Chapter Forty Eight

I sat in the church hall after Chris' funeral staring into space while trying to come to terms with that fact that this was his wake. A party to say goodbye.

It wasn't much of a party.

Despite the enormous gathering in the church (there hadn't even been seats for everyone), guests hadn't been inclined to stay. Some were from out of town and had flights to catch, some of the locals didn't want to associate too long with the Chamber family, even if their son Chris had been a stand up guy, and many other avoided the church hall because there was no bar in there. Gordie had told me this was Mrs Chambers idea. Mr Chambers didn't need the temptation the way his health was.

It was all so different to Ace's death where the numbers had been smaller but I had been the centre of attention. Barely anybody in the room knew that I'd been counting on spending the rest of time with the man who lay cold in the coffin.

Gordie and Fran got it. And maybe Marty, Danny and Paulie who looked completely out of place in a town where everybody knew everybody. They hugged me in turn, each offering condolences while I nodded vacantly, murmuring my own in response. But they didn't linger.

Gordie was my shield that day, steering me away from awkward conversation, handing me a kleenex which I used to shred during the service without shedding a tear. Once the remaining party vacated into the church hall, I pulled up a seat and let the world seal up tight around me.

"Nina? You want a drink or something?"

I stared up at Gordie's concerned face but it was as though the words he were speaking were foreign.

Mrs Chambers was talking to Mrs Lachance and Fran over by the food table, and Mr Chambers, now in a wheelchair, sat alone in the corner, looking a deathly shade of grey. I wanted to ask if he was okay but I couldn't. Nothing was as it should be. Nothing.

"Hey, Gordo. Hey, Nina. " It was Vern Tessio's voice, I was sure of it, but the pressure building up in my chest was ready to consume me so i kept my eyes glued to the floor. I tried to gulp some air but it was like there was none there, just the musty old smell of a damp church.

"Hey, man." Another familiar voice. Teddy Duchamp's, I'd know it anywhere.

"Nina, you okay?" Vern's voice again and now I really was beginning to panic. I couldn't breathe. "She ain't looking too hot."

"Nina?" Gordie had hold of my arm but it was like there were four of him the way the room was swimming.

"Get her outside, man. She needs some air." Teddy's authoritative voice led to Gordie taking one arm and Vern the other before I was led out of the church hall, through the chapel and out onto the front steps. Gordie and Vern lowered me carefully onto the top step before sitting down either side of me.

"We should have buried him in Berkeley."

I wasn't even sure the words were mine until Gordie responded.

"Nina, are you okay?"

"He hated it here. Why did they bury him here?" Suddenly I could breathe again but the tight feeling in my chest never left me.

"Here, have some of this." Teddy was standing in front of us when he shoved a hip flask at me. As I fumbled trying to unscrew it, Gordie sighed and took it from me, taking off the cap and passing it back.

"This is fucking shit," Vern commented. His voice was shaky, not like I ever remembered it. "You know, I saw him here, maybe four months ago? He was driving some tuff fucking pontiac. I had a flat down on Main. There was a spare in my trunk but no jack. And then like a knight in shining fucking armour, there was Chris Chambers."

"He had a nose for shit like that," Teddy said. He was smoking something that smelled suspiciously like pot. "He came and saw me when my old man got sick. Flushed my weed and straightened me out some. Then he drove me to Toga to visit him."

I looked up through hazy eyes and took another swig of Teddy's whisky.

"When was this?"

"I dunno, about a year ago."

"How can he be...?" The word I wanted to say was gone, but that would make it too frightening, too real.

"The last time he called I said I couldn't talk," Gordie said suddenly. I stared at him. Chris had been dead for almost two weeks and this was the first time Gordie had mentioned it.

"He called me the day before he died. At your place. You were in the shower, you'd just got back from class." Gordie had realised my eyes were trained on him. "He told me he was coming home and that he wanted me to collect him from the bus stand. I was late for a date. He started to say something to me and I said 'Tell me when I pick you up, Chambers. Stop cock blocking me.'"

Teddy snorted.

"It's not funny, Teddy," Gordie spat. "I'll never know what he was gonna tell me now."

I remembered my last conversation with Chris, the quarter dropping, me being unsure whether he heard that last 'I love you'. I knew how Gordie was feeling. If only we had both known it would be our last conversation.

