Sunset in D Minor

My favourite part of the day is my walk with my Max, my dog. In late July a few miles south of the sixtieth parallel, ten o’clock is when the sun is building to it's finale for the day. Like any opera the music builds to a crescendo as all the characters, or colours, join each other one last time on stage. Each bringing their distinctive notes, belting out the music with all they have left, leaving you holding your breath or biting your lip. Exploding in one final number before the denouement and the curtain comes down. Every night the sun and the clouds come together in a slightly different pattern. I am always taken a little aback at the spectacle of something so simple as the earth rotating away from the sun one more time.

The breeze is warm, soft and comforting. The air hugs me. The stickiness is gone from the height of the day and the breeze gently kisses my face. The thick smell of wild roses comes and goes, one breath at a time, teasing my senses. There are other flower smells too, they are fleeting, kind faced, strangers, smiling at me as I pass by.

At this time of day I take Max off his leash, I let my thoughts wander and he lets his nose wander, and we keep pace with each other in a lazy sort of way. He sniffs and pees on this bush, that fence, this rock, that patch of grass. One of us waits for the other when we get to an intersection, we may only see one or two cars in the half an hour it takes for the suns final number. We are perfect companions at this time, I hardly speak to him, and it seems like he's not paying much attention to me, but our souls are travelling together like they are two parts of one whole. We move like choreographed dancers, to the same rhythm, the same aria in the sky.

We enter the house from the back, winding our way down the alley. The fence is crumbling, boards leaning in and out, like depressed piano keys, sunset in D minor. I slow my pace as I cross the garden, savouring the evening before crossing the threshold into the house.

I tread lightly hoping he has fallen asleep and this will be a peaceful evening. I shrug off my shoes and Max brushes past me for an epic drink of water. I hear a snort from the living room and a wave of anxiety erupts in my stomach like a firework and sparkles shower up my neck and down my arms. The linoleum under my feet is cracked and lifting like peeling paint, it is a mustard yellow colour, and it occurs to me it was white at one time. In twenty years it has changed so slowly I only just now notice how worn it is.

The air in here is like the atmosphere of a different planet. I know without further investigation the garbage needs to be taken out and more than one ashtray is overflowing. The air is thick, I feel it stick to my skin, a layer of filth that doesn’t wash off. It is hard to breathe it in, it gets caught in my throat and chokes me. I try to clear my throat quietly.

I enter the living room, he is in that chair sleeping, Jon Stewart is on the TV. I move swiftly, quietly and remove the burning cigarette dangling precariously from his fingers and push it into the centre of the mound in the ashtray, careful not to push out the ones on the edges. He is snoring loudly, and I hazard a look at his face. I try not to look at him when he is awake, his eyes have changed I don’t recognize them anymore. I can only really see him when he is asleep.

When he is sleeping and his face is relaxed I see shadows of the boy I fell in love with. That boy would not recognize himself now. To say the years have been unkind would be like saying a tsunami will lap at your feet. We were so young once, so naïve. We had no idea how life can pull the rug out from under you and how getting back on your feet is not as straightforward as it sounds.

Mark has never recovered from Daniel’s death. He wears it fifteen years later like a heavy black cloak. Oppressive and all-consuming his sadness and his guilt has made us strangers. Opponents when we are meant to be teammates. It has destroyed who we were as people and who we are together.

Mark always blamed himself, like an old cliche. I was at work. I used to work at the coffee shop on Saturdays and Mark would get his day with Daniel. Mark was inside and Daniel was out in the alley behind the house with some other kids. They were on their bikes. The man in the car didn’t see him. He had come around the corner so fast. Everyone here knows kids play back there, but he wasn’t from here. He came too fast around the corner and hit Daniel at such an angle he was caught on the bumper and pulled under the car on the right hand side. Mark heard the kids screaming, and came running outside to see his son lifeless under the wheel of a Nissan Altima. I’m glad I wasn’t there. I think if I had been there I may not have lasted as long as Mark has. I remember my smiling, joyful little boy with those steely grey eyes. I remember him how he was in his life not how he was in his death. I know Mark isn’t to blame. Daniel played out there almost every sunny day. It is fifteen years later and there are still kids playing out there. The town put up a “slow, children playing” sign. That is the only difference. It had not happened before then, and it has not happened since. It was an accident, a stupid accident. He wasn’t from here.

Mark tried therapy, once. Preferring to tell his sorrows to Jack Daniel’s he never went back. I have had to grieve my son on my own, he is in such a dark hole that he sees nothing but his own pain. I tried to leave, once. I got as far as the driveway before I was dragged back by my hair. I have never seen rage like that coming right for me. I was tied to the tracks, a freight train barrelled down on top of me. All the pain, and hurt, and fear of his loss aimed directly at my spirit, I was not allowed to leave him too.

For me to be free I had to set him free. There was a way to release the burden on his soul, to let him be with Daniel again. He appeared to be trying to get there himself. That much alcohol every day will kill a man eventually. I could help him speed up the inevitable. There is some rat poison in the cupboard, leftover from before we had Max. One day when I come home from our sunset walk his snoring will be silenced. His face will be relaxed and he will be the boy that I loved. His spirit will be free and when the chorus builds to its crescendo it will be triumphant as his spirit soars high above the clouds to Daniel. They will wait for me.

I reach out to touch his face, the boy I loved, and draw my hand back quickly, suddenly seeing the monster. I turn away and move to the bedroom. Max is already there panting from his blanket on the floor in the closet. His ears bend down as I enter the room, a sure sign of love from my dog. A pure uninhibited, un-spoilable love. I playfully crawl over to him and he waves a paw at me and rolls over so I can scratch his tummy. I bury my head in the fur of his cheek, below the ear just past his cheek at the top of his neck is the softest spot. I breathe in, and am comforted by the smell. He smells sweet in that spot below the ear.

I move to the dresser and deposit the nights treasure in the top drawer, a smooth, round stone. Daniel was about three when I started finding them in his pockets when I did laundry. Always the smooth round, a little bit flat ones. I sometimes find them when I am out walking, not always. I had not seen one for a long time until tonight. Daniel had a good collection when he left, and I have added to it slowly. When he first died and I found one I would think he had left it there for me. To tell me he was still here. I remember him rubbing his thumb over the surface of it. I would rub my thumb in the same circular motion trying to connect with whatever it was that spoke to him.

Out the window the sun has just dipped below the horizon, and the day is over. The bright pinks and oranges that were so spectacular have dulled and will soon give way to darkness leaving no trace of the fleeting beauty and the glory that was just there. The curtain is falling and the doors will open for the audience to spill out into the streets feeling like they were just a part of something no one else saw. Something that will never be again.