Grave Cruelties

The motors whirred almost inaudibly as they lowered Paula's coffin into the ground. Mourners threw roses on top of the casket as it descended, then each departed after showing me they were still with me in their own way: a tearful hug, a firm handshake, a gentle squeeze of my forearm. Finally, only a handful remained: my son, Will; my daughter, Jenny; my best friend of 30 years, Aaron; his wife of 24 years, Becca.

My kids grieved as children do, feeling for the first time that painful confusion life eventually thrusts upon us, the kind we feel when a touchstone that's always been there is suddenly gone forever. But kids don't know what it's like to have someone come into their life, change it completely, and then leave too soon; the pain isn't lesser, but it's different. One is expected, just a part of growing up. The other we hope to avoid at all costs. Becca and I both felt it that day.

Becca had been my wife's best friend for almost as long as I'd been Aaron's. Aaron and I met in high school; Becca and Paula roomed together in college. Paula and I dated then, and Becca and Aaron met as a result. The four of us had seen each other through all the ups and downs of our adult lives.

I knew Aaron grieved, too, although he had never been as close to Paula as Becca was. Not until near the end, anyways. Becca had never been as close to me as Aaron, either, and she and I never would be now.

He grieved for my pain, I think, as a friend would. I knew he grieved for his wife's pain, as I would if our positions had been reversed. But then, I knew our positions could never really have been reversed. We were too different, although I'd never entirely admitted it to myself until recently.

My kids hugged me tightly, then murmured a few words about heading back to the house to pack. Paula had passed in the middle of the college semester, and Jenny needed to return to school before she fell behind. Will had recently started his new job, and he'd already gone past his PTO allowance. I kissed my daughter on the cheek and bade them both farewell. They offered me a ride, but I demurred, instead choosing to stay behind with their godparents for a little while longer.

Once my children had moved beyond earshot, I turned to Becca. She pulled me in close for a hug and kissed me on the cheek, whispering, "I'm so sorry, Frank. She loved you so much, and I know you loved her more than... well, more than anything." Becca stumbled through the last part, knowing she'd said something hurtful without meaning to. I had loved my wife. Maybe too much. I nodded and pulled away, leaving Paula's closest friend with an ashamed, regretful expression on her face.

Aaron moved towards me next, arms wide, but I shouldered him aside as I turned to leave. He stared at me with confusion. "Frank?" Then, again, more plaintively, "Frank? Come on, buddy, what's..." He stopped, his expression twisting with painful understanding and something resembling betrayal. On any other day, I might have laughed. "Frank, buddy, please, don't go. Let's talk, man. We can work through this."

I walked a few more yards before glancing back over my shoulder. "I never want to see either of you again. Ever." Aaron took a step, but his wife put a hand on his forearm, holding him back with a gentle touch. 'A bit late for that now,' I thought bitterly. Still, Paula had loved her. "I'm sorry for your loss, Becca." She nodded, a thin frown etching her face.

My former best friend called after me one last time, almost begging, "Frank!" Now all three of us felt the same pain, that cruel, hard-won knowledge of a love found and then lost. But of all of us, only I had prepared myself for the full extent of it.

Six months later

My wife's death had badly upset Jenny, but she still managed to graduate magna cum laude. I knew Paula would have beamed with pride. Her godparents did, too, although I only saw them at a distance at her graduation. Becca and Aaron had chosen an intentionally childfree lifestyle, and our kids were the closest things to a son and daughter they'd ever have.

My former friends hadn't acceded to my wishes after the funeral, especially Aaron, who had tried numerous times to contact me. At her graduation, though, I managed to keep away from them. Jenny noticed, but I only told her that we'd had a falling out, and she didn't need to concern herself with it. She pushed and pushed until I told her in no uncertain terms that I wouldn't discuss it and there was no chance we would reconcile. I should have known that would only encourage her to butt in. My daughter had so much of her mom in her.

Still, when I entered Jenny's apartment a couple months later and saw my former best friend and his wife sitting there, I couldn't help but blurt out, "What the fuck?"

My daughter's eyes shot wide open at the profanity. I almost never swore around my kids. "Dad!"

I wheeled on her. "I told you I didn't want to talk to them!"

Aaron and Becca both started in at once. "Frank, please--" "Buddy, don't--"

I snarled, "Don't you fucking 'buddy' me, you son of a bitch!"

