The walk to the church earlier this afternoon was as eventful as my morning; ordinary in its approach, but mind-bending in its execution.
Each step was familiar, each crack in the sidewalk a road sign to tell me I was going in the right direction, but the very real fact that I was able to make that journey was boggling my mind. That my life was continuing, moving forward and not slipping through the very cracks in which I follow to the church, it was a surreal experience. My wife, my partner, the person I had spent the last fourteen years growing with and loving more than I ever loved myself, she is gone.
She is dead, and I still live to walk over the cracks in the sidewalk.
Bobby was waiting for me when I got to the church's basement, where the meetings took place. People sat in chairs arranged in rows, but Bobby stood in the back, waiting for me to arrive. The meeting hadn't started yet, and there were a few people pouring themselves coffee from the pot on the table at the side of the room.
"Thought you might not show." Bobby said to me, his voice lowered but still loud enough for a few people to turn around and look at us.
"But then I'd have to listen to you bitch, old man." I walked around him and found a seat in the back row. It had been a few months since my last meeting, but I still had no intention of speaking.
"Can it, junior." Bobby griped behind me, following my path to the last row.
Thankfully the meeting started quickly thereafter, and only three people got up to speak. I cringed when it was time for the chants, but let the words tumble from my mouth nonetheless.
By the time we make it back outside, I am craving a drink more than I was when I entered, and it's pretty obvious to me that Bobby can tell.
"How about you let me buy you some food, and we can talk about what you're going to do next son."
I want to argue. I want to tell him that I don't need to discuss anything, especially not my future, but I only nod. Food actually sounds good, and my craving for a scotch and soda will only be stronger if I go home alone.
So here I sit, staring across the booth at the man who became my father, and wishing like hell I could trade places with my dead wife.
"You take as much time as you need, you hear?" Bobby was saying, making sure I knew I could wait to come back to work until I was ready. "But you may find it easier to... cope... or whatever, if you're busy."
Bobby stabs a fork into his gravy soaked fries and angles one into his mouth.
"Yeah." I say, because I'm not known for my ability to share my feelings, and there is nothing more waiting on my tongue.
I couldn't imagine not going back to work soon anyway, I am alone all of the time now.
Being surrounded by car parts, and sweat and grease stained men, that sounds like my particular brand of heaven at the moment.
"Why don't you come over tomorrow night for dinner? Ellen been yappin' my ear off about getting you to her." Bobby continued to shovel food into his mouth, holding a paper napkin in his hand that periodically wipes gravy off of his lumberjack beard.
"Bobby," I hope my voice sounds as stern as it's meant to, "Can't I just have some time? Jesus Christ, I just buried my wife, I don't want to go to a dinner party and have Ellen falling all over herself trying to shove food down my throat."
"Hey, I get it Dean." Bobby says gruffly. "But you and I both know how hard it is to keep her from getting what she wants."
I want to argue, but the truth keeps me silent.
Bobby's wife is a strong and colorful woman, and I have very little chance of getting out of her dinner invitation for long.
She married Bobby about five years after Lisa and I got hitched, and she has been bossing all of us around ever since. Of course, the woman has basically adopted me as her own, so I can't complain too much about her abrasiveness. She only acts out of love, and that's already more than I deserve.
"Yeah, I know it." I finally say, pushing the last of my pork sandwich into my mouth and chewing it lazily. "Maybe next week?"
"I'll tell her." Bobby nods. "You gonna be alright tonight?"
How do I answer that?
If he is asking if I plan on turning the bottle up, the answer is no.
If he is asking if I plan to make it through the night, the answer is yes.
But if he wants to know if I will be spending my evening doing anything other than crying over old pictures and lying in sheets I haven't changed because I can still smell Lisa on them, I will have to lie.
"As much as I can be."
That's a safe enough answer.
Bobby seems to disagree by the way his jaw sets in an irritated click, but he stays silent.
A few minutes later, Bobby is paying the check and leaning his way out of the booth. "You done here?"
"Yeah."
"Come on then, I'll walk you home." Bobby doesn't wait for me to answer, just turns and walks towards the doors of the diner.
"You don't have to," I say, when we get outside. "I don't need a babysitter walking me home Bobby."
"Do I look like a fifteen year old girl?" Bobby snaps back. "Just let me do this boy, and shut your trap."
