Rest in Peace, My Friend

A short story

by Robert Ryan

It was a bitterly cold morning, when the ashen clouded sky opaquely glowed from the faint sun behind it and a heavy, white fog poured over the earth. The ground was still wet from the last night’s torrential showers, with blind earthworms sprouting up from the soil. The blanched land in the young morning hours looked more like an old black and white photograph than actual life.

A chilling breeze plowed through the fog from beyond the graveyard gates. The cemetery seemed more at home in the quiet morning than during the day, when everything else in the city would be bustling. The solemn graveyard uttered no noise, as silent as death.

Not even the noise of the birds’ early-morning singing could be heard within the cemetery walls, for the only visitors were a couple of men standing by the entrance gate.

Solomon Lott stood tall in an umber trenchcoat and fedora. His gristly, grey beard and haggard features only hinted at his long, difficult life. Both of his bony, chapped hands were stuffed down his pockets; his breath came out in sparse whispers of white air. His eyes were clouded and aged, barely able to pierce the fog before him. His companion Timothy stood behind him silently, regarding him.

The old man’s head slowly rotated on his shoulders, looking out past the haze to the rows upon rows of unremarkable headstones in the plot. His eyelids flickered beneath his bushy eyebrows. Finally, without turning to face his companion, he said to him, “Show me the way.”

The young man stood placidly. “Right, sir.”

He walked slowly down the cobblestone path in the earth, as Solomon followed behind him. The two went forward into the cemetery grounds, passing by hundreds of tombstones, crosses and monuments, each one representing a life departed. Through the haze the duo continued, until eventually they stopped and turned down a row. At the very end, beneath a giant willow tree and only a few yards from a small creek which marked the border of the cemetery, laid a pair of headstones next to one another. Etched into one was the name “OLIVIA A. GATES MELBOURNE”, and the other “CLAUDE D. MELBOURNE”.

Solomon stepped before the two headstones, examining them silently. Timothy stood to the side, his arms behind his back. The scene was somber, and silent, for almost a minute.

Then, Solomon spoke to the headstones, “It’s a shame we had to meet like this.”

The headstones did not respond, as they stood still in the earth.

There was silence again. The only noise was the trickling water of the nearby creek. Solomon grabbed his hat with one of his old hands and lowered it to his breast. His eyebrows curled upward, and his lips drooped down into a sad frown. For the longest time, he just stood there, staring at the two headstones.

“She was a very old friend,” Solomon confessed, although Timothy hadn’t asked him. “I knew her very well. Olivia was the light of my life when we were young. She was remarkable, intelligent, beautiful. Yes, she was very beautiful. She must’ve had a hundred suitors in her time. Yet, I was still blessed with her presence.” He looked off into the distance, as if gazing into some distant memory. “I can still remember her face, how brightly it would glow when she smiled. I remember her in her beautiful yellow dress in the spring. I can remember every conversation we ever had together.

“She was my closest friend,” he muttered, “and the object of my utmost affection. I never felt happiness greater than when I was with her.”

He lowered his gaze back down to the two headstones. “I loved her. And I never kept that a secret. And for the longest time, I thought she loved me back.”

Timothy stood behind him, still composed, yet listening intently.

“She told me she did. Looking back, I’m not sure, though. I never would have suspected at the time.”

The younger man looked down at the headstone next to Olivia’s. “Who was he?”

“Claude,” Solomon muttered. “I never really knew him that well, although I honestly never wanted to. Nothing against him, he was probably a nice fellow, yet I hated him still.”

Timothy didn’t speak. He knew he wouldn’t have to ask.

After only a brief pause, the old man cleared his throat hoarsely, then continued. “Olivia and I had been courting for a while. I planned on asking her to be my wife. I had even bought the best ring I could afford with my money. Everything was planned out.

“Then, that’s when we met Claude. He seemed like just another person to me, but Olivia took an immediate liking to him and they became friends. I’m not even sure if I had worried at the time, for if I had, it must’ve been very little. I didn’t believe what did happen could ever happen.” Solomon stopped for a moment, his mind adrift in deep reflection. “I was so young, and so foolish. Perhaps if I had acted, I could have saved myself so much pain.”

He sighed. “Not a week had gone by when she left me. I was utterly heartbroken. I was so distraught I took the ring which had taken me more than two months’ salary to purchase and threw it into a river. I was despondent, yet nothing hurt me more than when I started seeing her again with Claude.

“He comforted her, he held her. They began to do everything together, they were so inseparable. I couldn’t even think of trying to repair my friendship with Olivia because she was always with him. It was too much for me to bear.”

Timothy frowned, staring down at the two graves. “I’m terribly sorry, sir.”

“I couldn’t talk to her,” Solomon went on, ignoring the young man’s solace. “I wanted to, but I couldn’t. I missed my friend, I truly did, and yet I hated her for what she had done to me. I fell out of touch with her soon after, and we didn’t talk to each other at all. I thought of her every day, though, as painful as it was. I dreamt of those happy days we had spent together so long ago, and cried when I woke up and realized they were gone. And I thought of the day I could speak to her again.

“Then, after a year’s time had passed, I met the two of them again. And they were betrothed.” He growled the last word with such bitter anger which hadn’t been visible in his previously somber demeanor. His face was now clenched and stiff in recollection of this past tragedy. “They were going to marry, and start a household. And she had the audacity to ask me to be the godfather of their firstborn child.”

Timothy asked curiously, “What did you say to her?”

