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Probably the only time I was ever recognized was because of "Hindsight."
It had just won second place in the Danny Lee Lawrence Writing Award for Fiction and was
published in the Houston Baptist University literary journal. I was in class when someone
remembered my name from the magazine. Not very impressive, especially since it was a small
college, but it was still something. It was also the first time I was paid for writing, and the
first time I read a story in front of an audience — at least since junior high.
More importantly, this was the first time I wrote a character that had
absolutely nothing to do with me. I have nothing upon which to base this story; I pray I never
will. I wrote it anyway, and I still think it is one of the best short stories I've ever dreamed
up.
John Sanders, his back softly bent forward and his eyes downcast, looks through his desktop to the images below it — memories that replay over and over in a sudden and bleeding moment, as though the scenes are not bound by time at all, simply one event dripping into another in a single gushing wave. The gunshots, sounds John never even heard, come at once, as though one is an echo of the next. The bodies, scenes John never saw, are burned upon the lens of his eyes, so that anything he sees in his everyday life is only viewed through those pictures, and he can't distinguish between now and then.
"Hey, John," says a tall man who stands in front of the desk. John, his pale face almost sickly under the buzzing fluorescent lights, looks up at his boss and nods in greeting. There is another man there — one John doesn't recognize. The boss introduces the man, but John doesn't hear the name.
"John, nice to meet ya," says the man, holding out his hand. As John accepts it, this man muses upon the name of his new acquaintance, saying, "John Sanders, how do I know that name? Oh, yeah! Johnny Sanders was that kid that shot up the school last month. Heh, that wasn't you, was it?" He laughs at his own words, finding the link incredibly funny, though he does not realize that the connection is closer than he would ever imagine.
The boss, who has more discretion, tries to pull the new guy away from John before the words are said but is unable to keep the statement contained. Without another moment the boss ushers the man away, and John returns to the flowing of images behind his desk. He really doesn't notice such comments anymore.
It's 4:30 — almost quitting time. Not that John will be quitting anything very important. His days have become a surreal dream, as though he floats through a world he doesn't recognize and doesn't care to know it. He does work, but not as dutifully as he used to. It simply takes him more time now. His boss understands and lets him grieve, even as long as it has so far taken.
It has been more than a month already, yet still the papers and the news run stories on the event. First they interviewed the parents of the victims and even tried to get in touch with John and his wife for comments, though he would not speak to them. Later the politicians appeared and talked about guns and criminals and assumed that John did something to little Johnny at a young age, for why else would he have done this? The general consensus of these politicians was that Johnny had been sexually abused. Lately they have reported on the reopening of the school, and how afraid all the kids were to be back within those walls.
John and his wife canceled the paper and unplugged the television a week ago. At the beginning, John couldn't help but watch the stories on how his own child killed seven people at the junior high school. The boy had been abused, they told the father. He had no friends, they told the father. There had been so many warning signs. Or so they told the father.
It felt as though he was watching a report about someone else. It wasn't his son they spoke about. None of those theories fit. Sometimes he watched and got angry at that family for what they had done, and then he remembered.
It is the same school John had attended a quarter of a century ago. He remembers how new it looked back then. He had been proud when Johnny began classes there. The school had survived so long — long enough to accept two generations of Sanders men.
4:50 already, John realizes, not sure how he could have simply daydreamed twenty minutes away. He stands suddenly, surprising the people around him. Their interest wears off quickly, and John takes his coat and folds it over his arm as he starts away. He can't stay until five. He has an appointment.
He waits until he gets an empty elevator car, which finally comes on the third attempt, then rides it quietly to the lobby. He walks along the edges of the room, where the bright lights of the entry don't illuminate quite as well. He slips out of the rotating door and hurries onto the street, quickly across the road in somewhat of a slow half-jog. His destination is only a block away, and before he's even truly ready to arrive, he is in another lobby, riding in another empty elevator, and hiding in the shadows of another building. The office door appears before him as if from nowhere, and he is surprised to see it so soon. It's 5:10.
But his hurry is for no gain, for he must sit in the comfortable chair in the waiting room while Dr. Hammond still speaks with his four o'clock patient. John takes a magazine and flips through it, not even looking at the articles. He is glad he got the comfortable chair. The other chairs are wooden and rigid — their backs do not recline enough. But he may drip into the comfortable chair, splashing into the cushion and letting it consume him. He puts his head in the magazine, looking through the page at the floor, where the picture moves.
