Authors: Katherine Owen
Days later, I am still reeling from the coincidental circumstances of all of it. The tragedy that pervades my life and the continual suffering of grief that presses down on me in all these inescapable ways.
Now that I'm alone, I unlock the desk drawer and open the box with all my teenage collections of memorabilia, including the police report and crime scene photos of my parents from Barcelona. My ability to read Spanish is rusty, but still better than my ability to speak it. I'm not sure what is worse, the description of my mother—sexual assault multiple times, facial lacerations, and throat slit—or the picture of her, where all I recognize is the color of her beautiful red hair. My mother. I stare at the grotesque picture of the beaten body of this woman labeled with my mother's name. The colors—purple, black, blue and red—make messy modern artwork of this once-beautiful woman. My mother. I flip through the rest of the crime scene pictures and see my father's face swim before my eyes. One green eye is open the other is a dark hole. His dark hair's matted with dried blood. It reminds me of Ethan.
With resolve, I finish the report as if I haven't read it all before. The banditos shot my father execution style, early on, from what the police surmised in the report. Then, they tortured, raped and killed my mother. The photos are gruesome. I cringe as I study them. My parents were beaten everywhere by their captors—these frenzied, out-of-control animals. Banditos. The police infer that it is only after the victims begged, that's when, mercifully, in the end, it
was
mercy that they killed them. First, my father. Then, my mother. At the time, I was assured by Officer Fernandez that they would find them. The Spaniards had been intent on catching the perpetrators, since dead Americans were bad for tourism. Famous, dead American actors, even more so. But, they never found them. The horrendous crime that took my parents from me was never solved. The flash of the hotel room the night of their murders returns full force. I envision myself as a young, scared teenage girl waiting for her parents' return. I remember the tears streaming down my face as I leaned against the wall. I'd left all the lights on in the hotel, somehow, believing that light would bring them back. After midnight, I'd called the front desk and told them that my parents hadn't returned. Officer Fernandez and the concierge, Annette Torres, arrived shortly after. Waiting the indeterminable five minutes after making that one phone call seemed like hours. When I heard Fernandez's rapid knock on my parent's hotel suite door, I remember going up to the door and swiftly realizing my life was changed with my first glance at the grim look on the police officer's face.
"You found my parents?" I'd asked, still naive and still hopeful in that moment.
"Yes." His answer would be the last word I heard for days after. The stark reality of being all alone engulfed me like a rogue ocean wave. The damage to my psyche had already begun and all the trust issues that arrived with it that I carry now. It's true. All the fairy-tales and happily-ever-afters deserted me with his utterance of that single word. Yes. Grief moved in on me so swiftly. I never did regain my balance. Then. Now.
I swallow and feel the familiar constriction in my throat. My eyes burn, but no tears fall.
I'm shaken from my reverie of those tragic moments, the old ones and the new ones, by the distinctive ring of my cell phone. Ashleigh has been screening all my phone calls for days, but now I feel compelled to take up the task on my own. I answer automatically without thinking of who might be on the other end.
"Hello?"
"Jordan, it's Brock Wainwright."
His voice seems so far away. I'm momentarily stunned to hear it.
In the next moment, it brings me back to Ethan and what has happened. Was it really only six weeks ago that we were all here doing tequila shots late into the night and laughing?
"Lieutenant." I hear the sadness in my own voice.
"Jordan, I just want to say how sorry I am. I was just told about Ethan last night. It's not enough to say I'm sorry, I know."
"Just told about him? What the hell are you talking about? You were
there
. What happened?"
"I don't know. I can't…I can't remember." His voice is barely above a whisper, but I press on.
"You promised me, Brock. You. Promised. Me." All the rage at my situation in losing Ethan culminates in that moment. "You promised me. You said you''d keep him safe. You promised. And, now? He's…gone. He's dead, Brock. He's dead!"
"Jordan, you have to believe me when I tell you how sorry I am. I… love…loved him like a brother."
