She Lives with Angels

She grabbed my hand and forcefully pulled me into the living room. I had never before seen her like this, she seemed possessed by a supernatural spirit by the way she pulled me over to the couch and pushed me down onto the cushions.

“There’s something I’m busy with at the moment, but I’ll be done in a few minutes, so you just stay down here and enjoy yourself while I go and finish up…whatever it is I’m doing,” Alice said, then smiled down at me before she disappeared like an upward-shooting bolt of lightning to the second floor of the house.

I was sitting on the couch in a daze, Alice has never treated me like this before. Usually she was so polite and gentle, but now she seemed like an impatient boss who didn’t have the attention span to deal with me. But I didn’t make a big fuss about it, I simply waited in the living room for her to come down. I stared at the pendulum clock hanging on the wall, becoming hypnotized by the tick-tock of the escapement. Five minutes passed and she didn’t come down, I became worried. Shouldn’t she be down here by now? But maybe she was using the term ‘few’ very loosely, so I decided wait for another five minutes.

I walked over to the piano and ran my fingers over the keyboard. Her piano sounded so wonderful that I wanted to press the keys; not to play a tune, but just any random key so I could enjoy the sound of a note coming into being and slowly decaying away. I closed my eyes and pressed a single finger down, a sonorous ringing reverberated throughout the room. Opening my eyes and looking down and saw my finger on G3, my second favorite note. It was low enough that it didn’t sound tense, but high enough it still sounded bright. My favorite note was E♭4, because it was the tone Alice spoke in.

“Are you practicing the piano?” Alice said, her voice muffled by the labyrinthine passages of the house, “Just wait a minute, I’ll be down there to help you in a minute!”

I didn’t want to practice the piano, so I said, “No, I just wanted to listen to how the piano sounds like.”

Alice laughed and said, “You’re weird.”

I immediately walked away from the piano, I didn’t want Alice to think of me as weird.

I waited for five more minutes, exactly five. I passed the time by reading the Wall Street Journal (not that I have any interest in business or economics, but it was the only reading material in the living room beside a stack of X-men comics). After five minutes I was frustrated with the way she was treating me,

so I carefully tip-toed upstairs to see to see what she was up to.

Despite how large her house was it was easy to find her room; it was the one with pictures of her cat attached to the door. I could hear her speaking, so I put my ear against the door to get a clearer sound of her voice.

“…of course I didn’t drink, mom,” Alice said, “I know enough that that stuff is toxic. Hehe…you did teach me well.”

It sounded like she was speaking with her mother, but I didn’t hear her mother’s voice. Perhaps she was speaking to her over the phone.

“No MOM, that dress wasn’t slutty, it’s normal for a party. Did you expect me to dress like a Puritan, with a buckle on my hat and a big red letter ‘A’ on the front? I know what you think, but let me have my life! It’s perfectly normal for me to like boys and want them to want me… No, I don’t allow him to touch my tits…yes, I did allow him to use tongue… No, that’s not disgusting!” At that moment I heard a cat meowing in the background. “Oh, Midnight wants me to feed her…yeah, we’ll have to talk later… Okay, I’ll give you a kiss, mwah, mwah!”

I planned to walk away right after she finished talking, but she opened the door too quickly for me to escape. The door swung open and I fell face-first onto the floor. After I got over the pain of planting my face on the carpet, I looked up at Alice and she was mortified.

“How long have you been listening to me?” she asked as she walked over to me.

“Not very long, I just got here,” I said.

She grabbed my hand and helped me get off the floor, then said, “It’s very rude to eavesdrop on other people, didn’t anyone tell you that?”

I didn’t want to look into Alice’s eyes out of shame, so I turned my head to look at her bed.

“Don’t look at that!” Alice shouted.

But it was too late, I already saw everything lying on her bed, especially a vase with a picture of a young woman’s face on it. And specifically because she told me not to look at it my mind unconsciously focused on that vase and the picture of a young woman was burned into my brain.

Alice covered my eyes with her hands and screamed, “Turn around, turn around! Don’t look back until I say so!” I was scared, never before had she been so aggressive, so I obeyed her. Behind my back she hid away that vase, I could even see which drawer she put it away because unknown to her, I could see her reflection in the glass cabinet facing her bed.

After stowing away the piece of pottery I wasn’t supposed to see, Alice sighed, walked up to me. I didn’t even turn around to look at her because I wasn’t sure she’d allow me. But I could see her face reflected in the glass, and it was she was smiling. Her sudden switch of mood was unsettling, I wanted to ask her what the hell she was doing, but was afraid she would yell at me again so I didn’t.

