“Where’s dad?”
The query froze the reunion like Cavis was pausing a VCR. Before, they had been crying over him, hugging him close, not even asking obvious questions like ‘Why are you in the body of a little high school kid’, or, the even more obvious one, ‘How are you even alive?’
The Tanes had been taking a backseat, Ms. Tanes obviously uncomfortable with her child hugging and laughing with complete strangers like he knew them. She also looked impatient.
Teagan, on the other hand, was too immersed with the thing Cavis finally understood to be an iPhone to say anything, but it was obvious he was tense. Tenser still when the question Cavis asked left the room quiet. Stagnant.
And suddenly, Cavis knew the answer before it was ever hesitantly strung together by his mother or sister. Something in his gut sank and died.
“He’s dead, isn’t he?”
There was something to announcing the words into the empty, yet static filled air. Like at the decree being spoken out loud, it finally rang true in his ears. It was the thought he had been trying to ignore. There was something to the way his family responded, looking down from the face of a stranger like they were ashamed to admit the inevitable. And dear god did Cavis hurt in that moment. Emotionally, he hurt more than he ever did in a long time. But he told himself he would not cry. He would not lose his resolve over a man that hated him. He would not--
10 minutes later, Cavis was still sobbing into his mother’s cardigan and squashed between his sister, feeling something like grief, but a variation extremely close to regret.
“Your…” his mother swallowed, “Your father never forgave himself for you dying, not really. When you hadn’t come home for about two years since he kicked you out, him and me actually had a talk about letting you back into the house. He agreed, said he would genuinely apologize about being too harsh. He said he would apologize for talking about Kevin like that too, although you knew how he felt truly about that anyway. So, your dad planned to do it on Saturday, drive up to your campus to get you. But then, we got a phone call that Tuesday morning and…”
His mother stared into nothing, gripping Cavis even tighter to herself. Tears fell from her eyes slowly, silently. “Well, he never really got the chance, did he? He died in early 2003. Apparently walked into a random hospital and screamed your name over and over in a prenatal ward. I think they said he ran into a patient’s room, smiled, then walked out like nothing happened, out of the hospital, and into oncoming traffic. I was at work and quit the day of the event. When I got there, they said some medical nonsense that added up to him being a delusioned old man, overtaken by grief. I’ve never really known your dad to be any of those things, but…”
She wavered off, tears falling faster now as she stared down at he own lap. Cavis knew he himself was crying too, and could feel Beatrice shudder next to him.
“You know, after.. Dad, I always tried to make myself feel better by imagining that the both of you were in heaven, arguing about some technology or another, smiling because you both had made up or something.” There was an exhausted sort of mirth in Beatrice’s statement, like she was smiling and patronizing her own whimsical dreams. She then heaved big sigh.
“Guess I was wrong about that.”
The pain their little broken family harbored was hard for Cavis to bear. He could see the grief they all held for the past, never really letting it go, never really moving past it. Cavis hated it. Distraught and not wanting to feel it a second longer, Cavis hopped off of the couch, shouting,
“Well that enough of that nonsense! Anyone wanna play video games?”
Beatrice looked shocked at the sudden change in mood, then smiled. “You won’t believe how good I got at Street Fighter II.”
Cavis beamed at her. “I know you just stole my cheat book.” She gave a wry smile in reply.
“Teagan, you should play too.” As he said so, the young man looked up, curious expression on his face.
“Actually, can I ask you a question?”
Cavis walked toward him, interested. “Sure?”
“Do you know what a Nintendo Switch is?”
“Never heard of it in my life. Mom, did you keep my SNES?”
“Naw, I don’t think that’s necessary. Just come here.” Ms.Tanes smiled like she's in on a joke.
When Cavis walks over to their side of the living room, the thing he described in his head as “mystical space age touchpad cell phone” was shoved in his face. A commercial of some sort played, showing Cavis…
His eyes widened. “Holy shit. I want it now.”
“It’s in the car. We were ‘bout to take it back too. You--” She cut out of her own statement, breathed, then started again. “Raris got it for Christmas from Teagan. Said he wasn’t interested. You wanna give it a try?”
He was about to nod eagerly, until...
“I actually don’t think that’s necessary.” Cavis mom spoke again from her place on the couch, a sort of somber happiness playing on her lips. She got up, and directed with her hand for Cavis to follow.
Beatrice’s happy expression pointed at him suddenly shifted into a disgruntled look, one Cavis didn’t understand the context of. He confusedly followed his mother anyway, leading up stairs and down the hall to his old bedroom.
The house creaked like an old man’s joints now, more scratches were littered everywhere. Cavis vaguely wondered why his mother hadn’t moved into a smaller house after everyone had moved out or… well, died.
They finally reached their destination, outside the bedroom door of his room, one he himself hadn’t even seen 2 years before is passing. His mother reached for the door knob, then her hand fell back. She appeared hesitant to open it.
“Mom, what’s in there? I mean, it’s okay that you probably trashed all my stuff, I really wouldn’t mind…”
“No. It’s not that. It’s just…” Her hand dwindled at the door, and seeing his mother’s struggle, Cavis decided to turn the knob and open the door of his room himself.
What he was greeted with made him hurt more than anything else.
The room was cleaner than it had ever been when he lived in it, with no clothes or pizza crust on the floor, the bed laid and not ridden with stains, and the posters on his wall of Nintendo paraphilia taped properly for once.
