The Millennial Ch. 3 (Pt 2/2)

               Digging and filling and filling and digging. They’d had their share of digging and filling.

               David and Juan trudged past an abandoned warehouse; shattered glass littered the sidewalk and the world was a plastered, metallic gray. David walked his bike alongside himself, avoiding the broken shards and listening to the spokes of his wheels. The hum of the click.

               The sun would be setting soon; Juan stopped at the entrance of the Helvetica Springs Cemetery. He stood for some time in silence, holding his shoulder where the tiger tattoo sat underneath his shirt. “It’s a place I like to go to remind myself,” he said finally.

                “Of what?” David asked.

                “That someday we will be here. Not here precisely. But here.”

                David nodded. “Do you want to go in?”

                A trio of dark granite monuments dedicated to the city’s founders dominated the entrance. History was with these men, their obelisks pointing high into the air. Intricate plaques bearing gold letters told the story of how these men had built the city, ground up. At the base of each obelisk bouquets piled up, generously donated by City Hall once a week.

                Carnations and chrysanthemums. White lilies and red roses.

                Daisies.

                Gladioli—glad you are alive.

                “Ground up,” Juan said. “Helvetica Springs, neutral as the Swiss.” He pulled a small flask from his pocket and took a swig. He offered it to David.

                “What’s in it?” David asked.

                “Whiskey.”

                “Yes, please.” He took the flask.

                “This fucking city,” Juan said as he wiped his nose. “We’re sans-serif, David. We don’t want to make anybody mad, don’t want to give the wrong impression. Everything is so goddamned neutral.”

                David took a swig from the flask and handed it back. He watched as Juan checked his surroundings, then slowly bent down and grabbed a small bunch of roses.

                “You’re taking that?” David asked.

                “I’ve stolen communion wine from a priest. I think a few flowers will be the least of my concerns hell-wise.”

                David smiled and grabbed a bunch himself.

                “We’ve washed ourselves of all the calloused hands and broken backs and erected three granite dicks in their place. See how tall they get. Ground up. Toil, sweat, blood and tears.”

                “I believe that’s the wrong order. Churchill would turn over in his grave.”

                “Perhaps if he were buried here.”

                “It is the sort of nonsense up with which he would not put.”

                Juan led David to the old gravestones of those who had died during the founding of the great city. Taking turns, they left a flower at each of the graves. David knelt beside one and traced the illegible letters of the crumbling gravestone with his finger. Was the epitaph witty? Or solemn? Perhaps the letters had been chiseled delicately by the hand of a husband grieving his wife, worn away with time. “Burial is one of the oldest of human traditions,” David said. “A hole is dug. A body fills the void. Digging and filling. Possessions have been found in the burials of humanity’s ancestors. It predates us.”

                “I like to make up their stories. Pretend to have some knowledge of them. At least someone is trying to remember them.” Juan pointed to the stone David was tracing. “What do you think happened to her?”

                “What makes you think it was a ‘her’?”

                “I have a feeling.”

                “I bet she was a lonely mistress,” David put simply.

                “Three months,” Juan said. “She had to wait three months each time, just for one short night to see her lover. He could only come to her when the old bank sent him here on business. They would meet outside the school where she taught. Each time he would bring her a white flower and when they were done, he would go back to his wife and pretend nothing happened. The next time he came to her, she was carrying a child. He became infused. Threw a lantern. Refused to speak to her again.

                “She grew sick and died a month later, their child along with her. The man came back during his next visit and learned of her fate. It ruined him. He visited the grave, but there was nothing there to remember her or his child. In the city, he purchased the headstone and had the caretaker place it here. He never returned; he is buried next to his wife in the family plot.”

                They walked the grounds, putting their hands to the lichen-rich stones and running them over the cracks; at others, they told a story. The rich accounts of carpenters, shepherds, actresses and even an Internet tycoon. They stopped before an ordinary-looking plot, one word etched into the generic headstone.  Francisco.

                “He was the owner of a local strip club,” David began to say, but Juan put his arm on David’s shoulder.

                “I have this one,” he said.

                David stepped aside.

                “He lived in a small Latin country, trying to make a living caring for horses. Came into money trouble. His wife died in childbirth and he fled the country with the baby. It was his last link to her. He found his way to America and settled down in a small city. Went to church, found a nice elderly couple who invited him to dinner on Sundays. Then every night. He named them his child’s godparents. One day, he was driving and was hit by a mother of two. Not a drop to drink, was driving to pick up her kids from soccer practice. It was just an accident. No one’s fault. An accident. The boy came to his father’s grave once a week. Left flowers. The boy came to know the other graves, giving them stories, hoping they kept his father company in the afterlife.”

                Juan set the remaining roses down on his father’s grave. He’d had his share of digging and filling.

----

                “He was your father,” David said.

                “Yes,” Juan answered.

                “You live with your godparents.”

                “They adopted me shortly after.”

                “I called him a strip club owner.”

                “You could not have known.”

                David put his hand to Juan’s back and led him to the cemetery’s exit. “I should have known. I should have guessed. How can I be forgiven?”

                “There is nothing to forgive,” Juan said.

                “A good deed,” David said.

                “A good deed?”

                “Yes, to be cashed in anytime you need it.”

                “Anytime?” Juan asked.

                “Yes, anytime,” David said, thinking back. “Cheer up now. I only do favors for people I like.”