“I see you are looking at my memento cabinet. Pretty neat, huh?”

“Memento cabinet?” I asked.

“Yeah, whenever I had a fantastic day, I would keep an item from that day so I could relive it whenever I wanted.” She pointed to a sand dollar on the bottom left corner of the cabinet and said, “That was from the first time mom took me to the beach. I could still remember the beautiful sun, the hot sand, and mom talking to some really charming guys while in her bathing suit. At the end of the day we found a sand dollar, Mom told me to keep it as a reminder of the wonderful day, and I did; that’s how this cabinet started.” She then pointed to some lacy fabric and said, “That was from the time mom took me to Disneyland for the first time. We met Belle and a small bit of her costume came off. We wanted to give it back but she was too busy greeting the other visitors, so we kept it.”

I looked up and saw a picture of Alice smiling while holding a violin, but what really caught my attention was the woman standing beside her; she looked like the picture of the woman on the vase.

“What’s that?” I asked, pointing to that photo.

“Oh, that was when I won the talent competition at my elementary school. I played a Mendelssohn piece, I gave an astonishing performance. I still remember the stunned faces on the audience when I finished, especially my mother who was sitting in the front row. She couldn’t have been prouder of me. I still know the piece by heart; do you want me to play it?”

I nodded, she took her violin out of its case, rubbed some rosin on the bow, checked the tuning of the instrument, then played the piece. As soon as the bow touched the strings Alice went to a land of pure bliss. She looked absolutely entranced by the music she was playing, her face and body melding with the sublime vibrations emanating from her violin, her arms and fingers moving sensuously along with the contours of the music. The music sounded as beautiful as the way she moved, and I couldn’t help but be seduced by the angelic singing of her violin.

After she finished she came down from her musical nirvana she smiled at me and asked, “What did you think? Did you like it?”

“Now I feel bad because no matter how much I practice I won’t be as good as you.”

She laughed and said, “Don’t think that way, with practice you’ll become good as well.”

“I doubt it, you’re just more talented than me.”

“Mom said you don’t need talent to be good at music, all you need is a love of music and lots of practice.”

“Maybe your mom should teach me.”

“I wish she could, unfortunately she’s not around anymore.”

“That’s not a problem, she could just Skype in.”

Alice suddenly looked sad and said, “No, you don’t understand, she’s not on Earth anymore.”

“You mean she’s an astronaut?”

Alice laughed and said, “What I’m trying to say is…she’s living with the angels.”

“Oh,” I said in a flat voice, unsure of how to respond to her situation.

“At least that’s where I assumed she went; I can’t imagine she went to any other place.”

“If she did go to a different place you would still be technically correct since Satan is an angel.”

Alice was outraged, she shouted, “How dare you suggest that my mom’s in hell!”

I was thrown off by her anger, but I kept calm and said, “Sorry, as someone who doesn’t believe in heaven and hell, I didn’t know someone who does would be so upset if I make a joke about it.”

“That’s okay, I don’t believe in that mumble jumble either, I just pretend because it makes me feel better.”

There was a knock at the door and a woman saying, “Dinner’s ready!”

Alice was suddenly happy again, and said, “Would you like to have dinner with me?” I nodded and followed her downstairs.

Part 4: Seeing Dad for a Last Time

After eating dinner with my mother and sisters I had a full night’s sleep, then waking up in the morning I put on a suit in preparation for going to the funeral. When I walked down the stairs and encountered mom in the kitchen she said, “Don’t forget that we’re leaving by 9:00AM, otherwise we will be late for the funeral.”

Still fiddling with my tie, I said without looking up at mom, “Uh…would you mind if I don’t ride in the car with you but take the bus to the funeral home?”

“Why?”

“I want to get there a little early,” I lied.

“Okay, but make sure you arrive on time!” she yelled as I was desperately walking away from her. I ran towards the basement and woke up Alice, then in a hurried voice said, “Alice, we’re going to dad’s funeral.”

“The event of ‘your dad’s funeral’ is not a well-defined event in my database, I cannot proceed further with your order,” Alice responded.

I looked up at the ceiling with frustration, then said, “You don’t have to know where my dad’s funeral will be, I’ll take you there.”

“Thank you, I’ll come with you,” Alice said, then stood up from the couch and began walking slowly towards me.

“Come on, walk faster, I don’t want mom to see you,” I said impatiently. The pace of her strides picked up until we were both running out of the house, to the point that I nearly forgot to lock the basement and had to run back into the house to do so.

