Dead On Arrival~ Season 2- Episode 17: More Than Meets The Eye

Episode 17: More Than Meets The Eye

Narrated by Matthew

From afar I watched the proceedings. With Jones’s full permission, we held a small funeral in the back yard for Grace. Her body to be buried amongst the flowers where she breathed her last breath. I couldn’t bring myself to get any closer than the porch. The guilt was eating me alive. I was on watch. This was my fault.

I noticed Vince standing around the dugged out grave where Grace’s body laid now. He held on to Audrey as he sadly looked on. He glanced back at me. I fully expected to get the evil eye from him, but he just looked somber and serious. I looked away almost feeling ashamed of myself. If I hadn’t been interrogating him and harassing him I would have seen Grace. Possibly maybe even saved her. Hell, if I had just listened to him I could have prevented all of this.

Omar stood by in a black suit borrowed by Jones as Jones himself said a prayer during the makeshift service. DJ stood by with a shovel looking grim. Madison, Lin, and Wade also stood around in black garments fitting for a funeral. Everyone was pretty much dressed up. Aaron leaned on the railing beside me seemingly to be sober for once. Not for long I figured. Tao sat on the bench behind me quiet as a mouse. Unusual for him, but expected. Nathan joined me on the porch beside me suddenly. I smiled at him as he looked over at me and he turned away ignoring me. I was shocked. He seemed angry.

In fact, everyone seemed to be cold towards me. Wade, especially after calling me out over Grace’s death. He was furious and cursed under his breath when we bumped into each other in the kitchen earlier. Madison, on the other hand, hadn’t forgiven me for lying to her from before. She slept on the other side of the living room away from me after that night. This only topped it off I’m sure. I was pretty sure I was on the top of everyone’s shit list.

When the funeral was over and everyone began to filter into the house, DJ picked up the shovel and began filling the grave. Omar had thrown the first piles of dirt into the grave, but the young man had taken over from the looks of it. I came over and grabbed the shovel nearby.

“I’ll do it,” I said as he glanced up at me. “Go back in the house.”

Omar who stayed behind to talk to Madison on the porch looked over at me. A picture of grief. He dabbed his eyes with a handkerchief and said nothing entering the house. Madison followed cutting her eye at me before disappearing. Vince though stayed watching from the stairs as I shoveled in dirt. He looked conflicted looking at the house and back at me. He eventually walked over and grabbed the extra shovel DJ had left. He began helping me shoveling dirt in. Our eyes meeting for a brief moment, but nothing was said between us. We continued in silence saying nothing. Nothing needed to be said.

I spent most my evening in silence. Everyone mostly stayed to themselves while some just actively avoided me. There was no doubt that a dark cloud was hanging over the house now. Part of me wished I was anywhere, but here. I decided to spend the evening sitting on the front porch steps with a bottle of wine. The cool air tonight was soothing and the sound of crickets reminded me of home. I drink from the bottle and savored the bitter flavor. I wasn’t even halfway into the bottle when I suddenly smelled cigarette smoke. I looked over to see Vince standing next to me now smoking. The cigarette hung out of his mouth and balanced on his lower lip. He appeared to be still dressed up just as I, but he had a backpack on.

I furrowed my brow. “Going somewhere?”

“Thinking about it,” he said taking the cig out of his mouth and blowing out a cloud of smoke in my face.

“So you’re going just leave with your tail between your legs?” I asked eyeing him. “Leave Audrey when she needs you the most?”

“Fuck off!”

“I’m just asking.”

“I said I’m just thinking about it. Not actually doing it. I don’t know. I just don’t do well with this shit. It’s unbearable,” he muttered. “Weren’t you the one who wanted me to go?”

I shrugged. “Yeah, but I changed my mind. I’m thinking maybe I was wrong about you. I sure as hell haven’t been making the best decisions lately.”

“No shit!”

I laughed. “Can I have a puff?”

He frowned and handed me the cigarette. I took a nice long drag from it. It was stale, but I had missed this taste. I blew the smoke out of my nose and mouth. I watched it float in the air marveling its intricate swirls. I handed it back to him and he held onto it flicking ashes onto the ground.

“Wine?” I said offering him the bottle. He took the bottle, studied it, read the label, and took a sip.