His sharp, but harmless tongue pulls something like laughter from my belly, but the twinge of affection isn't enough to let my amusement escape. "Yeah, okay."
The walk home is silent, a gift Bobby gives me in return for letting him walk me home. When we make it to my front door, his hand goes to my shoulder for a moment before telling me goodbye.
It's quick and painless, outwardly devoid of emotion, but I can always see how much Bobby cares for me in his eyes.
Once I'm inside, the smell of my house assaults me, and I think maybe I will always hate coming home now. There are a few different scents floating through the air, but every single one reminds me of Lisa.
The bananas I continued to buy, despite my hatred for them, are fragrant as they ripen on the counter. They were one of the only things Lisa could stomach towards the end, and I find myself unable to throw them out now.
The coffee from this morning, still lingers, like its collecting dust in the room. Lisa never liked coffee, but she still made it for me every morning that she was up first.
My eyes flicker to the living room where the perfume sticks Lisa bought at Target stick out of oil, in a bottle on the shelf. She said it was a decorative way to freshen up the room, and I pretended to find it stupid, when really I loved the way the citrus scented oil clung to every surface of the living room.
It isn't fair, having to continue my life in a place I no longer wish to be.
This house was meant for us, for me and Lisa. It was meant for us to have a family.
And now I will live here alone. Smelling Lisa until she disappears completely and I am left with nothing.
I push off from where I am leaning on the front door and walk slowly to the kitchen.
There is a wild thought pushing through my brain now, and I want to move my body while I think it out.
I don't have to live here.
The truth is, no matter where I go, I will be alone. So why not live somewhere Lisa doesn't haunt me? I shouldn't have to hate coming home or falling into bed. I shouldn't have to physically live with the memories that will already be pushing themselves in my head.
I could move.
I could pack up and leave this house, leave this town.
There are garages everywhere, it wouldn't be hard for me to find work.
My mind continues to plan out my escape as I find my way to the couch. It dips under my weight, and the air that escapes the cushions as I sit smells of citrus and lavender.
I need to buy new furniture too.
My eyes close and my head tilts back into the couch.
Maybe I will sleep here tonight, maybe I will actually be able to sleep if I am not using Lisa's pillow to muffle my cries.
The clock on the wall above the television chimes, and I snicker to myself because I used to hate that fucking thing, but now welcome the break in silence. It brings me to my feet and I'm taking down the clock and pulling out its batteries before I realize I've gotten up.
There are pictures lining the shelves next to the television and I purposely avoid looking at them. But as I reach to turn them all face down, a bright blue frame grabs my attention, and I know what picture I will find inside.
It's safe to look at, as I know Lisa is not in it.
I place the clock on the ground and pick up the frame, rubbing my thumb absently over the woman smiling back at me.
It's a picture of my parents, standing in front the of the beach house they bought the summer I turned eight. The picture was taken recently, though, and my father has his arm slung over my mother's shoulders, his smile barely a lift in the corners of his mouth.
My father, a marine and general hard-ass, almost never smiled wider than that. There are times I wonder if he used to, before I got fucked up and Sam died, but it's impossible for me to know now. Well, not impossible, seeing as though there are probably old pictures in the boxes I had sent to storage, but I don't necessarily want to find the answer.
If my father became physically incapable of smiling because of me, I'd rather not know. If I caused his eyes to look as though they've seen more than their fair share of hell, I'd like to keep that fact boxed away forever.
I'm not stupid enough to believe people are born with sadness in their eyes though.
My gaze is drawn to the house behind them. A small cottage surrounded by sand and a pebbled driveway. There is a dune to the right and just behind the house, and a crystal blue sky that could only be hovering above an ocean.
They willed this house to me when they died, and I've been renting it out to beach goers ever since.
I could go there.
Lisa and I only went to that house once, and only for a weekend to box up the personal stuff so that the house could be ready to rent. There won't be many memories of her being there to torture me.
The house won't smell of her, it will smell of salt and sand, and everything that isn't this house.
If I stay in this house, it will kill me. I will drink myself stupid, and I will die in a puddle of my own vomit.
As I replace the picture to the shelf, I keep my eyes steady on the house behind my parents. My breath hitches in my throat as I try to imagine the life waiting for me in that house.
A life where I've traded the ghost of my wife, for the ghosts of my past.
