Visitation
10 November 2011 09:52 AM Categories: Writing prompts
Before he appeared I had been standing by the sink in film noir lighting, looking at the dishes piled up with their memories of something fine, of conversation and small glasses of wine and garlic and breadcrumbs browned in butter. A dull knife rested on the cutting board. It had left its impressions upon the wood, made its mark repeatedly over years of chopping and mincing. This is home, I thought, what I’ve been missing.
All the actors had left the stage. They were sleeping in rooms cooled with night breezes, dreaming of the future landscape, a world without them. The younger me was sitting on a stoop at another house, a paperback copy of Anna Karenina balanced on her knees. The older me, visiting the imaginary past from the present, the me that yearned for things that didn't exist, things I created out of rose-filtered memories and hopes, knew I was being watched. A paper ornament hanging from the window -- was that the cut-out of a man? -- trembled. But the windows were closed. There was no breeze.
Show me a sign that you are here. The paper man twirled on his string. OK. But please, please, don't appear in front of me.
Kevin didn’t listen. He reconstituted himself on the couch as if he had been sitting there all along, waiting for me. I was grateful to see him, actually, to hear his voice. To have a conversation. And now he was saying something surprising. Good money to be made in the afterlife? Since when did Kevin care about money?
Can I ask you a philosophical question? Or maybe it isn’t a philosophical question – I mean, I now know the afterlife is real, that it exists, but, well, do you think it might be culturally determined? Like the idea of making money in the afterlife seems so … American. So capitalistic?
We talked philosophy, about the different possibilities of life after death, of the mysteries even the dead couldn't answer. This was home, too, the discussions that died with him, the way ideas mattered, and searching for the truth was a moral imperative. The only thing different was that I was no longer afraid to speak my mind. I could stand up to him if I needed to.
When it came time to leave, his pushed himself up gingerly from the couch. I’m not sure if I want you to touch me. He was more solid than life, more present.
I know. I’m cold like a zombie. He smiled.
It wasn’t that I was afraid of the touch of death, though it did give me pause. I was afraid of the unknown, of the truth, afraid of accepting that he was dead and not dead all at once, that these connections we make while living extend beyond our corporeality, that they reach out and out. How could I discount connection then, turn my back on it in some cowardly attempt at self-presevation?
He reached for my hand anyway. His was cool and clammy. Dead but not.
I woke up.
The next morning I had to call my mother about this, the solidity of Kevin, the strange things coming out of his mouth. Well, I’m glad to hear that he’s finally making money. We laughed and discussed the possible structures of the heavenly economy, and then she reminded me that it was Kevin's son's birthday.
In the world of dreams, in between life and death, our subconscious speaks to us in symbols. Kevin is a symbol, he was a person, he is part of my history. I'd like to believe it was really him stopping by, playing a lighthearted joke with an underlying message on the eve of his boy's birthday: don't discount connection. Keep your heart open. Trust your intuition. I am still here.
From a photo prompt of a dying rose. I've written the dream as it was.
Image by nimrodcooper.
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