“The best time to start is the earliest,” was her mantra, a code she hoped I would practice into habit in time. I never integrated it into my daily routine, but it’s been eight days since the funeral and seven since I left the house. So, when he suggested a hike, I thought it would be an opportunity to test her theory. *
You collect me from my family home at 7 a.m. I remember to bring my boots and insulated socks, and I’ve packed clingfilm ham sandwiches, thermal flask tea, and bandages. It’s a hike you’ve conquered many times, one shared by walkers, trail runners, and mountain bikers; you think the fresh air will do me good.
Phoebe Bridgers’ “Smoke Signals” plays on the radio and it makes me think of Twin Peaks, isolated wood cabins, and coffee in ceramic mugs. The car windscreen is fogged and your AC is on overdrive. Its intensity dries my lips and restricts the words I want to say, such as “Thanks for persuading me to do this,” and “I’ve missed you.”
We pull into the carpark — a tarmac haven at the heart of Dublin wilderness — at 8 a.m. on the button. Noble firs, the dominating presence, drip dew droplets onto cobwebbed moss bundles that sparkle in the morning sunlight. I imagine the purity of each drop, that if I were to gape my mouth beneath one, I might taste the curing elixir my mind craves.
This is our 8th official date and first hike. I wonder if you count our dates or if remembering became irrelevant after we slept together. You tell me the hike will take X hours and I ask if the car’s okay on its own, as if it’s our recently adopted puppy and we’re leaving it home alone for the first time. You say it will be fine; more hikers will arrive to keep it company.
You didn’t meet her, but I know she would have liked you. The attention you command when you walk into a room, your kindness and jovial sense of humour, your hands. Yes, she would have found something in you to like.
At this time of year each year past, we would be planning our Christmas shopping and getting into the spirit of the festivities. But this year and for every year to come, Dad and I must plan for Christmas without her. We’ll still set the table for three come Christmas day, but we’ll have to pull her cracker for her.
We pass a sign that reads ‘Checkpoint 1’, but you say no races are scheduled for today. I appreciate you dragging me out of the house, and the landscape of greenery and meandering mud trails is a welcome change of scenery, but the arduous incline is a shock to the system. While I take each step hand on knee and half-keeled, you float. Our breath clouds, the ghosts of dead conversations, mingle and rise as one. I watch them fade into the firs who themselves watch us with condescending rudeness; they are residents, we are intruders.
I’ve had such restless nights and repetitive days of late. Time, down to the seconds in which I succumb to sorrow, has lost its measure and purpose. Our home is no longer a home, but I can’t seem to leave it. I zombie from room to room, to places her laughter called for company and her humming soothed me to sleep. The floral print settee in the sitting room, the conservatory-cum-mini library, the nook in the kitchen where she kneaded bread, are now soulless ends I return to when I think I hear her. I pass nights in her armchair playing with her unfinished knitting, an eternal scarf of sorts.
I feel an impulse to call and check in on Dad. In what must have seemed like an instant to him, he would have witnessed the life in her extinguish like the flame of a windswept candle. He had no time to prepare, and now he will have the house to himself for the first time in 27 years; an unmapped world awaits. Each day, he reminds me of cherished memories, her headstrong nature, the way she completed him. I think he does it to reassure himself that their fairy tale was not fiction.
I check my watch and see it’s 9:35 a.m., a painful reminder of the remaining distance. At a bend with an altar-like rock jutting from an earth bank, we stop for a snack break. Voices catch our attention and two runners appear, thin men wearing bandanas and sunglasses, large font numbers pinned to their chests. They study us as if we’re the crazy ones and as they disappear into the trees, we laugh as we realise a race is being run and we’re in the middle of it.
‘I don’t know why they race here,’ you say, ‘Running a trail like this is so bad for you.’ ‘Really?’ ‘Yeah, well, for your joints anyway.’ ‘I’ll bear that in mind!’
I chomp into my granola bar. A morsel of oat catches in my throat and I cough until I sound like a wild boar. I apologise for the outburst.
‘Listen,’ you say, ‘Sorry I missed you the last few days, I thought it was better I stay out of the way for a while.’ ‘It’s okay.’ ‘I wanted to visit, I did, but I thought you’d want space.’ ‘It’s fine, really. I did need the space, and time to let everything settle in.’
Water trickles from my chin as I drink from my bottle. Every move I make feels embarrassing, as if I’m intentionally sabotaging my own chance at happiness.
‘And how’s your Dad?’ ‘Coming around. It’s harder for him, he hasn’t been without her for almost 30 years.’ ‘Yeah, jezz, that must be so strange. Nice man, your Dad.’ ‘Yeah, he’s lovely. Thanks for coming to the funeral by the way, you didn’t have to. I know this is all so sudden, so soon.’ ‘Don’t worry about it, I wanted to be there.’
