A Miss Is As Good as a Mile
Horace Kavanagh lay in repose until everyone — the doctor, the nurses, his wife, Gertrude, his best friend, Mal — had exited the room. The tender lamentations of his loved ones still echoed in his ears, where Horace collected them like precious jewels for the pleasure of future admirations.
Bracing against the side-rails, he held his breath and brought himself upright, astonished to feel no pain for the first time in years. Off came the itchy, threadbare gown, replaced by the familiar comfort of pants worn above the hip bones and a sweater that smelled faintly of home. Newly-nimble steps saw him past the busybodies at the nursing station; the antiseptic stench of the ward was his only pursuer onto an elevator which led back to the ground floor. Careful to avoid eye contact, he wound his way through the atrium and into the lobby, where the promise of a new day shone brightly through the big bay windows.
Vitality, adrenaline, and several weapons-grade painkillers coursed through his veins. Horace had never felt so alive.
“Excuse me, sir? Can I help you?”
He turned and met the irascible gaze of the woman perched behind the reception desk. “No ma’am,” Horace replied with a bashful, practiced wave, “I was just visiting a friend.”
The woman scowled, looking pointedly at Horace’s wrist, where a yellow armband with the words FALL RISK glared back at him. “If you’re leaving against medical advice, we’re going to need you to fill out some forms,” she said, reaching into a drawer and extracting a slab of papers. “What’s your name?”
Horace considered his options. There were twenty paces to the exit, give or take. The old Horace would’ve made a run for it. But running away was what you did when you were in the wrong, and Horace had never felt more righteous about anything in his life. Hitching his pants north of his bellybutton, he strode to the desk and gave his name, adopting a slight brogue for Kavanagh.
The woman clacked her keyboard. Her eyes grew wide as saucers, then narrowed. She motioned over a nearby colleague, a man with a walrus mustache. She indicated something on her screen, then whispered in the man’s ear. He regarded Horace now, looking as if he’d just made a pass at his own mother, before dashing down a nearby corridor.
The woman cast her eyes around the lobby, biting her lip. “Sir, according to our records… you passed away this morning.”
Horace winked, rapping his knuckles atop the pile of paperwork on the desk. “I tell ya, I decided against it.”
The woman traced the sign of the cross upon her chest. “I don’t — I don’t think you’re allowed to do that.”
“Oh?” said Horace, feigning indignity. “And why not?”
“It’s against hospital policy,” she said, her lips trembling and ashen. “It has to be.”
They were both silent then, until several minutes later when the man with the mustache returned with three more men in tow — two lumbering security guards and a waxy-looking fellow around half their size. “Mr. Kavanagh, I’m Eudy Marshall, the hospital administrator,” the short one said. “Come this way, please.” The guards flanked Horace as the administrator led the group to a spartan office.
“Mr. Kavanagh,” he said, seating himself with a tidy sequence of crisp movements, “thank you so much for taking the time to meet with me, and for choosing Preceptor for your care.”
“Call me Horace. What seems to be the trouble?”
“Well, according to palliative care, you were pronounced dead this morning.” He pursed his lips, interlocking his fingers on the desk. “My condolences.”
“Yes, thank you.”
“But you’ve decided not to pass on, is that correct?”
Horace’s fingers surreptitiously guided a few wisps of hair to camouflage his bald spot. “That’s right. I haven’t had my fill.”
Eudy offered a pursed smile. “You know…I’ve long suspected we’ve discharged a few patients who wished for death instead.” He angled back in his chair and huffed. “But we’ve never had someone attempt to discharge after they passed. It’s without precedent — and our shareholders cannot abide the risk.”
Horace winced. “Are you… are you telling me I can’t leave?”
Eudy centered the stack of papers on the desk between them and smiled, more naturally this time. “Not at all. I’ve consulted with the hospital attorney and checked the bylaws — you’re free to go as soon as we complete the appropriate indemnification forms.” Over the next several hours, he walked Horace through an accord to be legally reported as deceased to the county, an agreement to pay whatever portion of the bill Medicare would not, and a lengthy waiver in which Horace agreed to settle any potential discoveries of medical malpractice through binding arbitration.
When all the paperwork was signed, they stood, shook hands, and walked back into the lobby. “Godspeed, Horace. While the terms of our new nondisclosure agreement prevent you from revealing the details of your release, I do hope you’ll feel free to tell your family and friends to keep us in mind for all their future healthcare needs.”
The sliding doors opened onto a bright spring afternoon — the very first day of the rest of Horace Kavanagh’s life.
