The People Upstairs

David Sullivan turned his age-worn van left onto Grove Street and regarded his grandmother’s neighborhood through shimmering waves of late-July air. He thought the same thing he always did when he found himself here..
.
It’s been too long.

And it really had been, this time. These last seven (Christ, could it be eight?) months had been the longest he’d gone without visiting his maternal grandmother since his grandfather had passed. Now, by all accounts, she’d taken a sharp turn for the worse.

He reached his grandparent’s home, turned into the paved double-driveway and killed the engine. The air outside the van was tangible. Temperatures don’t often climb into triple digits on Long Island, but the temperature display on his dashboard read 102 this afternoon- and damned if Sullivan didn’t imagine he could feel every degree.

An sense of foreboding touched Sullivan’s mind as he trudged through the super-heated air and up the familiar slate path to his grandmother’s front door. Goose-flesh rose on his arms and shoulders.

Guilt, he decided, and actually shivered once in spite of the heat. He tapped the back of his knuckles against the storm door.

Of course it was guilt, what else would it be? He’d been feeling lousy for months now, knowing that he should have made the time to visit- that he owed it to his grandmother to make the time. She’d always made time for him, after all…

He knocked again- a bit louder this time.

Again, no response. He opened the screen door and rapped on the mighty oak. Nothing. He waited a few seconds and tried again.

You’re too late. You waited too long this time, and now it’s too late...

Now that, he knew, was the guilt talking. All the same, a steel band of panic seized him around the middle and gave a squeeze.

He backed off the stoop and eyed the large bay window that looked in on his grandmother’s living room. He’d just begun navigating the flowerbed in order to get a closer look when he heard the unmistakable sound of a lock being turned.

“Davey!” His grandmother beamed.

Sullivan backed out of the flower-bed, feeling stupid and being careful to retrace the few prints he’d already made. “Hi Grandma,” He smiled. “sorry, I got a little worried.”

His grandmother shook her head and smiled. “Just like your mother, always worried. Come in,” she said. “have a cup of tea.”

There weren’t many things, Sullivan reflected, that he’d rather do less than drink tea in this heat. What he could use was a beer cold enough to be measured in degrees Kelvin. Of course that was out of the question; he was sober, again- going on six years this time. A bitch of a heat rash was beginning where his collar rubbed at his neck and he resisted the urge to scratch at it. “Sure grandma, I’d love one.”

He followed her into the house. Grandma seemed to have aged five years since last he’d seen her. He tried to remember if she’d looked so frail the last time he’d visited and decided not.

“You look good, grandma.” He lied, and took his usual seat at the kitchen table. He’d spent countless hours at this same table, eating and playing cards; listening to stories and soliciting advice. It had been over this ancient table that he’d learned, over time, that his parent’s divorce hadn't meant the end of his world.

He experienced a fresh pang of guilt.

It’s been too long...

“And you don’t look so good.” She placed a hand on his forearm. “What’s wrong, Davy?”

What isn’t? Sullivan thought. “Not a thing, grandma. It’s just this heat…it really wears you out.”

The old woman studied him, clearly unconvinced. “Well that’s for sure. How’s Katie?”

“She’s good. She’s not looking forward to another surgery of course... but she’s doing well.”

“And does she still see Erica?”

Erica Dawson had been a satellite member of the Sullivan family since the two girls met in preschool, almost seven years now. “Oh sure,” He said, “sleep-overs, movies…you name it”

Grandma nodded. “Good. That’s good. A little girl needs time with friends.”

Sullivan smiled a tired but genuine smile. He nodded his agreement.

“And Lisa…?” she asked, “I’m so glad to hear that she’s in school again!”

Guilt chewed at Sullivan. This woman deserved a better grandson. “I am too. She really loves it.”

“She’ll make a wonderful nurse.”

Sullivan nodded, smiled. In actuality, his wife already was a nurse- an LPN. She’d gone back to school nights to earn her RN. He wouldn’t contradict his grandmother for all the Kelvin- measured beers in the world, though. “I sure think so.” He said.

