The Dark Hours
It’s ten in the evening, and well dark outside. It’s been cold, and the sun sets early, and I’ve been off school for Christmas break. I’m barely 16.
My mother has a police scanner that she likes to constantly keep on, to track what happens in our small town. Mostly its to listen to my father, a volunteer firefighter, when he’s out on calls. The rest of the time it just scans endlessly in the background, becoming white noise as dispatch clears mundane traffic stops.
Tonight is different. Tonight is one of the Big Ones. They page out all local departments, every kind of first responder in the area. We turn off the television and turn up the scanner. It’s a terrible car accident just two roads over, on a curve I drive every morning to go to school. An accident. A bad one. A Big One.
It was a boy I went to school with, speeding. He wrapped his car around a tree. He survived, but he was ever the same after that. He would be one of the only ones.
***
I’m 18 now, and scurrying in the halls in my cheerleading uniform from practice to class. My arms are full of books, and a boy slams into me from the bathroom exit. I hit the floor and the books scatter amidst his profuse apologies. He helps me up, our hands briefly touching when he helps me pick up my books and restock them. He carries a couple to my locker to help me. I know of him but we don’t run in the same circles.
He asks if I’m really ok, and then he turns and heads off to class. I watch him go, the back of his varsity jacket sticking out in my mind. Two months later, I visited his wake. Cancer had taken him, he was already dead when he ran into me, only no one had known. His varsity jacket hung over a chair to be displayed at the wake, next to the coffin. I share the story with his sister. “That was Jeremy.”
***
It’s one year after graduation. I’m driving home from work and as I pull into my parent’s driveway, I notice the fire trucks are sitting at the corner adjacent to our property. That’s not very uncommon as it’s a hotspot for fender benders. But something is wrong. Their lights aren’t on.
The feeling in my stomach goes from mild curiosity to instant dread. It’s Rachel. I know it in my heart. Rachel, who had come home from college for the summer, who had suddenly disappeared one July night leaving her abandoned car in our one horse town. It’s August now.
They had found her body, dumped in a tiny apple grove kitty-corner from where my parent’s six acres ended. Overdosed at a party, she had been dumped in this thicket instead of taken to the hospital. She was a couple of months pregnant trying to figure out her life.
News crews took up residence at the end of our long driveway, would stand outside my car and ask if I knew or had witnessed anything. I hadn’t. I wasn’t going to say that the odd smell we’d sometimes have drift across to us was chalked up to one of the many dead animals that littered the pavement with roadkill. It really didn’t smell any different.
***
It’s the middle of the night, a couple of years later. The phone next to my bed rings and in my half sleep I turn over and answer it. On the other end is a despondent voice, broken in tears. Another death. She had found her brother hanging in the garage. I tell her I’ll be over as soon as I can get up.
Half an hour later, I’m standing in that garage. The body is gone but they paint the scene. The rope, pulled down by the weight of his body made it so his feet ended up on the floor with his knees bent. Made it appear that all he need do was stand up. A bad choice so easily corrected. We learn later that this is common, and his feet started off dangling.
In the coffin, the collar of his shirt is drawn up to his chin to hide the broken angle of his neck. He doesn’t look like he’s sleeping, he looks like he’s been frozen.
***
It’s barely six months later and I’m at a house party. We’re mingling and laughing, and Corey is bragging that his parents are gone for the month. We’re all of age but none of us own houses, and this one is big and in the country. No one around for miles so we can throw a rager.
It’s well into the night when a murmur spreads through the crowd. Corey caught some stranger peering in through the window. He’d taken off running after this mysterious figure. Off onto the dirt road with only the vague moonlight to see.
He doesn’t come back.
We go out looking for him, drunk and laughing at his stupidity, guessing at what he might do if he catches this guy. Maybe it was all a joke. Maybe this was some fun at our expense. We call his name, we walk a couple of miles.
Someone points to what looks like a deer carcass in the ditch. A deer carcass wearing a t-shirt. We stop, this body face down and sprawled, unmoving. There is no more laughter, and we slowly approach, calling his name.
