Jack doesn’t do anything creative. If he’s not lounging on the couch, reading psychology magazines, he’s lifting weights, enjoying himself watching us work. Some of the injuries he sustained while freeing Penelope from the coffin were permanent and serious enough to prevent him from ever returning to the police force. Even though he’s an invalid, he’s more athletic and stronger than any of us. He walks with a limp and can’t run, but there are plenty of things he can still do that we can’t, such as walk on his hands and do back handsprings (as long as he lands on his good leg). Financially, he’s okay, thanks to a huge anonymous gift of money he received after the rescue—perhaps from Penelope’s father, no one knows. He makes extra with a part-time job at a senior center, which leaves him with plenty of free time—much of which he spends with us.
Even though it was wonderful working to the scent of Gabriel’s culinary inventions and our evenings have never been the same since he died, we still enjoy working in one another’s company. We cherish that sense of camaraderie and companionship. Everyone’s art mixes with and affects everyone else’s.
Tonight, as usual, Lily, Georgia, Penelope, Jack, and I busy ourselves with various activities. I’m working on a pair of fantasy pants for a play. Georgia is mourning the loss of her novel by slowly flipping through the pages of her last novel. Penelope, hammer in hand, is finding new and delicate ways to break pots and balance their pieces back on one another in a deceptive appearance of wholeness. Jack is browsing through psychology magazines. And Lily is throbbing away at the piano, but today, instead of looking at her hands or at nothing in particular, her gaze is fixed on Jack, which I find peculiar. Jack notices it and starts making faces at her in an attempt to snap her out of her hypnotized stare.
“Don’t mind me. It’s my new project,” Lily tells him, interrupting neither her playing nor her gazing.
“Does your new project involve me, somehow?”
“Yeah, I’m just practicing on you. I’m trying to beautify you.”
He blinks quickly as he processes this information. “You don’t find me good-looking enough?”
“Of course I do. I’m just trying to make you even better-looking. So get back to your reading and let me work.”
Lily continues her playing and staring.
After another half hour, Jack says, “It’s starting to hurt.”
Lily stops playing. “You’re kidding!”
“No.”
“What hurts?”
“My ego.”
“Oh.” She instantly resumes playing.
He adds, “To watch you trying to beautify me while wearing that frustrated expression makes me feel self-conscious and unattractive.”
I KNOW I’M acting like a mother hen, but I call Lily before going to bed to make sure she’s okay. I keep thinking of Gabriel.
“How are you holding up?” I ask.
After a pause, she says, “Okay.”
Her tone is odd. I don’t buy her reply. “How are you doing?” I ask, more slowly. “Really.”
She’s silent, and then says, “Oh, I’m sure it’s nothing. It’s just . . .”
“What?”
“My hands . . . They’ve been strange today.”
“Strange? How?”
“You’re going to think I’m crazy.”
“That’s okay.” I add, “No, I won’t.”
“Okay . . . After I saw you in the park this afternoon, I came home and I started playing the piano. As you know, I was really depressed. Well, I gave in to that feeling, I sank into it. And something scary happened.”
“What?”
“My hands started changing,” she says.
“They did?”
“Yes. They became gray and shiny. And they felt different. Sort of empty. Or hollow.”
Now I’m the one who’s silent. I finally say, “Gray and shiny?”
“Yeah . . . Kind of like silver.”
“Are you exaggerating?”
“Do I ever exaggerate?”
I think about it. “No.”
“I’m actually understating it,” she says. “Because then my hands became worse. They got shinier, until they were very reflective, like mirrors.” She is silent, as though waiting for me to react. But I don’t know what to say, so finally she asks, “You do believe me?”
“Yes,” I say, not technically lying. Sure, I believe that her hands were reflective—reflective of her mental state, a mental state which concerns me greatly. “And do you have any idea what triggered this?” I ask.
“I think my mood.”
“What was your mood, exactly?”
“I told you. Extremely sad.”
“Do you know what the reflectiveness was?”
“It felt like death. As though it was trying to take hold of me. And the worst part was, I was tempted to let it, because it was a welcome relief. But then I resisted it and it went away.”
THAT MAKES ME think of Gabriel, of course. I’m still thinking about him the next day when I check the mail and, to my surprise, I have another letter from him:
Dear Barb, Georgia, Lily, Penelope, and Jack,
One of you, in addition to Barb, was my very close friend. Our friendship was deeper than the rest of you suspected, even deeper than my friendship with you, Barb. This person knew about my love for you, Barb, and kept my secret, and for that, I’m grateful. During times when I was depressed over my unrequited love, this human being was my only source of comfort and knew that sometimes I wanted to end my life and that one day I might.
I will refer to this special friend as “KAY.” Eventually, I will tell you what this acronym stands for, but for now let me simply say that just because KAY is more popular as a girl’s name than a boy’s, do not assume KAY is female. Do not assume anything.
My closer level of friendship with KAY started one day when we were alone and confided in each other more deeply than we had with the rest of the group. We began meeting one on one without telling the group. We confessed more about our lives, our feelings, our opinions, our dreams.
We’d meet for walks. For coffees. It was strangely like having an affair, except that it was not sexual—just a very caring intimacy.
One day, KAY did something very bad and told me about it two weeks later and made the decision to do something very bad again, but not immediately; instead, KAY would do it exactly two years from then—which is now just a couple of weeks away.
You’ll have to prepare yourselves for the date (Friday, October 27), hopefully get through it, and then put it behind you, and try to forget.
In all honesty, you will never be able to forget. But with a little luck and my postmortem guidance, your group might be able to return to some semblance of what it is today. I know it’s asking a lot, but I hope you will see your way to forgiving KAY her/his folly.
Love,
Gabriel
I call Georgia.
“Hello?” she answers, sounding loud and excited and out of breath.
“I just got another letter from Gabriel.”
“Oh yeah? It’s so nice of him to stay in touch, isn’t it?”
I’m not in the mood. “Not funny.”
“Sorry. What does he say?”
I read her the letter.
She greets it with stunned silence, which jibes with my mood much better.
“How weird,” she finally says.
“Are you KAY?” I ask.
“Oh, I am more than okay.”
“Not O-KAY. KAY!”
“No.”
“You’re not making much effort to deny it.”
“If I don’t sound fully engaged, it’s because I was just about to call you with some news. I GOT MY LAPTOP BACK! Someone dropped it off at my building with a note that said, ‘Sorry for the delay. Been busy.’” She laughs.
“I’m so happy for you. That makes up a little for Gabriel’s letter.”
Her tone sobers up. “Oh, yeah. What a disturbing letter. He’s even weirder in death than in life.”
I decide I want to read the letter to the others in person when I see them tomorrow, in case their expressions reveal which one of them is KAY.