I always knew some aspect of my life was cursed. I tried to be reasonable about it, just assuming that I was making bad decisions, but there’s only so much tragedy one can take as misfortune. I had more than my fair share in the past twenty years.
It started with the birth of my son, David.
His mother, the love of my life, my Camila…she became a shell. After giving birth to David, something happened within her mind, something broke. She lost the ability to speak instantly and as the years went by, slowly ‘forgot’ how to do many things. How to drive, how to read, how to dress herself, until she was finally stuck in a wheelchair.
I say ‘forgot’ because there was nothing wrong with her body. According to our doctors, her nerves, organs, muscles, and everything else were in perfect order. It was just her mind. It was unlearning all that she learned since she was born. Memories and personality took much longer to go, I could tell from the tears she sometimes cried.
When they stopped, I knew Camilla was mentally gone - that took ten years. It was enough to break me, but I didn’t have the luxury of curling up in the fetal position and melting into a puddle for long. I had a son to raise. David.
From day one, David was perfect.
David could do no wrong in any aspect of his life. Incredibly intelligent, progressing faster in school than his classmates. Nothing newsworthy, there have been greater child prodigies, but I think he was just holding back. He had this spark in his eyes when confronted with any problem. It was a confidence and hint of amusement that told me that he had the answer already.
As for his behavior at home, he was the pillar of the family. No father should ever have to lean on their son so early in life, but that’s what I did. And he was a rock. That’s why I never got in his way when he wanted to do something. I let him do as he pleased, because I had no reason to doubt that he could look after himself.
I expected some kind of ego to develop, I expected David to take advantage of me and my weak parenting, but he never did. David graduated from university at eighteen and found a job almost immediately thanks to some connection with another student. He was sending money home every month to pay for a caregiver who would look after Camilla, the caregiver being an ex-professor from that university.
I assumed she was getting more money than what she was earning at the university.
All those years, since the moment he could more-or-less look after himself until he left home, I heard the phrase, “Thank God you have David,” from everyone who knew our family situation. You might even be thinking that right now, reading this. Yet, I could never quite share that feeling.
Without any real reason, I wasn’t as happy with David as others were. He intimidated the hell out of me. He had this way of looking at me, reaching out with love, and even as his father, I could never make that connection - I couldn’t even bring myself to like him. My son treated me better than any son has treated a father and in my heart, I felt the same way about him as I do about a stranger I pass in an alleyway.
I just wanted to keep my distance.
That good he brought into my life should have helped balance things out, just a little bit, but tragedy always found me. I lost family, I lost friends, I’ve watched my colleagues betray me and my work crumble. Even my pets didn’t last long, so I stopped getting them. And although I never told anyone, I started to feel the reason for all of it was David.
In my head, as damaged as it was, I blamed him. Not just for Camilla, but for everything. Everything. To see him leave the house was probably the happiest I had been in a long time. That is until that caregiver he sent arrived a month or so later.
“Hi, Mr. Samuels,” she said walking into my home. “My name is Lilith, Lilith Evans. I know your son, David.”
She shook my hand with a smile. My heart just about nearly popped when I saw her, this beautiful woman. It went cold again when she mentioned David. She didn’t falter in her enthusiasm. Lilith explained why she was there, tears in her eyes when she spoke about how kind and amazing David was to care about his ailing mother.
I don’t think I said a word to her in our first meeting. I was just too shocked, giving her hums and nods. I did speak to her the next day, but it was like speaking to David. I just ended up bending in her favor, letting her do her thing, taking care of Camilla, and leaving me to my work.
She had the same eyes as David. Pouring with kindness, but for me, lacking any soul. I decided to give her the same treatment and just stay out of her way.
*
“Mr. Samuels, we’re leaving,” she called to me from the front door.
“Okay,” I called just before she shut the door.
Alone. Lilith was taking Camilla on a walk and had been doing so every day for two years. It hurts to say it like that - taking her for a walk. As if she was an animal to be looked after. Even now, with bitterness towards myself, I can’t help but think it was a waste anyway.
I focused on my work and when I finished, I turned to the TV. I was good at distracting myself from the problems, from my feelings. I could go a whole day feeling nothing, while some inside of me was begging to be resolved. I ignored it even then, staring at the mouths of actors I didn’t know, trying to see how fake they were.
I fell asleep.
*
I woke up later, much later. The sun had settled, and the room was dark. I had only the light from the TV to help me spot the furniture. Without a single question going through my mind, I went through the house closing curtains, checking windows, and then locking the doors. I grabbed a glass of water in the kitchen. Rubbed my eyes for too long, the lights hurting them, so I just turned them all off.
I would feel my way upstairs to the bedroom.