Two of them move to grab his arms and lift him up. This act evicerates him as he’s been slit from belly button to sternum, and all that had formerly been inside spills outside to gleam in the silver light. He’s dead, and the horrific sound of his body squishing into the pile of his intestines makes us all sick.
I’m wretching when the ambulance shows up. I didn’t notice one of us tear off to find help. I didn’t notice the passage of time.
At his wake, there’s nothing but stunned silence.
***
I’m helping my sister’s fire department, bring water to a scene. Garage fire. I’m sitting on the tailgate of a truck when a woman stumbles out of the house next door. Something flashes in her hand, reflecting the red lights of the truck. The gathered first responders start to look over and just as they tense and cry out that it’s a gun, she sticks it in her mouth and blows her face off.
She survives a little while, her hands reaching out for grasp whatever is nearby. Grass, dirt, jackets. The sucking sound of her breath through what’s left of her mouth haunts me.
I don’t go to her closed casket funeral.
***
Countless others die by overdose, by murder and by accident. The last I attend is for a boy who grew up taking care of my grandmother in the trailer park where they lived. Her house was immaculate, and she would allow the boys in and feed them when they fell on hard times. They would shovel her driveway and bring her mail in, and no one messed with Katie on their watch.
It’s some years since then and Miss Katie has passed. The boys are grown. I get the call that there’s been another accident. Driving down a dirt road too fast, Bobby hit a set of railroad tracks and wrapped his car around the only tree in the field. He buries the engine in the backseat and all three occupants die.
At the funeral I’m surrounded by these people who have lost more than they’ve gained. Who have continued to face mortality time and again.
It’s a bright, sunny day and we’re standing in the rural cemetery, the coffin shining. In the distance, after the service, his friends fire up their classic cars and peel out one by one, revving their engines in a salute. I get in my car and drive away.
That is the last I will attend. That is the last I will keep count and keep memory for. That is the last time I will stand for someone who is not family making poor choices.
I’m still trying to drive away.
My mother has a police scanner that she likes to constantly keep on, to track what happens in our small town. Mostly its to listen to my father, a volunteer firefighter, when he’s out on calls. The rest of the time it just scans endlessly in the background, becoming white noise as dispatch clears mundane traffic stops.
Tonight is different. Tonight is one of the Big Ones. They page out all local departments, every kind of first responder in the area. We turn off the television and turn up the scanner. It’s a terrible car accident just two roads over, on a curve I drive every morning to go to school. An accident. A bad one. A Big One.
It was a boy I went to school with, speeding. He wrapped his car around a tree. He survived, but he was ever the same after that. He would be one of the only ones.
***
I’m 18 now, and scurrying in the halls in my cheerleading uniform from practice to class. My arms are full of books, and a boy slams into me from the bathroom exit. I hit the floor and the books scatter amidst his profuse apologies. He helps me up, our hands briefly touching when he helps me pick up my books and restock them. He carries a couple to my locker to help me. I know of him but we don’t run in the same circles.
He asks if I’m really ok, and then he turns and heads off to class. I watch him go, the back of his varsity jacket sticking out in my mind. Two months later, I visited his wake. Cancer had taken him, he was already dead when he ran into me, only no one had known. His varsity jacket hung over a chair to be displayed at the wake, next to the coffin. I share the story with his sister. “That was Jeremy.”
***
It’s one year after graduation. I’m driving home from work and as I pull into my parent’s driveway, I notice the fire trucks are sitting at the corner adjacent to our property. That’s not very uncommon as it’s a hotspot for fender benders. But something is wrong. Their lights aren’t on.
The feeling in my stomach goes from mild curiosity to instant dread. It’s Rachel. I know it in my heart. Rachel, who had come home from college for the summer, who had suddenly disappeared one July night leaving her abandoned car in our one horse town. It’s August now.
