"This tremendous world I have inside of me. How to free myself, and this world, without tearing myself to pieces? And rather tear myself to a thousand pieces than be buried with this world within me"

Franz Kafka

LOVE RHYMES WITH DEATH

Enos walked toward the patrol cars' flashings, his mind wrapped in a confusing fog as in a dream (better to say a nightmare) in that early morning, the sun sparkling on the snow all around him, nearly blinding him. When his hand reached the yellow and black tape, a cop stopped him.

"Where are you goin'? You can't pass that tape"

Waking up from that strange state of vigil unconsciousness, Enos stopped, his hand still clenching the tape, his eyes on the cop who's coming closer him.

"I'm… I'm… the son of Rose Strate. And… I'm a cop, I'm deputy Strate, Enos Strate", only few words, but costing him a great effort since his throat was totally dry and he was fighting against a pressing nausea.

The cop stared at him, his look and his voice changing from roughness to pity, "Uh, I'm sorry deputy Strate. But… you can't pass that tape, anyway. Come on, you can talk to Sheriff McGregor; he can explain you everything", he smiled friendly, "I'm deputy Elliott"

Enos walked behind the cop… deputy Elliott, focusing on the snow under his shoes in order not to slip and in order to focus his mind on anything different from what was behind the tape: a black car surrounded by other cops. He walked his eyes down, avoiding any other sight of what's around him, 'cause he knew pretty well everything (trees, snow, tape and cars) would have visited him in his nightmares along his life.

"Enos…"

It was Doc Martin's voice. When he looked up, he saw Miss Kate by Doc Martin's side.

Enos forced his voice through needles piercing his throat, "What…?"

A uniformed man, Sheriff McGregor, as Enos supposed, walked toward him, "I'm sorry to meet you this way, deputy Strate. It's a case of… apparent double suicide"

Apparent… double… suicide

Double… suicide

Suicide…

"Your mother… and this man. Do you know this man? He's probably your mother's lover, since they're… ehm… hugging"

Lover? Only in movies or books love rhymes with death, only in movies or books lovers commit suicide that way; it was what he's always thought.

Enos saw Sheriff McGregor walking to him, in his hands a picture, his figure wrapped in a gray fog. As he approached Enos, Sheriff McGregor kept on talking, "they used this man's car and a tube… ehm… it's a case of carbon monoxide poisoning"

Carbon monoxide poisoning: when he was in L.A. he saw a young man dead because of carbon monoxide poisoning, a suicide; he remembered the body of that man in his car. There's no need Sheriff McGregor explained him how it worked.

"It seems a case of double suicide, but… we have to wait for autopsies and scientific analysis to confirm it, or… it could be a case of homicide-suicide instead, … less probably a double homicide".

Enos stood in front of Sheriff McGregor, the voice of the sheriff becoming more and more distant and the fog around him more and more thick.

"Ehm… sheriff McGregor, I think it's better… to stop, now", Doc Martin approached Enos and he squeezed gently his arm, "Come on to the Institute, you need… you need to sit down and to calm".

"Enos, please, come on", Miss Kate's voice added to Doc Martin's.

Walking between Doc Martin and Miss Kate, Enos reached the Institute like in a dream, finally sinking into a bed in one of the little rooms of the central building, closing his eyes and falling into something more similar to coma than to sleep.

"He's shocked, poor Enos"

"Somehow, I felt things would have gone this way, at the end, with Rose, but I hoped that… it could be different"

"I'm feeling guilty, Doc Martin, 'cause I didn't hear Rose goin' out last night. If I had heard her, maybe…"

"It's not your fault, Kate. If there's someone to blame, I'm the culprit. I'm a psychiatrist, and I should have prevented it"

Miss Kate's and Doc Martin's voices reached Enos's mind through a sort of thick wall made of smoke and jelly, or it was what it seemed to him. He opened his eyes and he looked at the little room around him: yellow walls, a wooden wardrobe and near the bed a small table with a yellow night lamp on it. A quiet room, but his heart was too much in turmoil to enjoy anything 'round him.

Miss Kate's and Doc Martin's voices came muffled from the other side of the wall, probably from Doc Martin's office. He came out the bed and he walked to the door. When he entered Doc Martin's office, Miss Kate and the psychiatrist looked at him; Miss Kate stood up from the couch and she came closer him, hugging him tight, "I'm so sorry, Enos".

He numbly accepted her hug, feeling nothing, nothing at all, no comfort, no warmth, nothing; a scaring feeling. His eyes were lost outside the window, the sunlight turning into the reddish shade of the sunset.

Sunset? Did he sleep all day long?

"You slept a lot, and we didn't wake you up since you needed rest", Doc Martin noticed his look and his surprise, answering his unsaid question.

Sunset. Dinner. Daisy! She was waiting for him at the farm.