There was a rail on one side of the stairs where Camilla’s chair lift was mounted. My fingers traced along it. Something was wrong, but I didn’t know what. Trudging into the bedroom, I saw my unmade bed in the night light coming from the window. The cool blues spoke to my heart and I fell onto the sheets. Perfect.
I knew I could only enjoy it for a moment, I had to get undressed and close the curtains, but I argued with myself before I finally got up.
The window gave me a clear view of the backyard, the adjacent lake, and of course, the woods. I saw the neighbor’s swingset moving slightly in the breeze. Not squeaking, thankfully - I had snuck over one night to oil the chains. A light flickered among the trees.
I looked at them, waiting to see something. A beam of light, a flashlight. It turned away and continued deeper into the woods. I thought it was more than likely my other neighbor going after his dog again, it tended to escape. I closed the curtains.
When I turned around, I saw that the door to Camilla’s bedroom across from mine was still open. Her wheelchair wasn’t in the corner of the room and Lilith usually closed it after putting Camilla to bed. I then realized what was wrong when I climbed the stairs. The chair lift was at the bottom. Lilith hadn’t returned with Camilla after her walk.
I immediately called Lilith’s phone, but she wasn’t picking up. The phone would keep ringing then time out. That left only David, he picked up almost immediately.
“David? Lilith hasn’t come home with Camilla,” I told him.
“Mom’s here with me, I wanted to see her,” David answered. “Didn’t Lilith tell you this afternoon?”
“I…I was sleeping,” I stuttered. I remember telling Lilith not to wake me up when I was napping. “Maybe she left me a note…sorry, what? Why do you want to see Ca-your mother?”
He could tell I was tense. Even though Camilla was mostly gone in my eyes, I still cared enough about her memory to want her to be safe.
“Relax, I just wanted to,” David explained in a calm tone. “I haven’t seen either of you in two years. I just happened to see Mom and Lilith while driving through the neighborhood.”
“Where in town?”
“Hmm, Lionel Street, I think-”
“No, where are you staying?”
David gave me the address of a motel and told me he would come around in the morning if I was available. Of course, I said I was and we ended the call shortly after that. I sat down at the end of my bed, fell back, and was asleep as my head hit the sheets.
Looking back, I was stressed. David was back.
*
“How’s Aunty Grace?” David asked me from the other side of the table. He held his cup of coffee with both hands as if warming them. He had a kind smile.
“She passed away…shortly after her husband,” I said. I tried not to think about losing my sister. “About a week after you left.”
I said that last sentence with a little too much anger, but I tried to pass it off as sadness. David looked down, his face painted with concern. After a long moment, I had finished my coffee and David looked up again. His black hair had grown into flowing waves around his chiseled face.
“I liked her,” he said.
“Hmm,” I hummed. “Where’s Camilla?”
“Lilith is looking after her, Dad,” David sighed. “Do you want to see her? Do you want Lilith to bring her here?”
“I just wanted to know where she was,” I told him.
“Where else would she be?”
It was a simple question. David was being reasonable. I just didn’t like his attitude. Seeing him again just put me on edge. Looking at him, I couldn’t find a single fault. He had grown into a handsome young man. He looked nothing like me. I didn’t see any of my weakness in him.
“Why are you back in town?” I grunted. “Problems at work?”
“No, work is good,” David sighed again. “Speaking of work, I will come back another time with Mom. Still have those meetings every Thursday, right?”
I nodded.
“Okay, I will leave you to it.”
David got up and left. I didn’t follow. I listened to his footsteps and heard him close the front door. I let out a breath I had been holding. My heart was pounding. I picked up my empty cup and put it in the sink. I then walked over to grab David’s.
The cup was still scalding hot.
I hissed and whipped my fingers. It had been over half an hour since I poured it and it still hadn’t cooled down. I dumped the hot contents and rinsed the cup angrily. There was always something to send me over the edge. I ended up taking that cup out of the sink and throwing it as hard as I could into the trash, wanting it to break, but some other trash cushioned the fall.
*
I spent the whole day staring at a whiteboard and a ream of paper on my desk. Marker in hand, I needed to write something on the board, but I was too distracted.
Being stuck in my head, I couldn’t help but play back the talk I had with David. No matter which way I looked at it, I couldn’t help but see myself as the asshole. I didn’t really care about Camilla, I was unhappy seeing my son, and damn it, I respected him enough for sensing my discomfort and leaving when he did.
“What the fuck is wrong with me?” I murmured. “Seriously? I’m just…”
I blinked and it was night again. I put the marker down and made my rounds. Curtains, windows, doors, finally ending in my bedroom. I looked out at the lake. The swings were squeaking again. A breeze rustled the trees more than it disturbed the lake.
I heard the familiar pitter-patter of droplets hitting the earth outside.
“Rain…where are the clouds?” I said to myself. I looked up at the sky. I could see the stars.
