MONO ISSUE 1 PDF FLIPBOOK - Flipbook - Page 40
wake… and the box…the place where they were going to shut her into the dark forever.
***
It didn’t take very long. He couldn’t even hear anything that was said. Imagined all the words had
been spoken at a service before anyone had even found their way into the cemetery. He stood up
and let the wide brim of an ancient Stetson keep the sun from his eyes and the last of his tears from
witness.
When it was over, he edged closer, waiting for the stragglers to go away so he could say goodbye.
Someone had set a small photograph on the small bump in the earth that was left. He knelt and felt
his heart stop, reached for it without thinking…
“What the fuck d’you think you’re doing? Who the fuck are you?”
He stood up. He was there in front of him…bigger…wider than he’d ever imagined he would be.
Maybe if he’d been the one to live with her, the life that was gone, he would’ve been bigger too…the
luxury of loving.
He took a step backward. Outweighed by fifty sixty pounds. The face was something new; he
realised he’d never actually known what he looked like. He said:
“I knew her. A long time ago.”
The much larger presence got even larger. He backed away some more, still with the small square
of Kodachrome paper in his hand.
“Please…can I keep this?” he asked. “You must have dozens…hundreds of them just like it…”
“Who the fuck are you?”
He closed his eyes and took in a deep breath. Let it out slowly.
“I’m Matthew,” he whispered.
“Matthew.”
“Yes.”
“I don’t know any Matthews.”
“We never met. Spoke only once…on the telephone…for all of maybe half a minute…fifty years
ago...”
The shaven head tilted to one side, eyes locked with his and staying there. He could see him
thinking.
“You’re David,” he said. “You took her away from me. I saw her one last time…the summer
before she told you she was pregnant…”
David’s eyes went wide and he took a step forward, his hands curling into fists.
“Why the fuck are you here?”
He swallowed down his sorrow; his grief belonged to the girl they were burying.
“You think because she left me I stopped loving her? When all the shit I’ve done to myself, and
anyone I’ve ever known, stops howling in my head, I still can hear her laughing…I can still see her
smile…I can still feel her fingers touching my face...”
“She never had my baby. It never even occurred to me that it might be mine. Only that she
couldn’t have a child without being married and you never stepped up to fix it…so I did…”
“Motherfucker.”
“Sure. Whatever works for you. I just couldn’t let her leave without saying goodbye. Please let me
keep this.”
Matthew offered the photograph back to him.
“I didn’t come here to give you any more grief than you’ve got. As long as you loved her...adored
her every fucking minute of every fucking day. As long as you gave her everything she ever wanted
and made her laugh…never made her cry.” David stopped looking like he wanted to tear his head
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