"Why isn't he here, yet?", Daisy walked in the living room as an animal in a cage, stopping only to check the clock on the wall, then having a sigh and starting again her wandering. "And he doesn't answer to the phone in his apartment. I'm really starting to worry, uncle Jesse", another brief stop, her eyes glancing at the clock, "maybe I should try to call him on C.B.".

She headed to the kitchen and she took the C.B.'s receiver, "This is Daisy Duke calling Enos Strate. Enos, sugar, where are you?"

A sort of buzzing came out the receiver then Rosco's voice erupted from it, "Daisy Duke. You're the one I thought knowing where that dipstick is. He hasn't come to work, this morning. I called him but he didn't answer, and his car is not parked at the Boarding House. So, I suppose he's at the Institute, even if it's not his day off. Boss is really angry. That dipstick, Boss is goin' to fire him if he doesn't show up with a darn GOOD reason for his not doin' his duty".

Daisy's mouth opened wide; she was speechless, she was shocked, and she was worried. NOW she had a REAL reason to worry for: Enos's NEVER acted like that, he's always been very scrupulous 'bout his work, no matter what (his work was above everything, his work was his life, his work meant so much to him she nearly was jealous because of it, but along her life she's learnt to accept it, not trying to push him against his duty nor to blame him for doin' his duty even when it meant to go "against" her family).

The phone ringing in the living room and uncle Jesse's voice wake her up from her shocked state.

"This is Jesse Duke speakin'"

She walked to the living room, standing near uncle Jesse the same way as Bo and Luke, all three cousins now around their uncle.

"Enos!", uncle Jesse's shoulders stiffened and his niece and nephews came even closer him, "Enos, where are you, boy? Everything's OK?"

A deep silence filled the room as uncle Jesse's opened his eyes wide, "What does it mean you don't know where you are? In the middle of nowhere? Enos… please", uncle Jesse frowned, "What… uh… Miss Kate?"

Miss Kate? Who's Miss Kate? Daisy and her cousins looked each other, and Daisy realized that something was wrong, really wrong with Enos. Her heart raced.

He felt as in the middle of nowhere, in that Institute's hall, so empty to seem unreal since patients were having dinner. Standing in front of the phone, its receiver firmly in his hands and pressed against his ear, Enos tried to understand what's uncle Jesse was asking him, but he couldn't answer him, he simply couldn't, 'till Miss Kate took the receiver from his hands and he slowly crumpled on the floor as that receiver was what allowed him to stand.

Kneeling on the floor, his chest bent forward, his forehead against the wooden wall and his arms along his body, like an abandoned rag doll, he listened to Miss Kate's words.

"I'm Miss Kate. You don't know me, Mr Duke, I'm sorry to bother you. Enos's here at Ridge Institute, 'cause…", Miss Kate looked down at Enos' motionless shoulders, "… 'cause Rose Strate died". Enos' shoulders had a gentle and brief shiver, and Miss Kate fought against the urgency to put the receiver down and to kneel by Enos's side, hugging him, but she knew perfectly well he needed an help from the real world, and it meant Dukes… and Daisy.

Her heart raced when Jesse Duke asked the obvious question and she had to answer him, "Suicide", her voice a whisper, her eyes fixed on Enos, her throat dried as Enos had another gentle shiver, his arms slowly moving to embrace himself.

"I think… I think it's better to wait 'till tomorrow, it's not safe to drive in a night like that, and I… and Enos couldn't stand if something happens to you on your way here", Miss Kate's worried eyes looked at the darkness outside, a strong wind shaking the Institute's windows; it was a night promising a violent blizzard, "Doc Martin and I are goin' to take care of him since your arrive".

Putting slowly down the receiver, Miss Kate had a deep sigh, Enos still crumpled on the floor near her, "Enos… please… I can't stand to see you this way, so…"

Steps coming closer and echoing in the empty hall interrupted her.

"I'm sorry, Miss Kate, but I need to talk to deputy Strate. I know it's not the best moment for it, but…"

The woman looked in surprise at Sheriff McGregor walking to her, again that picture in his hands.

"Only one question, only one, please", the sheriff knelt by Enos' side, "did you ever meet this man? Do you know if your mother… ehm… had an affair with this man?"

Enos slowly turned his head to the picture, and his heart skipped a beat as he fought against the urgency to shout: he perfectly knew that man, since that night, the man burying his face against his mother's chest and then turning to him when he opened the door of his parents' room, their eyes meeting for few seconds but enough to remember forever that face, and, even now, several years after, he could recognize him, a ghost coming out his nightmares. Did his mother still meet that man? When did they start to meet? When did they know each other? Maybe even before his birth...

... Maybe… was that man his real father? The doubt so well concealed in his heart woke up and became bigger and bigger, tearing his heart apart. He fought against the urgency to run away, and he whispered the obvious answer, "I never saw him, I'm sorry", then he turned away from that picture, his forehead still against the wall and his look down at the floor.