“I said nothing!” Solomon yelled. “I never said anything to her again! Not in all these years!” His fingers curled in, digging violently into his fedora. “I haven’t seen or spoken to Olivia in half a century, and now our reunion is destined to be here, in a graveyard! Pray tell, why couldn’t it have been me in the earth and her standing over me?”

“But sir,” Timothy inquired, “why come now after all these years?”

“Because in all these years, every day of every month of every year, I have thought about her. How could I forget her? Such bittersweet remembrance has plagued my living, of happy days long-since passed, eclipsed by memories of heartbreaking adversity. I knew I would have to meet her again. I suppose I was too great a coward to see her in life, so I had to wait until she was dead.” He raised a hand to his mouth and began to sob roughly.

Timothy halted, unsure of whether or not he should speak. Yet again, Solomon went on without him having to ask. “Of course, I still loved her. And just as I loved her, I hated her. I wanted her gone, out of my life, and yet I wanted her right there. Could I have ever wished her dead? I do not know.”

“But what about Claude?” Timothy asked.

“Claude? Feh! I would spit on his grave!” And then he did, turning his head sharply and spitting straight onto the headstone. “For what he’s done I don’t care what happened to him! To Hell with his soul!”

And then immediately, Solomon’s hands dropped down to his sides, his hat fluttering to the ground. His face was contorted in anguish and dolor, staring up into the heavens. “Oh, Lord! How could such a quandary be placed upon me? To have the woman I loved paramour to another man? And yet she was so pleased with him! Should I have just left in peace that the woman I loved so much could be happy, even if it were not with me? Was I wrong to not feel such selfless compersion?”

“Mr. Lott,” Timothy pleaded, “there’s nothing wrong with feeling this way.”

“Then why must if feel so terrible?” Hot, saline tears bled down his rumpled cheeks. “Blessed were they with their lives, for half a century they were together. Half a century of love and beatitude, of prosperity I could only dream of! To their very last hours, they could have looked back on their days with fulfillment. And what about me? I deplore my life! I feel disgusted with the hours I wasted in the throes of worry and heartache! I despise the way I was so immobilized by grief and felt powerless against it! All these years, I have spent thrall to my depression! One life, and how shamefully I have spent it!

“But they… They lived together, and died together. Look!” Solomon shouted, pointing at the graven headstones. “Not even death could keep them apart, for they died not a day apart from one another. Now, they rest here as they shall for all eternity, together.” He wept loudly, his hands convulsing beneath his chin. “Where will I be buried when I die? Somewhere distant and alone, somewhere far from anyone who could care about me.”

“Sir, nevermind how they lived together,” Timothy assured him. “It was their lives that they lived, and now they are over. You still have yours!”

“To finish alone in my old age?” the old man challenged. “What relief could I find in that? Even now, I covet their situation!”

“But they are dead,” Timothy denoted.

“And how I envy them!” Solomon lamented. “They have the privilege to have died happy! What windfall fate has bestowed upon them! And what of I? I get to continue my miserable and undistinguished life alone! How I dream of the final, comfortable repose of death! Oh, happy death!”

“Solomon, you need not base the quality of your life on the achievements of theirs!” Timothy pleaded. “You’ve lived a long life thus far and may have plenty more years to come! Why waste what you have left in you worrying about what they’ve done? It’s just as you said, why should you be thrall to your depression? Live your life free of these woes, it is within your ability!”

The old man didn’t respond. His face was furrowed in anger and disgust, his hands clenched at his sides. He didn’t utter a word, his teeth packed against each other. Then he let out a noise that sounded like a cough, then fell to his knees. He knelt before the grave of the dead woman as a condemned man would before a judge. He dropped forward onto his hands, the palms pressed into the backfill of the grave. His arms shook like rubber, and tears dropped from his face and disappeared into the dirt below.

Finally, he let out a roaring, furious scream. He pounded at the grave with angry fists, and implored to the heavens above, “Why? Why? Why did you do this to me? Why did you leave me behind?” His hands clawed at the earth, as if begging it for answers. Slowly, his head collapsed into his arms, as he sobbed loudly. “Why did you have to go? Why did you have to leave me? I loved you.”

His face remained buried in his arms, pressed against the soil at Olivia’s grave. He wept softly, but didn’t speak at all anymore. His quivering body lay prone against the earth, as if hugging it. After a while, his body didn’t move at all. Slowly, the old man’s weeping leveled down to complete silence, until it could have appeared as though he himself had died.

Then, he lifted his head up, as if awakening from a deep sleep. He pushed himself back up on his elbows, then sat up on his knees. He looked down at the grave, quietly observing it. Gradually, everything came back. The fog around him, the willow tree above, and the sound of the flowing creek nearby.

He slowly stood up on his old legs. His knees and elbows were damp and dirty from being pressed into the soil, but he didn’t seem to mind. He glanced down, and stooped to pick up his hat. He brushed it off a bit, then placed it back on his head. Swiftly, he turned around to face Timothy, who was still a little unnerved by his companion’s previous display of emotion.

“Timothy,” Solomon said calmly. “Let’s go now.”

The young man blinked, then sputtered, “R-Right, sir.”

He stepped back and quickly walked down the row of headstones, back the way the two of them had come. Solomon turned took a few steps in that direction, and then paused. He gently turned his head back, looking to the two graves sitting behind him. He regarded them for another moment, then said earnestly, “Rest in peace, my friend.” He turned, and walked off into the fog.

END