Grandma filled her ancient steel tea-kettle and placed it on the stove.

“How are you, grandma?”

She lit a burner on the stove and shook out the match. She considered. “Not bad for an old lady… tired.” She shrugged, tossed the match into the sink.

Sullivan wondered if tired meant what he thought it might. It made him shiver again, in spite of the heat. “Haven’t you been sleeping?”

“Oh, you know me; I’m not much of a sleeper to begin with and, well… lately I seem to be sleeping less and less.”

“Why don’t you sit down, grandma?”

She smiled. She was beautiful when she smiled. “I’ll wait for the tea.”

Sullivan shrugged. “And how are you feeling otherwise?”

“Okay, thank God. My hip hurts, and they’ve got me on more damned pills than I can keep track of, but all in all not bad.” She went to the cupboard, removed four cups and saucers, and placed them on the table.

Trying to sound more playful than critical, Sullivan said, “We expecting company?”

Grandma made a dismissive gesture. “Don’t worry, they never come down. I always make sure I have enough though; I even call up to them sometimes…”

An imagined stone sank in Sullivan’s stomach. This was what he’d been worried about; what he’d been warned about.

She retrieved four spoons and four napkins. “It’s a terrible waste of food, but I won’t be responsible for them starving.”

The stone sat a little harder in his abdomen. The last time Sullivan had seen his grandmother she’d been convinced that animals were getting in upstairs. She’d asked him to check, and he’d done so- thoroughly. There’d been no trace of animals, though- no tracks or scuffs; nothing chewed on or out of place; no feces or fur. He’d told her as much, hoping to assuage her fear.

“Oh my,” she’d said, and the color had drained from her face, “I hear them coming down the stairs at night. What in the world could it be?”

Sullivan had suggested that perhaps it had been a nightmare, but Grandma didn’t think that likely. It happened too often, she’d explained. It hadn’t taken much prodding to learn that she’d been locking herself in her bedroom at night, terrified of the sounds coming from the rooms upstairs.

“Maybe I’m going batty,” she’d said with a nervous chuckle.

“Who knows, grandma,” he’d said. “People report poltergeists all the time. By and large they’re harmless, but we can’t explain them so they terrify us. They go away, eventually.”

Sullivan could remember the look she’d given him- it was a look that said ‘I know you don’t really believe that.’ She’d squeezed his hand, though, and said. “You’re a good boy, Davey.”

Now, it seemed, not only had the people upstairs not gone away; they had somehow become her terrifying responsibility.

“Come and live with Lisa and me.” Sullivan heard himself say.

Grandma leaned against the sink and took a moment before she spoke. Time itself seemed to move more slowly in grandma’s house, Sullivan was reminded. It always had. “I appreciate that Davey; but my place is here.”

The comment struck him as odd. “You wouldn’t have to worry about locking your room, or people upstairs; we’d make sure you have everything you need to be comfortable…”

“I’ve been in this house for almost sixty years.” Something in her voice had changed, “So many memories…”

Sullivan had seen his grandmother cry before. She’d cried when his grandfather had passed away, nearly ten years ago now; and she’d broken down a few times since, mostly around his birthday. By and large though, she was tough as nails beneath her prim and proper packaging.

She cried now. She turned toward the sink, likely hoping he wouldn’t see.

He pretended not to. “You cook for them, grandma?” It was hard to get the words past his lips. He swallowed over the lump that was forming in his throat.

Grandma turned, tears in her eyes. “I walk up there sometimes…when I have the nerve. I hear them talking and watching the television. I don’t know how they get in, but they never seem to eat... there’s never any garbage.”

The teakettle screamed; Sullivan nearly did too. He got up, turned off the offending burner and helped his grandmother into her seat. He poured two cups of boiling water into mugs, added teabags. The other two settings he ignored.

“Thank you, Davey.”
He smiled.

“You think I’m crazy. They all do. Sometimes I wonder myself…” A single tear coursed down her crepe-paper cheek.

