Headstone

In the spring time a cemetery has green grass, flowers and budding trees to offset the gloomy landscape. In December the spindly trees and dead grass are as cold as the tenants here. Mattie pulled her jacket tight against the steady cold wind. She’d absentmindedly left her gloves in the car. She blew hot breath into her cupped hands to warm them. She walked past the headstones, careful not to walk on the graves. Superstitious or respectful, it was an old habit that hadn’t changed since she was a little girl. Some things didn’t change with age.

At forty five, Mattie was still a looker. She had a pretty, girl next door face and a nice figure. She’d cut her smokes down to a couple a week, and been on the wagon for four years now. She hit the gym twice a week. It was a struggle, but she was happy with the results. It made her feel good about herself if she looked good. Vanity was, at least in her opinion, the least of her problems.

She stopped when she saw the old willow tree. As much as she loved the tree in the warm seasons, she hated it as much in the dead of winter. It reminded her of a horror movie setting. A wrought iron bench sat underneath the ugly branches. She walked over and sat down.

The headstone was a simple affair. His name, birth and death date, and one simple sentence. She smiled, despite the cold and gloom. Even in death, her Dad could still make her smile. Jack Noonan was special like that. The smile faded only a little as she closed her eyes and sighed just a bit. She conjured up his face in her mind. She thought of his irrepressible grin, his big ole hands, and his laugh. God, how she missed his laugh. The scent of Old Spice lingered on the memory before she reopened her eyes. There he was, sitting on the rough stone that marked his grave. Mattie felt her eyes begin to water. Must be the cold wind.

“Don’t you start bawlin’, Kiddo, or I’ll just leave. I ain’t here for that. You know that. Besides, you’ll make your makeup run black rivers if you don’t stop. Very ugly look, ya know.” His baritone gravel filled voice spoke to the little girl inside of her. She pulled a Kleenex from her pocket and dabbed her eyes.

“That’s better, Kiddo.” He hopped off the stone and ambled over to her and held out his hand, expectantly. Mattie reached into her pants pocket and retrieved the old coin and placed it in her dads hand.

“ Ahh…” he said. He closed his hand around the 1880 Morgan dollar. The big coin was smothered quickly in his paw. He clenched his fist, reveling in the feel of it, before he held it up to his eyes.

“The old girl’s getting smoother. Losing the points of her crown a bit since last year. Been tough, Kiddo?” He flicked the coin once into the air, catching it without even looking.

Mattie shoved her hands deeper into her jacket pockets. The air was even colder since Daddy Jack showed up. It was an uncomfortable reminder that she was talking to a dead man. Her mind wandered for a minute, wondering if she was crazy. Probably, she concluded.

“It’s been a hell of a year, Pops. Still clean, still sober. Still working my ass off to keep the lights on in that old drafty house. I’m tired, Pops. More mentally than physically. How did you do it, Pops? I just don’t see me making another twenty years like this.” The furrows between her eyes showed as she squinted slightly.

“Don’t look so constipated, girl. At least you ain’t dead.” The short laugh he spit out made her spine tingle, but she grinned a little in spite of it.

“I mean it, Pops. I get so frustrated. So exhausted. It gets so monotonous, like waiting at the railroad crossing and the train’s a million miles long. And you’re always late for work.” A pack of Pall Malls appeared from the inside pocket of her jacket. She pulled one out and put it between her lips. She pulled another out and offered it over to Jack. His eyes lit up as he gently took it from her. He ran it under his nose, smelling the sweet tobacco like a cigar aficionado with a fine Cuban. She reached in again and out came a battered old zippo. Jack stepped over, took the lighter and smoothly lit the cigarette. Then he cupped it and lit Mattie’s. He looked at the zippo one last time, then handed it back to his daughter. She inhaled deeply, letting the tobacco hit her lungs. It made her head light, it had been so long since her last smoke. In a good way.

“Mattie, what do you expect from life?” he said. He took a drag, looking at her with raised eyebrows.

