the story off to Chuck Fritch the next morning.
The ending is now self-evident to me. Logical. Simple. Easy to come up with.
After only 26 years.
DEATH DECISION
Michael followed his younger sister up the sloping ramp, the heavy leather suitcase bumping his knee, the cool dusk of the station tunnel behind him—seeing the snake-length of train ahead of them, the gleaming passenger coaches waiting on the tracks in the glare of late afternoon sunlight.
He paused for a moment on the edge of the blazing white expanse of concrete and allowed the hot, unfamiliar iron-and-steel smells of the platform to envelop him.
His first train... his first trip outside the city... his first real adventure.
Then his fathers hard voice probed at him sharply. “Hurry along, Michael. And take sister’s hand. We don’t want the train to leave without us.”
The tall figure moved past him, a lean silhouette against the reflecting silver of the coaches, and Michael followed, switching the suitcase to ease its weight, taking Lucy’s small hand. He thought: Lucy is too young to understand death. When you’re seven, death is a dark fantasy you can’t really believe in. But she was learning, thought Michael bitterly; she was learning all about death, as he had learned. Father was seeing to that.
Michael tried to imagine what they would find in Los Angeles, California; he tried to envision his mother lying starched and painted like a plaster saint in a flower-banked coffin with organ music playing softly in the background and people moving past her in a dreamlike procession, silent and, tight-lipped. When his uncle had died of a heart attack it had been that way, with the flowers so sickeningly sweet that Michael had nearly become ill. He remembered it all, every detail.
But now it was different. He had not seen his mother in six years, not since he was eight, when she had gone away from them forever, and it was impossible to imagine her lying cold and unmoving somewhere in a strange city. She still seemed alive to him; he could hear her repeating his name over and over again, the favorite name she’d had for him: “Mikey, oh, Mikey...”
“Michael!” the lost voice of his mother became the hard, commanding voice of his father. “I told you to move along.”
A round-faced, smiling porter took the suitcase from Michael as they mounted the iron coach steps and led them toward their compartment. The coach interior was cool, cooler even than the long station tunnel, and Michael moved behind his father with a feeling of having entered a new world, separated utterly from the city-world beyond the glass windows. He’d seen trains, heard them roar past in the night, but this was his first time on one. It was nothing like the bus that held taken them into Jefferson, here to the big station. Not like the bus at all.
His father gave the porter some change and the man disappeared down the narrow corridor, leaving them alone in their compartment. It was like a little room, with a silver wash basin over to one side and green velvet seats.
“Well, don’t just stand there, Michael. Close the door and put away our things. What is the matter with you today?”
Mr. Leonard Bair, Michael’s father, was a tall man with a thin, corded neck and small black bird’s eyes. He wore steel-rimmed spectacles which made his eyes look even smaller and more birdlike, and when he smiled, which was infrequently, his lips twisted up from porcelain dentures which seemed at least a size too large for his spare face.
Michael helped his father put away their coats and the leather suitcase. Then he sat down opposite him. Lucy pressed her nose flat against the cool glass of the window. “Will we be starting soon?” she asked, watching the pre-journey activity outside.
“I guess so,” replied Michael. He looked over at his father.
Mr. Bair said nothing. He was shaking out the evening paper he’d purchased at the depot.
Michael said, I hate you, to his
The ending is now self-evident to me. Logical. Simple. Easy to come up with.
After only 26 years.
DEATH DECISION
Michael followed his younger sister up the sloping ramp, the heavy leather suitcase bumping his knee, the cool dusk of the station tunnel behind him—seeing the snake-length of train ahead of them, the gleaming passenger coaches waiting on the tracks in the glare of late afternoon sunlight.
He paused for a moment on the edge of the blazing white expanse of concrete and allowed the hot, unfamiliar iron-and-steel smells of the platform to envelop him.
His first train... his first trip outside the city... his first real adventure.
Then his fathers hard voice probed at him sharply. “Hurry along, Michael. And take sister’s hand. We don’t want the train to leave without us.”
The tall figure moved past him, a lean silhouette against the reflecting silver of the coaches, and Michael followed, switching the suitcase to ease its weight, taking Lucy’s small hand. He thought: Lucy is too young to understand death. When you’re seven, death is a dark fantasy you can’t really believe in. But she was learning, thought Michael bitterly; she was learning all about death, as he had learned. Father was seeing to that.
Michael tried to imagine what they would find in Los Angeles, California; he tried to envision his mother lying starched and painted like a plaster saint in a flower-banked coffin with organ music playing softly in the background and people moving past her in a dreamlike procession, silent and, tight-lipped. When his uncle had died of a heart attack it had been that way, with the flowers so sickeningly sweet that Michael had nearly become ill. He remembered it all, every detail.
But now it was different. He had not seen his mother in six years, not since he was eight, when she had gone away from them forever, and it was impossible to imagine her lying cold and unmoving somewhere in a strange city. She still seemed alive to him; he could hear her repeating his name over and over again, the favorite name she’d had for him: “Mikey, oh, Mikey...”
“Michael!” the lost voice of his mother became the hard, commanding voice of his father. “I told you to move along.”
A round-faced, smiling porter took the suitcase from Michael as they mounted the iron coach steps and led them toward their compartment. The coach interior was cool, cooler even than the long station tunnel, and Michael moved behind his father with a feeling of having entered a new world, separated utterly from the city-world beyond the glass windows. He’d seen trains, heard them roar past in the night, but this was his first time on one. It was nothing like the bus that held taken them into Jefferson, here to the big station. Not like the bus at all.
His father gave the porter some change and the man disappeared down the narrow corridor, leaving them alone in their compartment. It was like a little room, with a silver wash basin over to one side and green velvet seats.
“Well, don’t just stand there, Michael. Close the door and put away our things. What is the matter with you today?”
Mr. Leonard Bair, Michael’s father, was a tall man with a thin, corded neck and small black bird’s eyes. He wore steel-rimmed spectacles which made his eyes look even smaller and more birdlike, and when he smiled, which was infrequently, his lips twisted up from porcelain dentures which seemed at least a size too large for his spare face.
Michael helped his father put away their coats and the leather suitcase. Then he sat down opposite him. Lucy pressed her nose flat against the cool glass of the window. “Will we be starting soon?” she asked, watching the pre-journey activity outside.
“I guess so,” replied Michael. He looked over at his father.
Mr. Bair said nothing. He was shaking out the evening paper he’d purchased at the depot.
Michael said, I hate you, to his
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