Cemetery Street by John Zunski (ebook reader color screen .txt) 📖

Shannie reminded me.
“Maybe if she’d call she’d find out.”
“She may as well be dead,” Shannie said.
“Sometimes you’re a cold-hearted bitch.”
“It’s not my job to pump sunshine up your ass.”
“You’re going to make one hell of a lawyer. You have the sensitivity.”
As Christmas of ‘96 passed and the New Year was a sunrise away, my father, Diane, Shannie and I made the trip to Laurel Hill. The trip was unremarkable, other than it was the first time the four of us attended together. “We’re one big happy family,” I complained to Krista. “I never, ever, imagined being Shannie’s step-brother. Jesus H. Christ, life sucks.”
“I didn’t know they’re getting married,” Krista chirped.
“They’re not! Not that I know of.” Our session fell into a rare silence. Krista let the silence stand. She knew my mind was racing.
“You know,” I said breaking the silence. “My dad is reaping the ass I worked so hard to sew.”
“You tried getting into Diane’s pants?” Krista asked, amused.
“Christ, everyone’s a comedian,” I complained.
“I know what you mean, but do you?” Krista asked.
“What’s that suppose to mean?” I replied.
Krista returned my stare. She was a pro, I wished I had her composure. “I’m pissed. I’m really pissed! I spent years trying to get into Shannie’s pants and just like that, my dad’s banging Diane. Where’s the justice?”
Krista sat back in her chair. I was captured by a silver bracelet dangling from her wrist. She’s worn it since, but it never hypnotized me like that afternoon. “I think there’s more between Diane and your father than sex. It seems they’re in love.”
I fell into my chair.
“You mentioned justice. Where’s the justice in continually expecting Shannie to be in love with you?”
“Huh?”
“Where’s the justice in continually expecting Shannie to be in love with you?” she repeated.
“I never pressure Shannie - ever. I know she just wants to be friends. I give her what she wants. I’m just her friend.”
“I’m not talking about you pressuring Shannie.”
“You’re confusing the shit out of me.”
“I’m talking about you pressuring yourself. I’m talking about the cruelness of your own expectations. I talking about the cruelty of expecting her to wake one day a changed woman and suddenly be in love with you and beg you for marriage. Stop beating yourself up because Shannie isn’t interested in being your lover.” Shaping her hands into a megaphone Krista cried, “STOP THE MENTAL MASTURBATION! Shannie’s choices are beyond your control.”
“I guess,” I mumbled.
“Hey, guess what?”
“What?”
“Times up. Now go wax on the day.”
“Take on,” I corrected her. “It’s take on the day.”
“Whatever,” Krista shrugged. “I don’t listen to radio shrinks.”