"No! You don't get to tell me that! I
loved
him. And, you…promised me you''d keep him safe and bring him back to me. Well, he's back all right. I guess I just forgot to specify to bring him back alive." My pulse races as I unleash the fury at him that I've harbored deep inside for the past ten days, the past decade.
"I'm…sorry, Jordan. I'm so sorry."
I don't answer for a long time as I try to contain these competing emotions: this incredible rage and heartfelt remorse for my outburst. I gulp the air and finally say, "His funeral is tomorrow. Ashleigh came with me to D.C. and we flew his body home to Austin. The funeral will be in Austin. We leave tonight on a red-eye flight from L.A. You should come."
I hear him take in an audible breath and then he says, "I won't be able to make his funeral."
"Why? Why won't you be able to be there? He…he would have wanted you to be here. He would have done that for you."
"They won't release me." His voice is bleak when he says this.
I fight with feeling sympathy for him and the fury I have had for him at the same time. "What? Where are you?"
"I'm at Walter Reed in D.C."
"Walter Reed. Why? What's wrong with you? The officers wouldn't give me any information about what happened. Tell me, Brock."
"They're not sure what's wrong and I can't tell you what happened. I haven't been able…to remember what happened."
"You can't remember?" I struggle to breathe. "Ethan's dead! Oh God."
I stand up and begin to pace the floor unable to hang up the phone. Finally, I recover enough to say, "He would have wanted you at the funeral. He loved you. He would have wanted you to come."
"I can't."
He sounds so broken it momentarily gives me pause; I almost feel sorry for him, but then, the rage overtakes me.
"Find a way. Ethan would have. Look, I can't talk to you anymore. I'm sorry, but don't call me anymore, Brock. There's nothing left to say."
"Jordan, wait—"
"No!"
I power off the cell phone and undo the land line in case he tries to call me back on the house number. No more phone calls. Not one. Because there's nothing left to say to anyone, least of all, to Brock Wainwright.
≈ ≈
I've been here before, when at seventeen, I buried my famous parents, Davis and Laurel Breckenridge. Ten years later, I'm here, again, to bury Ethan. I''m alone. Once again. A punishment I've been expecting.
I am the tortured soul.
Brock Wainwright was right the entire time. The thought of Brock Wainwright brings about the powerful relentless emotion of pure hatred. Putting all my energies into hating Brock Wainwright has been rekindled in me at a soul level these past twelve hours.
I sit in obscurity at the side entrance to the church on these wretched cement steps and stare out at the long-forgotten garden. Withered stalks of Gladiolus, long dead and black with mold, keep me company. I breathe in the neglect and vegetative carnage and feel right at home. Maybe, I'll just sit here all day.
The smoldering cigarette in my left hand begins to singe my fingers. I throw it to the ground and smother it with the toe of my black Blahniks. Manolo isn't helping me out today. Being dressed to the nines in my favorite color from head to toe isn't working.
I light up another cigarette thirty seconds after putting out the last one and inhale deeply. I smother the cough that rises in my throat, determined to suffer in silence in any way I can. My eyes begin to water and I blow the smoke out in desperation and cough, anyway, despite my self-determination. I stare at the cigarette and inhale again. The nicotine rushes through me and I start to smile at the weird heady feeling. I'm not a smoker. The politically correct rules would say the widow shouldn't be smoking. But today? I do. I don't care. I don't give a damn. Not today. Not the day, I''m burying Ethan.
"Hey," Ashleigh says from behind me.
She takes the cigarette from my hand, takes a few puffs, and hands it back.
"I should be saying you shouldn't be smoking," she says.
"I should be saying, fuck you, but I don't," I answer back. She laughs; I make a concerted effort to laugh as well.
We share in this conspiracy together. It reminds me of the time we tried cigarettes at seventeen—the end of summer between our junior and senior year. My parents had been dead a couple of months and I remember thinking that there was no longer anyone around to truly tell me what to do or watch over me. My grandfather didn't count. He wasn't too enthused about taking care of a grandchild he barely knew. He and my mother had a falling out, about what, I never really knew. My guess was it had something to do with my father. Davis Breckenridge was not my grandfather's favorite, my mother had once told me.
