By Gabriel Cassidy

HE HAD LOST. There was no use in attempting to hold back the inevitable tears and subsequent wailing. He bowed his head, kissing his chest with his chin. As the pain increased, the sobbing grew louder. More so out of a sense of obligation rather than desire, he lifted his head back up and gingerly tousled the hair of the immobile child. The joyous response this simple act of parental engagement normally elicited was never to come about again. At this thought, the weeping became even more aggressive. The child’s jaw was slack, causing his mouth to be in a permanent state of gasping amazement. The rigid fixture of the open mouth complemented what was probably the most troubling feature, the eyes. Glazed and dilated, they evoked the sense of one who was in a pathetically calamitous state of being both mid-stroke and mid-orgasm.

Finally, summoning a herculean amount of courage, the father slowly raked his right hand over the child’s face, closing his eyes for all of eternity.

He broke into a piece of the earth with his shovel. The burial, he had decided, would take place in front of the farm. The surrounding soil was fertile enough, so the dig wouldn’t be too taxing, physically speaking. Halfway through, the father appeared to lose control of his basic motor skills. He dropped the shovel and immediately fell to his knees and began to dry-heave. The heaving gave way to a sudden and hostile appearance of vomit that expelled out of his mouth with a force that could only be described as audacious.

Once this spectacle concluded, the man fell to his side, cradling his knees to his chest. An invasive glop of saliva protruded out of the corner of his mouth as he began to shiver and curse God. He shouted why?, and argued that it indeed should have been him who was taken. With a certain sense of temerity, given his present state, the man limply dropped one fist into the soil in a pathetic attempt to hoist himself upwards.

After three unsuccessful attempts, he finally summoned the strength, yet he knew not from where, to push himself back to his knees, and eventually to his feet. He continued to dig.

Walking back toward the house, the man was anything but consciously alert. His hearing was muffled, and the distance of his vision had been dramatically reduced. He hiked up the two front porch steps. The heavy ungraceful force of his feet on the splintered wood caused the steps to expel a loud creaking cry. He fumbled with the handle of his front door and eventually entered the house.

He was beginning to notice the things that had once been so simple to accomplish were now being imbued with a layer of unprecedented difficulty. Walking to the refrigerator to grab a beer felt like an entirely new experience. The first beer he grabbed slipped effortlessly out of his hands, shattering to pieces and leaving a small pool of foamy residue on the ground. The man didn’t particularly seem to notice or care. In an almost robotic fashion, he grabbed another beer and gripped it with a vice-like force. He reached his other hand to the counter and grabbed the bottle opener. His hand shook as he brought the opener to the cap. The cap flew-off and landed limply in the pile of what was the first beer. The shaking continued as he brought the bottle to his mouth. The ratio of beer consumed to beer spilt down his chin was about 50:50.

“I was gonna stop,” he eventually cried out, “I swear to Christ I was gonna stop! But I don’t know what to do now.” The father paused and reflected. His eyes became fixed and dead. “I don’t know what to do now.”

He lumbered over to the kitchen table and allowed his body to fall into one of the chairs. His clumsy descent into his seat caused a significant amount of the alcohol to slosh out of the bottle. Becoming frustrated now with the gravitational cruelty that appeared to be inherent within the universe, the man cursed himself and the bottle.

“Are you okay, Pa?” the inquisitive voice of a child sprang out.

“Yeah. I’m fine,” the father replied unconfidently. He glanced across the table and witnessed an appalling sight. A ghostlike figure reminiscent of his son, clad in overalls over a white t-shirt. His hair was tousled. Dirt caked his fingernails and painted the sides of his face. 

It ain’t him, the father thought to himself, Goddamnit it can’t be. The father rubbed at his eyes vigorously, but the image remained. The body tremors of the father immediately became more aggressive. He took another clumsy sip of his beer, lowered his head and closed his eyes, he began to silently pray in a Scrooge-like fashion for this apparition to withdraw its haunting presence.

“Is that beer, Pa?”
“Yes,” the father replied curtly without opening his eyes.
“I thought you says you wasn’t gonna drink beer no more.”

At this reminder, the father further tightened his shut eyes and emitted a short cavalcade of groans, gasps, and sobs. Many fruitless attempts to produce coherent sentences subsequently proceeded. Surrendering, the father eventually opened his eyes and, even though his vision was partially obscured by the tears, he could see that his ‘child’ had vanished. “I was gonna stop,” he eventually cried out, “I swear to Christ I was gonna stop! But I don’t know what to do now.” The father paused and reflected. His eyes became fixed and dead. “I don’t know what to do now.”

Days felt like weeks, and weeks felt like years. The work around the farm was being completed, but not with the same vigor that had usually accompanied it. It wasn’t easy for one man to maintain this much land by himself, especially given the circumstances. The child’s previous contributions, albeit miniscule and limited given his age, were nonetheless invaluable.

The father soon discovered that the most difficult part of the work were the periodic ascents to the loft to gather hay. The reason for this being the square unshaded window that offered an unneededly perfect view of the child’s grave. It was almost as if it were mocking him. Every time he ventured up the steps of the wooden ladder, he would be met with the constant reminder of his loss.

From this, an odd event began to occur. The father’s trips to the loft became more frequent. Notwithstanding the inevitable pain that would be elicited, he found himself returning to the area night after night. Thereafter, his schedule soon became: breakfast, finish work, eat dinner, return to the loft and stare out the window uninhibited. This continued for weeks, and the time spent in the barn began to steadily increase day-by-day.

Eventually, the loft transitioned from a destination of temporary visitation, to a place of residence. After work, the father would take his dinner to the barn, choosing to sleep on the hay. This lasted a few days until he ultimately refrained from going to his house altogether. He was no longer eating. Not too long after that, he stopped working. It was almost an understatement to say he was becoming gaunt. The surrounding land and animals were similarly suffering as a result of his absence. The father did not seem to notice, however. His gaze appeared to be permanently fixed onto the crude wooden cross planted into the soil.

One night, when the illuminating force of the moon was at its oppressive peak, the father morosely gathered himself out of his bed of hay and scaled down the ladder. Before his inevitable return, he had acquired a rope and a stool. Two objects that appear mundane by themselves, but when combined, immediately become ominous. The father fashioned one end of the rope to a hook that protruded from the barn’s ceiling. He made sure it was tight, there could be no mistakes here. The other end of the rope was knotted, and a noose was subsequently produced. Gingerly, the father climbed up the stool and placed the noose around his neck.

Staring out the window for what would ultimately be the last time, he quickly surveyed his land. The moon’s glow seemed to tyrannically engulf the farm. However, it was the area where his dead child lay that appeared to attract the majority of the moon’s attention. A noticeably glowing spotlight extended toward the grave like the seering eye of God.

The father kicked the stool. The light was extinguished.