"You know, I still dream about Ray Browers." The words were Vern's and they startled us all.

"What?" Teddy said demanded.

"Come on, you guys, that was a fucked up weekend. You telling me you guys dont think about it anymore?"

"I've thought about him since I heard about Chris." Gordie trailed off and looked at me guiltily. "Guys, just drop it, okay?"

"No way, man. That was over ten years ago," Teddy exclaimed. "Why bring it up now?"

"'Cause life is fucking fragile, that's why." The usual level headed Vern was curling his fingers into fists and spitting as he spoke.

"You're crazy." Teddy laughed out loud. "That's okay though. Funeral's make people a little crazy."

Vern turned and grabbed Teddy by the collar of his shirt, almost yanking him off of his feet.

"Hey, guys!" Gordie ripped them forcibly apart. "Now is not the fucking time okay? Nina, come on, let's go inside."

"No." I leaned up against the Chambers broken panel fence and stared at Gordie. "What do you mean, Gordie? Why did you think of Ray Brower when Chris...?"

Gordie looked at me then back at Teddy and Vern, who also seemed to be wanting an answer from him. Gordie sighed and loosened his tie.

"Oh, I don't know. I guess because that weekend he just seemed...older than us. He stopped Teddy from doing that stupid train dodge, he sat with me after a really bad dream about Denny, and he protected all of us from the Cobra's. But Ray Brower...he protected that kid too. From Ace and the Cobra's. From the newspaper and television crews. He was ready to have his throat sliced open to do the right thing. And I-"

I was horrified to watch Gordie burst into tears. Teddy, Vern and I watched Gordie helplessly sob as his words sank in. Chris was ready to have his throat sliced open to do the right thing...that was the kind of guy he had always been.

Despite wanting to comfort him, I felt frozen. Afraid if I moved closer, that I would lose it too. Teddy stayed standing while Vern awkwardly patted Gordie on the back.

"Oh, fuck." Gordie finally stood up, swiped a hand across his damp face and took a breath. "He was so fucking unselfish. He was never gonna live as long as everybody else. Not when he had to be saving somebody every five fucking minutes."

"That's true, man," Vern agreed. "Remember when he saved you from the tree, Teddy? You slipped past him and if he hadn't grabbed you by the hair you'd have broken your neck."

"Don't remember."

Even I knew he was lying.

"You were pissed about it," Gordie recalled. "You said he nearly sculpted you. Like what the cowboys did to the Indians."

"He fucking well did!" Teddy snapped, forgetting that he wasn't supposed to have remembered. "I had a hell of a headache after."

"You know he pulled all the muscles in his arm after that? Could barely lift a pencil all week it hurt so bad."

Teddy screwed up his face.

"I don't remember that."

"Of course you don't," Gordie snapped. "'Cause all you thought about was your damn fucking self."

I suddenly realised how distraught Gordie really was. He had been trying to hold it together for me the entire time and I realised that now I had to hold it together for him.

Chris had been Gordie's hero. Gordie didn't really lean on me when we were kids-or now even- I had always been too fragile for that, it was always me that needed saving. But Gordie could cry to Chris, could lean on his shoulder, could tell him his worst fears. Gordie may have been my big brother but Chris had been his.

"You think this is fucking easy for me?" Teddy gave Gordie a shove. "Easy to know that I was high as a fucking kite the last time I saw him. That I didn't look for him the next time I knew he was in town?"

"Hey, back off." I stood up and faced Teddy levelly. "This isn't a competition and Chris wouldn't want to see us fighting."

Teddy sneered at me.

"What do you know about it, Nina? So you banged him for all of five minutes in high school. That doesn't mean you get it."

Gordie stepped forward angrily but I stepped between them.

"I know that he called you his brothers. All three of you," I looked between them all. "He said it to me in high school and he said it a few weeks ago when I saw him last. He once told me that I would never understand the loyalty between you all, that he would trust you all with his life. That, I know."

My words seemed to subdue everybody. I handed Teddy his flask back and he and Gordie sat back down with me and Vern.

The flask got passed around everybody as the sun began to set in the distance.

"Get yourself another spare, Verno," Vern blurted out.

"Huh?"

We all looked at him strangely.

"That's the last thing he said to me when I saw him," Vern said. "Get yourself another spare, Verno."

