by Thomas L. Traband III
I didn't see him on those last couple of days. I suppose it was just as well. I'm sure he looked so broken and defeated, it would have made me give up too.
I had been his best friend, so I knew what he was going through. I liked the kid. It tore me up to see him losing this fight. I helped where I could, but as a man he had to face this on his own. As his friend, I had to let him face it.
I never expected our friendship to grow so close. We met in high school, probably in German class. We were both in the same class as freshmen. The class was small, so we easily became acquainted. Besides, he always talked a lot, to anyone.
I didn't really get to know him until he went out for cross country. We were both juniors, but it was his first year on the team. He worked enthusiastically hard, with a child-like naiveté. Nearly everyone hated him for it, they all liked to complain. Eventually, he gave in to the pressure and stopped showing the pure fun he was having. It pleased me as much as anyone, but I felt a little saddened too.
He made varsity his first year, which surprised everyone. People frequently underestimated his abilities, though. He'd say his height was what did it, and he probably was right.
He had an irrational preoccupation with his height. At five-six, he swore he was a victim of his diminutive stature. He stated it as an inarguable fact. He said it was one more hurdle to clear. He said a lot of other things.
I knew he was using it as a scapegoat, as something to hide behind. He seemed to be hiding from the world. It scared him. His dreams invariably depicted him saving the world from itself while he remade it in his own image.
I found this out after we became close friends. That started when, as a senior, he signed up for chorus. He wound up in the advanced section, while I was in the more advanced small ensemble. He said he took the class because it was an easy ‘A’ or to meet girls or for the trips, but, really, I think he just liked to sing. He wasn't bad. He wasn't good, either, not by a long shot. He did win ‘Most Improved Vocalist’ that year. Surprise.
Our choral tour that year took us to New England. On this trip, new friendships developed everywhere. Most petered out, but ours took hold. After our week-long excursion, we began to interact socially, facilitated by common interests like running and gaming.
I discovered that beneath the happy-go-lucky, swaggering bravado lurked a tortured soul. His parents split before he had any memories, sending him off with his grandparents at three. He lost his grandfather three years later. Under pressure from an aging, widowed grandmother the father took him back at age twelve. From there, his life took a downward turn (As if it could get any lower).
He and his father hit it off as well as me and my father. Patricide was a viable option. That old man tore apart this ever-hopeful, trusting kid like a rabid, starving tiger. Anything he did was wrong. Nothing could please the father. When the father looked up from his frenzy, he found a nearly impenetrable wall and the shell of a kid cowering behind it. This wall was a wall of hate and fear and disillusionment. Although the father managed to breach it several times, it never came down.
I always felt the kid was strong, though. From behind his wall, he still battled the world, in an effort to reach those world-saving dreams. He would have done it. I believe he would have overcome any insurmountable odds. Makes him sound like some sort of hero, or cliché, doesn't it? Well, maybe he was. While he never saved princesses or slew any dragons, he did what he had to do with what he had. He was an ‘everyman's’ hero.
To be fair, he had shortcomings. He was rude, crass, obnoxious, and, once you got to know him, adversarial and confrontational. He had a mean temper, just like his father. By nature he was a fighter, albeit a broken one. And he took life too damn seriously.
I pulled a sixteen hour shift, then a seven the next day with the carpet store. I was gone, tired, but I called on Monday to check on his love life. On Friday we'd doubled. He told me he bombed and that he and his girlfriend were probably through. He also told me he had seen a doctor about his headache. They did a CAT scan on him, which he described as laser beams being shot at his head. He then told me it came out negative, but he got some pills to take. The doctor told him “it was probably a backlash of stress.” Surprise again.
His father couldn't understand how a kid could feel overburdened with stress. His father also didn't realize his son wasn't a kid anymore. The father held pat conclusion that the kid was faking it all just to get sympathy.
Why would he need sympathy? He only spent a thousand dollars on car repairs, made necessary because of a couple pranks. He helplessly watched tuition rise and financial aid disappear. The resulting chasm swallowed his future plans.
