him. She said his name in a breathless whisper. He knew he dared not respond. If he opened his eyes she might believe he was alive. And he knew otherwise. As much as he desperately wanted to hold her, to caress her, he knew it would be wrong. He knew was dead, and she was going to have to move on. It was cruel, he knew, but it was for the best.

She had said that he was her Knight In Shining Armor, her Savior.

On the first day of their honeymoon, she had told him about a painful memory. Of the nine children in her family, one night an older brother tried to molest her. While young Lisa was able to scream and bring her parents to the rescue, the incident had caused psychological damage to her. Mom and Dad knew nothing about psychotherapy, and said they didn’t believe in it. Pull Yourself Up By Your Own Bootstraps was there motto. It didn’t work for Lisa. Years of stress in her mind drove her to consider suicide. Only a chance meeting with Matt gave her a level of hope that chased away the depression. He was her reason to live.

As she stood and gazed at her husband, a tear fell from her eyes and dropped on the back of his hand. It was warm, from her body, and almost caused him to stir. She stood over him as she stared, her hair haloed about her face. She called his name several times but he refused react. She touched his face, his hair. Then she cried full out. Her face contorted and the tears flowed. For several minutes she remained and chanted his name and touched him. Face. Hair. Suit. Hands.

Matt felt her sorrow and her deep heartache. He felt her pain, and the misery she believed would haunt her the rest of her days. He could not remember how he died, but knew he felt remorse at leaving her too soon. He felt not sorrow but regret. They had both hoped to grow old together, but, he knew, only she might grow old. He hoped she wouldn’t reconsider suicide. He hoped she might find a reason to live even after he was buried.

Finally, finally, she turned away.

How empty and alone she must feel, he thought. To be married for only a short time, to the man she called her Soul Mate, only to lose him like this. To have such a bright future only to have it collapse into a deep pit of darkness and despair. Death is so cruel.

“And what of you?”

The voice was that of his grandmother. He saw her face in his mind. White hair, wrinkled face, strong eyes. Always those strong eyes. She had passed but two years ago after a long and happy life. And she had been a good friend to Matt. While his parents had been good, she had been the guiding light in his life. Mom had her own job, her own business, and had to focus on that most of the time. Dad worked in sales, and traveled frequently. While he was a great dad, he was absent for long periods of time. His influence was not nearly as great as Grandma.

That night her voice was strong and clear in his mind. “You have suffered the same as me,” she said. “You are just as alone.”

Then grief struck him, a hammer blow that drove him down into a cavern so black that he could not see nor sense anything but his own despair.

“Help me, Gramma,” he whispered.

“I can not,” she replied. “We are born as we die. Alone.”

THE END