"Oh, real prolific." Teddy rolled his eyes.

"Alright, what did he say to you?"

"Something about...wasted talent. And me having potential. I was still high. Who the fuck knows?" Teddy's eyes glazed over behind his glazes as he remembered his last moments with Chris.

"Nina?" Vern turned to ask me.

I knew what we had spoken about on the phone, that his last words were that he loved me but I cast my mind back to the bus station goodbye...

"You sure you have to go?" He looked good in his shorts and sunglasses and he fit with in the tanned blond Californian boys.

"I have a little man at home who would say yes," I responded.

Chris took out a cigarette and I gave him a look.

"Last in the pack," he told me. "Im quitting today, it'll be the last time you see me smoke, promise." He fished around in his shorts for a lighter, cursing when he couldn't find one.

"I'll be two seconds, " he said. "Don't go anywhere."

I watched him wander into the general store a couple of doors down and raised my face to the Californian sky.

The sun felt good on my skin and I felt good. For the first time in a long time, I felt happy, content and whole.

I stood watching the people cross the street, listening to a street vender yell out prices. I smiled at a kid eating cotton candy while his Mom chattered away with a group of ladies outside a coffee house.

"Damn, you are so beautiful."

He was the beautiful one but I didn't say it out loud.

"Did you get a light?"

"I did but I figured if I'm smoking, we cant do this." He pulled me towards him and pressed his lips against mine. I kissed him back a little but became mindful of the other people at the bus stand.

"Chris..." I was a little embarrassed as I pulled away but he wouldn't let me go.

"Look, I know you're not a fan of public affection but public time is the only time I got with you right now so you'll have to live with it." He kissed me again and this time I relaxed a little more.

When we finally came up for air, he put a hand to my face and ran his thumb along my jaw line.

"I was so stupid for letting you go. I can't wait until I can see you every day."

I leaned into his hand but shook my head uncertainly.

"This weekends been so fast. Amazing but fast. I think we have to think things through."

"Babe, you take all the time you need but I am done with thinking. I want to be with you. Always and forever. "

"So you really want to do this full time? Get married and settle down?"

"Always and forever," he repeated as the bus pulled up. We shared a long lingering kiss before I reluctantly released him.

"Don't be falling for any Californian Blonds while I'm away," I said, rapping him playfully with my bus ticket.

"Not a chance," he responded. I was stepping away when he pulled me back again for a last embrace.

I hugged him tightly, breathing in his skin, running my fingers across the nape of his neck.

"I miss you already."

"Miss you too, babe. Ill be back as soon as I can," he promised.

I stood on the steps of the bus to give the driver my ticket then i smiled back over my shoulder at Chris.

"Hey, Chambers..."

"What?" He was grinning at me too, the stupid grin of two people in love who didn't care what anybody else thought.

"I'll see ya."

It was an old saying but the venom previously used between us was replaced with flirtatiousness.

I knew what he was going to say before he said it.

"Not if I see you first."

He smiled, and the bus door closed behind us, leaving him in California without me.

"Nina? The last time you saw him?" Vern broke into my day dream

"I- I dont remember," I lied.

There was an awkward silence where I stared vacantly into space.

"What about you, Gordie?"

They had given up on waiting for me to answer. And I wasn't going to share no matter how long they waited.

"I was giving him shit about leaving," Gordie answered. We had both alluded to the fact that Chris and I had got back together but either Teddy and Vern hadn't picked up on it or they didn't care to ask. "I told him he was being a runner. That he should get his sorry behind back into town and be responsible."

"You told Chris to be responsible?"

The irony wasn't lost on any of us. He was the most responsible guy we knew. Gordie looked suitably ashamed.

"How'd he take it?"

"Like a man. Said there were things going on I didn't know about but he'd work it out eventually. Asked me to hold the fort while he was gone. And then I said 'See ya, you fucking deserter' and he said..."

"Not if I see you first..." I joined in on that last line, knowing what was coming.

Gordie and I looked at each other then and I felt a weird displaced kind of feeling- the loss of the person whom was once our only source of friction was now bringing us closer together. Teddy and Vern had been important to Chris but in the later years, Gordie and I were the people who knew him best.

"Chris Chambers was one of a kind," sighed Vern.

"Fucking A," Teddy agreed.

888