Death Is Neither Quiet, Nor Unassuming

He should have written about stars, he thought. They always write about stars. Poets, philosophers, the average drunk in the pub; they have an enigmatic way of thrashing a star into a parable—a metaphor so profound it short-circuits your breathing and makes you feel as if you have never loved anything in any sort of way that mattered in your whole life. Nabokov, talking of rust and stardust. Nietzsche, of falling from the stars to meet here. McMillian, he would be remembered for hair dark as candy licorice and an ass as of Grecian clay…Grecian clay. He should have written about stars.

The stars themselves began to blossom and bloom overhead, and his head felt as if it were about to project in a splatter over the clearing that would soon be his deathbed. His body had given up fight. His hands throbbed, useless in the mounds of snow created by his thrashing. His mouth opened and formed the words, “Grecian clay,” as the now indistinguishable form on his chest plummeted sideways.

The stars exploded bright and blinding as his body writhed upward and his airways expanded; his lungs filled to painful capacity. His gulps crystalized on the air to spiral around his ears, red with chill. He felt the earth tremble beneath him. He felt it give way and splinter as deafening thuds filled the air. What was happening to him? It had all been grand. Grecian Clay…he had to get rid of it. He had been given a second chance.

“Ellis! Ellis, Ellis, look at me! What the fuck were you thinking?” His ears were ringing, and he trembled; his body damp from the melting snow that drenched his sweater.

Thatcher’s hands were warm on his face, and he could tell by the pupils and the stench of a thousand pints on his breath that his rescuer was no better off than his assailant. “Damn you, Ellis. Fucking hell…” His friend’s drunken eyes ran over him and his thick thumbs touched lightly the open wounds that stung in the winter air. There was a groaning that was audible now and a sudden whir of headlights filled the clearing. Thatcher stood up and shielded his eyes.

“Jesus Christ…” Mallory gasped as she leaned on the door of the Aston Martin their father was going to kill them for taking without permission. “Thank god you found him!” She skidded on the snow as she made her way to where her brother and Thatcher sat huddled. She ripped out of her herringbone coat with cool silk lining and slung it around Ellis’ shoulders, inspecting the cracked veneer of his skin the way Thatcher had done. Her cigarette burned at his earlobe and he relished in the warmth of the ash.

Suddenly the earth began to tremble again, and sullen thwacks filled the clearing once more. His sister’s eyes flicked in the direction where Thatcher had retreated to finish his score against the crumbling body that spurted crimson onto the white of the snow to morph and bleed like a morbid Rothko around them. Mallory ran to him, wrapping her hands around the pulse of his wrist. “Leave him! Leave him, Thatcher; it isn’t worth it. Stop it! You’re killing him!” Ellis trembled in place before swaying greatly to meet the ground once more.

———

“Crucified Christ!” Thatcher yelled and he twisted the car in the bright white and came parallel to a blinding beam of light that surged from the snow drenched house that glowed from top to bottom. The Constable waved his torch over the passengers huddled together in the front seat for just a moment before he flicked it down, snuffing the light.

“Mother of God,” he whispered at the three bloodied and pale faces that immediately blurred again in a flurry of snow.

———

Carolers were out front in the warm glow of lanterns, almost morphing into the grounds in their long white robes and red and green collars pulled up around their throats. The Constable led the three through the back entrance, through the gardens and into the warm foyer where the carols and delightful banter of the Christmas Eve celebration could be heard. Ellis stood still, trembling and panting in the sudden rush of warmth and light. Grecian Clay…he thought of it and took off in a dead sprint for the heavily carpeted and garland strung staircase.

“Ellis!” his sister screamed, more terrified than she had intended. He froze on the stairs. His tattered chest rising and falling rapidly as his eyes whirred, blind and wild with determination. He turned to look at them below. His sister in her coat, blood flecked on her cheek and the front of her white turtleneck. Thatcher covered from face to abdomen in flecks of bright crimson. The Constable, silent and concerned. They all looked at him in stunned silence in the hall that was drenched in bows and fresh pine. There was a cadence of footfall in the great entry and Ellis took a rugged breath and sobbed, “Mom…”

———

Sweat ran down the tip of his nose to catch at the apex and draw back towards his nostrils, colliding with the salty tears that traveled over the cuts and raised lumps turning a sickly purple as moments ticked by. His mouth was dry, and sobriety began to prick at his tongue, turning it to rubber as he rolled it around his mouth to wet it damp with saliva. With each roll from one side of his mouth to the other, his jaw twinged, and his eyes squinted in a bright flash of pain that pulsed through the throbbing muscles of his face to nearly blind him.

Through the haloed orbs that still danced in his peripherals, he could see Thatcher’s thick, bloodied hands flick open the buttons of his chambray button-down. He shrugged out of it and every muscle in his body flexed with a tension that should have been left behind in the clearing some ten punches ago. He twisted it around his wrist and shoved it deep into the trash bin that was teeming with peels and unfavorable bits of the food that sautéed and simmered in sleek pans around them.