…
Had the air always been so crisp? Each step brought new delights to his attention; the once-mundane grays of existence now rendered in sparking Technicolor. It was one of those magical, early spring days in Milwaukee when the temperature climbs above fifty, bringing all the city’s residents out of their winter hibernations. A gorgeous young woman pushed her baby down the path in a stroller, each of them smiling as they passed. Horace wept openly, a fierce determination to live his new life with far greater purpose, far greater meaning, swelling inside his breast.
He continued west along the elms, making a list of the things he would do. There were the obvious ones — learning to play the piano, starting each new day with a jog. Taking the trip to Italy that he and Gertrude always put off until next year, when things wouldn’t be quite as hectic. He’d heard they were doing miraculous things for hair restoration as of late, and the thought of luxurious new growth sent Horace leaping into the air like a man half his age. He stuck the landing like a man very much his own age, legs tangling and arms akimbo, his foot jutting out at an unsightly angle when the dust had settled. A powerful and curious vibration thrummed deep within his innards, as if someone had sounded the lowest note on a piano from inside the pit of his stomach. He forced his foot back into position and wondered how badly it would hurt when the painkillers wore off. It took until he exited the park and was nearly home for the resonance in his stomach to dissipate.
Rounding onto his block, he spotted his neighbor, Atticus Fernsby, knifing his trowel into a bed of lavender and daisies. They’d never been close, only neighborly, and Horace had always harbored jealousy of the man’s intelligence and rakish good looks, which had only deepened over the years when his thick, still-lustrous head of hair turned silver. New beginnings, Horace reminded himself, and offered a hearty wave in his direction. Atticus appeared to take no notice, rising and walking back inside his home.
“Nuts to you, Fernsby. Look like you seen a ghost!” said Horace, before pausing at the bottom of the driveway to the residence he’d shared with his wife for over thirty-seven years. The approach would take great caution — after all, what good was refusing the specter of death if it only sent your beloved to an early grave from fright? Gentle steps and a tender heart, Horace thought, and she would understand him completely. Tonight, they would dine out on the town and return home to bask in their triumph, making love on the kitchen table because death was but an illusion now and they needn’t live in fear of its tyranny any longer.
He steadied himself and entered through the back door. Everything in the house was at once so familiar and yet brand new. He tiptoed down the hallway, past the yellowed wallpaper she’d always begged him to change, and peered into the living room, where he found Gertrude sitting upon the sofa, a cup of tea in her hands and a hazy look in her eyes.
“Oh, Gert,” he said, and rushed to her side, taking her hands in his and knocking the teacup to the floor, cracking it in half. “It’s all right, darling. Don’t be scared. I’m here. I’m home.” He kissed the tips of her fingers with grateful lips.
“Horace,” she said, removing her hands and placing them in her lap, “that was my favorite cup.”
Horace rose and sat next to her on the sofa. “Gert, I couldn’t go through with it, I couldn’t leave you now. There’s still time, so much for us to do.”
Gertrude squirmed, pushing herself in the opposite direction. “How did you even manage such a thing?”
Horace winked, clicking his tongue. “It was easy, I just thought about baseball.”
“That’s not funny,” she said, gathering the broken teacup and exiting the room.
Horace trailed her to the kitchen, where he pictured closing the distance between them to sweep her in his arms. “Gert, let’s hit the town tonight and celebrate in style.”
Gertrude turned to face him. “Oh, I didn’t realize you’d come all the way back from the dead to take me out to the Sizzler, then. Honestly, Horace — you’re always thinking about yourself. Did you ever think I might have been waiting all these years to dine al fresco in Paris, just the once? But we had our time, and you’ve passed on. I was there, in case you’ve forgotten.”
Hands on his hips, Horace gazed around the room, grasping for the words to sweeten, where he spotted a sparkling blue vase filled with fresh lavender and daisies next to the telephone. Their aroma burned his nostrils and turned his spirits to vinegar. “Boy, you sure move on fast, huh?”
She turned to face him, smoothing down her hair. “Oh please. It’s simply a lovely gesture. Aren’t they beautiful?”
“Thirty-seven years, and she’s out and about before I’m even cold in the ground.”
“God help me,” Gertrude said, slamming her hand on the countertop. “You’re not in the ground, you’re in my kitchen. You can refuse death all you like, but we had our time — a good, long while at that. ‘Until death do us part,’ remember? No, I won’t go on living in sin with you now. Imagine what my mother would say!”
Horace rubbed at his temples. “Your mother’s been dead for forty years!”
“Well, that doesn’t seem to count for much nowadays, does it? Next thing you know, she’ll come bursting through the door to remind me I should have married Clancy Fitzsimmons instead.”
Horace stormed out, giving the door a satisfying slam. In the garden, he lined himself up behind a potted plant, as if setting to kick a field goal. Sweeping forward, he swung his leg as hard as he could, the pot exploding into pieces. A large, somewhat triangular hunk landed twenty feet away in the street; to Horace’s tremulous astonishment, his foot landed another ten feet beyond that, in the middle of Atticus Fernsby’s front yard.
