I’m attending a funeral. I don’t know who it is who has passed. All I know is that I’m supposed to be here. I am wearing a dark blue blazer and white collared shirt covered with wine stains. I have my hair slicked back, and I’m wearing dark glasses to keep the sun out of my eyes. Someone keeps leering over my shoulder, just out of reach of my vision. When I turn to see who it is, there is no one there. I stop at a water fountain for a drink and I continue to feel this presence—some unnamed figure is standing there, just watching me—but I cannot see who it is. All my family members are here. No one is really talking that much. There are just faces everywhere. They aren’t old, they aren’t young, they are every era of their lives all wrapped together. They all have dressed very nice and are in good spirits. I keep imagining a good whiskey being in my glass but there is none to be found. Beyond the pillars of the front of what could be the church I see a mass field of wooden crates covered in picture frames and assorted bouquets. Beyond that, nothing else. Most of the flowers are red although I don’t think they are roses. When I reach the one crate that everyone is standing around, the one the people have come for, I pry the lid off the crate. No one tries to stop me. I turn and a waiter is standing next to me. He takes my order, and suddenly we are all at lunch. There is no funeral, we are all seated around a large table, and all the faces are smiling. We order our food, we drink and talk, and no one is unhappy.
The alarm wakes you and you crinkle out of your fixed position. You roll over and silence it, take a deep breath and pull the sheets back. The light goes on and you stumble to the toilet, rubbing the glare until it doesn’t sting anymore. The first sound you expect to hear is your piss stream breaking the surface of the water, but when you focus in closer you curse yourself for missing the toilet completely. You stop yourself short when you see it drenching the corner behind the bowl.
The shower’s pipes make a painful bellow when you adjust the water temperature. You step in and the water always needs re-adjusting. Through the window you can see that it’s still dark out, and five minutes go by in ten seconds. You step out of the shower and the towel isn’t there waiting for you. You make it into the kitchen in time to slam down a couple eggs and re-heat the coffee. Then it’s a quick few minutes left to dress and brush your teeth.
The bus stop is a good ten minute walk from the front door. Adventure and death lay behind every turn, every bush, behind walls and inside parked cars. Stray cats stare at you with curiosity. Rustling and imagined footsteps (or not) get your senses tingling. The bus comes a few minutes late and the driver says, “It’s usually better if you have your fare ready before you board the bus.” The computer voice inside lists each bus stop you approach and you wonder if the voice actually belongs to a person. The date scrolls across a digital sign above the door and you say to yourself, “Is it really?”
You enter the building and the fluorescent lights vibrate in your eyes and ears and coworkers are discussing sports, business sales, and ideas for lunch time. You try to clock in using the machine on the wall but it keeps rejecting your ID number. You pocket a slip to fill out and bring to the bookkeeping office that says you had arrived on time. And everything is numb. It could be a memory, it could be yesterday. But you go about the motions, you help the people find things, you answer phones, you restock shelves. Is this life a fantasy? You rub your face and it feels real: the flesh, the bone, eyes, nose—it’s all there. You wonder if it’s all a program, if it’s backwards, if you’re the only one in existence and this is all in your mind. Even when someone tells you that you’re not alone, how true can that statement actually be? Do they even know, and who is reliable? If they can give you information, who gave it to them? We’re all the same, we’re all humans, just a species, perhaps, narrowed down and walking the Earth, but is there a great significance, or are we just waiting to die…
Talk to your supervisor, tell them you need a break. You go to the break room and sit at a table, flip through a few pages of a nearby magazine. You look at the faces of these celebrities. You wonder if they are made up or if they are robots or somehow manufactured by an industry that you aren’t a part of. But you see them dining, pumping gas, sitting at the beach, pampering their kids, dressed in the highest of modern fashion, and it all looks magnificently dull. And you don’t know which is worse—the articles, the photographs, the writing, or the fact that we are all obsessed with people who are living their lives the way they choose. Or the lives they were born into—it’s for the individual to decide. But all that attention—who really wants it? In some alternate reality we are the popular ones. Vending machines line the wall behind you and they watch your misery unfold when no one else is there. Back to work and the faces mold and twist and they’ll never remember you. They are ever demanding, and you are supposed to be patient with their recurring wishes. Hours and hours grind into the next series of questions and answers and torment and obedience. Do what you are told because your future depends on it.