Sullivan sat, took her hand. “I don’t think you’re crazy grandma.” He struggled for the right words. “Maybe you’re getting a little confused because you aren’t sleeping enough. And like I said, whoever knows…maybe you do have a poltergeist. Stranger things have happened.”

“You’re a good boy Davey.” She squeezed his hand and let go. “Would you like milk and sugar?”

“Please.” He said.

They drank tea; Sullivan sweated and itched. Grandma filled him in on people from church and what their grandchildren were doing.

Finally, they said their goodbyes. He kissed her on the cheek; it felt cold. “Thanks grandma. It was great to see you.”

“Don’t be a stranger.” She said, and smiled. “Thanks for stopping by.”

He was halfway to the van, when:

“Oh, Davey…” She was outside, walking toward him.

“Grandma, it’s way too hot out here!”

“Oh, it really is! But I need to tell you…if you’re working in the city tomorrow be careful. There’s going to be a bad accident... something to do with a plane.”

Sullivan narrowed his eyes. “Oh?”

“I heard it on television.” She said.

“You heard it on television?” he asked, “On the news?”

Grandma looked confused. “I don’t really know. I heard it on their television.”


**************************************


He almost drove past the diner the following morning. He’d considered it seriously, but no- it was better not to hide, and especially not in his hometown. The Hill’s Light Diner had been his regular stop every tuesday and thursday morning for the past twenty years, and he didn’t mean to change that now.

The air conditioning was on full blast even at this time of morning, and that was a relief. The current heat-wave, the folks on television assured everyone, would snap by next week, and not a day before.

Sullivan walked past the double row of worn wooden booths and up to the counter, to his usual stool. A well read newspaper lay next to a stack of menus; he’d already read the morning news on his ipad, but he opened the black-and-white for nostalgia’s sake.

“Morning sweetie…”

He smiled. Margaret Anderson, who’d worked at the diner for as long as he’d been a patron, was one of the good ones. “Hey Maggie,” he said, “How’s the prettiest girl in East Northport?”

She cocked her head, put her hands on her ample hips. “You don’t get out much, do you Sully?”

“I get out plenty…just not lately.”

Maggie laughed. “The usual, hon?” she asked.

“Sure,” he nodded. “Why not.”

She didn’t write anything down; she never did, as far as Sullivan knew. She poured coffee and placed it in front of him. She leaned in close, “people have been asking about you.”

Shit he thought. He’d been afraid of that. “Hugh?” he asked.

Maggie nodded; her red ponytail bobbing with the movement. “And Mickey.”

Sullivan frowned. “Thanks Maggie, you’re an angel.”

“Anytime Dave,” she smiled and touched his hand, walked away to place his order.

He’d call Hugh Dolan. After breakfast, he’d call and explain. He moved the sticky, coffee-stained menu to the side and perused the paper. He’d gone to school with Hugh, had grown up rattling around the same neighborhood. Mickey Walsh, though...Mickey Walsh was trouble, if you believed the barroom banter.

How had it come to this, he wondered? It was bad luck, that’s all; a black cloud that seemed to insist on following him around lately. Sullivan tried not to believe in luck. A man makes his own luck, his father had told him, and Sullivan believed it still. Only sometimes- times like these- it was a damned hard sell.

Maggie came back with his bacon and eggs, and her usual admonishment. “If you keep eating this every morning you’re going to die.”

“You say that to all the guys…” he said, without looking up.

The eggs were sunny-side up and runny, the way he liked them. He soaked the end of a triangle of toast in gooey yolk and took a bite.

“Oh my God!” someone shouted.

Sullivan didn’t quite drop his toast but he let his hand fall to his plate. He surveyed the diner and saw that all eyes were riveted to the old television behind the counter.

“Holy shit,” someone said, “would you turn that up, Maggie?”

Maggie didn’t have to. Wendy, the other waitress on staff was already there. Sullivan wondered stupidly, and not for the first time, why all waitresses names seemed to end with “y” sounds.