During the days approaching my twenty-fifth birthday, I fell into a state as close to hibernation as humanly possible. Only in dreams could I sometimes escape despair. I mistook Shannie’s voice echoing through my house as a dream. “James! Are you here?” Smiling, I listened as her footfalls. Ellie bounded down the stairs. “James?” Shannie called from the base of the steps. “You up there?”
In my dream I didn’t answer.
“James!,” Shannie’s voice raced up the stairs.
My silence led her up the stairs and into my bedroom. From the corner of my eye I watched her undress and slip under the covers. I felt her softness upon my lips. Light rushed into my room crushing my fantasy.
“James,” Shannie cried. I woke embracing my pillow. “Wake up,” Shannie ordered from the doorway. Ellie jumped on the bed and licked my face.
“You have some nasty breath girlfriend.” I pushed Ellie away.
“We have a problem,” Shannie said.
“Yeah, the wrong blonde is in my bed.”
“Steve’s dad killed himself.”
“What?” I rubbed the sleep from my eyes.
“Steve found him about an hour ago. He shot himself in the embalming room.”
A silence settled over my bedroom. I scratched my head as I looked from Shannie to the floor to Ellie and back to Shannie again. “At least they didn’t have to take him far.”
“You’re such a prick! Our friend’s father killed himself and your making jokes! What the Hell is your problem?”
“Jesus Shannie, lighten up.”
“I don’t take death lightly.”
“You know…”I hesitated. If ever I had a chance to share my near-death experience it was now. I missed the best opportunity to share the most intimate detail of my life with the person I wished to be the most intimate with.
“You know what?” Shannie asked.
“Nothing.”
“Geezus Pete James. Who cares about the bastard. But Steve is a friend, Marcy and Janice are friends. What about them? Their world’s been thrown into flux.”
“Life is constant flux,” I stabbed.
Shannie walked out of my room, down the stairs and out the front door.
I pulled my covers over my head. I was safe in their embrace. Krista once said not making a decision is making a decision, by that logic I decided to hibernate. Hibernation was easier; there weren’t decisions to make. Sleep evaded me, in the warmth of my cocoon I remembered learning of Count’s death.
I fell into the habit of sleeping on the couch, I’d fall asleep to CNN’s round the clock coverage. The war was two days old when we learned Count’s fate. I was nodding off to the sound of jet engines when the phone rang. I rolled over and buried my face against the back of the couch. I had a cold thanks to my midnight tunnel run.
My cheerful voice came on with the answering machine. “Morrison’s Mortuary, you stab ‘em we slab ‘em. Leave a message and we’ll get back to ya. Late.”
A foreboding silence answered my salutation. “Joe, James, this is Leroy. Listen,” the voice paused, gathering strength. “Junior’s been killed; I don’t know what, how it happened. Still trying to find out. Flossy ain’t taking it too well. Diane knows. He’s a good boy. Pray for him.”
The phone went silent. I bolted upright. Trembling, I stared at the answering machine as it clicked off. I struggled to my feet and hobbled across the living room. I replayed the message.
“NOOOO!” I screamed. I yanked the answering machine from the wall and threw it across the room. “NOOOOO!” I repeated. The answering machine exploded into pieces.
“YOOOOO What’s the fuck is going on down there?” my father yelled from his room.
I stared at the shattered pieces: “Count’s dead.”
My father ranted his way down the stairs. “JESUS CHRIST JAMES, WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON?”
“Count’s dead,” I mumbled.
His voice grew closer with every word until his breath clawed my back.
I turned. “Count’s dead,” I mumbled to his angry face. “Count’s been killed! HE’S FUCKING DEAD!” I yelled at my father. I shoved him. He landed on the floor. “THEY FUCKING KILLED HIM!” I moved towards my father.
“How? What happened?”
“He’s dead,” I said. From above, I saw my leg cock back to kick my father.
“James! Get hold of yourself.” My father scrambled to his feet. “You definitely got your temper from your mother,” he said later.
The front door shook under a barrage of knocks. “JAMES!” Shannie’s cried “JAMES!”
I opened the door. Shannie’s untamed hair framed bloodshot eyes. We fell into each other’s arms. For days Shannie and I didn’t leave each other’s company. It seemed weeks before we didn’t feel the need for each other’s assurance. It would be weeks before we’d learn when Count would make his final trip home.
Like the night we learned of Count’s death, I felt a longing for Shannie’s companionship. Sliding out from beneath my covers, I made my to the Ortolans.
Despite having no love lost for the deceased, his death was an ordeal for Shannie and myself. A self-inflicted gunshot sprayed the elder Lucas’s brains across the embalming room. Someone had to clean it up. “It’s not like there’s a suicide clean-up service in the Yellow pages,” Shannie said. In 1997, there wasn’t. “Somebody has to clean up the mess. It would be a crime if the family had to.”
Oh Christ, I thought.
“Nothing wrong with a little anesthesia,” Shannie said yanking the GTI’s parking brake. We stepped into JD’s Tavern. We watched television, slugged shots of bourbon and tipped mugs of beer. “I need a smoke,” Shannie said. I watched her glide to the cigarette machine.
“Listen, Marcy’s home, Janice is on her way. I don’t want Marcy and Steve coming down stairs. I want to be incognito as possible. Deal?”
“Deal,” I said.
By the time Shannie and I slithered through the funeral parlor’s back entrance, the coroner had already removed the body. “Thank God for small favors. At least we don’t have to work around him,” Shannie whispered as we stared at the complex web of blood and brains splattered across the white washed walls. “Jason Pollock would be proud,” Shannie muttered.
“Fuck, the walls needs to be repainted.”
“Tell me about it,” Shannie replied.
“Let’s get to it.”
I gathered the necessary cleaning supplies as Shannie drug a chair to the center of the room. “What are you doing?” I asked.
“Disconnecting the smoke detector,” Shannie answered. I watched her sweatshirt rise above her jeans revealing a thin swath of stomach.
“Why?”
“I’m going to need a smoke and I don’t want to set it off.”
“Dumb ass, they’re going to smell the smoke.”
“Dumb ass, they’re smokers,” she said.
“Steve ain’t,” I complained.
Between the gagging, fresh air breaks, and the lengthy drags on our cigarettes, it took us hours to finish the job. Between the two of us, we killed a pack of cigarettes. “I’m a dumb ass,” Shannie said flushing the last bucket down the toilet.
“Why’s that?” I asked.
“They can hear the hopper.”

“He fucked with us while he was alive and now that he’s dead, he’s still at it,” I told Shannie during his funeral. The day was raw and overcast, exhaust from the procession spiraled skyward. “I can’t sleep, every time I close my eyes – every time - I see his goddamn brains clinging to the wall like some kind of, of,” I stammered. “Of, Christ, I don’t know, but they hang there, taunting me. I can’t wait till he’s buried! I’m telling you I’m going to get even - I’m going to piss on his grave!”
“Whatever,” Shannie sighed.
“I’m serious!
“Just James, What you don’t do is more powerful than what you do.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” I questioned.
“Oh young Grasshopper, the absence of the positive outweighs the negative.”
“Huh?”
“You don’t see me in any rush to whip up a mud pie and throw it on his grave. The absence of positive deeds outweighs committing negative ones.”
“You haven’t whipped one up since Count.” The procession turned into the Cemetery’s driveway. My comment got me thinking. “Would you have made one for me? You know, if I, if I had died?” I stammered as Shannie parked.
Shannie looked at me, kissed her fingers and touched my forehead. “You know it.”

“You know, if I would have known then what I know now, I would have pissed on his grave too, ” Shannie said. It was Memorial Day weekend ’97. Shannie and I ventured to Indian Point. The weather was perfect, the sky deep cobalt blue.
“I’ve pissed on it enough for the both of us.” I watched a jet birthing contrails as it raced westward.
“Really, abusing corpses. That’s disgusting!” Shannie pontificated. It was one of many rumors that surfaced as the departed cooled in his grave.
“Consider the source,” I mouthed as the jet disappeared.
“If I would have known, I would have pulled the trigger for the sicko. The sick fuck! Ewww, he still makes my skin crawl.”
“You don’t really believe that?” I turned my attention to Shannie. She sat Indian style on