Wednesday Afternoon by D I Jolly
In many ways, my life started the day my father committed suicide. I wasn’t there, I didn’t walk in and find him. Truth is, no one was there. No one was ever there. He was alone and everyone else was just out living their lives, paying rent, making dinner, going to work. Lots of people busy all the time, doing nothing.
And while I was out living my life, my father got old, and he got lonely, and I got busier. Sure, I called him on Fridays to catch up. And he was ‘fine’ and I was, ‘fine’ and I’d complain about work and he’d listen, and then I’d have to get back to what I was doing and he’d make some half-hearted comment about arranging dinner or a visit and I’d quarter-heartedly agree.
And it never happened because I was too busy and there would always be time… later. Until there wasn’t.
The first time my phone rang and I saw that I didn’t recognise the number, I let it ring out while I looked it up to see if it was a known spam/scam call. The third time the same number called, I finally answered.
“Hello?”
“Hello, is this a Mr Tony Deepmarsh?”
“Yes, speaking.”
“Mr Deepmarsh my name is Frank Oslo. I’m with the police. I’m sorry to have to tell you this, but your father has been found dead in his home in North Docks.”
The police officer continued to talk, but I couldn’t hear him. My mind filled with words and sounds but none of them fitted together, they just smashed into each other creating sharp and jagged edges in my mind. My breathing became short and I tried not to move for fear of cutting myself on one of those edges. Eventually, I latched back onto the sound of the policeman’s voice.
“Mr Deepmarsh? Hello, are you still there?”
“Yes, sorry, I’m here. Uuummm… so someone killed my father?”
The silence from the other side of the phone put ice water into my veins and I wanted to both stay in that moment forever, terrified of what would happen next, and desperately wanted the agony to end.
“No, again, I’m very sorry to have to tell you this, but it looks like he killed himself.”
It took me a moment to understand the words that I’d heard, and then I suddenly understood what people meant when they say things like, ‘it felt like the bottom dropped out of my life.’
I closed my eyes and felt the world rush away from me like I’d had way too much to drink and lain down. I reopened them with a gasp and felt everything screech to a halt. And even though I was still standing in exactly the same place, everything was different. My deepest trust had been betrayed. The original belief that I’d built my entire life on, that no matter what, my father would always be there for me, that he was the strongest man in the world, that my dad could easily beat up your dad… It was a lie. Tears rolled down my face as mean, hurtful things filled my mind. I called him weak, I called him a coward, and like a small child I screamed that I hated him. My knees gave up and I crumbled to the floor as I looked around trying to find something to grab onto for safety in this new dangerous world.
Then came a voice, it was firm and unfamiliar, but it was there.
“Mr Deepmarsh, hello, are you there? Listen, I know this is a very difficult thing to hear and I am truly sorry. Is there anyone around you that can support you right now?”
My first instinct was to look around me for someone, but then the fog in my mind cleared and I could find thoughts. I was at home, I was alone, but I had friends I could call. I still had people in my life.
“I… I can call some friends. But right now, I’m just at home.”
“I think that’s a very good idea Mr Deepmarsh. Call a friend and ask them to come to your house. It’s always best to have someone near you at times like this. I’ll call you back in a couple of hours to discuss some details, there is some paperwork that will need to be done, but that can wait. I’m very sorry that it happened like this.”
The small voice inside of me wanted to hang onto the phone call, to replace the voice of my father with this man’s voice. He sounded strong and sure and steady, but then again, my father had as well and look what had happened. Images started to flash in my mind, and I felt my throat lock up so that I could only manage a choked
“Thank you.”
Before long the call ended and I was alone, more alone than I’d ever thought possible.
At the point when your head is so confused that you can’t think for yourself, the easiest thing to do, is to do as you’re told.
But I couldn’t find a voice, so I went through my phone and texted my best friend, Samantha. We’d been friends since childhood, we’d had the occasional fling, but really friendship was more important to us than anything else.
The truth was, my father was dead, but I couldn’t find those words in my head. I couldn’t make myself write that message, make myself look at it that way. I couldn’t yet admit that my father was dead. So, what I sent read:
- My father committed suicide.
Which wasn’t fair, she’d known him most of her life too, but there it was. Two minutes passed like hours as I waited for a reply, for a light in this, the darkest moment of my life, and it came. First Read, then Typing, and finally:
- I’m on my way. Where are you?
- Home
And fifteen minutes later she arrived, letting herself in with her key, she found me sitting exactly where I had been standing when I finally decided to answer my phone. And there we both sat and cried until a thought hit me. If you ever needed a reason to get drunk on a Wednesday afternoon, this was the reason. So, I put on a record of the greatest hits of the 80s, opened two bottles of wine and we sang and drank and danced in my kitchen until we ran out of wine and started making mix drinks. At about the same point in the album we’d calmed down a little, we remembered why we were there and cried. Then Rebel Yell would start and we’d rebelliously start dancing all over again.