When we arrived at the bus station we were just in time to catch it. As I entered the door I swiped my subdermal RFID ID tag against the pay panel. The female voice of the automated payment system said, “Payment accepted, you may board the bus,” before unlocking the turnstile to allow me in. Unfortunately Alice did not have any payment method, so I tried reasoning with the automated payment system to see if she’ll allow Alice to tag along with me. “Alice isn’t really a human, she’s an android and therefore can be considered luggage and can come along with me for free,” I said.

The automated payment system thought for a while, then said, “Please transfer sufficient amount of money from your electronic wallet or bank account.”

I rolled my eyes in frustration, if there were a human being in charge of handling payment I might have been able to get Alice on the bus for free, but since this is a completely automated bus there is only a dumb computer in control, so I swiped my ID tag against the pay panel again to allow Alice through. I breathed a sigh of relief after as we sat down on the bus, looked at my watch make to make sure we would arrive on-time. As we rode we noticed there were a couple of men staring at Alice, they were probably paying attention to her unusual facial features as well as body proportion. It make me smile knowing how attractive Alice is to other people.

When we arrived at the funeral home we entered the lobby, an old lady greeted us and asked, “Please sign in next to your name.” I found my name in a notebook in front of her and signed, but then looked at Alice, then back at the old lady as she said, “And your lady friend as well.”

I smiled nervously and said, “You see, Alice…she’s not human, she’s an android.”

The old lady looked puzzled, but then I tapped Alice’s eyes, then said, “See, her eyes are made of cameras behind a protective sphere of glass, doing this doesn’t bother her at all.”

Alice looked at the old woman and said, “I don’t believe we have met before, nice to meet you.” The old woman was stunned by the life-like behavior of Alice, at which point I grabbed Alice’s hand and led her to the chapel before the old woman had any more questions.

Dad was probably the most atheist person anyone can think of, nonetheless his funeral was taking place in a chapel because that’s what most funeral homes offer. Obviously there would not be any priests, but there were not very many differences with his and a Christian burial. I was about five minutes late, and there were only two seats left at the back, just enough for me and Alice. Even though my mom promised it will be a small funeral and invite only close friends, he was a very important person in the robotics and artificial intelligence community and there were more than 120 people who worked with, knew about, or close to him who wanted to attend. To accommodate those people, along with the dozen or so family members, the puny chapel had to be packed extraordinarily tight.

When I first sat down the funeral home director was wrapping up his speech, and an uncle of mine was about to go up to the podium to be the first speaker to address the audience when another person entered the chapel. He had an adipose frame but was dressed immaculately with the fashion sense of a professor. There were no seats left, but I whispered to Alice, “Would you get out of your seat? The man behind you wants it.”

She stood up, and the man smiled at me and whispered in a heavy Russian accent, “Thank you, I’m Wally Yanikov, who are you?”

“I’m Robbie Walska,” I whispered back.

A look of joy appeared on his face, he reached out to me with his hand and said, “Really? You’re Ivan’s son? Your father worked under my supervision during his post-doc project. He likes to show me pictures of you, but that was when you were two years old, you have grown up a lot since then.”

“As you would expect of a person who doesn’t have any pituitary problems.”

“And I see you brought along your girlfriend as well.”

I blushed, then said, “I’m not sure that girlfriend is the right word. You see, she’s an android.”

Wally opened his mouth in astonishment and said, “Wow, that must be the famous Alice he had been working on until he died. He started the project when he was in my lab, but after he left I wasn’t able to see the improvements he made to her during that time, but now I can see how sophisticated she is. Can I take a closer look of her after the funeral?”

“Why of course,” I answered. I was returning my attention to my uncle’s speech when I noticed Wally was trying to touch Alice’s right breast, at which point I slapped him and said, “Don’t do that around here, everyone can see you.”

The service lasted for an hour, everybody tried to finish their speech but the director hurried them along so there would be time left for the burial. But just when the director thought he was ready to lead everyone to the grave, Wally stood up and said, “Wait, I didn’t get a chance to speak!”

The director took a look at the schedule and said, “Oh, sorry, but please make this quick because everyone else’s speeches took such a long time. I apologize for this, but let’s not keep everyone waiting.”