“So, they could be anywhere, is what you’re telling me?” Mrs. McMillan asked as she massaged absently at the reddening patch of skin above her left eyebrow. The gaud of her tiered wedding set glinted in the romantic glow of the clustered kitchen.

“Yes, in theory they could be. That is if Mister Donoghue has allowed any skull left for them to operate,” The Constable said sternly. His hard eyes flicked to where Thatcher had begun to scrub the blood from his hands in the large farmhouse sink with a mangled bar of lye soap.

Thatcher didn’t so much wince at his name and stared blankly at his own reflection in the multi-paned windows that looked out over the grounds swirling with snow and sparkled in the lights strung about the eaves. He looked to be surrounded by fireflies, the way their reflections danced on the windowpanes draped in limp garland.

Ellis blinked back tears and his hands trembled as he looked over at his mother who continued to twirl her fingers above her brow. His eyes burned still from the cold and strangulation and the sudden smell of onion and warmth of the kitchen that moved like clockwork around them.

“Thatcher…” Mrs. McMillan sighed and moved around the table, giving her son a concerned once over.

“I’m not going to apologize for what’s been done, Mrs. M…So I suppose you can save your breath if you’re offering up a scolding. If you want to send out the troops—go out into that clearing to see if he’s managed to crawl his way out, be my guest. I could have made it right easy for you, sir. No hunt necessary…” Thatcher flicked his hands on the air and droplets of water flecked Ellis’ burning skin, causing his eyes to bat in rapid succession. “I wager he might be breathing still. Though I surely meant to kill him, Constable, if you’re after a confession.”

“Darling…what happened out there?” Mrs. McMillan turned to her son who stared blankly across the kitchen, trembling slightly. It was also perhaps the first time that she herself had taken in the gravity of the situation. The ripped sweater, the blackened skin, the cuts from a signet ring under his left eye. She trembled at the sight of him and her hands moved to her throat. The room fell silent.

“Marilyn, what do you want me to do? Ellis? We can make a report of what’s happened here tonight, or…”

“Or?” Mrs. McMillan asked, turning to her longtime friend who still tossed a flashlight around in his hands.

“Or we work our way around it…Marilyn…” His eyes fell soft as he looked at her son, battered and shaking on the butcher’s block. “Whatever confession he makes will be damning.”

“The village queen,” Ellis finally muttered; his body barely capable of pushing it from him. “There’s no way I don’t come out of this, Mother, without more permanent damage than has already been done. You want me to confess what happened? That I went into the woods with a near stranger with the intention—need for affection and was beaten within an inch of my life? You can imagine how they will spin that tale, and I won’t be the victim in a single one of them. There will be another thrashing. One of tongues and sideways glances and none of them subtle. They’ll want to know why he’s been pummeled to bits in his own right. If our names get involved, it’s over…for all of us.”

“People do get lost, Marilyn,” The Constable offered softly, stroking his close-cut beard. His eyes still flicking between the tense and toned Thatcher to the trembling, teary eyed Ellis. “People get lost in these woods all the time when the snow rolls in like this. The fresh powder… it covers their tracks, disorients, and confuses. They wander off and freeze to death in a blind dash all the time. Do you think the same courtesy would be extended to your family, were it that man sitting on this block?”

“So, he’s lost?” Mallory asked boldly, tendrils of smoke swirling around her. Her eyes barred into The Constable. “He’s lost.” She turned to her mother and nodded her head.

“He can’t be lost if we never suspected him missing. What we have on our side is discretion. Even if he does survive the night, I highly doubt he’ll start a full inquiry into why he and Mr. McMillan were that far off the path in the dead of night. If we start swapping tales here tonight and he does come up missing, then we have a real situation on our hands, and for what? Saving your son’s life? Ellis was drunk and fell, off a balcony, off the front steps—he fell. End of story. Marilyn…he fell.”

Mrs. McMillan’s hands shook as she looked around the room. Three children that either were or were considered her own stood before her covered in blood and shaking of fear or frustration. Even the kitchen staff had stopped now, looking amongst themselves and speaking in whispers. She swallowed hard and turned to The Constable.

“He fell,” she whispered and ran her hand along the curve of her son’s jaw. “And thank god he survived it.” She blinked back tears and shuddered. “Mallory, for the love of god, stop smoking! I’ve asked you a thousand times.” She snapped and turned to her daughter with a severe look. “He fell…” She nodded again.

“I’d have Doctor Calhoun take a look at those cuts. Wipe him up before the party…rumor has it he’s a guest.” The Constable tipped his hat and ducked out of the kitchen.

“Friend of Dorothy, indeed,” Mallory said with a flutter of her brow and an exhale of smoke. Her mother scoffed and she shrugged, unstoppered a bottle of sherry and poured a large glass. “You can’t tell me you aren’t the least bit shocked that straight as a board Constable Martin Charlton has washed his hands of morality? Whatever, I’ll get the good doctor.”