Now, I half-laugh, remembering how Ashleigh and I decided that no matter how cool we looked, cigarettes probably weren't going to be in our future, except when we really needed to fulfill a desire for social deviancy. Obviously, that day has arrived. Earlier, we had a shot of tequila in the limo on the way here. Ashleigh knows what I need before I do. This morning, we both agreed that all the rules should be broken on this day.
I don't care. She knows this, too.
≈ ≈
I stand at the front of the church and stare at the dark wooden casket that holds Ethan. Cremation. I wanted cremation. Ethan said once that would be his preference, too. Maybe, he had a premonition that he would die a violent death. Maybe, the thought of rotting in the ground bothered him as much as it bothers me. But, Ellen Holloway couldn't bear it. If I had an ounce of love for Ethan's mother, it has been annihilated in the last eleven days. Ethan will rot in the ground in Austin because of his mother. The process has already begun with his face. Despite the best efforts of Igor Dasher to make him as presentable as possible——his face is still missing. Ethan wears his finest suit, the charcoal one by Armani that I loved on him so much. He wears the silk boxers, the black ones, I bought him for his twenty-sixth birthday, two years ago. He wears his gold wedding ring and his Rolex. But, neither vows nor time nor his favorite things will bring him back to me. No.
I finger the key to his casket. I bury it deep into the palm of my hand. It's tied by a thin red ribbon around my left wrist. The sharp edges dig in. I close my eyes and ride the small waves of pain it provides. Pain of any kind, physical or mental, I welcome. I just want to feel something before the numbness asphyxiates me completely.
The good news out of all of the bad is this: I have caved on every major decision with Ethan's funeral, except one. Max is
not
within a twelve-hundred and thirty-five mile radius of this spectacle. If five hundred people in Austin need to pay respects to Ethan at his funeral, his only son will not be among them. Ashleigh backed me up on this and Max's preschool teacher was more than willing to take him for the week. In fact, she'd insisted that he stay with them and Max was enthralled with the idea of spending time with his best friend, Davey.
Max.
I have tried to explain to him that Daddy went to Heaven and that makes Mommy really sad. My son just nods and gives me a bewildered look. He seems to comprehend that we won't be able to see Daddy, again, until we meet him again in Heaven, but that is as far as the tragic event that has transpired with us registers with my son. I'm grateful that Max is doing all right, but feel this constant agony and struggle to hide it from him.
I'm unable to compartmentalize my own grief in the same way as my child. I have no faith in Heaven. No faith in God. No faith in seeing Ethan again. He's gone. He's just gone.
"Brock's here," Ashleigh whispers to me.
I look over. He's in his full white dress uniform coming in from the back of the church with a blond woman dressed in a navy dress, holding on to his arm.
"Not alone. A beautiful blond at his side, how typical." My sarcastic tone causes Ashleigh to give me the once-over.
"Are you all right?" Ashleigh whispers.
I give her a stony look and try to nod.
In the next few seconds while the crowd settles, I covertly glance beyond Ashleigh at Brock Wainwright. He grasps the blond woman's arm and then slides in at the end of the pew, right next to the aisle across from us. He looks, well, awful. His right arm is in a sling, so his uniform jacket is slung over his shoulder on one side. His face is drawn as if he hasn't slept in days and he is wearing dark glasses. He looks straight ahead and the blond whispers something to him and he just nods. I tear my gaze away and try to concentrate on the beginning of the service.
Ashleigh has planned most of this thing, so I watch in a daze as the funeral unfolds. The music she's chosen is poignant and beautiful and I get lost in its sad melody. The priest starts to talk about life coming full circle and I judiciously tune him out after a while.
Fuck the full circle.
I paste a serene look upon my face and try to ignore the priest's imploring predictions that life goes on and it's God's will and all that slick stuff that must bolster all the rest of the mourners here.