Wally walked up to the podium, smiled down at everybody and said, “Good morning everyone, I’m Vasily Yanikov, but most people call me ‘Wally.’ I came here to remember and honor an extraordinary man who I had the privilege to work with. He was unlike anybody that I have met, he had a very deep understanding of all areas of computer science, and even some areas he was not formally trained in. When we split and went our separate ways, most people who knew him expected him to get the Nobel Prize, but instead, as you all well know, me and my group got that honor. Many people have said that the biggest blunder of his career was that he did not come with me to my lab at MIT, and that this decision cost him the Nobel Prize, but we should not read his decision in this way. Ivan was a great scientist and engineer who was driven by his own desires and goals, he didn’t care about receiving rewards and accolades and more about satisfying his own needs, which was to create something unique. During the last decade he has made remarkable progress in the field of artificial intelligence and robotics, ones which will have far more impact than my own work. Had he lived for a decade more those projects would have come to fruition, and we would have all seen the wonders produced by his labors. But since he did not, the best we could do is to carry forward the progress he has made, and fulfill his dream of a fully-functioning android.”

As Wally walked off the stage the room burst into applause, and the people in the chapel began filing out into the graveyard. On the way we had to walk past my dad’s open casket. I was not mentally prepared to see his dead body; that was the reason I brought Alice along with me to the funeral, so during the more emotional parts of the ceremony the would be somebody’s hand to hold for comfort. I became more nervous the closer I approached the casket as I did not know how I would react to seeing my father’s body, so I clasped Alice’s hand tightly just in case I lose composure.

When I saw my father’s corpse the finality of his death finally hit me, and immediately broke into a fit of sobbing. Before setting my eyes on his eternally still face I only understood his death in an intellectual sense, but now confronting his body his death finally seemed real to me. He is undeniably dead, his body lying inside the casket expressed his death in a more emotionally impactful way than any newspaper obituary could. The makeup applied by the mortician to hide any imperfections in his skin made him look like an angelic being that has already passed into the afterlife. I gripped tightly onto Alice’s hand to comfort me and stop me crying, looked at her face to remind myself that despite being dead he left behind a creation which still contained a part him.

Part 1: The Death of Ivan

This is an excerpt from my novel, Girlfriend in a Box

I had a very special relationship with my father, Ivan. The memories of him in my mind are still strong, especially the times when he took me out fishing. There was a small pond about a fifteen minute drive from our house. Being wide and relatively shallow it harbored few fishes, and our catches usually consisted of pieces of garbage, and if we were lucky we would catch some tiny catfish so foul-smelling that no sane person will try to eat. Nonetheless I enjoyed the placid quietude of the lake and the surrounding environment. We spent much time lazily laying about on the shores watching cyclists rolling in front of the wooded landscape that provides a backdrop to this picture postcard scene.

Few people fished that lake, it may have to do with the fact that the wildlife and gaming department had closed it for that purpose. But since my dad knows the police and game warden well and was a renowned person in our community, nobody cared that we fished there. Of course we never took home anything we captured, dad used it as an exercise to expose me to the outdoors, and consequently I always had beautifully tanned arms almost year-round.

Every time after we finished fishing, except for those deathly cold months in the heart of winter, my dad would take me out for ice cream. My favorite flavor, the one I almost invariably chose, was vanilla, the most cliché flavor in the world. (You might think I would enjoy more exciting flavors, however the story of my life is not a novel, so every minuscule detail doesn’t have to hold the reader in rapt attention.) After finishing licking my ice cream cone, the melted streams of white fluid would trickle down the corners of my mouth, which somehow always brings a smile to my dad’s face. He said that I look cute that way.

Unfortunately, as time passed my father and I grew apart. From about the time of my middle school all the way through university I decided to focus more on studying and less attention on him. To be honest I was growing aloof from everybody, not just him. When I find myself amidst a crowd of strangers, such as in a classroom, I usually my head down hoping nobody would be paying attention to my business. What kept me from completely lapsing into despondency was the love of nature my dad instilled in me. When I was indoors doing homework and studying for exams I still enjoy looking outside the windows at the trees, grass and birds, they have such an ability to calm my nerves.

My father died a few years ago and now all that is left of him are those pleasant memories he left behind in my mind. I can’t remember precisely which day it was, probably some time in September since the leaves on the trees were beginning to turn color, and walking to my class the air was saturated with dust kicked up by the leaf-blower. After entering the lecture hall I found John sitting at his usual spot and decided to join him. John is the only friend I made since attending college, and we had grown close enough that we took the same courses just to be in each other’s company. It also helps that he happened to be the same major as me.

When the lecture started the professor had begun speaking about artificial neural networks. 10 minutes into his lecture I heard a beep from my cell phone notifying me of a new text message. I felt embarrassed because I thought everyone else heard the notification too, but then realized no one else could hear these sounds because they were coming directly from my neural implants.