They had found her body, dumped in a tiny apple grove kitty-corner from where my parent’s six acres ended. Overdosed at a party, she had been dumped in this thicket instead of taken to the hospital. She was a couple of months pregnant trying to figure out her life.
News crews took up residence at the end of our long driveway, would stand outside my car and ask if I knew or had witnessed anything. I hadn’t. I wasn’t going to say that the odd smell we’d sometimes have drift across to us was chalked up to one of the many dead animals that littered the pavement with roadkill. It really didn’t smell any different.
***
It’s the middle of the night, a couple of years later. The phone next to my bed rings and in my half sleep I turn over and answer it. On the other end is a despondent voice, broken in tears. Another death. She had found her brother hanging in the garage. I tell her I’ll be over as soon as I can get up.
Half an hour later, I’m standing in that garage. The body is gone but they paint the scene. The rope, pulled down by the weight of his body made it so his feet ended up on the floor with his knees bent. Made it appear that all he need do was stand up. A bad choice so easily corrected. We learn later that this is common, and his feet started off dangling.
In the coffin, the collar of his shirt is drawn up to his chin to hide the broken angle of his neck. He doesn’t look like he’s sleeping, he looks like he’s been frozen.
***
It’s barely six months later and I’m at a house party. We’re mingling and laughing, and Corey is bragging that his parents are gone for the month. We’re all of age but none of us own houses, and this one is big and in the country. No one around for miles so we can throw a rager.
It’s well into the night when a murmur spreads through the crowd. Corey caught some stranger peering in through the window. He’d taken off running after this mysterious figure. Off onto the dirt road with only the vague moonlight to see.
He doesn’t come back.
We go out looking for him, drunk and laughing at his stupidity, guessing at what he might do if he catches this guy. Maybe it was all a joke. Maybe this was some fun at our expense. We call his name, we walk a couple of miles.
Someone points to what looks like a deer carcass in the ditch. A deer carcass wearing a t-shirt. We stop, this body face down and sprawled, unmoving. There is no more laughter, and we slowly approach, calling his name.
Two of them move to grab his arms and lift him up. This act evicerates him as he’s been slit from belly button to sternum, and all that had formerly been inside spills outside to gleam in the silver light. He’s dead, and the horrific sound of his body squishing into the pile of his intestines makes us all sick.
I’m wretching when the ambulance shows up. I didn’t notice one of us tear off to find help. I didn’t notice the passage of time.
At his wake, there’s nothing but stunned silence.
***
I’m helping my sister’s fire department, bring water to a scene. Garage fire. I’m sitting on the tailgate of a truck when a woman stumbles out of the house next door. Something flashes in her hand, reflecting the red lights of the truck. The gathered first responders start to look over and just as they tense and cry out that it’s a gun, she sticks it in her mouth and blows her face off.
She survives a little while, her hands reaching out for grasp whatever is nearby. Grass, dirt, jackets. The sucking sound of her breath through what’s left of her mouth haunts me.
I don’t go to her closed casket funeral.
***
Countless others die by overdose, by murder and by accident. The last I attend is for a boy who grew up taking care of my grandmother in the trailer park where they lived. Her house was immaculate, and she would allow the boys in and feed them when they fell on hard times. They would shovel her driveway and bring her mail in, and no one messed with Katie on their watch.
It’s some years since then and Miss Katie has passed. The boys are grown. I get the call that there’s been another accident. Driving down a dirt road too fast, Bobby hit a set of railroad tracks and wrapped his car around the only tree in the field. He buries the engine in the backseat and all three occupants die.
At the funeral I’m surrounded by these people who have lost more than they’ve gained. Who have continued to face mortality time and again.
It’s a bright, sunny day and we’re standing in the rural cemetery, the coffin shining. In the distance, after the service, his friends fire up their classic cars and peel out one by one, revving their engines in a salute. I get in my car and drive away.
That is the last I will attend. That is the last I will keep count and keep memory for. That is the last time I will stand for someone who is not family making poor choices.
I’m still trying to drive away.
Comments
Post a Comment