On the television, a ball of fire smoldered smack dab in the middle of what Sullivan recognized as Times Square. Wendy reached up and raised the volume: “…confirm that a two man aircraft has gone down in Times Square. Details are still unclear and we don’t know if this was an accident or an act of terrorism…”

The voice on the television droned on, but Sullivan had tuned it out. He watched the images on the screen though. People milled about, many with hands raised to cover their mouths. Others sat in the street or on the sidewalks, dazed. Still others rushed toward the wreckage, hoping to bring some sense of order to the chaos. Sullivan thought of his grandmother.

Every face in the diner was turned toward the live broadcast. Every patron felt something close to the same mingling of shock and fear. Every patron that is, but one. One was thinking something else…

One was thinking that maybe, just maybe... his luck had finally changed.


****************************************


By ten o’clock that morning the rest of the world knew that the plane crash in Times Square- which in the end had claimed four lives and injured about forty people, ten seriously- had been an accident, and no act of terrorism.

Of course at least two people had known that already- David Sullivan and his grandmother.

“An accident- something to do with a plane” she had said. He remembered her words vividly.

The work day seemed to drag on forever. He’d put in a call to Hugh Dolan after breakfast and gotten his voicemail. Apparently Dolan, along with the rest of the world, had been glued to the television set, eagerly awaiting details. Well, that had been just fine with Sullivan. Maybe he’d even scored a point or two for good faith.

He wrapped up his last job- a faucet repair off of Elm- at around four o’clock and headed for his grandmother’s house. He turned onto Grove Street and lit his usual last-minute cigarette. This time he threw half out the window.

Sullivan turned into the drive, wondered if maybe he was losing his mind. Did he honestly believe that his grandmother had heard about this morning’s plane crash yesterday? On a television set that- last he had seen- was not only unplugged, but without any cable feed?

She’d known though. Somehow she’d known.

Chills worked their way down his arms, left goosebumps in their wake. Nothing about this made any sense.

Grandma stood at her door, waiting. She smiled and waved.

Sullivan waved back. Had she been waiting for him? A fresh wave of goose-flesh prickled his arms and shoulders.

She held the door open. “Isn’t it terrible, what happened? You weren’t in the city today, were you Davey?”

He took the door, kissed her impossibly thin cheek. “No grandma, I was on the island today.”

She took his face in both hands. “Oh thank God.”

Thank you, he thought. “Thank God…”

“Come in, have a cup of tea.”

Moments later they were positioned exactly as they had been twenty four hours earlier- he seated, she setting water to boil.

“How are you feeling today?” he asked.

Grandma regarded him, shook her head. “Not that well today. I barely slept last night.”

“Why?” he asked.

“Oh,” she said, and indicated the ceiling with her eyes, “you know why…”

He nodded. “A lot of noise last night?” he asked.

She looked shaken. “I went up there last night; after you left. I could hear them.” She crossed her arms; shivered. “When I asked if they had eaten, they got so quiet…and I could hear that television again.”

Sullivan’s mouth felt suddenly arid; he swallowed hard.

“I don’t think they like that I know they’re here.” Tears were running down her face, but her voice was even. “So I listened for awhile- I just couldn’t help it- and then I practically ran down the stairs and locked myself in the bedroom.” And then, almost as an afterthought, “I haven’t run in thirty years.”

The pocket of Sullivan’s coveralls vibrated; he reached in, located his phone and silenced it. “Have you eaten today?”

She shrugged. “I had a bit of yogurt for lunch. I forced myself.”

“Do you want me to go up there and check it out for you again? I won’t tell mom.”

Grandma smiled, shook her head. “I appreciate it Davey, you’re a good boy. But no, it wouldn’t do any good. They come in at night; through a hole in the back of the closet, I think.”

Sullivan sweated, shivered. It sounded so insane, and yet coming from her it sounded so perfectly damned natural. Her delivery spooked him to the core.

