Walking Backwards - Episode 13
A few months have passed since the death of Rick Anders. The voices come back in full force and fury. Mark is acting strangely and disappears until a shooter's moon.
Welcome to the thirteenth episode of Walking Backwards, the third collection of not quite true tales of Texas. Previous collections are:
The Cold Days of Summer - If you are new to these tales and the type who likes to know how things started I would recommend starting here.
The Hollow Men - the second collection of not quite true tales of Texas.
New episodes are posted (almost) every Sunday. You can move easily between episodes via links to the previous and next episode.
If you are new to these not quite true tales of Texas but are the type who likes to dive right in you could start with the prologue to Walking Backwards. The prologue provides a summary of the first two collections and descriptions of the major characters you will be reading about in Walking backwards.
In our last episode, episode 12 of Walking Backwards, Drew and Mark try to help each other out after Rick's death but Drew isn’t sure if it’s working, and Drew, Ann, Buster, and Sam welcome a new member to their family.
Beware a shooter’s moon
I did my best to get back in a rhythm after Ricks’ death, but the voices wouldn’t leave me alone. Every forty days, every forty God damn days the voices spoke to me. First, I would hear “I'm not done with you yet.” Then three days later I would hear “Life seems to be forever but the people in it just seem to come and go.” Like clockwork, every forty days. Once I heard the first voice while I was driving to Houston. Another time I was woken from a dead sleep by the second voice. Different times of day I would hear the voices, there was no discernible pattern there, save that roughly every forty days the voices would speak. I was once again learning to not pay attention to them and hoped in time they might become nothing more than noise but for now, they stood out.
When the occurrence is so regular, you get a little weary and leery as the forty days countdown. I knew it was going to occur, I just didn't know exactly where and when.
On October 8, 1989 the first voice screamed “I'm not done with you yet!” at 11:45 pm. The day was nearly done but I hadn't heard the voice yet and was unable to fall asleep, dreading what was to come. I was reading in the living room. Sam was sleeping by the front door. Ann and Buster were sound asleep in our bedroom. Rae was sleeping in her room. Since August, Rae had been sleeping through the night so one of the most exhausting parts about being a new parent, the night feedings, was past us.
I was startled by the loudness of the voice and dropped my book. Sam lifted her head, sniffed, whined, jumped up on the couch and curled up to me. I petted her until she relaxed and fell back asleep. That was it, one loud scream, for that day.
“Life seems to be forever but the people in it just seem to come and go.” was spoken quietly, in almost a whisper on Wednesday, October 11th. I was driving to the grocery store, listening to “Never been any reason” by Head East on a classic rock station when just above the song I heard the voice. Once home I logged the information in my journal and noted on the calendar when I would expect to hear the voices again.
Thursday came and went. Friday morning I realized I hadn't talked to Mark in nearly a month. That was strange. He had the habit of calling me nearly every Friday evening since Rick died, but I hadn't noticed until this day the habit had been broken.
Friday evening, 9:00 pm. I still hadn't heard from Mark, so I called him. Mark didn't answer. I left a message on his answering machine. I stayed up to almost midnight just in case he called. He didn't.
Early Saturday morning was cool, but the high would be near 80 before the day was done. No rain, a good day to work a little in the yard and spend time with the girls and Buster. I was in the back yard with Sam, Buster and Rae when Ann told me I had a phone call.
I brought Rae back in the house, handed her off to Ann and picked up the phone.
“Hello?”
“Drew? This is Art, Art Kilmer. Hey, how are you doing?”
“Fine, and you?” I couldn't remember ever talking to Art on the phone before and was wondering what was up.
“Good, good.” There was a long pause before Art spoke again. “Look, this is going sound sort of strange... Have you talked to Mark lately?”
“No, not in nearly a month, which isn't normal, we talk most Friday nights. I called him last night but he didn't answer. Why do you ask? Has something happened?”
“No, I don't think so, but he did call me Thursday morning. Strange call, but Mark has been getting strange for awhile, more so since Rick died.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, the drinking isn't that strange. He always drank, it just seems that there aren't many dry times between the wet if you know what I mean.”
I did. Over the last few months Mark's calls seemed to be more and more liquid.
“Then there's the call Thursday morning. I was at work, he called me there and ranted about everything, football, politics, religion. He seemed pissed about everything, didn't matter what subject came up, he was pissed at it. The call had gone on and on with no end in sight. I suggested we get together for lunch, have a chance to sit down for some food and conversation. He said no, that he was busy getting ready for a hunting trip, that starting this coming Thursday night there would be a shooter's moon. What the hell is that?”
Something about “shooter's moon” was familiar. I let the phrase roll around in my mind trying to figure it out a little too long.
“Drew, you still there?”
“Yeah, I'm here. Sorry, I was thinking about shooter's moon. I can't figure out what it means, but it feels like it is on the tip of my tongue.”