“I don’t know. I just….I don’t know.” her words were as lost as she was.

“If you don’t know where you’re going, how ya gonna know when you’re there? Really, Kiddo. It ain’t rocket science. Figure it out. Use your head. Your smarter than this.” His impatience was obvious.

“Steve left me. I know what you thought about him, but I loved him dad. I did. Now everything just feels….bland. Tasteless. I don’t know how you did it, Pops. I seriously don’t.” The cigarette was half smoked by now. She almost wished she smoked more at times like this.

“What I did, I did outta love. And FOR love, Kiddo. Your mom, and you kids, was all I ever wanted in this world. To be with you. To make you safe. To see you all happy. That’s what made my life worth while. It was all I lived for. Till I didn’t have any of it any more.” His sadness crept into her heart as he said that last sentence. The shared memories of loss and pain wilted both of their souls like a dying rose.

“Steve was …” he began, but stopped himself.

“Doesn’t really matter what he was, he’s gone. Either you deal with it, or it’ll deal with you. We both know it takes two to tango, Kiddo. It ain’t like he’s dead or somethin.” He took a long, last drag from the Pall Mall and flicked it away, onto a neighbors grave, without a second thought.

“You know what I always say. Where there’s life, there’s hope. Lotsa times, girl, hope is all you’re gonna get. I’m gonna ask you again, Mattie Dear. What do you want outta life?” He stood there, arms crossed, waiting.

She snubbed out the cigarette. The bad taste in her mouth as stale as her mood right now.

“True love.” Her words lacked conviction. She’d heard those words from her dad all her life. From her lips, however, they felt like a lie.

“Damn skippy, Kiddo!” he exclaimed. “But you don’t believe it. You know it, in your head. Your heart, my darlin, Your heart ain’t in it. You keep trying to do the math on it, and it don’t add up. I’m telling you, it never will. You gotta believe, Kiddo.”

She stood up from the bench. Her toes were cold. Her joints were getting stiff. She reached into her jacket for the other item she’d brought. A pint of cheap vodka. She held it out to him without breaking the seal. There was joy in his eyes as he took it from her. He cracked it open and held the freshly opened bottle under his nose, closing his eyes as he breathed in deeply.

“Mercy me, Kiddo. Even this cheap shit smells like roses. Been how long, did you say?”

“Pops, you know perfectly well that today makes four years. I was a drunk for a lot more. Sober years seem so long sometimes. Doesn’t seem right.” She sighed.

Jack alternated between smelling the vodka and splashing a little on his own grave. He watched the driblets fall, as if he were a child burning ants with a magnifying glass.

“I do miss my vodka, Kiddo. The smell. The taste. The shiver. The cloud of pleasantness before it goes too far. Too bad it always went too far, eh?”

It wasn’t a question as much as a fact. Mattie had watched her pops drink himself into oblivion far more times than she wanted to remember. She’d been plastered through a lot of those occasions herself. Jack splashed the vodka like Holy Water as he walked around the grave. There was only a swallow left when he was done. He smiled at Mattie and held out the bottle until it nestled under her nose, assaulting her with memories. She did as her father had, taking a deep breath, then exhaling like someone in a trance. The passing years hadn’t dulled her brains desire for the sauce.

“Go ahead, Kiddo. Nobody here’s gonna care.”

“No, Pops. Go ahead. I’m good.” Her brain hated her for the response, but she held her ground.

“ That’s my Mattie. Good girl.” he said as he turned up the bottle….and let the alcohol pour over his headstone in its entirety. It only took a couple of seconds. He shook out every last drop. He replaced the top after one last sniff, then handed it back to Mattie.

“I guess we’re both just a couple of quitters.” he said. “Worse things out there to be when it comes to habits like these.” She put the bottle back into her jacket. She and Jack stood there in the quiet. Jack spoke first.