No rain on my house, and not a droplet hit my face, but I heard rain nonetheless. I looked down at the ground, but couldn’t see anything. Out of curiosity, but mostly escaping my own thoughts, I marched down the stairs, seeing as I was already dressed, and opened the kitchen door to the backyard.
The sound of rain was closer, but when I pointed my phone light at the ground, I didn’t see anything. I then listened closer and realized the sound was coming from the nearby trees. It didn’t sound like the leaves were moving, there was no way I was confusing the two. I walked over to the tree and was almost immediately soaked in water. I stepped back out of the downpour and turned on my phone light again.
From the branches and the leaves, rain fell thick and fast. It pooled on the ground and soaked into the earth. The sight of it left me silent and thoughtless. When seeing something that just didn’t make sense, my mind struggled to make sense of it. What snapped me out of it was the sound my ears picked up amongst the patter.
Crying.
Weeping coming from the trees, so low and pathetic. It was the kind of moaning sob that only those who were grieving could make. It was how I cried the many nights that followed Camilla’s degradation. Only, that was a long time ago.
Yet, the thought of Camilla seemed to get the cogs in my mind moving again. I looked down at my phone, wiped a few stray droplets from the front of the screen, and hovered over David’s number. I wanted to call him, but I knew that no matter what he said, I would just want the call to end.
Instead, I turned back to the house. The weeping followed me as I entered the house. Even when the sound of the drops faded, those cries echoed. I got in my car and drove off the property, heading to the motel David was staying at.
I probably sound hypocritical for caring all of a sudden, but if you were confronted with trees that sounded like you in a moment where your heart was breaking…going to Camilla was the best thing on my mind.
*
Arriving at the motel, I saw a few cars parked in the front. One room had the lights on, I heard a TV playing through the thin walls. I could understand that - for some people it was the only way they could get to sleep.
I saw David’s silver four-door parked in front of one of the dark rooms, so I assumed that it had to be his. Definitely not the best place to be looking after one’s ailing mother, but I didn’t care to question it until I was standing in front of the motel. I wanted to call Lilith and ask her what she was thinking about leaving Camilla with David in such a place, but then I noticed her car was there as well.
It made me angry. With a sudden wave of responsibility for my wife washing over me, I marched up to the door and thumped it with the meat of my hand.
“David, it’s me,” I growled through the door. “Let me in or-”
“Jeremy?”
It shattered. Everything inside of me. My heart felt so hollow that I thought it might collapse in on itself. My bones were glass, cracking under the weight of my flesh. I stepped back from the door. It opened.
The light was on inside. Camilla was standing in the doorway, her body frail and skinny. Her eyes were wide and scared. I knew her body had wasted away, but it seemed to be less saddening when she was in a wheelchair. When she was standing, and moving, she looked like a starving prisoner.
Yet, I was the one who buckled first. She took a few shaky steps towards me and fell forward. I caught her in my arms and held her against me. She was so light. A bony hand reached up and touched the side of my head as I cried into her shoulder.
As her fingertips graced my skin, there was a cold plunge and a sudden fall. It was the same sensation of suddenly falling into a dream and waking up. Only, this time I was soaked in rain, kneeling in front of a dark, empty motel room. The door was open.
Blood had stained the doorway. I was breathing with a burst of adrenaline, I was in danger, or at least I was a moment ago. I stood up quickly and stepped into the motel room. Blood on the bed, the walls, the curtains. I could see the dark shape of bodies on the ground. An empty wheelchair in the corner.
I stepped out, unable to investigate any further. When I had the stomach for it, I trudged over to the reception. I had to make a call.
*
Camilla and Lilith’s bodies were covered and carted away. Camilla was untouched, not a scratch on her. The same could not be said for Lilith. Her body was mutilated beyond recognition, but her wallet and car remained in the parking lot. It was safe to assume that it was her.
David is the prime suspect in the investigation, although I don’t hold much hope for that. It is only because I said so that he is being investigated, but the receptionist reports a different name, a different man entirely, renting that room at the motel. There were no records of David returning to town. Nothing to say he wasn’t either.
Lilith was the only real connection, but there were problems with that as well. There were no transfers of money into her account from David, or anyone. She was a professor at his university, but he never took her classes. Nobody there had even seen the two of them speak. From the outside, it looked like a random person was playing caretaker for my wife and I just went along with it.
I didn’t say anything about what I had seen before finding the bodies. I haven’t told them about the ill feelings I had towards my son. It’s better to leave as much of the unexplained out of my statement.
Yet, I believe since anyone has found a reasonable explanation for what happened, mine is the only one that matters. Mine is the only one that pieces things together, that confirms the fears I have regarding my son. That there is something wrong with him, that he isn’t the kind of man everyone thinks he is.
Only, I am too old, too afraid, to do anything about it.
I haven’t had any communication with David since. I retired from my job last year. I live alone.