"Dad!"

My eyes snapped back to my daughter. "I told you--I told you!--that I never wanted to talk to them again. I cannot believe you'd ambush me like this!"

Becca said, "Frank, please, we begged her. Aaron has- both of us have missed you so much."

"I haven't missed you. At all."

"Bud... Frank, come on. That's not true. Jenny told us you've been sitting at home all by yourself this whole time, and--"

"You've been spying for them?"

"No, Dad! No, of course not! But I'm worried about you. The four of you used to go out together all the time. Heck, Uncle Aaron and Aunt Becca were over at our house constantly when I was growing up!"

"Yeah, well, we all make mistakes." I jabbed a finger at my erstwhile friends. "Take this as a lesson, Jenny: be careful who you trust. Some folks are just waiting to stab you in the back. You don't know what they did to me."

Jenny hugged herself, rubbing one arm and looking away, embarrassed. "I do, Dad. Aunt Becca told me about- about what you did for mom. About what the three of you did for her." My jaw hung open as I struggled to find my voice. "I understand how hurt you must--"

I shook with rage, trying to not scream in her face and only partially succeeding. "You have NO IDEA how hurt I am, you- you--!" I bit back the 'brat' that sat at the tip of my tongue, instead turning my anger on her godmother with a snarl. "I asked for one thing, Becca. One. Fucking. THING! I asked you to not tell anyone about what happened, and you couldn't even do that! God, you fucking slut. You always had trouble keeping your legs together when we were kids, so I guess I shouldn't be surprised you can't keep your mouth shut either!"

Aaron stood. "Hey, now, watch what you say to my--"

"To what? To the whore you sent over to 'comfort' me while you fucked my wife?" He took a step towards me. "Do it, asshole. Give me an excuse, a legal excuse, to kick your ass."

That stopped him. Not because he was afraid of me, per se; Aaron's never been a physical coward. A moral one, yes, but not a physical one. But he's also a lawyer, and the words 'legal excuse' acted like a bucket of cold water over his head. I wished I hadn't said them; it would have felt good to pound his face in, but it wasn't worth going to jail over. Probably for the best, anyways; a neurosurgeon can't afford to damage his hands.

"Yeah, that's what I fucking thought. Brave enough to make a pass at my dying wife, but not brave enough to stand up for yours when the chips are down." I glared at Becca. "But it's not like he knows the whole story, either, does he?"

Paula's best friend froze. "Frank, please--"

"No! You don't get to ask me for a damned thing. You started all of this." My gaze flicked to Jenny for a moment. "Have you told anyone else?"

"Dad, no! Of course I haven't! You can trust me." I couldn't help but snort at that, and she frowned petulantly in return, before mumbling, "I know I haven't done... great with secrets in the past, when I was a kid, but--"

"Jenny..." I sighed. "For the love of God, you couldn't even keep your mom's surprise birthday party secret for a week. And that was two years ago! You weren't a kid then. It's not..."

Shaking my head, I looked back to Becca. "Really? You went to her--to my wonderful, sweet, open book of a daughter--and you told her this awful secret about me? About my dead wife? About her mother, for God's sake? You told her, knowing who she is and how she is, knowing there's no way she'll manage to keep quiet about it for longer than a microsecond, and--"

"Hey!"

I ignored my daughter's protestation. "So, yeah, you get the exact same courtesy that you gave me. None. You opened up this can of worms. Now you can fucking choke on them."

Fear flickered across Becca's face. Jenny's expression froze somewhere between anger and confusion; I assume the former came from my dismissal of her and the latter from a slow realization that perhaps Aunt Jenny hadn't told her everything. Aaron looked surprised at my words, but even more surprised when I shouldered him aside and flopped down on an IKEA chair, leaving him, his wife, and my daughter to pick between a futon of similar provenance and a duct-taped beanbag chair. Jenny, being the good host, opted for the latter, leaving her godparents the marginally nicer option.

After they seated themselves, I cracked my neck. "So, why don't we start by hearing what she's told you, Jenny?"