…
“Clancy Fitzsimmons?” Mal scowled and placed two beers on the kitchen table. “That guy was a jerk.”
“You can say that again,” Horace said, rubbing the stump where his right foot had been. After the vibrations had stopped, he’d collected the missing appendage and tried jamming it back into place for a while before giving up and tossing it into the center of Atticus’s garden. Luckily, Mal only lived a few blocks away, and Horace had been able to hop over on his remaining extremity. “Like she’s the only one who had a high school sweetheart. Do you remember Desi —”
“Desiree Stevenson,” Mal said, a wistful gleam in his eye. “How could I forget? She was real pretty. Smart, too.”
Horace laughed. Mal was smitten by her when they were teenagers, hardly able to speak when she’d been around. “Yes sir. Desiree Stevenson. I wonder where life took her. There’s a gal that’d appreciate a guy refusing to buy the farm, I’ll bet. Her smile always lit up the room.”
As if on cue, the silhouette of Mal’s wife Florence darkened the entryway. Holding her finger up to pursed lips, she nodded at the wall clock above them before shrinking back into the recesses of the home. “Thanks for letting me stay here tonight,” Horace said, muffling his voice. “Hope I’m not digging you in too deep here.”
“No deeper than usual. Don’t worry about it. She says you can’t come with us tomorrow, though. Said it would be poor form.”
“Well, she’s not wrong about that. Don’t worry, I’ll make my way.” Horace sipped his beer, leaning back into the chair. “I can’t believe they’re still going through with it. Think they’ll use an empty coffin?”
“Beats me,” Mal said, grinning back at him. “I’m just glad you’re back, is all. I know how hard this must have been for you.”
Horace sighed, running a hand over his stump. “Oh, you do, do you?”
Mal glanced towards the hallway, then leaned forward. “I do. See, the thing of it is…I’m supposed to be dead, too.”
Horace seized up mid-swallow, taking a long while to clear his airway with slow, steady breaths. “You’re kidding. But — but how?”
“Last November. Flo and I were getting ready for the Friday Fish Fry over at the Legion. I was sat right here, waiting for her to fix her hair, and wham — I go down like a sack of bricks.” Mal pantomimed a coronary, clutching his chest and flapping his tongue before tilting his head towards the ceiling. “Tell you the truth,” he said, looking back again towards the hallway, “I was ready to go. All them years at the factory, working overtime just to keep the mortgage, putting the kids through school, getting screwed out of my pension. Let’s just say I wasn’t too broken up about it. Just wish I coulda seen the Brewers win it all, right? Think we’re gonna be waiting a while on that one still.”
Horace looked upon his friend, truly took him in for the first time in years, and was astonished to discover Mal was missing an ear. “But how?”
“That’s just it. It wasn’t me — it was Flo. After they pronounced me, she came in and said I had another thing coming if I thought I was getting away that easy. Said I still hadn’t taken her to see Spain like I’d promised back in high school. Shoot, I woulda told her we’d go to the moon back then if I thought it’d get me in her pants, y’know? We was just kids.”
They finished their beers in silence. When they were done, Mal threw Horace’s arm around his shoulder and walked him to the living room, helping him to get arranged on the couch. He paused at the entryway on the way out, his finger hovering over the light switch. “Welcome back, buddy. Oh, and one last thing: be careful, okay? Your body isn’t going to heal like it used to.”
Horace rubbed at his leg. “Yeah, I kinda figured that one already.”
“Can I tell you something else?”
His heart heavy with gratitude, Horace once more looked upon his friend. “Tell me anything in the world, pal.”
Mal looked up, tears welling in his eyes. “You remember Barbarella?”
“The Jane Fonda picture?”
“Yeah,” Mal said, “that’s the one. It was on TV a few months back, while Flo was at the store.” He sighed and looked towards the ceiling, his lower lip quivering. “Be gentle. If you break something off, it’s never ever coming back.”
…
“Christ, fix your face before Flo sees.”
With shaking hands, Horace rattled his lower mandible until something clicked into place. He’d fallen after waking in an unfamiliar setting, not yet used to his missing appendage. A glance in the mirror confirmed that his mouth now hung slightly ajar, as if he was constantly off-guard, even when he tried closing it all the way.
“I told you to be careful, didn’t I? The world is a scary place for people like us.” Mal adjusted his tie and gestured towards the street. “We’re heading over now. I left some clothes out for ya, and dug out the crutches from Flo’s hip surgery, too.”
The men embraced. Horace swallowed back the lump in his throat. “I love you, buddy. Thanks for everything.” His S’s now hissed when he spoke.