Dr. Hammond, after a few minutes, appears at the door at the other side of the reception room. "John," he smiles, pulling the glasses off his nose. The four o'clock appointment slips out of the office, careful to hide his face from the others who are waiting. He doesn't want people to think he's crazy, John suspects. He turns to Dr. Hammond, a middle-aged and balding man. The doctor's smile is genuine, not just for the benefit of his patients. Some of the psychologists wear phoney faces to convince the patients that they are normal, and many are very bad at acting. Dr. Hammond isn't like the others. He truly cares what happens to those who come to him, at least in John's case. John can't pretend to speak for everyone.
"Let me give you the number of Dr. Richard Hammond," the school counselor had said several months before. "He is an exceptional family therapist."
"You think Johnny needs therapy?" asked John, truly surprised.
"Your son is a good boy," said the counselor, "but he is having problems in class, probably due to some depression or anxiety." She never had been a very good counselor.
"Depression?"
She continued, "I've talked to him a couple of times. He doesn't have any friends here. He's very lonely."
"He talks to you?" asked John. He didn't want his son in therapy. He never had been a very good father.
"Occasionally. I can schedule him some appointments here if you would like."
"If he will talk to you."
She was the first to be killed.
At first John didn't want to call Dr. Hammond. It was probably a bad idea anyway. He felt guilty that he hadn't brought Johnny there. He had been seeing another psychologist daily, but he was impatient, and he wasn't feeling better. Then Hammond's card fell out of his wallet, and his wife, Susan, found it. She didn't know that it had come from the school counselor. She wanted to call him for herself, and John thought he may try as well. It was a bad idea, but he is a good therapist.
And so John walks into the small office with a view of the park and automatically sits on the red couch. It's not as comfortable as the chair in the reception area. Dr. Hammond sits in his chair. It's leather — one John normally associates with a desk, though Hammond has no desk.
"How have you felt today, John?" Hammond asks, leaning back. His chair squeaks.
"More of the same," John replies. He talks about the thoughts of his day at work, and they fill most of the session. It takes him a half hour just to describe one moment of his moving picture. There is so much that makes up every drop. But Dr. Hammond is patient. He doesn't comment much — he merely listens. John says, "I was just thinking about the school counselor."
"What about her?"
"I should have listened to her."
"Hindsight is never 20/20," says Hammond, leaning forward, "contrary to the old cliché. Our memories are made up of ‘what ifs.' We think of things how they might have been instead of the way they were. Just this morning I was thinking about my first love, Carrie. I was pretending that I had said something else at this time, or stayed quiet at another. But I don't know what would have made Carrie react differently, I only pretend that I do. You may think that this could have been avoided if you had called me when you first got my card, but it probably wouldn't have. I would have probably gone in the same directions as the school counselor, and the same things would have happened. You can't change it anymore than I can go back to Carrie. It simply wasn't your fault."
"I can't help but to look back."
"I know. But when you begin to think on the past, try to remember what happened instead of trying to find blame in your own actions, knowing that you can't change the events."
John thinks on this, remembering Johnny's second birthday, when the entire family flew in to celebrate. The red wax of the candles dripped slowly off their lit tips as the chocolate cake was brought in. John's own parents were so proud. Johnny was their first grandchild, and they spoiled him. Everyone spoiled him. He was the light of the family, especially at that time. Johnny's other grandmother had been ill, yet she made it to the party. Susan cried when she saw her mother so happy. Johnny began to cry too, though he didn't know why.
The illness passed, eventually. She began to feel better after that party. She still lives, John smiles. Then he thinks that she shouldn't have lived so long. She should have died back then, when she was happy and proud. She should have died before her grandson shot himself with a semiautomatic rifle.
"When I was in eighth grade I played football," John says, smiling a moment at the memory. "A defensive lineman. There was this one game when we were only a couple of points behind, but time was running out. They had the ball. Our defense sacked the quarterback on the one yardline. There was only time for a couple more plays. As the ball was hiked, I charged forward, tried to get passed the line, but I couldn't. Somehow I got turned around, and I saw the ball in the air. The pass had been blocked. I dove for it, catching it just before it hit the ground. We got the ball on the one, and we won the game."
"Thanks to you."
"Yeah. And for a few hours it was great. But after that all I could think about was how I could have done it better. Maybe I could have stayed on my feet when I caught it and made the touchdown myself. It never was enough that I brought about the win, I needed to make the points."
The football quarterback slips into John's mind. Johnny used to love to see the school team play. The quarterback came into the school that day to see the nurse about a twisted ankle. He was the third shot, but he lived to witness the rest of the drama, then died later in the hospital.
"I think it was the same year," John says, and he's not sure why he brings it up, "I was given a writing assignment in my English class. Suppose that you have a chance to kill some terrible murderer before he committed his crimes. You have some time machine or something that will take you to the past. The question was, would you kill that person? It was a silly assignment."