Using the electrodes implanted into my brain I entered the password into my phone without moving a muscle. It was a very clumsy experience because I was not used to this completely new interface, but after a few tries I succeeded. I saw a message from my mother in the overwhelmingly large screen that appeared in my field of vision. It was one of the strangest messages she ever sent because all the letters are capitalized, “PLEASE COME HOME IMMEDIATELY” followed by a URL. I followed the link, which lead to an article on a university website, title reading: “Ivan Walska, robotics pioneer, dies at age 47 from a heart attack.”

When I first read the article I thought it must be some kind of a joke. First, people don’t usually drop dead at at this age, and second, the last time I saw him he was still healthy, perhaps out of shape but who wouldn’t be at this age unless they were taking steroids? I immediately checked to make sure it wasn’t April Fool’s day, then started to read the details. I still remembered that false death announcements are sometimes issued by mistake, but the further I read into the article the more details emerged that made it seem genuine. For example, it listed the exact date (yesterday) and cause of death, which would be details that would be missed if it were an accidental “leaking” of a prefabricated obituary. He wasn’t nearly famous enough to have had a prefabricated obituary, but I considered all possibilities at this point since announcement of his death was such a surprise. Being so engrossed reading the article I paid no attention to the lecture.

As the realization that my father had died sank in into my mind my body slowly slumped into my chair as a feeling of helplessness overtook me. I pressed my hand on my chest to ease a feeling of numbness where my heart used to be. My eyes were affixed to the article announcing my father’s death, it seemed like the only thing my mind could respond to. But at some deep level my mind was not able to accept this new fact, I almost expected to be awaken at any moment and discover that it had just been a nightmare. I started to cry but was worried I might attract attention from John who was sitting beside me, so I walked out of the lecture hall. Nobody, except for John, noticed me walking out of the room. He stared at me with eyes that looked like headlights as he followed me out of the exit.

I wanted to find a place where I can cry alone, fortunately there’s one building on campus almost completely devoid of people, the library. Ever since all books and documents became digital they became a superfluous institution that are only kept around for nostalgic reasons. I walked past a small garden to the entrance of the building, and upon entering the emptiness of the library was strikingly eerie. It was as if the place had been struck by that mythical weapon known as a “neutron bomb,” a device designed to kill humans but leave buildings intact. I began walking deep into the vast shelves of books endlessly aligned like rows of corn in a field to find a small corner where John could not possibly find me so I could cry properly.

Suddenly there was a tap on my shoulder, I jumped in surprised, then turned around and realized it was John. He looked even more startled than I was, and clutching onto his chest as though having a heart attack he said in a very apologetic voice, “Sorry, sorry that I sneaked up on you without warning.”

“It’s okay,” I said in a tranquil voice, then lowered my head to avoid eye contact with him.

He put his hand on my chin and lifted my head so he could look into my eyes, then asked, “Have you been crying? Your eyeliner look smudged.”

“No, it was just something in my eyes,” I said, shaking my head vigorously in order to persuasively convince John of my denial, but I can tell by the expression on his face he didn’t believe me.

“Both of your eyes?” he asked incredulously.

“Why not? There’s a lot of dirt blowing around since the wildfires last week,”

I was about to leave John when he grabbed me by my left arm, peered into my eyes with a stern look, and said, “I know something is wrong with you because you have never stormed out of a lecture like that. I can tell that something is bothering you because you look unusually sad, but I don’t know what. Please tell me so I can stop worrying.”

John’s forcefulness was making me withdraw into myself, but I knew he would not be satisfied until I confessed, so I said while evasively looking away from his face, “Oh nothing, my father has died, that’s all.”

A gloomy expression suddenly came over his face, he immediately switched toward an apologetic mood and said, “Oh my god, sorry that I didn’t understand. Will you be alright?”

I shrugged my shoulders, but did not give a verbal response.

“I’m worried about you because you never express your emotions openly. Looking at you from the outside it’s impossible to tell how you feel, as far as I know you might be suicidal. I don’t want to find you unconscious lying on the floor overdosing on painkillers like last time…” As soon as he mentioned my last suicide attempt memories of the knife slashing the back of my hand started flashing in my mind and I immediately broke into a stream of tears, sobbing uncontrollably. John panicked thinking that he has made the situation worse, and immediately pressed his chest against my face, allowing me to use his shirt as a handkerchief.