He chuckled. “It’s a miracle you found alcohol in this house with Aaron around.”

“It’s a miracle you found a cigarette. You got any more?”

“Nah. If I did I wouldn’t be saving this,” he said puffing from it. He handed it back to me. “I lucked up and found this when we first discovered the gas station some weeks ago.”

I happily took it and smirked. “Well, it’s pretty stale but good. I had quit before when things were normal. Got back in the habit after I found a pack in a convenient store recently. Went through the pack pretty fast. Thought I might never see another cig. As bad as it is for your health, I sure I miss it.”

He shrugged. “You’ll be surprised at how much you miss nowadays.”

“You know I haven’t had the guts to face Omar. I can’t imagine what’s he’s going through,” I lamented. “I heard Grace might have woke up in the middle of the night looking for that damn cat. She might have thought it was outside terrorizing the chickens or something. She probably didn’t even see the walker.”

“Most people like that with Alzheimer’s wander around at strange hours anyway. She probably had no idea what she was doing.”

“Are you trying to make me feel better?”

“Maybe,…but you still fucked up majorly.”

“I know that. Must you be so blunt?” I chuckled trying not to cringe. I slowly deflated feeling guilt wash me over again. “So, what makes you think there’s more to me?”

He shrugged again seemingly mulling over his answer. He exhaled. “It’s something about you. Sometimes you seem cold. Like you’ve seen some shit or been through some shit. Well before the corpses took over at least. I just don’t think you were some ordinary privilege white boy with a cushy job is what I’m saying.”

“Now you’re making assumptions Mr. Martez,” I said handing him what was left of his cigarette. I then laughed and looked him right in the eye. “I can see why you would say that, but I am what I say I am. Now, I wasn’t always ‘privileged’. I did grow up poor in a small town. As for being 'cold’, you can blame my father for that I guess.

"Damn, you got old man problems too?”

I took the bottle from him and took a nice long drink. I sighed. “I guess so. Well, he wasn’t a terrible father compared to some. He took care of us and was there at least, but he was strict and old fashion. You see our older sister, Rachel had it easy. She was his little princess. She was raised as daddy’s little girl. Us boys, me and Nate, we were raised to be men. Men in the images of him or what he wanted us to be at least.”

I took another sip. “He put guns in our hands before we could say my ABCs. We were raised to be cold, calculating, and tough. One of our first lessons was hunting. We would hunt deer mostly. I…I didn’t like it. I never did. Shooting something that couldn’t shoot back or defend itself seemed unfair. Even to me as a little kid, but there was no crying with him. Boys didn’t cry in his presence and he didn’t raise sissys. We would get whoopings if we did.”

“Damn.”

“Yeah,” I chuckled again. “I remember he took me and my brother out in the forest one day. Told us we had to shoot our first deer. Each of us. We were only nine then. I remember hunting down one and then taking aim at the poor creature. I thought there was something beautiful about them. Majestic you know. I aimed at it and remember my hands shook as I began to squeeze the trigger, but I couldn’t do it. I lowered my gun and told him I couldn’t do it. Begged him not to make me, but he threatened to beat me and my brother till we couldn’t stand. Then beat us again if he felt like it. So I took the shot.”

“You took it?”

“Yeah. I was supposed to shoot the poor thing in the head. I shot it in the torso and it fell but it cried and cried. It was the most horrible sound I ever heard. He slapped me in the back of the head for not getting a clean shot. Then he dragged me and my brother over to it. I watched it squirm and scream in pain. It was horrible. That’s when I began crying and my brother followed. We both cried and that only enraged my father. He cursed at us. Told us to stop crying and be men. Then he handed me a knife and told me to finish what I started. He wanted me to stab it in the head.”

“Did you stab it?”

“Of course I did. I had no choice. He wasn’t going put it out of its misery and I feared what might happen if I didn’t, so I did. Now it would take me several minutes and I begged him to do it, but I did. Then we took it home. He made us watch him skin it. Then we ate it for dinner that night. Typical and pretty common for animals we raised too.”

I grimaced. “It was one of the many lessons he would force on us. Practically beat into us. I can still hear his words. His lessons.”

“Well, how about your mom? Didn’t she do anything?”