"I had that one too," Hammond says, stroking his beard. He leans back again and the chair squeaks. "How did you answer?"
"I said no. I don't know, I thought at the time that it's not justice if the life involved is still innocent. Even if someone will do something terrible some time in the future, the life is innocent before the fact."
"Have you changed your mind now?"
"A time machine would make a lot of things better."
There is a long silence before Dr. Hammond says, "I agree with what you wrote. When you kill in that way, you do not save the world from a murderer, you only make one of yourself."
John grunts and nods.
Dr. Hammond asks carefully, "Do you wish Johnny had died before all this?"
There is another pause as John carefully words his answer, saying, "Would I be better off as a murderer than the father of one? Which path would have come out worse? At least if it had been me it would have been my choice. It would have been my act. I don't feel innocent anymore."
"Why are you here, John?" Hammond says as their hour expires.
"What?"
"Is this helping you? You still connect me with the event."
John sighs and says, "It's helping me."
"Do you still carry my card?" There is no answer to the question, so Hammond merely nods and continues, "You're punishing yourself in some ways by seeing me. I've given you the names of some of my colleagues. Did you call any of them?"
"They won't help."
"Alright, John. Call me if you need me before tomorrow."
"Okay, I'll see you tomorrow." John gets up and starts for the door.
"See you tomorrow, John."
John gets his car from the garage and drives slowly home — rush hour is once again extending itself past its promised hour and into the second. It will last for at least a third, but by that time John will be home. The drive isn't far — only a few miles on the freeway.
He doesn't even know he's driving anymore. His body makes the motions without the help of his mind. It's automatic — his foot hits the brake when the lights on the car in front of him turn bright red, and then back to the gas when those lights dim.
A truck wants into the right lane. Its blinker is on, and the driver looks back desperately. John slows on instinct, and the truck moves in. The driver doesn't wave. It's an old truck, dirty — in places rusted straight through, creating jagged holes in the bed. Something underneath is leaking, dripping in rapid succession onto the pavement. The liquid is green or black or clear or red or something — John doesn't really care. But his eyes are drawn to it, and he's not sure why.
But when his eyes are closed, he understands. He remembers when he used to watch the news. He sat transfixed on the screen, night after night. Nothing new was revealed. It was the same story time and again, with the same images. It had rained that day, and one of the cops slipped on the grass. They only showed that once. It wasn't important, and it wasn't funny. But time and again they showed two men pushing a gurney down the slippery sidewalk and under the yellow tape that marked the crime scene. The corpse was covered by the wet body bag, but John knew, somehow, that it was Johnny laying within. They never specified, but it was Johnny. Off the back of the bag dripped something, and at first John thought it merely water. But as the scene repeated night after night, after a while the drip turned red. As the days went on, all John could see was the drip of blood off his son's dead body.
He pulls into the driveway and parks under the basketball goal. The garage is crowded and the car won't fit there. He gets out and goes inside the house — the front door is unlocked. He calls out, "Susan," but hears no reply.
The television is off — the plug is laying on the floor, and the outlet is empty. The lights are off, too. There are messages on the machine — all reporters, no doubt. The ringer on the phone is turned off. Their friends don't call anymore anyway. With a push of a button the messages are erased without ever being heard.
Susan is found in the bedroom, sitting upon the bed, her head leaned down into her hands. John sits beside her and puts his arm around her, and she looks up at him, her eyes red from tears. Something falls from her hands, landing as a splash on the ground. There is a moment when neither moves. Then they both reach for it suddenly. She tries to hide it, but John grabs it first, picking up the small white tube. It's a pregnancy test. It's positive.
"This can't happen now," Susan pleads, and she begins to cry again.
They sit for hours, the test still in John's sweaty hand. He stares blankly at it, expecting it to change, but it doesn't. He can't understand why it doesn't change. The sun goes down, and all is dark. They finally crawl into a bed, not even bothering to get undressed.
"What did we do wrong?" asks John after a while, lying under the warm sheets. He looks into the darkness of the empty room, not able to keep his eyes closed. It's late, but Susan is awake too. They don't sleep anymore. They only turn off the lights.
"I don't know," she replies after a pause. John isn't sure that she said it at all, for he isn't really listening.
There is a great silence so deep that it seems a noise of its own, crashing upon the ears of the couple. They can't stand it. They need it ended, and yet they know it resides just on the other side of their words. There's no sense in battling it. It's always waiting for them now, for the house has become noisy with quiet.
"I want you to have an abortion," spits out John suddenly.
There is no reply. The silence speaks its agreement. And there John lies in darkness, in a complete void of sight and sound, but his eyes are forever staring at the drip, drip, drip of the blood on his hands.
© Copyright 2002 by Paul Lytle. All rights reserved.
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