“It’s alright, it’s alright, everything will be alright,” he said, almost chanting the phrase like a mantra as he stroked my long hair in an attempt to comfort me. After I became more emotionally stable he wiped my face of tears and excessive makeup, then said, “Sorry that I’m so demanding on you but it’s because I am concerned about you. You seem unfazed by your father’s death and yet cry at the drop of a hat when I mentioned your past suicide attempt. I suspect you are hurting deep on the inside but are unwilling to express it, yet you wouldn’t be honest with me about this. I just don’t want you to…you know, make a bad decision that will cause harm to you.”

“You mean kill myself?” I asked.

He appeared puzzled, then said, “You see, you did it again! You concealed your true emotions underneath this artificial nonchalance. I wish you can be honest with me about your feelings so I don’t have to worry so much.” He took a deep breath to calm himself down, then said, “I don’t mean to be overbearing on you, I’m just very concerned. Would you mind if I take you back to our apartment?” I nodded, he held my hand as we left the library together.

John was relieved when we returned to our apartment, that way he could keep an eye over me to make sure I was doing well. When I returned to my room I simply laid in my bed with my face planted on the pillow in a torpor, occasionally checking the phone to make sure that my father was still dead. Even as the sun began setting, casting its amber glow in my room I did not turn on the light as it didn’t seem worth the effort. Finally the phone rang, I waited until about the second ring to answer, and my mother on the line.

“Darling, did you get the news about dad’s death?”

I began rising from the bed, my hair disheveled and eyes drooping, my spirit still weighing me down. But I had to present a stoic face in front of my mother so gathering my torrents of emotions and put them away while talking to her.

“Mom, why did you text me about dad’s death instead of calling me?”

“Sorry,” mom answered, her voice sounding rushed, “force of habit, I supposed. Listen, we just have planned the funeral, it will be on Saturday because that’s when I can organize everyone to be there. Well, not everyone, Uncle Theo couldn’t be there because he is arguing an important case in court, but everyone who we want to invite, as well as a few important people, will be there. You better reserve your plane ticket now, or otherwise there might not be any left by the time you show up at the airport.”

“Okay, do you have anything else to say?”

“Not right now, I’ll be too busy organizing the funeral over the next few days to talk to you. I hope you’re doing well, you’re taking the news well, aren’t you?”

“Of course,” I said resolutely.

“Then, bye,” mom said before cutting off the phone call without hesitation. As soon as the call ended I sank back into bed, my will to live plunged right back down and did not go back up even as I drifted off into sleep.

Part 11: The Funeral (Part 1)

This is an excerpt from my novel Caroline. Read the previous chapter here.

One morning, seemingly without warning, mother asked us to don on our formal wear. I didn’t understand why but Caroline apparently did. She was very perceptive, noticing how mom was dressing all in black and Emily was in a black gown with black shoes, Caroline immediately ascertain that they were going to her parent’s funeral. While the most of us were polishing our shoes and eating a light breakfast (funerals usually don’t elicit hunger in most of us) Caroline locked herself up in her room, refusing to come out.

Her dress was well-starched and well-ironed; we weren’t able to afford any formal wear for her but found a pair of dress shoes our neighbors tossed out onto the curb and polished it with used motor oil (we can’t afford shoe polish) until it’s spick-and-span. We even applied a little makeup on her and darkened her eyebrows, yet she cloistered herself in her room. Mom was concerned she wouldn’t attend the funeral and said, “Ricky dear, could you go to your cousin and convince her to come with us?”

Being the ruling dame of the household I could not disobey my mother, although I hate it whenever mom uses me as a weapon of subterfuge to force another person to do something against their will. I went and knocked on the door of my room, and asked, “Could I come in and get a tie?”

For a while I thought Caroline had decided not to open the door under any circumstances, but my tie excuse apparently deceived her into thinking that I was merely coming to retrieve a silly piece of silk and did not have ulterior motives, so she opened. I wasn’t planning to wear a tie but since it was my pretext to come into her room I’d look like a liar if I didn’t, so I decided to put on a nice, quirky bowtie. As I was struggling to put it on I asked, “We’re burying some dead people today, do you wish to come join us?”

Caroline did not respond, she merely sat on her bed and stared at the floor, almost unaware I was in the room. I ran up to her bed, jumped up and sat on it, sending ripples of vibration across its surface. Caroline responded to the bed’s motion by stretching her neck, but after a few minutes she returned to her lackadaisical self.