His phone vibrated again. He knew who was calling, and was not about to answer in front of his grandmother. Hugh Dolan would get his money, he just needed to cool his heels for a day or two…

The kettle began to tick on the stove; grandma was looking out the window, her face ashen.

“Are you okay, grandma?”

She didn’t turn but kept staring off into the distance. She nodded. “I’m okay.”

“Was it something you heard them say?” Sullivan asked. “Is that what made you run?”

“I hear all kinds of things up there.” She said, turning to face him. “But it’s always on the television.”

“Do you remember what?” he asked, feeling intrusive.

“I do.” She said.

She turned to the cupboard above the sink, removed four place settings. “The thing is, Davey- and I know this sounds crazy- but I get the feeling that they want me to listen to their television. Whenever I make any noise up there they get so quiet...but that television is always on.”

Sullivan looked at his grandmother in silence. She looked back.

The teakettle whistled and they both jumped.

She poured two cups of boiling water over teabags. She left the extra two cups on the counter this time.

“Maybe I’m just going wacky.” She smiled and shook her head.

“I don’t think so, grandma. There are all sorts of things we can’t explain.” Sullivan sipped his tea, because he was expected to. “Were they watching the news again last night?”

Grandma thought. “Yes. They’re always watching the news. No matter what time I go up there, it’s always on.” She seemed to consider this as though it had only just occurred to her now. “It must be a cable news channel.”

That isn’t likely, Sullivan thought. It’s hard to get cable news on a television with no cable feed.

It was all so crazy; but there it was.

“What did you hear last night? I mean… are you sure it’s the news? Do they report on stocks and sports and weather?”

Grandma sipped her tea and nodded.

“I’m sorry…if you’d rather not talk about it…”

“No,” she said, her features set. “I don’t mind talking to you about it; but it stays between you and I, okay? I don’t need everyone thinking the old lady has wandered beyond the point of no return…”

She’d said this last in a joking manner, but Sullivan knew that she was making light of her situation. The fact that she would confide in him brought on a fresh wave of guilt. What was he doing? “Of course, grandma.” He said.

“Well last night the set was turned down very low, but I could still make it out clearly…”

Sullivan found himself leaning forward and made himself sit back. “What did you hear?”

Grandma’s eyes clouded over as she struggled to recall. “There was a bridge that collapsed in California…and there was a scandal involving- who’s that senator from New Hampshire? Oh, that’s right, Riley. It involves photographs.” She sipped her tea, her hands shaking, “the market was down; the Yankees lost; and if I remember correctly the daily numbers were 734.” She laughed; it was a frightened sound.

Sullivan regarded his grandmother with something approaching awe. He shook his head slowly and smiled. “Well, your memory for details seems fine…”

“But that’s just it Davey- I remember what I hear on their TV up there; but I can’t remember what I ate for breakfast this morning. My memory is lousy, but what I hear on their television stays with me. I wish it wouldn’t.”
“The fear, maybe,” Sullivan suggested. “it heightens the senses.”

“If we were dishonest, we could make a fortune…”

Grandma was kidding, of course.
.


**********************************


He would wait. Wait and see how accurate the information was. Mrs. Sullivan may not have raised any geniuses, but she hadn’t raised any fools either. He loved his grandmother, and surely there was something more going on in her head and in her home than some heady blend of senility and paranoia- but it just couldn’t be that simple...
Could it?



***********************************


The following day Sullivan was back at his grandmother’s. She’d sounded terrible on the phone; in person he could see that she was downright shaken. Her color was awful and the little muscles around her eyes and jaw worked involuntarily.

“Grandma…” he said, and took her hands, “What’s wrong?”

Tears streamed from her eyes; she kept her voice even by sheer force of will.

“I heard a racket,” she said, “about an hour ago it started- from up there.” She gave a meaningful glance at the ceiling. “A lot of shuffling around…and I could hear the voices.”

She took a deep breath, let it out.

“Take your time…” Sullivan said.

“I went up the stairs- very quietly. I even took my shoes off.” She shook her head, “They knew anyway. They always know when I’m coming….”