———

“Let’s take a look, shall we?” You knew he was destined to be a doctor the way that ice clung to his fingers. They pricked the tender parts of Ellis’ face as they took up his half hearted attempts to wipe away the crusted blood with a damp cloth. Cleaning alcohol stung the jagged flesh. “My dear Mr. McMillan. I’ve cured nearly every fever, cough, and cricket sprain you’ve had in your young life…I fear this is the worst. You’ll need stitches.”

He smelled like peppermint and sherry. Ellis had always envisioned him a Saint Nicholas type. Somehow trapped here in this forgotten ripple of English countryside reserved for Christmas and extended summer vacations. It made sense to see him here at Christmas, and indeed he would on occasion don the moth eaten red suit and faded green sack Ellis’ grandmother kept stashed away in a trunk upstairs.

“I know this must seem like a great and terrible defeat to you, and in fact it might be, but I’ll give you a token if you promise to hold it close for me.” Ellis blinked; his eyes broke their barring into the scrubbed planks of the floor. They met the old man’s that sparkled in the ripple of flame that consumed the fresh logs. “You’re young and accustomed to a great many comforts. The world is a kinder place than it once was, but there are still corners that house darkness. New York, London, Paris, they’ve always housed light within the dark. My darling boy, do not search ignorantly for tenderness in places that still wreak of barbarism, because you will surely be met with it when you let your guard down. The country is a place that time has forgotten, but it yearns for its touch…when time catches up with it, that tender intelligence is too new, too sharp, too sudden, and here you sit before me a testament of what happens when intelligence—a modern caress touches this place.

There are ways to find pockets of light here, no doubt, my boy, but I beg you to find it where light is more welcome.” Ellis looked up at him in startled understanding. “Oh yes, I know your heart.” The Doctor placed that cold and withering hand on Ellis’ torn sweater, and Thatcher looked up from the dressing mirror. His crisp tuxedo shirt hung now in loose fingers as he watched his friend and The Doctor carefully.

“These scars you’ll bear, and you will share them with a multitude of brothers and sisters who came before you and who will follow you and they will share them inwardly and outwardly, don’t you forget it. Each generation must be a reflection of the past and then some. They must bend in reverence to those who could not shine. They must become wiser and softer and more tolerant. The world is changing.”

“Not fast enough, it isn’t,” Ellis said, his hands wound with the old Doctor and held fast as he trembled, tears streaming.

“It never does for those who suffer the cruelty of it most…You are the son of a legacy of land barons and a swan of Fifth Avenue. I fear, my boy, that you have nothing to fear at all. The world will carve a way for you. Use it. And us…us old brothers in arms like The Constable Charlton and I will meet you in the sun.” Ellis and Thatcher both turned at this.

“The Constable? He’s…” Thatcher squinted at the doctor.

“As light as he can be in those treacherous boots, and my longtime companion. A light in the dark spaces.” The Doctor smiled at Ellis and it warmed him to his core. He trembled and fresh tears pooled over his lashes. “Mr. Donoghue, will you bring me my bag, please? We’ve got some needle point to do here on Mr. McMillan’s face.”

———

“You look like the Frankenstein Monster,” Thatcher said as he straightened Ellis’ tie.

“Or maybe worse than,” Mallory said, pouring out a stream of bourbon into three cut crystal glasses. She passed them off to the boys in quick succession. The television on Ellis’ corner table reported severe gales across Wales and Southwest England while a ticker in memoriam for the loss of Princess Diana a month prior scrolled across the bottom and toasts were being lifted to her downstairs. The three of them turned to the bleak man in a tan suit and raised their glasses in unison. “Happy Christmas,” Mallory said softly.

“Happy Christmas,” the boys responded solemnly.

Mallory turned back her glass and shook her head at the television as she discarded it on an end table. “I hope it strips the earth bare,” she said softly as she watched the storm’s trajectory across the screen. She dabbed the corners of her mouth. She grabbed her skirts and with a backwards glance, left the room. Thatcher nodded at the screen.

“As do I…” He paused and twirled his glass. He turned to Ellis and took his chin in his hand. “Please don’t make me prove that I’ll kill for you ever again, Ellis McMillan. Because I’ll prove it time and time again.” He flung his arms around Ellis and held him tight to his freshly washed body.

“I’ll be down in just a bit…” Ellis smiled at his friend and nodded his head for him to leave. He sat down at his desk where a spattering of prose offered praise to the locks of licorice hair that now lay spattered in a clearing or hobbling through the storm. The locks of a god he had worshiped from afar that had dripped with sweat as they loomed over him in the night. He crumpled the page and tossed it into the fire. He trembled and could see the face, tortured, confused, and angry. Ellis wrote quickly a prose to be left out always for any passing eye to see:

They say that death

is quiet and unassuming.

How funny,

I thought as I lay dying,

It was quite the opposite

When one has lived both quietly and unassumingly.

Dying is neither quiet nor unassuming.

Death is the body’s last passion;

It is aware

There are a thousand eyes overhead that blossom and bloom,

And they have seen.

I should have written about stars and what are they?

A thousand eyes that blossom and bloom.

Death is not quiet, nor is it unassuming.

Homecoming, I say.

I hope that living becomes more a home than that heathen snow.