“Well, the truth is that we’ll not be responsible for burying them, a backhoe has probably dug the hole which the caskets will be thrown into. The pallbearers will actually carry the caskets and lower it into the grave so all we have to do is sit and watch the somber procession, the boring eulogy given by sappy relatives and the preacher doing the whole ‘dust to dust’ thing. I heard they’ll be serving shrimp cocktails, light hors d’oeuvres and chilled sauvignon blanc as concessions so it might be fun, you can drown your sorrows in ‘Napa lightning’ as I call it.”

Caroline moved her head a bit, I didn’t know what it meant but I was glad she was responding, and what I said didn’t go into thin air. I fiddled with the tie a little while but the ‘bow’ part of the tie keep turning out funny, it was getting frustrating to the point where I said, “Shit! Why can’t you tie behave yourself?” The “s” word got Caroline’s attention, she turned around and showed her sublime face (even at such a young age a meager dab of makeup accented her natural beauty so much that I was a little taken away when I first saw her dolled up), took the tie from my left hand and started tying it for me.

“The tie goes around like this,” she started to explain, tucking the tie underneath my collar, making me feel embarrassed for my previous attempts wrapping it over my collar. For quite a small girl she had strong hands, but she was quite gentle tying the tie, making sure that she wasn’t strangling me as she tightened the bow. The whole time my eyes were paying attention to her face, her faced looked rather indifferent as she focused attention on my neck, she might as well be reading a newspaper or a textbook. Her fingers moved so naturally, as though she was born to tie ties. She was very quick and I was very satisfied with the results, as a matter of fact I even looked at myself vainly in the mirror to inspect my tie and adjust it.

“I never knew you know how to tie a bowtie.” Caroline smiled slyly and said, “My father taught me a thing or two. He used to sit me on his table before work and watch him dress, he laid out his ties which I liked to play with. Noticing this, he taught me the Windsor knot, the half-knot and the bowtie, now I know them all.”

“Is that all your father taught you?”

“Well, let’s see; he helped me out with my math homework. The heck, he virtually taught me math; I was often too sick to attend school and what I learned was mostly through him. He read me everything, from Clifford the Big Red Dog to Time magazine, all those months which I couldn’t leave my bed he was always beside me, wearing his hairnet, surgical mask and gloves. He tried comforting me all the time, often using his sense of humor and never-failing optimism. I had always been afraid of clowns, nonetheless I didn’t mind when my father dressed as a clown for Halloween, with his gentleness he took what were boogymen in heavy makeup and wigs and made them appear to be the most kind and understanding people.”

“You seem to remember many positive experiences of your father,” I remarked rather innocently.

Caroline’s face lit up as though she was experiencing an orgasm (girls of her age don’t have orgasms, at least I thought), she laughed delightfully (although to ears that are not used to her voice this would sound like the blood-culling screech of an eagle), and said, “Daddy was a wonderful man, truly. He was there with me the most of the time when I was sick, we saw each other at least once a day if not more, and he even gave up his job which garnished us with the salary that was necessary for my medical treatment, for years we lived mainly off of welfare.”

“And how about your mother, what were your memories of her?”

She was struck with terror, her face twitched before she broke down into tears, “Mom! Her brains, brains, everywhere, and not a piece of it in her head!”

“I’m sorry, but could you remember anything about her when she was alive?”

Her tears abated and she started reminiscing, “She’s the one I miss the most. I don’t think, with the possible exception of the time I’m enjoying a good banana cream pie, there is a moment that I spend without thinking of my mother. They told me that her death was painless, but I couldn’t believe it with so much blood spilling out from the back of her head.”

I thought she’d be forever mourning her mother in her room, so as I was about to leave I told her, “Mom said you can stay in your room if you want to, she understands you’re too distraught to come to the funeral.”

After sobbing for half a minute she said with her whimpering voice, “No, I’ll go, I want to say goodbye to them for the last time when I still have the chance.” It was rather unexpected that she would come along, I guess my fears of my failure to convince her was just self-flagellation. Perhaps I do have a persuasive personality that is characteristic of all snake oil salesmen and politicians.

Part 9: Death on the Highway

This is an excerpt from my novel Caroline. Read the previous chapter here.

As we were eating our ice cream I listened to Caroline’s comments, “You know, it’s a lot cooler out here than inside the house.”

“Yes, out here the wind blows freely and dissipates the heat, inside the house the air’s trapped and thus does not allow the heat to go anywhere.”

“You know Ricky, can I tell you something?” The smile on her face made me suspect she was going to say something important, so I tried in all my might not to interrupt her. “I miss my parents.”

“Yes, and now they’re dead,” I said rather insensitively, then realized I may have made a mistake. I tried keeping thoughts like these to myself but sometimes I slipped and said them aloud.