If that wasn't enough, he and his girlfriend had drifted further apart. They probably would never get back together. She wasn't his first love, but he'd had some tough times with the ladies. This one had been the only one not to screw him over, figuratively speaking.
I did all I could to get them together. I knew they belonged with each other, but they never realized it. My hands were tied. I could force them to see the truth, but I couldn't force them to accept it.
But I had faith in him. He needed help, someone to talk to. I did my best. I helped, I listened, and I failed him.
That last Friday night, despite his drunken charade, he had given up. The gleam had gone from his eyes. His face, and for that matter, his whole body sagged. He had become nothing more than an empty shell. His soul had fled, and I could not bring it back.
I didn't believe it at first. I figured I was too drunk for my senses to function properly. I told myself I had an overactive imagination. Besides, the kid always bounced back.
On Friday, the invitation came. I knew something was wrong before I opened it. I experienced one of those unearthly chills, the ominous kind that warn you of impending doom. I shook as I opened it.
They sent out those generic, fill-in-the-blank cards. I dragged my eyes from line to line, shock and incomprehension swept over me.
‘Heh, hehh, he's joking with me again. The old fake invitation trick. What a kidder,’ I thought, laughing out loud. Somehow I didn't believe it to be a joke. With mounting anxiety, I dialed their number.
“Hello?” answered the woman's voice.
“I just got your invitation and wanted to make sure it wasn't a joke,-” I spurted.
“Is this John?”
“Yes.”
“I'm sorry. It's all true. He passed away in his sleep Monday night.” She paused.
I didn't know what to say. For once, I couldn't speak. She saved me by asking, “Will you be coming to the funeral?”
“Yeah, yes I will. Thank you. I've got to go. Thanks,” I said in a hesitant staccato.
“Take care. It's a sad thing, but pull through it. He would've wanted it that way,” she said.
“Yeah… yeah. Okay, um, good-bye.”
“Goodbye, John.”
I had trouble returning the phone to it's wall bracket.
“It's not fair!” I screamed. “I don't believe this is happening. How could he just die like that. ‘Pull through,’ she says. ‘He would've wanted it that way,’ she says. How come people get psychic after someone dies, going around telling people what he would've wanted. IT'S NOT FAIR!” I ranted and raved for about five minutes. The words changed but the thought was the same.
A wave of guilt hit me after I'd settled down.
‘I could have helped him. I could've saved him,’ I thought, but I knew it wasn't true. He was beyond help.
‘I failed him, though,’ I thought, but that wasn't true either. His family failed him. The world failed him. And at the end, he failed himself.
I stood, head bowed, by the open grave. Human mortality had never hit quite so close to home. Like a movie, a light rain fell. I stood without umbrella or rain coat and let the water soak into my clothes. The family and a handful of friends held umbrellas and shifted restlessly in the mud. I refused their company, preferring to stand alone. Some understood, for which I'm thankful.
Within minutes, the ‘mourners’ began seeking shelter from the elements but I refused to go. He needed some more time from me.
Over that next stretch of time, thoroughly soaked now, I experienced the most miraculous event of my life. I swear this wasn't a hallucination, though it probably was.
I looked up, and standing across the grave from me was an ethereal manifestation of a very healthy, handsome, compassionate-looking, and very dry man. I realized I was looking at him, stripped of the limitations of a human body. I was more astounded when he spoke in a clear, saddened voice to me.
“John, I just wanted to apologize for all I've done. I have hurt you though you wouldn't admit it. You've been my best friend. Thank you for everything and don't grieve for me too long, okay? You've got your own life to lead. Hey man, smile. I've gone to a far, far better place. Catch ya later, dude,” he finished glibly.
I couldn't speak, but I did smile. Then, a tightness seized my throat and chest, and I thought of something he'd said to me. One time, in his most matter-of-fact tone, he told me that no one would cry for him when he died. I laughed it off then, but on recollection, I never saw anyone cry at his funeral or the burial.
He came very close to being right.