He waited.

“I know they know because they always clam up as soon as I get up there. Today I put my ear against the door. I could hear the television, but the sound was so low. I pressed a little harder into the door, trying to hear…and that’s when I felt it.”

The rash on Sullivan’s neck burned and itched; he barely noticed.

“Felt what...?” He asked.

Grandma looked him in the eye. “Them. One of them anyway. I could feel him moving against the door, as though...”
What tenuous grip she had on self-control failed her. She wept.

Sullivan waited while she regained some composure. He held her hand, listened to the drone of her useless air conditioner.

“As though what?” he prodded.

Grandma looked at him with red and swollen eyes. “As though…as though they’re listening to me…”


****************************************


Sullivan had offered to reschedule his remaining jobs and spend the afternoon, but grandma had flatly refused.

“I’ve been more than enough trouble to you already…” she’d said. He’d assured her that wasn’t the case but she remained firm. He’d relented, on condition that he would stop by on the way home from work and check in on her.

The afternoon proved a busy and frustrating one. The only thing less fun than an overflowed toilet, he was reminded, is an overflowed toilet in a house with no air conditioning during a heat wave. By the time Sullivan packed up the last of his tools he was feeling about the way he smelled. What’s more, the rash on his neck was becoming unbearable, and despite his best efforts he’d succeeding in scratching it raw.

Grandma was sitting on her stoop when Sullivan pulled into the driveway that evening. He wasted no time reaching her.

“Grandma what are you doing? It’s one hundred degrees out here!”

She looked up at him, and he stopped cold.

“Grandma…?”

“I went in.” There was a note of defiance in her trembling voice. “This is my house. So I went in.”

Sullivan shivered in the heat. He didn’t like the look in her eyes. “Why are you out here?” he asked.

“They don’t like that I talk about them to you.”

“They told you that?” He asked.

She nodded, regarded him with haunted eyes.

Outside in the daylight it all seemed so insane. With the hot humid air in his lungs and a day’s hard work in his pores- and that goddamned heat-rash torturing him- Sullivan found he had little patience for ghosts- even those that might still prove bringers of good fortune. He fought a sudden urge to yell at her then; to tell her how ridiculous all of this was.

“Let’s go inside. It’s dangerous out here.” He held out his hand and helped her to her feet.

It was cool inside the house, cool but not at all comfortable. It was a sickly cool, feverish and bone deep. “Did you get the air conditioner fixed?” Sullivan asked, and shivered.

Grandma shook her head as she closed the front door. “It gets like this sometimes. It won’t last long.” She motioned him toward his grandfather’s old armchair.

“What happened?”

She sat on the end of the couch. “I heard them very distinctly. They were talking about your father.”
Sullivan frowned. He knew that she meant his grandfather. “What did they say?”

“Well…the way they were speaking, it sounded as though he’s coming here- coming home.”

“Grandma…” He struggled to find the right words and couldn’t. “You do know Grandpa is dead, right?” Inwardly, he cringed, waited for who knew what sort of reaction.

She laughed. “Of course I do! I’m not that wacky..not yet anyway.”

He regarded her. “But…I mean, you know that people only die once, right? Grandpa isn’t going anywhere. His soul is with God. He’s in heaven.”

“Yes…” she said. Sullivan wasn’t sure he believed her.

“What happened after that?”

She looked down. “I went into the room.”

It took grandma less than three minutes to tell Sullivan what she’d seen and heard. For a long time the two sat in silence.

“Come stay with us.” He said, again.

“I can’t leave, not now!”

Sullivan thought he might cry; he bit the inside of his lip. “Grandma…”

She looked to him expectantly, but he was at a loss for words.

“It will be okay” she lied. Or maybe she hadn’t.

**************************************


The call came at 10:42 in the morning, and Sullivan wasn’t at all surprised. He’d sort of expected it, he realized. “How…?” He asked his wife.

“They suspect it was a stroke, or a heart attack. She passed peacefully, they said.”