“There's something else that's strange. Mark told me had talked to Tommy. Hell, Tommy's been dead for fourteen years. I asked when he talked to Tommy. He said he talked to him on Wednesday, fucking Wednesday. He said Tommy had told him that you can't pick the time of your death. That you die when it is your time.”
Tommy had told me that the first time I met him in the field in a dream after he was dead. To hear Art say that Tommy had told Mark the very same thing fourteen years later was strange indeed.
“Mark was laughing, saying he told Tommy that he was wrong, that you can pick the time of your death, that living and dying is totally in the person's control. Is that crazy or what?”
“It's crazy. Man, talking to Tommy when Tommy has been dead for fourteen years. That is crazy.”
I didn't see any point in telling Art I had been talking to Tommy ever since he died, same for my Dad, same for Rick. Nope, no point in mentioning that.
Art and I talked for a few more minutes about Mark. We managed to get both of ourselves concerned and promised that if we heard anything we would let the other person know.
Later that afternoon the meaning of shooter's moon bubbled up in my memory. My Mom's cousin Bert owned a ranch outside of Sonora, Texas, a couple of hours west of San Antonio on I-10. When I was ten or eleven we visited Bert and his family during the fall. One night we were sitting on the porch, drinking iced tea and lemonade when Burt stood up, walked out into the yard and looked up at the moon, not quite full, but bright in the sky. He said it was a shooter's moon. My Mom asked what that was. Bert said a shooter's moon shows up around a week before and after a full moon. He said it was a good moon to hunt by, not bright enough to be seen by all of the creatures out and about, but bright enough that you could see a critter's eyes shining with the moon's reflection.
Today, Saturday October 14th, 1989, there would be a full moon. According to cousin Bert, the shooter’s moon occurred about a week before and after a full moon. The shooter’s moon might last from the coming Thursday through the weekend, right in line with what Mark had told Art.
I called Mark's phone three times that Saturday. Mark didn't answer. Each time I left a message. I called every day. I talked to Art every day. He had called around. So had I. No one had heard from Mark.
The week passed.
Around 7:00 pm on Saturday, October 21st, the phone rang. It was Art. This was when I learned I wouldn't be talking to Mark anymore, at least not in this world.
“Drew, I, uh.., well, they found Mark about 30 minutes ago.”
“They? Who is they? Where was Mark?”
“The county sheriffs. They came across an abandoned car on a caliche road, near Texaco Plant Road, south of town.”
Texaco Plant Road? I knew that road. I had driven out there the Sunday after graduating from high school with an ice chest of beer. Tommy and Nicole Devers, both dead, had met me there.
Art continued talking. I didn't hear every word but I did get the gist of the story. Earlier that day some guy was driving down the caliche roads, headed for one of the tank stations when he saw Mark's car pulled off to the side of the road. He thought that was strange so he stopped and took a look around. About thirty yards off the road he found Mark's body. He went back to this car and using his mobile radio called the county sheriffs office. They sent two sheriffs out to the site. They found the car, an ice chest beside the car and a lot of empty beer cans. They found Mark's body away from the car. Best they could tell, Mark walked out into the field, sat down on the ground, faced to the east, put a pistol to his right temple and pulled the trigger. The sheriffs think Mark's body had been out in the field since sometime late Thursday or early Friday. That was right in line with Mark saying there would be a shooter’s moon.
Mark had killed himself.
“Drew, you still there?”
“Yeah, Art, still here. Shit. Who else knows?”
“Mark's parents, I don't know who else.”
There were a number of other phone calls to and from Odessa that weekend. The details of what happened weren't any clearer. By Sunday evening, a few details about the future clarified. Mark's funeral would be late the following week. I planned to go to Odessa about the middle of the week. I would be going alone. Rae was almost five months old. Neither Ann or I thought it would be good for the two of them to go to Odessa this time around.
Sunday night I dreamed, but not of the field. I stood in darkness. A hard rain began to fall. The rain was cold and it wasn't long before my clothes, skin, muscles and bones were soaked through and through. There was no one there, and no clear direction to follow. I looked around, saw nothing and figured it didn’t matter which way I went so I started walking. I walked in darkness, no stars in the sky and no familiar landmarks.
Time passes in no particular way when I’m in the dream world, so I don’t know how much time had passed or how far I had walked before I found Mark. The rain was still falling, the ground was saturated, and the water was pooling on the ground. Mark was hunkered down to the ground, his t-shirt and jeans soaked from the rain. He didn't see me. I stood over him for a moment but he wasn't aware I was there.
“Mark.”
He looked up at me and shivered, maybe it was the rain, maybe it was something else.
“What the fuck did you do? What were you thinking of?”
He looked up at me, at first like a kid lost, looking for his parents but I could see a little anger in his eyes.
“Drew, you of all people, asking me what I did? You know what I did, you know why I did it. You know it better than anyone else could. I got tired of living, of not being in control of my world, of my life. You know exactly how I feel. I couldn't talk about this to anyone, but I could have talked to you, so don't give me this shit like you don't know what it is like to feel like there is no point to anything. Like any of this shit means anything. Don't give me that shit!”
