“No one knew what possessed him to go into the pond. The water was murky. There was even a sign saying no trespassing. When I think about it I imagine the sound of those damned Cicadas playing in the background. That’s what I remember of Wappoo, the humidity and that sound ringing everywhere you went. And of course what happened to Sam.”

We were sitting in the shade outside WalMart smoking those camel crush cigarettes Rhonda loved. The kind where you crush the bottom and it gives it a menthol taste. I never liked them much. I smoked them because of her.

She was looking at me with her eyes and there was no expression. There wasn’t a flicker of anything. I was looking hard hoping for some kind of response. Sadness. Sympathy. Horror. There was nothing there. I didn’t know if I hated her for it or I kind of respected the hell out of her. She wasn’t the kind who would feign anything. She didn’t like to give you the usual bullshit. The vigorous nodding like most people do when there’s nothing they can say. She just sat there listening as if I was telling her about the new HBO series.

I liked to think Rhonda and I were friends.

She sighed. She emitted a huge amount of air when she sighed, enough to fill up a hot air balloon. She closed her eyes, inhaled her sweet tasting menthol cigarettes and said nothing in response. Absolutely nothing. After a while she checked her watch and said coolly that her break was over. Only then did I see something. It wasn’t what I had expected. It was a look of understanding. I loved her for it.

She was gone too quickly. It didn’t matter though because I was stuck in my thoughts. I was thinking about the day they hauled Sam out of that godforsaken pond near the Maybank. I nearly yelped. It sounds horrible to admit it now but I thought he looked disgusting. Like a giant dead fish. It made me think of those photos of fisherman beside their gigantic conquests. I didn’t love him right then and there. It sounds inhuman to say that but there’s no use in feeling guilty about how I felt. I can’t be held accountable for every single thought I’ve ever had. When I think about Sam I think a million different things. There’s bound to be some bad in there.

It was eighty-two degrees and something like ninety-five percent humidity when they found him. The air around there could get real heavy when it got like that. It felt like you could almost scoop it up with your hands if you tried hard enough. I always wondered why people in the south weren’t smaller. There was all this pressure weighing down on them.

I don’t remember too much else from that day. The chubby detective at the scene stands out. He was sweating a lot almost like a cartoon character. His scrunched up face, bulbous nose and thinning hair made him look like the cop from a Chaplin movie. It seemed cruel to make them wear black like that in the heat. He kept running around, asking questions, circling back to other people asking them more questions. I wanted to blurt out that there was no use in crying over spilt milk. All those people; the firemen, the paramedics, the detective, and not a single one of them had the power to do any good. It was a circus alright with no purpose at all.

I hated the way people looked at me after. There was a whole lot of grief going around. It felt like enough grief for everyone to get their share in the world in fact. I felt like going down to a street corner and handing it out. Being a good Samaritan and donating it to all the happy people out there. No one really cared. They were just glad it wasn’t them. It may make me sound spiteful to say so but it’s true. I don’t blame them either. I wouldn’t want it on my hands.

Something inside me changed when I called the priest though. Before that happened I felt like I was doing a pretty good job of holding it together. Like I did the grieving think like a pro and the whole charade seemed bearable. I knew if I let go the whole thing would fall apart and I’d be brought sprawling to the ground. It’s a cliché but it was like bearing a weight and the slightest disturbance was going to send everything flying.

He was the priest at the Catholic church down the road. He knew our family and while we weren’t in church every single Sunday we went enough for him to know us. For him to know that we were good, if nothing but, ordinary people.

He was a nervous man. A lot of the reverends and priests in the Bible belt exuded a sort of supreme confidence. He didn’t. He was awkward. He made you feel like he didn’t know what the hell he was doing. He didn’t play the part well of someone who had the utmost faith. Those quiet moments of doubt where he wondered why he was who he was shone through more often than not. You felt like you had to console him.

I could never like him and back then I liked most people pretty easy if I tried.

I called him up soon after. He told me it was a terrible tragedy. He said it was a waste of a life that God intended to use in a glorious way. I nearly laughed. Then the tone changed. I could almost picture him on the other line fidgeting. He was unable to decide how he was going to say it.

“Today I have given you the choice between life and death, between blessings and curses. Now I call on heaven and earth to witness the choice you make”. He was almost as bad as those b list actors at the Emmys with their prepared speeches. I wanted to tell him to not give me crap from the scriptures. It was the fucking circus all over again. If I had been standing in front of him I would have knocked him right out. Before he could finish telling me I couldn’t bury my son I hung up.

After that I spent a few days thinking about everything. I didn’t stop. I’d chop wood out back and I’d have these conversations with Sam. I’d talk out loud and then I’d pause and imagine his response. Then I’d reply back. Sometimes I’d get angry at him. I’d call him a selfish bastard. I’d tell him I hated him. I’d scream and shout like a spoilt ten year old that hadn’t been allowed get his way. I’d sit back down and I’d either be crying or as calm as a Buddha. No one can truly understand the depth of someone else’s suffering. That’s all I realised during those days.

I left town that Fall. I left it all behind. The rental on Wappoo with those horrible Palmetto cockroaches, the Cicadas, the humidity, the churches that you came across every hundred yards. I called one or two people and told them I was going on a vacation. I thought it seemed kind of mysterious. Some people were wary and asked me was I okay. Others said they thought it was a great idea. I couldn’t bear it anymore, either response. I stopped calling people all together.

I took the greyhound west to Santa Fe.

When I got to Oklahoma I stopped in a Barnes & Nobles. I don’t know why I did it now that I think about it but I bought a little moleskine with lined pages and a cheap pen. I liked the feel of the leather and the worn look of the paper. When I got on my connection to Santa Fe I started to write. I’d never written a single word that I didn’t have to. I was writing though like the words couldn’t come out fast enough. I was writing to Sam but at the time I didn’t know it.

When we stopped off at a restroom near Amarillo I got off. I started walking off into the desert with my hands in the air and these sheets with scribblings all over them clutched tightly. I must have looked like a madman to the people on the bus.

I walked out until I couldn’t see a single soul. I knew the bus had left me behind but I didn’t care. When I felt comfortable I crouched down and studied the sand. I picked it up. Let it fall through my fingers. I looked all around me and breathed in the air. I had never been in the desert before but I had read about it. In fact I had read Zane Grey to Sam when he was a kid. There was the smell of the Creotose plant in the air or at least I’m pretty sure it was. The kind of unique odour that many don’t care for it but some like just because it conveys a positive message – rain.

I began to dig in the sand. Only enough so as to comfortably bury what I had written. I placed a rock over it and sat back. Rain the size of olive pits thundered onto the ground around me and for the first time in as long as I could remember I looked up. I studied the unnatural dark sky of the afternoon and smiled.

Written by a 20 year old Galway boy currently roaming America.