The unforced curves at the edge of your mouth and direct eyes tell me you’re sincere. I want to kiss you but the thought of it becoming a cliché moment turns me off.
‘Thanks,’ I say, ‘Will we walk on?’
A light rain begins to fall, birthing brief rainbows in the mid-morning sky. Several runners pass wearing skin-tight lyrca shorts that I imagine put uncomfortable pressure on their privates; perhaps there’s a sexual element to it? Climbing a stone staircase, we reach the ‘Checkpoint 2’ sign. You laugh and say, ‘Slow and steady, slow and steady,’ as if we’re partaking.
As you lead, thoughts of our first time cross my mind and, as out of place as they seem, I can’t help but fantasise. I first experienced the thrill of giving myself completely, the electricity of exposure, the apex of sex, with you. I want us to stop and kiss, for you to squeeze me and flush my cheeks. I want you to take me among the blushing forest flora and have me. I want to lie with you and thank the stars for aligning above us that Halloween night.
I get into my stride and keep pace with you. It’s 10:43 a.m. and by your estimation, we should be nearing the peak.
‘You heading back to work this week?’ you ask. ‘Yeah, they said I could take more time, but I’d prefer to get back into a routine. I feel I need it you know?’ ‘Yeah, good thinking, it’ll help you focus on something else. Not that you shouldn’t think about her. Sorry.’ ‘It’s okay, you’re right. I know she wouldn’t want me to stay home and laze around the house all day.’ ‘Right, yeah. If am, if you’re free some night, maybe we could call to my parents’ house for dinner?’ ‘Really?’ ‘Yeah, about time you met them, isn’t it?’ ‘Am, yeah, sure, that’d be lovely.’ ‘After all, I guess we’re kinda going out now, aren’t we?’ ‘Are we?’ ‘I’d like to think so…’
An ocean of elation pushes me into your arms. In unspoiled silence the moment becomes a paradisiacal dream. My lips tingle; my longing for yours rushing to the surface. My body becomes so weak that my foot slips and our kneecaps clash. The sudden pain separates us, but we laugh and walk on, holding hands. I can’t help but imagine how happy she would be to know I’m happy. And yet, for a reason I choose not to focus on, I feel guilty for not feeling selfish, as if to be this happy this soon is a sin.
We pass ‘Checkpoint 3’ and you ask me what song I’m humming. I didn’t realise I was and as I dig through my brain for seeded songs, I realise it’s “No Frontiers” by Mary Black, and I know who taught me the melody.
Thinking of her death, I choose to see it as the culmination of a task, the ending of a purpose. In her final weeks, I spent every waking moment with her and became her student. In conversations she would drop in beads of knowledge that I would add to my bracelet; rules of life, essential morals, the delicacy of time. It’s now I play with the bracelet, considerate of each bead.
At a part of the trail akin to the standard Hollywood ‘camping murder’ location, you peel off and tell me to follow behind. I watch as you navigate your way to the base of a slip of rock and, in a shroud of trees, disappear. My chest erupts at this; the forest is disorientating and comfortable in its own silence, and I am nobody’s quintessential explorer. A lone runner passes; does he sense my anxiety?
I reach the rock and descend in a panic. I slip and slide, scraping my ass on its face. I reach the base and, through the body battered trail in the trees, see you surrounded by blue. Hunched, I lumber in.
I kick a root and land on all fours. Needles prick my palms and knees, soaked moss squelches. My bag catches a branch and hanging raindrops begin to fall onto my neck and exposed lower back. I look up and see how they flicker in shards of sunlight like diamonds.
They are individually cut and exhilarated, realising their existential purpose as they dive. I look towards the sky and, like a child led to communion, present my tongue to the offering of each drop. They splash and ping into my mouth, and I taste at once the unequivocal and transcendental purity of nature, its absolute absoluteness.
For a moment I feel her presence; beneath me, above me, within me. She’s the forest and the parachuting raindrops, the air our breath clouds vanished into, the hum in my heart. And then, in a brush of goosebumps, she’s gone.
I crawl to the clearing where you stand by the cliff edge like a conqueror observing his claim. You turn to me and smile.
‘Hey, I was wondering where you were.’ ‘Just took my time coming through the trees.’ I walk to you and lean my face on your shoulder.
‘Well, you’re out the other end now.’ ‘Yeah,’ I say, ‘I think I am.’
*
“The best time to start is the earliest,” was her mantra, and now it’s mine.
AUTHOR BIO:
Gene Murphy is a writer/Copywriter from Co. Kerry, Ireland. In 2020, he won a local Short Story Competition and had his first published story, Learning, appear in Sonder Magazine. Gene, who has undertaken writing courses with the Irish Writers Centre and DFEI, is working on his first novel which he hopes to complete in early 2021.