“You got it. Don’t be late, eh?” Mal adjusted his tie and scurried out of the room.
Horace hopped into the bedroom and dressed himself, taking care not to jostle anything. There was something obscene about the way his pants leg dangled without his foot to serve as an endpoint. He crutched to the corner and got on the bus, women covering their children’s eyes in the seats around him. Horace pretended not to see and adopted a pensive pose to hold up his now-permanently slack jaw.
He exited in front of the church, where he was heartened to find the premises teeming with mourners. He made his way inside, preparing for the well-wishes and accolades of his many friends and acquaintances.
“Dead man walking,” someone said inside the lobby.
“Can you believe the nerve of that guy?” one attendee asked another near the entrance to the narthex.
“He’s really let himself go,” said a woman as he passed.
Gertrude stood at the head of the transept, looking refined in a black dress that Horace had never seen before. She did not acknowledge his presence when he took his place beside her.
“I’m so sorry,” said Rose Gebhardt, Gertrude’s friend from the Red Hat Society, maneuvering her walker next to them. “I can’t imagine all that you’ve been through, dear.”
“Thank you,” Horace and Gertrude said simultaneously. Gertrude began to cry.
Rose turned and smashed a tennis-balled tip of her walker into the upper half of Horace’s remaining foot, disconnecting his two largest toes.
“Atticus,” Gertrude said, dabbing her eyes with a wrist and waving towards the pews, “thank you so much for coming.”
Atticus strode towards them in a dark suit that seemed tailor-made to fit his proportions, carrying a black trash bag by its knotted-off top. “Of course. A friend in need deserves a friend, indeed.”
Horace cleared his throat.
“Horace,” said Atticus.
“Atticus,” said Horace.
“Something the matter?” Atticus said, extending the bag at arm’s length. His silver hair shimmered under the spare church lighting.
Horace shook his head, his jaw trailing behind each turn. “Not a thing. I’m a lucky man, Fernsby. Get to see my own funeral. Pretty well attended if I do say so myself. What’s in the bag?”
“I believe you misplaced something in my garden yesterday, so I brought it with. Be forewarned, its odor is rather unpleasant.”
“That’s swell. Why don’t you give it here so I can stick my stinking foot straight up your ass?”
“Enough,” Gertrude said, turning to face him. “You’re so selfish. Plenty of people were going to miss you, you know.”
“People can still miss me,” Horace said.
“Oh, that’s rich. How could anyone miss you when you refuse to leave?” She turned away. “Please don’t sit with me today, I would simply die from the embarrassment.”
“Woe be to those that refuse the toll to Acheron,” said Atticus, tossing the bag on the floor next to the coffin. He placed his hand upon the small of Gertrude’s back and led her away.
Horace hopped his way to an open seat at the back of the church. The pastor, who looked impossibly young, delivered the opening sermon: “In Job it is written: ‘If a man dies, shall he live again? All the days of my service I would wait, ’till my renewal should come.’ For when one departs, he returns to the Earth, and on that very day his plans too shall perish. The living know they will die, but the dead know nothing, and they’ve no more reward to keep them.”
None of his fellow parishioners offered a eulogy when the time came, and the service concluded soon thereafter. Attendees were filing out as Mal approached from the side, but Florence reached out and grabbed him by his remaining ear, which made a sharp popping sound when it detached from his skull. Mal offered a mournful wave before being swept away in the departing crowd.
Horace teetered up to the coffin. The lid was rather heavy, and offered a groan of disapproval when lifted. Inside was his favorite suit, the suit he’d worn on the day of his wedding, and a collection of photos from across his life. He’d looked so happy.
The lobby was empty. It was raining out, and at this temperature it would likely turn to snow before too long. The crossbeams above would be an excellent place to hang himself, he decided, provided he could find a way to shimmy up there and a rope for the job; perhaps, if he dropped from a great enough height, his head would pop off entirely. Then the pastor could simply collect all the pieces and arrange him inside of his suit within the casket. They could resend the invites and start all over again.
“Our dead are never dead to us until we have forgotten them.”
Horace turned to face a woman wearing an overcoat and bonnet, both of which failed to hide her striking features. “Who was it that said that?”
“George Eliot.”
“I’ve heard of him. He was a writer, right?”
“She. Her real name was Mary Ann Evans.” The woman’s pale skin seemed to be glowing. “She had to use a pen name to be taken seriously.”
Horace’s jaw fell so far agape that it unhinged completely and needed popping back into place before he could speak again. “Desiree? Desiree Stevenson?”
“Hello, Horace,” she said, with a smile that turned the vestibule incandescent. “I saw your obituary in the paper yesterday — and the retraction this morning. It’s nice to see you again.”
Horace balanced on his crutches and grasped her hand, breaking off three of her fingers in the process.
—
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