“No, but I don’t blame her. Maybe I should, but I don’t. At the end of the day, she was a good mom.”

“So let me see here. You’re basically saying you got a bit of excuse to be an asshole. So what? We all had fucked up lives one way or another.”

"True. Very true.”

“But the point I was making is I’ve been like this all my life. It’s always been easier for me to assume the worse in people. Easier to mistrust. What I did last night. You didn’t deserve that. There’s no excuse for that. I’m sorry,” I said looking him in the eye now.

“It’s fine,” he said nodding flashing me an earnest smile. “So that’s all that makes you tick?”

“Well yeah. When I got older I made a point to move out to the city and make something for myself. Now that I that think about it, I got carried away with that too I guess. That cushy job became my life.  It became more important than anyone and anything. Not to mention I was a ruthless asshole. Maybe I did become my dad.”

“I doubt that. Well, I barely know you, but these people seem to respect you. To like you.”

“Yeah, but I couldn’t blame them if they didn’t now. After what happened to Grace. I failed her and everyone.”

I felt warm tears collect at my bottom lid but I kept my composure. Vince kept quiet as he appeared to be in deep in thought now. He threw the cigarette butt on the ground and stomped the embers still looking downward away from me.

“I don’t know why I told you all this. You probably hate me yourself,” I said rubbing my eyes and letting out a small laugh.

“I don’t hate you,” he said sitting down next me now with his eyes solely on me. “I pity you, but one thing. I guess I should pity Nate too. Sounds like you both had it rough.”

“Well, he did. I mostly took the brunt of it. He may not look it, but he’s always been the sensitive one. He used to faint at the sight of blood. My father considered him weak and I was the one with potential. I often resented my brother for that.”

“So let me see you’re a fucked up white kid who ran away from Mommy and Daddy, went to the city with your bro, became a fancy executive and now you’re here slumming it up with an ex-convict in the apocalypse?

I laughed. "That’s a pretty good summary.”

“And part of me was hoping you were a spy.”

We shared a chuckle and I downed the last of the wine. We then heard the door open and Madison appeared. She stepped out onto the porch staring at the both of us.

She wore a very confused expression on her face as she did. “Um…am I missing something? You’re not trying to kill each other?” she perplexed.

“No,” we both said shrugging.

“Are you two feeling ok?” she asked still bewildered. She then looked down at the empty wine bottle now sitting on the ground. “You’re drunk? Really drunk?”

I scoffed. “Madison. We buried the hatchet. Is it that hard to believe?”

“In each other? You buried a hatchet in each other?”

I grabbed her playfully and she fell onto my lap. She didn’t try to struggle. She sat there looking back at me with a worried expression on her face. She seemed to be in a forgiving mood as well.

“Well, I’m going to leave you two love birds alone,” Vince said slightly frowning at the two of us. He got up and headed towards the house.

“Oh, no you can stay,” Madison pleaded.

“Nah. I’ll catch y'all later.”

“Vince,” I said. He stopped in his tracks. “Thanks for listening to me.”

He flashed me a small smile. “Um..sure. Anytime..”

He went back inside leaving me and Madison alone. She remained on my lap. Her eyes searching my face still looking concerned.

“You been crying?” she asked touching my face.

“No. It was something in my eye. I’m fine,” I said wiping them.

“Well, I came to bury the hatchet too,” she purred in my ear. She got up from my lap and sat down beside me. She placed her head on my shoulder and sighed. “I don’t want to be mad anymore. I don’t even want to think.”

“Me either.”

“I just want to forget today ever happened. Forget last night ever happened. I just want things to go back to normal. I want everything to be ok again. Is that stupid?”

I looked into her eyes. Her eyes so beautiful, but so sad. Something about her seemed so small at this moment. So vulnerable. I rubbed her back ensuring her. “No. Everything will be ok. I promise.”

She then lifted up looking alarmed. She seemed to be staring at the bushes as if looking for something.

“What’s wrong?” I asked straining to see anything.

“It’s… it’s nothing. I’m just being paranoid,” she said forcing a smile on her face. She leaned her head back on my shoulder. “You’re right. Everything’s going to be alright.”

Sorry for the delay.  Schoolwork. >_< Looks like someones watching. 😱

P.S. This is my first time making poses on stairs b/w. xD