“Why is it you keep coming here, Kiddo? What is it you’re looking for? Absolution? Forgiveness? An apology? Are you looking for me to make excuses? You want me to reveal some great reason why life is so hard? Really, Mattie girl. This is a graveyard. There aren’t any answers here, just dried up old bones of people who had their shot. We finished our race, at least as far as this world is concerned. For good, or bad, what we had to give is left behind here. If we’re lucky, we’ve made a mark on someone, or something. If I had to guess what kinda mark I’ve left…I’d have to say it was you.” The old man’s eyes gleamed a bit at that. He looked Mattie over with satisfaction.

“I look at you, Kiddo, and I think ‘I helped make that beautiful woman with a kind heart. Here is a smart, hard working lady with common sense, style and class.’ Pride ain’t a virtue, hon, but I’m proud your my kid. I see the best parts of me in you. I see the worst parts too, but you overcame those better than I did. You made my life worth living every minute. Even the bad parts. You’re worth it, Kiddo, and then some.” A tear had gathered in the corner of his eye. Just one. Mattie watched in amazement as it slowly trickled down his cheek. It fell, soundlessly, to the cold, hard ground. It made a loud reverberation in her own heart.

The old man surprised her. He’d never gotten to her like this before. His words rang her heart like a bell. Mattie thought about the question. Why was she here? What was she looking for? Ever since she’d sobered up, she made it a point to come here every year on her sobriety day. The first time, four years ago, she’d come here with every intention of getting drunk. She’d planned on downing a bottle and working up the courage to tell her old man all the things she had always wanted to say to him in life. But when he appeared, all that anger seemed to fade. They’d talked about meaningless things. Bits and pieces of her life’s trivial problems. On each visit, they’d scratch the surface a little deeper. It went from an intended drunken rant to a yearly therapy session. Now he was calling her bluff with his blunt question. She steeled herself to find an answer.

“ I came here at first just because I was mad at the world, you included. Being sober freed my mind up to come up with all kinds of question about myself and my life. I came here to drink a toast to how well you screwed my life up, then walk away and never come back. I don’t blame you anymore for my crappy life, Pops. That’s on me. I don’t need absolution. God’s got my back, I know that. Forgiveness? Maybe. Lord knows I need it, but I don’t think I need it from you. We’ve both done things, and said things, we wish we could take back. Answers? Yeah, I’d love a lot of answers about my screwed up life, but I don’t think it’s anybody else’s answers I’m looking for. It’s my job to find my own.” Mattie let her own words sink in for a minute. Her head tilted in deep thought for a couple of heartbeats. Jack wiped his tear track away and waited.

“I think…why I’m here is….I just…” She didn’t really know how to get it out.

Jack walked over. He reached out and pulled her to him and gave her the first real hug she’d had since she was seven. Her eyes gushed. She lay her head on his shoulder. They held each other tight, Jack swaying back and forth just a touch, with his little girl in his arms.

“I love you, Kiddo. To the moon and back…” he said.

“For forever and a day, Pops.” she finished it for him, then added “I love you, too.”

The revelation hit her like a brick.

“I guess this is all I ever really wanted. Just one more time.” She slowly stepped back, smiling through the tears.

“Thank you Pops. I think I can go now. Is that okay?”

“Yeah, Mattie. It’s more than okay. Come back next year. It’ll be different, but I’ll still be here to listen. Don’t bother with the booze or smokes next time. We don’t need it anymore, Kiddo. Take old Liberty, too, hon.” He put the dollar into her palm.

“ Some day you can pass her on to somebody who needs to rub a coin when they worry. I’m pretty sure you don’t need it for that anymore. I know I don’t.”

Mattie squeezed Jack’s hand one last time, then turned and began walking away. She turned back for one last look. Just a scary old tree with a cold bench was left. He was gone. She headed for her car. As she passed her father’s headstone, one corner of her mouth curled into a tight grin as she read the single line under the dates.

“Never, never, NEVER give up.”

And she didn’t.