He stood in the back of the room, looking down and wringing his hands. He looked up, across the sea of black. He looked at the small, ornate wooden box. He looked at the small, neatly folded hands. He looked down again, a feeling of disgust deep in his stomach.
'Putting people in boxes,' he thought. 'Hiding them from the rest of the world. Hiding because the world can't bear to look a the truth. No one here knows the truth. No one here wants to. No one... except me.' And so it was. Only he had a grasp of the truth. It was his to know, to keep, to bear. It was his to hate.
There was a sudden ripple of movement in the crowd of people as the eulogy was finished. It wasn't a long one. But neither was the life it had been about. Sam only got four short years.
A hymn was sung. A prayer was said. A line was formed. Each spoke a sentiment or laid a flower in the small casket. Afterwards, some approached him and offered what condolences they could. He didn't know half of them. Nor did he care to. 'If they only knew...' he thought as he shook the hand of another nameless mourner.
After everyone had left the chapel and moved into the foyer, conversing quietly in low, somber tones, he slowly approached the casket. He looked at his daughter's beautiful face. His eyes were dry, though he desperately wished otherwise. He said nothing, for no words were needed. He thought of her mother--more specifically her mother's absence. Tracy's funeral had been last summer. He desperately wished she could be there beside him. He thought of how much easier it would be. He felt her hand on his shoulder. He took it in his and she moved to hug him. He looked up at her face and cringed. Her face was torn and shredded, bits of gravel visibly embedded in the open wounds. Though, it wasn't because of the ghastly vision that he cringed.
He was an island.
Looking at his daughter one more time--the final time, he knew--he wondered what to do. His mind couldn't conjure up a single thing. A long while passed. Finally, he offered a small "I'm sorry" to his precious Samantha, turned and left the chapel, passing silently through the crowd. He left the church with nothing but guilt and dry eyes.
About a year passed.
* * *
My ear-splitting alarm interrupts my recurring nightmare and brings me into the waking world. It's not much better. And, like every other day, even though I can never find a good reason, I roll out of bed and get in the shower. I hear that's a good place to think, the shower. They say it's because your shower time is the only time you truly get to yourself. As I shower, my mind is blank. I think of nothing. Nothing at all.
I am an island.
I go to work. I have a good enough job. Brings in a lot of money. Used to being a lot of satisfaction, too. But those days are long gone. Now all I do is make masks for people to hide behind. Talk about shallow.
I scrub up, get ready to start yet another grand day at Lake Mead General Hospital. Surprise, surprise--another person running from themselves. This one wants her nose "fixed." I'm not fixing anything. I'm just helping them hide. Everyone always hiding the truth, too afraid to be themselves, to own up...
I study the face of my anesthetized patient. She's pretty--quite beautiful, even. How could I help her? She didn't need my hands ruining her natural beauty. I'll probably end up botching the operation anyways. Then she'd sue me. Incompetent fool... What happened to the days when I did reconstructive surgery, when I did some real good, and actually helped...
My thoughts are interrupted by the image of my wife's battered and bloody face.
"Doctor? Is everything okay? You've stopped operating." No. Everything is most definitely not okay.
"Yes, everything's fine. Sorry." I hate hiding. I'm no better than the patient. Shallow, materialistic, delusional, depressed, alone, guilty... I'm not like you, you self-conscious, foolish coward. No.
I am an island.
"Doctor... Are you sure everything is alright?"
"Sorry. Just a little distracted, I guess. Won't happen again." Must've gotten caught up in my thoughts... again. I'm always doing that. Letting me get the better of myself. Jeez, I'm such a wreck. I can't even focus for five straight minutes. If it's not the idle thought, it's the pain. Sometimes it gets really bad.
The needle glints in my finger.
If I could, somehow, just make it go away, even for a moment. Be distracted. Something, anything.
I set the needle on the tray of surgical instruments. My ring finger touches the scalpel. A thought occurs to me.
The first drop looked like a red teardrop.
"D-Doctor! What on earth are you doing?!"
The blood flowed more freely now as the nurse extricated the scalpel from my hand. It dripped from my fingertips onto the floor of the operating room. It pulsated, in synchronized rhythm with my heartbeat. The pain got a little better. The incision wasn't very big. Quite small, in fact. Still, the blood flowed as if it had been held back by something that now released it. Like it always wanted to come out, but never could. Like it was hiding... and now it could reveal itself to the world.
I am an island.
So... what's stopping me?
It's clear to me now. I grab another scalpel, spin on my heels and leave the operating room. I walk to the nurses station quickly, grab the nearest paper and pen and begin to write.
The nurses all stand in silence as I furiously scrawl the truth on the back of a yellow patient discharge form. My arm shoots pulses of pain as I write, and there are bloodstains on the paper and countertop. I don't worry about that much right now. My mind is made up. I'm coming clean. I am done hiding.
I took the truth, walked to the Chief of Surgery's office door and pinned it there with the scalpel. I turn and walk briskly to the stairs. I get to the roof. I step up onto the short ledge at the edge and remember. I remember the night I stormed out of the house and Tracy followed me, running. I remember the small cry of surprise as she tripped and the squeal of the tires, the dull thud as her body made contact with the car and dragged her body twenty feet before finally stopping. I remember the tears left on her lifeless face. I remember the absence of them on mine. I remember the guilt. For the first time in over a year... I remember.
* * *
As he remembered, they read.
They read that he had snapped at his daughter for crying because she missed her mother. They read about him yelling and her running. They read about how Sam tripped and fell down the stairs in retreat. They read about how she died when she broke her frail neck as she hit the bottom of the stairs. They read about his tearless eyes. They read about the guilt. For the first time... they read the truth.
And then they ran.
When they reached the roof, he turned to them. Blood ran down his arm and wrist, off his fingers. He showed himself as he truly was.
The sound of silence was deafening as a solitary tear rolled down his cheek and onto his lip. He tasted it. It was salty.
He smiled.
The tears flowed freely, silently now. He looked at the world through his tears. It was beautiful. It was real. Nothing could hide from him anymore. He saw the truth. He leaned backwards, gently and fell... leaving everything he didn't hold dear behind.
He was no longer an island. He was no longer alone.
Carter Alan Rockwell committed suicide
on April 17th. It was a beautiful day--
72 degrees, partly cloudy, with a 4 mph
wind from the west. It was his birthday.
This is as beautiful as it is sad. Which is a lot.
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