Aaron piped up, "Frank, I'm the one that told her the story. She called me, worried about you, and... Well, I just... I don't get it. Really, man, I don't get it at all. Until the funeral, things were fine and--"

"Hah!" He always could make me laugh. "Things were not 'fine,' at all. But at least that explains a couple of things. For one, why Jenny hasn't run both of you out of here on a rail. Because she would if she knew the truth, wouldn't she, Becca?" Aaron's wife opened her mouth to speak, but I shook my head. "Just tell me what you know, Jenny. Or what you think you know."

My daughter looked between the three of us, then slowly began. "I know Mom was sick with... with cancer. I mean, I was there at the end for a while, and I saw..." She wiped at one eye with a tissue. "Uncle Aaron told me she had a bucket list, and you'd helped her get through most of it. But there was... an item that she had on it, that she'd- um, that she'd never been with anyone besides you, and that bothered her. She told you that she wanted to be with someone and..." I felt my lip curl into a snarl; I no longer had to hide my anger, and I didn't.

"Dad, I know you're hurting, but I just... I think that's so beautiful. So loving, to let her have that fantasy, even if it hurt you. And hiding it from her that it hurt you, too. I know it hurt Aunt Becca, too, since... well, you know, since it was with Uncle Frank. But I also know that you and her... Well..." Her cheeks turned pink. "... Um, you made things even. So I don't get why you're so angry. Uncle Aaron says maybe your ego's bruised, but I don't--"

The snarl turned into a harsh bark of laughter. "Is that what you think? What they told you? That we all sat down together and decided to tick an item off her bucket list? That we collectively gave her this gift, and now, what, because Aaron was such a phenomenal fuck or something, my ego that's making me shut them out?"

She shot a glance at Becca, whose own eyes darted away, then looked to Aaron, who smiled encouragingly at her. God, what an asshole. And an idiot, too, apparently. Well, that made two of us, I guess. Jenny swallowed, but her voice still squeaked out, "Isn't it?"

"No. It's not. I've got much better reasons to be angry than that, don't I, Rebecca?" I saw the wheels spinning behind her eyes as she tried to formulate a response, weighing exactly what I might and might not say, given the presence of my daughter in the room. 'Bad call, Becca,' I thought. "Let's start with the fact that I was the last to be included in this little 'discussion.' By the time your mom came to me, along with your godparents, it had already been decided."

Aaron's courtroom smile flagged as I pressed on. "But let's go back further than that. Yes, your mom had cancer. Brain cancer. Glioblastoma multiforme, to be exact. I know that we didn't talk too much about the specifics, because I didn't want you to..." I frowned, and my voice creaked just a little. "You're my little girl. I wanted to protect you from the worst of it. From the worst of all of this. Because I've seen the progression in my own practice often enough; I knew how bad it was going to get. And I knew..."

I pulled a handkerchief from my pocket and daubed my eyes. Paula had always laughed at that. Called me an old man for always having one on me. The memory made me smile briefly; but only briefly.

"Even back as far as my ER rotation in med school, I knew how different people can be when they realize they're dying. Big tough guys crying for their mothers, wives spitting venom at their husbands, fathers deciding that what they want to do with the last three months of their lives is to get as far away from their children as they can.

"It's worse with a brain tumor, and worst of all with something as aggressive as what your mom had. Then... Well, then it's not just a matter of a near-death epiphany. It's their brain malfunctioning. The tumor presses into places it shouldn't." I glared at my former friends. "And sometimes it destroys the ability to regulate emotions. Control impulses."

Jenny's brow furrowed. "But... But Mom... She never acted any different. She was just Mom."

With a sad smile, I said, "That's what we wanted you to believe. Your mom and I tried to make sure you only saw her when she was either at her best or at her worst. As fast as everything went near the end, well... you were at college.

"You came home to visit, but mostly early on, and then later, when she was bedridden. Before the tumor really changed her much, and then when she was so visibly sick that her behavior... Well, it didn't matter. She was on so many painkillers near the end that I could blame the changes on that. I couldn't always manage to keep you away, though. Do you remember Christmas? How manic she got?"

My daughter slowly nodded. "Yeah. I thought... We knew we only had a little more time together. I thought she was trying to... experience it to the fullest. Make the memories count."

"She was, somewhat. But she also was starting to lose control. I don't know if you remember how much she drank. Or..." I chuckled. "Or the noise she made later that night." Jenny's cheeks went from pink to bright red. "Normally, when you kids were visiting, we didn't do much, or at least we tried to be discreet. But your mom had lost the necessary self-control by then. I gave her something to... take it down a few notches the rest of the time you were home that visit."