You get home and there’s only more bills in the mail. At this point you could build your own house out of these notices. You don’t even want to take them from the mailbox. You get inside and you peer through the blinds of the living room. Cars drive by and you wonder who is in those cars, where they are going, and what kind of lives do they live. The television remains off because there’s no television to watch. If you can get around the debt, someday, you’ll order cable. The dishes are mounted high and mighty and you wash out a bowl, pour some cereal and use the last of the milk. There’s a half-empty bottle of cheap vodka and you get it down as soon as the cereal is gone. Then you sit on your couch and contemplate who will find your body after your brains hit the wall, after you stretch your neck, after you spray the bath tub walls with your wrists. For a moment you consider if you’ll be aware after the muzzle flash; after the jerking snap of your neck; after the warm generous life gradually evades your body. And you wonder if you will see them bag and ship your body away, if you’ll still be around. What would the waiting period be like? What would you do to pass the time?
What a nightmare. I almost believed it to be true. It’s amazing how deep we can fall into a dream. The cool sleek sheets comfort me in my waking. The clock smiles at me. Six hours of rest and I didn’t even need to use the alarm. I roll over and there she is, the love of my life, still sleeping. Her shoulders rise and then fall with each breath she takes. The sun peeks in through the imported Venetian blinds that I had flown over last spring and lay gentle kisses down on her bare neck. My arms stretch out and I feel any tension in my back release slowly. Today will be better than yesterday.
The tile of the bathroom floor heats upon my entrance, motion sensor sensitive, as is the shower. The water breaks down through the stainless steel overheads (3 separate spouts) and is always the right temperature. The coffee is ready when I reach the kitchen and the paper is waiting when I sit at the table. My love comes down the stairs, still groggy, but waking, that body of hers accentuated by the finest silk robe. Her nipples shine through the fabric and tell me they want me. She always walks barefoot—her feet are one of her best features—and she comes right up to me and sits upon my lap. “How did you sleep?” she asks. I always respond with, “Better than the night before.” We smile at one another and I take a deep breath. Today, definitely better already.
I decide to take the day off and drive the Audi down to the market for coffee, desert and wine. Wine tasting last weekend opened my mind to Cab, so I purchase three different bottles made from three different wineries along the northern coast. I pick out a nice steak—a fine thick cut the butcher recommends that any of the three wines will accompany. The manager of the store greets me at checkout and offers me a fresh shipment of cigars, which of course, I accept. He has the cashier total it up with the rest of my items and I take one from the box and smell it. We shake hands before I leave and he doesn’t even mind that I’m not fully outside before lighting it.
At dinner we watch films of culture on the flush-mounted flat screen. The guy who installed it gave me a great price on speakers—including the overheads mounted in each room of the house. The subwoofer makes the dishes and glasses and jewelry and toothbrushes and coats shake during the climaxes. All three wines have their distinct flavors and one is quite robust with a hint of rose and strawberry. Tomorrow I will go back and purchase a case for the cellar.
I light another cigar out on the balcony. Imported. Hand-rolled. Who cares where. And here she comes—my love, my wife, my everything. She hands me a brandy. I swish the snifter and sip it gradually. She’s still barefoot, still beautiful. Ever positive, she makes the world to me. We sit with our drinks and we figure the stars, we name constellations. She smiles and I feel secure. Next summer we plan to go around the world on my boat. Starting in the South West, we’ll sail all the way through the Caribbean, Panama, Gulf of Mexico, the Keys, and then further east until we find Italy, and Spain. We’ll stay inland for a while and experience their cultures, drink their coffee and their wine. Going further we’ll travel towards Japan—she has always wanted to see Tokyo—then onward until we see the Pacific again. We’ll discover new territory. We’ll live from one land to the next. We’ll make love under the moon with nothing but the ocean around us. Sometimes it will join us, sometimes it will just watch, listen. Upon returning we’ll begin a new chapter in our lives with a family, starting with a boy. We’ll raise him to take over the business when we retire. The sun will kiss us in the morning. We have it all.
Author: Lawrence Goodwin