Sullivan thanked his wife for calling, told her he loved her. He thought for a moment and pulled out his day-planner; the one his wife kept up because he was always double, and sometimes triple, booking jobs. He found the afternoon’s gig and dialed the number. He canceled.

The drive to his grandmother’s house felt like a dream. The heat-wave had broken, for one thing. It was still eighty-four degrees, but that’s a long way from one hundred, and the humidity had dropped appreciably. He didn’t light a cigarette as he turned into the development, didn’t feel like it.

He wondered if the cops would still be there, or the coroner. Not that it would matter if they were. But no, the driveway was empty and there were no emergency vehicles parked in front of the house. He pulled into the driveway, suddenly conscious of the fact that this would likely be one of the last times he did. He took a deep breath and walked up the old path to the door.

The authorities had locked the door, of course. Sullivan opened it with the key his grandfather had given him some fifteen years earlier. He stepped inside and breathed deeply- he’d always loved the smell of his grandparent’s home; the ghosts of a thousand fond memories lingered in every lungful.

For a moment he stood, letting the terrible emptiness of the place wash over him- permeate him. He didn’t even look toward the kitchen. If he had to go in there for some reason he would, otherwise he wanted to remember that room as it had been; full of life and generosity and gentle wisdom. He went to the stairs, ascended. It was noticeably cooler upstairs, but it wasn’t the toxic-seeming cool he’d experienced yesterday. It was quite pleasant, actually.

He paused on the landing at the top of the stairs. Goose-flesh raked his shoulders and arms. He looked at the door to his left, the one his poor grandmother had feared so. The door through which she’d heard such amazing and terrifying things.

Sullivan turned the knob and pushed. He took a deep breath and walked inside.

The room was exactly as he’d remembered it. There was nothing out of place, nothing out of the ordinary. There was the hexagonal table with the glass top where he and his cousins had played board games as children; and there, in its place, the closet door cut to run paralleled to the steep slope of the ceiling. A cardboard box that had once belonged to a microwave oven, now filled with Christmas decorations.

He walked over to the television set. It was an ancient black and white model that, now that he thought of it, wasn’t even cable-ready. Which meant, of course, that it was worse than useless these days. Nonetheless he checked the plug. It lay on the carpet, nowhere close to the nearest outlet.

The couch showed no signs of having been used any time lately, though Sullivan wasn’t sure he would be able to tell the difference. He forced himself to sit.

After a time he stood. He left the room and closed the door behind him. He descended.

He wasn’t ready to leave just yet. Maybe he’d go sit in the kitchen for a minute after all. He didn’t want the last memory of this wonderful place to be that upstairs room.

The kitchen was as it had been the day before; as it would remain until his mother, or he himself came and cleaned it out. The thought depressed him.

He sat at his place.

What was he going to do?

If this had been a movie, Sullivan mused, his grandmother would have used her amazing foresight one last time in order to save her stupid grandson. She’d have left him a note, perhaps, in her meticulous and somehow ancient handwriting, leaving him tomorrow’s quick-pick numbers.

This wasn’t a movie, though. This was real life, and if his grandmother had left him the score to tomorrow night’s football game, she hadn’t left it anywhere obvious.

Why in the world had he waited? Why couldn’t he have just accepted the amazing gift the universe had offered him on faith? She’d known about the plane crash, after all. What more proof should he have required?

And worst of all, why was he thinking about this now, when he’d just lost his grandmother. His predicament, he realized, wouldn’t even let him grieve.

Sullivan felt his mood darken. It fell as though it were something tangible. The answer to all of these self-defeating questions seemed suddenly so clear to him. He was a loser. The universe had broken its own laws in order to try and help him, and still he’d managed to dick it up.

He hadn’t known, until that moment, that he’d been planning on killing himself. Now that he was aware, he realized he’d been thinking about it for some time, days at least. With that awareness came a sense of blessed relief. It radiated from his core and out into his extremities, a morbid opiate. He cried.