She gasped, "You drugged her?!"

"I didn't 'drug' her; I offered her a very mild sedative, and she agreed. We both wanted you to remember her fondly, not as the stranger in her skin that I had to see as the tumor grew. Neither of us wanted that for you or for your brother. And I would never have told you any of this if..." Her godparents withered under my glare. "...they had kept their promises."

Aaron's tone came out somewhere between sympathetic and chiding, like a father trying to get his kid to fess up to something they might get punished for. "Frank, come on. She didn't change that much. I mean at the end, sure, but not when... Well, not when we had our date."

"Bullshit. You were barely around once she got sick. It was always Becca that came to visit, not you. You and I hung out. Paula and Becca hung out. Every once in a while, we'd all go do something together on her bucket list, like skydiving, that didn't require you to interact as much with her, but that was about it for group activities. You've never been able to handle being around sick people; I remember you came to the hospital exactly once when I was doing my ER rotation, and you almost passed out. Becca knew, though, didn't you?"

Aaron's wife set her jaw and cooly defended herself. "It wasn't like that. Yes, she was sick, but, God, Frank, you treated her like a china doll. Paula wanted to get out and live at the end! Seize the day! She wanted to have the best life could offer: meals, drinks, dancing, and, yes, sex. And, no offense, but both of you were virgins when you got together. She said you were good--great, even--but it's not like she had anything to compare it against."

I snorted again. "Yeah, unlike you, you slut."

She rolled her eyes. "Yes, Frank, I had extensive experience when I got married, as did Aaron. And, yes, Paula--God rest her soul--was always a bit prudish until the end, just like you. But it's like you said, dying changes people."

'The fucking audacity of this woman,' I thought. "You're really going to try this? With me knowing what I know? You can't be that stupid."

Becca grumbled, "You know what I told you, Frank. That doesn't mean you know the truth."

"Becca?" Aaron's tone hovered between confused and worried. "What are you talking about?"

She took his hand in hers and sighed. "I... I told a white lie, Aaron. Two, actually, to you and to Frank. It never should have come to this, but..." She shook her head. "I honestly can't believe he'd besmirch her memory this way."

"You lying fucking bitch. I'm not the one that got her to break her vows."

Becca waved a hand and rolled her eyes. "I didn't either, Frank. She wanted to. I let you talk. Now hush; it's my turn."

She turned back to Aaron, keeping her eyes on his as she spoke in low, soothing tones. Like a snakecharmer. "When I told you that Paula wanted to experience another man, I... misrepresented how much Frank knew. She had mentioned the idea to him in passing, but he thought it was all theoretical. 'Do you ever wonder what it would have been like if we weren't virgins when we started dating?' That sort of thing."

"W- What?"

"Please, honey, please understand. I was trying to do something good for my friend, and I knew..." She shot a dirty look at me. "I knew Frank was too inflexible to really let her be happy the way she deserved. And I knew that you were too loyal to him to... well, to make the right decision." He started to interrupt, but she shushed him and continued.

"You're such a good man. And- and don't get me wrong, Frank is, too. Paula loved him, and for good reason. I know that. But you're also a man of the world, and he's not.

"I've never cheated on you, and I know you've never cheated on me. However, we've both agreed in the past that, while fidelity is important, it's no more or less important than any of the other vows. Paula and Frank, well, they didn't agree with that. Not until the end, anyways, when she saw how much her prudishness made her miss out in her youth. And she wanted to remedy that. So... I told you that Frank had already tentatively agreed, if she could find someone he trusted. And who would he trust more than you?"

Aaron's jaw hung open, then snapped shut suddenly. He swallowed a few times, then hoarsely said to me, "Frank, you have to believe me. I didn't know. Becca told me that you'd agreed to let Paula have this, specifically because you trusted me. I... She let me believe you'd given the okay. I didn't know, man."

"I know you didn't. I also know she's not telling you everything. She didn't tell you--"

Jenny found her voice. "Wait! Wait. Dad, if you weren't okay with it, why did you go along?"

I sighed. I'd asked myself that question enough in the course of the last ten months, but the answer never changed. "Because I loved your mom, kiddo. But by that time, she wasn't really your mom."