I’m in a new fiction class. I wrote this following criteria of 1) a life changing adolescent thingamjig and 2) it’s a story about death where no one dies. I haven’t written in a while, so this may not be my best.
I was twelve on the day that I first saw a dead body. I’m surprised I made it that long.
My father hated that we lived in a funeral home. We hated each other: I hated that he always told me to find a way to entertain myself in our boring house, and he hated that I would interrupt his dealing with customers—grieving families, as he called them. I didn’t understand what grieving meant back then, and I’ve still never experienced it, I think.
My mother, who owned the business, was very cautious not to have me exposed to death too young. She always kept the basement door locked. She didn’t want to confuse me, or that’s what she would say. Given how rarely we talked, I assume she just didn’t want me to annoy her with questions.
But that day, as unfortunate as it was inevitable, came on a frosty afternoon in the post-Christmas, pre-New Year winter. The air was cold enough to have me walking around the house in a coat, snow pants, and mittens. We couldn’t afford to heat the whole house given the financial issues my parents had in running a failing funeral home. The sky was too grey to play outside. My father yelled at me to go away when I approached him, even though he was alone. He was unusually irritable. No grieving families came that day nor for several days after that.
Out of boredom and youthful spite I walked toward the basement, looking down the stairs that led to an open door. That door was never open, and my curiosity overpowered the phrase that entered my lexicon as soon as I could walk and comprehend: Never go into The Basement. Actually, between the open door and the enigma surrounding it, the phrase powered my curiosity and pushed my snow pants-covered legs toward the enticing portal. I grew nervous as I further descended the stairs. I could feel the old wooden steps sink a little under my grey wool socks. I could feel the walls narrowing, although I’m sure that was only in my mind.
When I got to the bottom of the stairs and went through the door, I realized that I was sweating not because of my apprehension of disobeying my parents, but because this room was much warmer than the rest of the house. I took off my snow pants and jacket, leaving on my white underwear and t-shirt, and then observed the large room: the walls were grey, probably cement, and encompassed the room into a spacious rectangle. A shower curtain was hung in the closest corner. The smell was of chemicals; the sound, an empty lab. Back then, I thought the smell was of my cough medicine; the sound, my father sitting alone in the den.
I saw metal gurneys on the far end near what seemed to me like a kitchen counter and sink. As I got closer I could see that the gurney was occupied, and as I got closer still I saw that its occupant was a pale, unmoving body: a corpse, although I did not know that word at the time. I took my mittens off and reached upward to touch the body, which I assumed was a dummy. When I felt the skin I could tell that it was the real thing. I was perplexed.
My curiosity pushed me to grab and climb a stool to get a better view. When I saw the body in full, I stepped backward, almost off the ledge. It was Mr. Thompson, a good friend of my parents. The last time I had seen him was a few days before—on Christmas Eve—when Mrs. Thompson was walking to her car with suitcases. He was yelling after her, questioning more than exclaiming, and when she drove off, he got into his Bug and backed into a fire hydrant. It looked like the water that came pouring out was dousing his deep-red car. As he walked back to his house, he did not look sad or angry. He looked defeated. He looked empty. He looked like a man who had just had the worst of him displayed to the world, a world watching through kitchen windows.
Now, all I looked at was the hole in his stomach. The hole was like a void, and I thought that everyone’s insides were hollowed out like Mr. Thompson’s for a long time after. I stared into it and noticed how some of the exterior was being sewn to cover this up.
As I felt Mr. Thompson’s empty stomach staring into me, my mother came in the room. I did not hear her come down the stairs, but I did hear her scream. She looked at me with harsh red eyes, eyes that I never saw her wear before, and I could tell that she thought I had done something wrong.
“Mom…is this Mr. Thompson?” I knew the answer, but I was scared of what she would do if the silence continued.
“Yes.” Her voice was weak, and this was a quality I had never thought to describe any aspect of her before.
“What’s wrong with him?”
“He’s dead.” She said this in a way that made me feel like an even smaller child.
“What does that mean?”
“It means his mind is no longer working and he is now just a body. He is gone forever. He lost his soul.”
“Is that because his stomach broke?”
“No. He died because he killed himself. His stomach didn’t break.”
I was confused and I started to feel the cold seep into the room from the upstairs. I put back on my mittens.
“D-does his happen to everyone? Does everyone kill them-self? Will I kill myself?”
My mother was very upset at this point. “No. Everyone dies. How you die is something you won’t know until you…die.”
“Oh.” I gave a questioning stare, wanting to know more, but this was apparently an improper response. Her face changed color from pink to dark red.
“Go upstairs. Now. You know you’re not supposed to be down here. Go play with your toys or something.”
“But what happens when—“
“Go upstairs. Now.”
I put back on my snow pants and jacket and went upstairs. I grabbed my toys and had them talk to each other about what it felt like to have no insides. I had Cobra Commander “die” by ripping open his stomach, but couldn’t figure out what to do after the stomach was open. I didn’t know if he was supposed to talk, or someone was supposed to tell him something, or if he was just supposed to be quiet and still.
I walked into the den to ask my dad if he had any idea what I could do, but as I entered I heard him on the phone. He was asking about Mr. Thompson’s family. No, no, he told the phone, he would pay for the funeral; he just wanted to know if anyone would go. He hung up and started sobbing.
“Dad?”
“Oh, for Christ’s sake! Go away!”
I ran back to my toys and stared at Cobra Commander. I asked him how he felt, but he didn’t respond. I sat in my room for a long time in my mittens, jacket, and snow pants. The only breaks were sleep. At some point I attended the funeral of Mr. Thompson. It was only my parents, the minister, and I. My father stood up to give the only eulogy; when he walked in front of the black curtains and stained glass he opened his mouth but nothing came out. He stepped away from the wooden podium and walked back to his seat to let the minister finish.
Mrs. Thompson never came. I don’t blame her for not coming, and I don’t think I would have gone either, to be honest. It wasn’t her problem. I haven’t been to a funeral since Mr. Thompson’s, and the last time I spoke to my parents was long before they died.
I think about that day a lot, but I mostly think about Mr. Thompson. Anytime it’s around Christmas, like it is now, I think about his vacant face as he walked back into his house. I wonder if he thought that he was empty and wanted someone else to see it, or if he was trying to fill that empty feeling with something.
I have that empty feeling. I feel like all people have that empty feeling when they learn about things grander than themselves, like death. Parents or books or other things usually fill that emptiness up with comfort. But I still feel that way and I don’t know how to fill the emptiness. I don’t have much more family, and I don’t socialize. My apartment is small and comfortable. Now I just wait as each day is crossed off of my calendar, and I wonder if anyone will attend my funeral. I wonder if anyone will see how empty my stomach looks and wonder, “How did he get this old with nothing inside of him?”