A drink. He’d have a drink first. He had six years sober, now, but what did that matter? David Sullivan was about to stop the proverbial ride, and get his widening, middle-aged ass the hell off.

He rose and walked to the adjacent room. The liquor cabinet in the far corner of the room was fairly well stocked. Grandma didn’t drink, but a good Irish hostess always keeps some of the hard stuff around for those family and friends who do. Sullivan crouched and selected a three-quarters full bottle of what looked like pretty good bourbon. With his free hand he selected a tumbler- if this was to be his last drink, he didn’t want it to be out of the bottle.

Seated once again at his usual place, Sullivan opened the whiskey and poured four fingers of golden-brown liquor into his glass. He placed his hand around the tumbler- and paused.

This is no good… he thought.

And it wasn’t. Perhaps this was the end, and perhaps suicide was the only means of relief...but here? No. Not here- not in this place of kindness and generosity. Not in the one place where he’d always felt at home. To do so would be to disgrace the memory of his grandparents. Permanent relief would have to wait.

His cellular phone rang. Resolute, David Sullivan stood, dumped his cocktail into the sink and pressed the green icon on the keypad. “Hello.” He said, brusquely.

“Davey-boy,” the voice on the line said, “Hugh Dolan.”

“Hello Hugh. Look, I tried calling…”

The voice on the line spoke over him. “I got your message.”

“Hugh, I’ll have the money,” Sullivan lied, “I just need a little more time…”

“I heard about your grandmother. I called to offer my condolences.”

Sullivan wasn’t quite sure if he could believe what he was hearing. “How did you hear?” he managed.

“Our gal Maggie....” Dolan answered. “How she heard I couldn’t tell you.”

For a moment Sullivan didn’t speak, didn’t know what to say. “Thank you.” He said at last.

“I don’t know if you know this, Davey, but your grandmother was very kind to my ma when she was sick. Stopped in to check in on her, read to her and such.” The voice on the line paused. “I haven’t forgotten that. A good woman, your gramma.”

David swallowed over a lump in his throat. “I didn’t know that, Hugh.” he said. “But it doesn’t surprise me.”

“You’ll call me with the funeral arrangements, right Davey?” Sullivan’s former classmate said. “I mean, don’t make me hear about it from someone else.”

“Of course, Hugh. I’ll call as soon as I know...”

“About the other thing...”

Sullivan’s stomach flip-flopped in his abdomen. “Yeah?”

“We can revisit that say...a month from now?”

For the second time is as many minutes, relief flooded Sullivan’s system. “Yes... yes of course, Hugh.”

“Don’t worry, Davey-boy” the voice on the phone said, “we’ve known each other since kindergarten. We’ll work this out.”

“Thank you.” Sullivan said. “Thank you.”

Dolan coughed. “Alright, call me with the arrangements.”

“I will…” Sullivan answered, but the connection had already been broken. He thumbed the red icon and returned the phone to his pocket. He stood halfway between the kitchen table and the stainless-steel sink, frozen in thought. Only that wasn’t quite right- thought was a part of what he was experiencing, but only a small part. Waves of disparate, and in in some cases conflicting, emotion coursed over, around, and through him. They moved too quickly, though, and proved too slippery for him to hold onto any one of them for very long.

. At some point he became aware, in an offhanded, out-of-body sort of way, that he’d begun to cry. David Sullivan, forty-five years old and still (by the grace of God and circumstance) a recovering alcoholic; David Sullivan, who up until only moments before had been planning on giving up on himself and his life, wept great heaving sobs that wracked his entire frame.
His thoughts returned, after a time, to the here and now. He walked into the living room, past his grandfather’s armchair and reached for the front-doorknob; he paused.

He turned then, and- because it would likely be his last chance- returned to the kitchen. Grandma’s ancient teakettle rested in its usual spot on the stove, its time of service now nearly at an end. He filled it with tap-water from the sink and replaced it, lit the burner with a wooden match.






John Kane
10/25/16
Long Island, New York