Surprisingly Caroline was not upset, in fact she was very good humored and laughed. Her laugh was not pleasing to the ear but with familiarity I was slowly finding it to be quite sweet.

“I can’t believe that it has been a month since they’ve died; it seemed like only yesterday that we tumbled off of that hill and dove to our deaths.”

“But obviously you survived.”

“Yes, though life seems so difficult without them I wish I was dead.”

Caroline started to cry, tears flowed from the corner of her eyes as if on command, her face tightened as she was preparing to weep, and her voice became constricted and high-pitched. “After we rolled down the hill we were all still alive. When the car hit a tree, a large majestic redwood, the collision caused the entire left side of the car to crumple, pinning dad inside his seat. I was lucky, I was sitting on the right side and heard my dad saying, ‘Caroline! Caroline!’

“I was elated to hear my father still alive, I said, ‘Daddy! Oh daddy!’

“‘Caroline, my left leg is trapped and I can’t get out of the car, how about you?’

“He turned his neck around and based on the look of agony on his face drenched in large drops of cold sweat, I could see he was suffering from considerable pain. The car door was too warped to be opened; I crawled out of the window to reach him when he saw my face said, ‘Caroline, Caroline!’

“‘What is it now, daddy?’

“‘Go back onto the highway and get help, we’re all depending on you because daddy is too hurt to get out of this car, and be fast because I’m not feeling well…’ At that point daddy passed out and I realized the urgency of the situation, I ran up the hillside, which was difficult because it was steep and my feet slipped under the crumbling dirt a few times. But when I climbed back up on the highway I panicked, I was scared of the cars which were traveling so fast. I didn’t know where to go for help and wandered aimlessly. Cars swerved to avoid me, honking their horns and cursing at me for being such an obstruction to traffic. With nowhere to turn for help I started crying, thinking about how much my father was suffering pinned and helpless inside his own vehicle.

“After half an hour of this a police car saw me and pulled over, two police officers came out and asked me what’s the matter. I told them everything and one of them went down the hillside to take a look at the wreckage while the other took me in inside the police car and called an ambulance, while at the same time attempting to console me. He showed me a picture of his wife and his children, and told me about the first time he tried changing a baby’s diaper he was sprayed with urine. He was quite good at making me lose my worries, and even told me that he was certain that my family will be found alive, that once they use the jaws-of-life on the car that my parents will spring out and give me a big hug. Of course we now know this not to be true, the car already burst into flames killing both of them. Throughout the past weeks I’ve been thinking to myself if I didn’t panic the way I did I might have been cognizant enough to get attention from passing drivers quickly enough to save my parents.”

She continued weeping and hiccuping uncontrollably, and her ice cream was beginning to melt so I did her the favor of taking her cone and eating it. I laid my hand on her shoulder to reassure her and said, “Only your father died in the subsequent fire that consumed the car, your mother died instantly remember? So your failure to procure help quicker only resulted in the death of one person instead of two.”

Apparently such words were of no comfort to Caroline, and she cried even louder than before. Taking a lick of vanilla and another lick of coffee-chocolate got enough sugar into my body to fire all my brain cells in order to think up of a way to lighten up the mood, but then my brain suddenly stumbled upon a paradox which was quite intriguing, and even though I knew better not to further traumatize Caroline I asked, “Wait, how come your father’s body was burnt to a crisp yet your mother’s remained unburnt despite the fact that both of them were inside the same flaming car?”

Caroline’s gasps for air became heavier as more tears spilled out of her large eyes, “Oh my mother, her head split open like a ripe watermelon, pieces of her brain splattered all over my dress!” At that point I was wise enough not to speak to her any further, I only gave her comfort through holding her hand and even conceded my seat right above the storm drain so her salty tears could fall straight in and join the run-off from overwatered lawns and out to the Pacific Ocean.

After fifteen minutes watching my cousin cry, I suddenly realized there was a spare copy of the house key hidden under a pot of petunias on the patio, meaning us being locked out of the house was completely unnecessary. Caroline went crazy after she found this out. Even though I told her it was unintentional, I had merely forgotten that mom keeps a copy of the key hidden outside of the house in case any of us were locked out, it didn’t matter. She heckled me for my absentmindedness, as though I had conscious control over what to forget and what not to forget. Despite knowing it was a lot cooler under the shade of a gingko tree than inside the house, she went back to the house anyway. I guess this is what women are good at, complaining about things which are completely irrelevant and in spite of the fact that they know they are not in the right.