He was right. I knew how he felt, I knew how that felt. I just didn't know that's how he had been feeling.
“God damn, it's cold. Does it rain like this all of the fucking time? It hasn't stopped since I woke up here.”
“How long you been here?”
“Since I, well, you know, I finished things off.”
“That was two, maybe three days ago, back in the other world.”
“Shit, two to three fucking days! Where the hell am I?”
“I don't know. This place isn't familiar. Doesn't look familiar, doesn't seem familiar.”
“Hey, what are you doing here? You're the first familiar thing I've seen since I've been here.”
“I don't know why I am here. I don't know.” I could feel the dream slipping away. This world was getting dimmer, softer, out of focus. It was about to disappear or I was about to disappear from it. “Look, I don't know what to tell you, but if you see a light, like the lights of a town on the horizon, walk towards it, just walk towards it.”
I was gone. Mark was gone. The rain had stopped. I woke up in my bedroom with Ann asleep at my side. Sam stood by the bed softly whimpering. I petted her and she calmed down. I eventually fell back asleep.
Monday and Tuesday I tied up loose ends and let people know I would be out the rest of the week. Wednesday morning I kissed Ann and Rae goodbye and drove west to Odessa. I arrived at my Mom's house in the late afternoon.
Thursday and Friday were blurs of people. The service was set for Saturday at the First Baptist Church near downtown Odessa. Mark's Dad asked me to say something at the service. I drank too much Thursday and Friday night. Thursday night those of us who were in town gathered at Art's house. Friday night we gathered at J.T.'s and Sue's house. I drank way too much and slept in a spare bedroom. I woke up Saturday morning at 5:00 am. The rest of the house was asleep. I dressed quietly and left. The service was at 2:00 pm and I had to figure out what I was going to say.
I drove out to the remains of Golden Acres. Nothing much had changed since I had been there in January. The old cinder brick clubhouse was still standing. I parked in the caliche parking lot. I got out of my car and walked the first loop out from the clubhouse. On the tee of number three I found where the water spigot once was. All that was left was a pipe rising out of the ground, I didn't feel refreshed, I wasn't rejuvenated, my sins of the last hole were not washed away. I did not feel whole. I was hollow, nothing but skins and bones, skin and bones.
I drove to my Mom's house and got ready for the service. Mom rode with me and we arrived at the church at 1:45 pm. We sat in the church and waited for others to arrive. The service began, the music played, there was a choir. Eventually I felt my Mom nudge me. It was my turn.
I stood up in front of them all. I had to say something but I couldn't say what I felt, what I believed. I felt like I was dying, like a part of me had been cut off. I wanted to be dead. I was tired of living, it was just too damn hard. I had lost too much and I didn't want to lose any more. I had nothing good to say, nothing at all, nothing that was real. If I told the truth I would do no one any good, so I had to lie.
I had to lie. And I did.
I told them stories about Mark. I told them about the day after Tommy had died, how Rick, Mark and I had driven to Pecos, of how we stuck out because we wore Levi's and not Wranglers, of the best thing about that day, the enchiladas and that was thanks to Mark knowing where to get them. I told them about stealing brownies from Greg Connors and Mark's role in that. I told them about Mick Jagger and Keith Richards on High Noon and how the only two people I knew who had witnessed this was Mark and me, both of us had stayed home that day feigning illness just because we didn't want to go to school.
I told them about the drunken week we had both spent when we had been laid off in Austin and how Jack was the one who kicked our asses and got us back on track. Some of the stories were true, some of the stories I spiced up a bit, some were flat out made up. But I was lying all the time because I never said what was really on my mind. By the time I was done I had the whole church laughing and crying.
Afterwards people walked up to me and said they had never heard such an affirmation of life, that what I said was beautiful, that the Lord's presence was surely in me that day, that I had done the best thing that anyone could do on such a day. I smiled, shook their hands, accepted their praise, all the while knowing everything I said that day was a lie, it was all a lie. I was reminded of something I learned as a child. People want to believe in something and they'll believe a lie if it is comforting and if it seems real. It's all in the delivery.
Sunday I drove back to West Columbia, to those I loved. But a part of me didn't make the trip. A part of me was dead and buried in Odessa.
Time passed slowly and I often dreamed of Mark. It was always the same dream. I would wake up in darkness, no stars, no landmarks. I would start walking, the hard rain would start, and I would find Mark hunkered down, shivering in the rain. We would talk, nothing would be learned, nothing would be gained, and the dream would end. In all this time he had never seen the light on the horizon.
Next week in episode 14 of Walking Backwards several months have passed since Mark’s death. Drew, Ann and Rae travel to Odessa. Drew learns again about the power of forgiveness from his Mom. Mark begins to see the light.
never have been able to fully understand suicide...I understand pain and confusion, just not the part about giving up