Eventually though, we hit a wall. The drink ran out, the music stopped and the world became quiet and still again. We crawled into bed together, fully clothed, and lay there until the policeman called me back. In the meantime, I thought over the life of my father, the truth of him, and I tried to see him as a man. Just a man. His wife had died young and left him with a small child and a broken heart. He worked to try find a balance between being a parent and trying to afford being a parent. He made mistakes. We all make mistakes. I began to wonder if he’d still be alive if I’d visited more, or if this had been a long time coming. Was there some kind of medical issue he hadn’t told me of or that I’d just not heard about?
As I laid there, I thought of a lot of questions that couldn’t be answered, lots of gaps in my knowledge of the man who was also my father. I realised that, for all the time we did and didn’t spend together, I’d never really taken the time to truly get to know him. I don’t know if he really would have let me, but now I’d never know.
I cried again, a quieter more sorrowful cry. I cried for the death of the man, not the shock of my loss, not for the fear and the anger of the way he had died. Just for the man.
It was morning when the policeman called me back. I think he knew I needed the time, or maybe he was just busy. Either way I was grateful. He told me I needed to come to the station to ID the body, something I really didn’t want to do, but it had to be done. Apparently even when the police are 100% certain, someone who knows still has to give the final nod of approval and sign a form.
“I know it seems a bit unkind,’’ he said over the phone without prompting, ‘‘but you’d be surprised at how often people just refuse to believe something in their very core until they’ve seen it for themselves. For the record, I don’t think that’s the case today.”
It was my father, only he looked different, and I realised that I hadn’t seen him in person in over 9 months. He looked older, he looked sad, and he looked like he’d hung himself.
When I was done signing the papers and accepting the business card of a psychologist that specialised in grief and trauma, I decided that I’d drive to my father’s house. It was a little while away, but driving felt good. It was just enough to keep me focused and not enough to make me forget. And the whole way Samantha sat next to me, not saying anything but being there with me.
When we reached the front door and I let us in, a strange reflex washed over me and I called out.
“Dad, I’m home!”
That was the first time Samantha really cried. There had been lots of tears the day before, but in all that time she was still there supporting me. This time it was my turn. She threw her arms around me and wept for her loss, not mine. And I cried with her.
The house looked exactly as I remembered it. Everything in its place, only there was more dust than usual, and the soul of the place seemed to have gone. It was now just a house with things in it. It had lost that feeling of being a home. We made our way through the house into the kitchen and sat down at our usual spots at the table. For a minute, I thought about the practical side of things. What I would keep, what I would throw away, if I’d move into the house or sell it. I thought about cleaning companies and real estate agents. Then I reached into my back pocket and pulled out the folded envelope that Detective Frank Oslo had given me and put it on the table.
We both stared at it for a long time, not moving, not speaking. Then Samantha, bless her heart, slammed her hand on the table and said in a booming imitation of my father’s voice:
“Whose turn is it to make coffee!”
As children it would make us jump and giggle all at the same time. As adults it usually made us flinch away from our hangovers. Now it made us smile, and sad.
“I drove, it’s your turn.”
She stuck out her tongue at me, but rose and started to make coffee. To my surprise, the fridge was fully stocked, just like normal. I watched her make her way around the kitchen, opening the same wrong cupboard door she always did when looking for mugs, and finally we were both back sitting, now with hot cups in front of us and still the letter sat there.
Anthony,
I want you to know that I’m very proud of the man you’ve become and the man I see you becoming still. I just hope that you learn to find some balance in your life. I never could, and I think we all suffered from it. I know I did.
I can’t imagine how you are feeling reading this letter so I won’t try, but I do hope, deeply sincerely hope, that you forgive me one day.
My deepest hope though, is that this doesn’t become a weight around your neck that holds you back from life. I want you to go out and live, to enjoy the sunrise and dance in the rain, to jump on your bed and eat ice-cream for breakfast. Kiss girls, or boys, if that is what makes you happy. The world today is so different from the one I was born into, and I can no longer keep up with it.
There are too many bright lights and loud noises for me, too much information and not enough knowledge, and I can no longer tell which is which.
I love you my boy, that never changed.
My insurance pays out even on suicide, so you will have enough money. Quit your job and go look for the life you truly want to have, don’t settle for the one you got, unless, that’s truly what you want. But be sure that you know it’s what you want and not just because.
Give my love to Samantha.
Goodbye.
Dad.
Walter G. Deepmarsh.
First, I read the letter out loud, and then we both cried, for ourselves, for each other and for Walter G. Deepmarsh.
And then, I did as I was told. I quit my job, I kept the house and let go of my flat, and I went out into the world to find the life I wanted to live and not just accept the life that I was given.