But it was the fact that the room was exactly the same as 20-some years ago when he left it, with the light blue paint and the pale red bedspread, with the cabinet in the corner littered with bumper stickers and the blue lava lamp collecting dust on his drawer, with the note Beatrice gave him for Christmas when he was 6 still hanging limply from the back of his doorframe. That moved him to tears. Sad, horrible, anguished, grieving tears.
“Mom... why... yo--you didn’t have to…” He said through chokes, falling to his knees, sobbing in the door frame. Cavis could not help but imagine a world in which he had never come back, the most probable world, where his mother just kept his things, mourning and mourning over something that had been long gone, cleaning the room year after year of dust and disuse, having to always look painfully at something she lost and could never get back. It hurt, it hurt him so much.
His mother appeared so lost, creases moving into a frown on her face. “Is this-- Isn’t this what you would have wanted? I cleaned it up for you and just thought… Oh wait!” She exclaimed suddenly, running to the closet, smiling sporadically.
“I had always known you were into consoles and video games. You talked about them all the time, always inviting your friends over or going to their house to play one thing or another. And well, on your birthday in 1996, this one called the Nintendo 64 had came out. I felt like it was you just telling me to buy it for you! And well, I don’t know. When I came home with it, your dad was angry. I think, at that point it was almost like he hadn’t forgived you for… well.”
She stared off into space, looking away from the closet she had just opened. Cavis stared up at her, mouth open in a silent scream, gut filling with unadulterated dread.
The smile on her face returned slowly, sadly, just like it had left. She stared at the contents of the closet.
“So, every time one of those Nintendo consoles came out, on your birthday, I would always go buy one for you, keep it in your room, you know... I put the other ones we already had in here, too. You know, when I brought them home, I’d always imagine you smiling, with that jittery face you had when I bought you the Atari for the first time…” Cavis’ mother tapered off, tears falling from her face again.
From his place on the ground, Cavis could see the hardware presented in the closet, evenly spaced from each other in their respective boxes, as clean and as new as the day she got them. Then his vision blurred over in tears again.
“Your sister, she became so prude after you--! And anyway, I bought the Switch in 2017, and she told me not too, struggled with the box like some banshee. She said I was too old to be harboring all this stuff, or whatever. I had to get a new box.” She pulled the box out of the closet, proud look on her face.
What could Cavis say? How could he possibly reply to that? How could he rectify his mother’s years and years of obsessive buying, keeping, cleaning, and stock-holding? It was his fault. It was his fault for waltzing out of his dorm on that fateful night. It was his fault for not caring for his surroundings. It was his fault for dying. It was his fault his sister had to grow up too early, or maybe too late; it was his fault his mother was this way, with her sad, delusioned, simpering smile; it was his fault his dad had gone insane and committed suicide by walking into oncoming traffic.
And what did he even expect, to just be his crass self again and walk back into the lives of these people he himself had broken? Act like 24 years had never happened and laugh over video games and Betamax and whatever Netflix was?
“No…”
That was all his brain would allow, choking back tears and sputtering. “No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no!”
HIs mother looked shocked, walking toward him. “Cavis… Isn’t this what you--”
“It’s always about me! Every fucking time it’s always about me mom! All I ever did was play fucking video games, I never grew up, I never cared about anyone else-- Even Dad! He pushed me away because I was a selfish, lazy little shit for a son--”
“Don’t say that about yourself! ”
“No! It’s true! He killed himself because of me! You did this,” he waves his hands at his surroundings, “because of me! I was dead mom! And look how much I ruined your life after, not even during, with all the disrespect, wasting my time, never getting a job, the student loans I never paid! I never called, I hated dad… Jesus, I never, not once, told you guys I loved you…”
Cavis choked, wracking with tears, unable to keep himself up. His palms fell to the floor, leaving him in a crouch. He felt as if the entire facade he made for his life was crashing down. His heart and chest burned with regret.Cavis squeezed the scratchy carpet in between both of his hands, not even knowing what he was trying to hold on to anymore.
“I love you guys, I love you, so, so much… but why? Why couldn’t you have just let me go?” He stared up at his mother, glassy eyed, face hurting from shouting, throat strained from crying. He didn’t deserve to cry like a baby. He deserved to grow up.
His mother had no telligible reply to him. She cried, sputtering, “I...I-I-I- well...”
Cavis then heard his sister call from behind him, the footsteps of the remaining party coming up the stairs. He turned to face the presence he knew was behind this scene of anguish.
"...Cavis! Is everything alright up here?”
It appeared as if the silence after the question lasted eons; he didn’t answer her. Beatrice saw the scene before her and sank to her knees to hug her crying brother. Sniffling and crying filled the background noise, burning Cavis’ resolve even more.
Barely knowing why he did it, Cavis asked the question he had been avoiding. The question they had all been avoiding, now that he thought of it.
“Bea, how did I die? I-I mean, specifically.”
Cavis’ voice was hoarse. The question was whispered, only heard by everyone from how it carried through the silence and tension in the room.
Beatrice sighed, wrapping her arms tighter around him, She did not stare him in the face. She instead breathed a deep breath, and spoke, half-whispered, reciting like she had been asked this question more than a thousand times.
"On Tuesday night, March 23rd, Washington State’s students Ashlyn Walker and Hank Fisher, prior in a relationship, had a domestic argument outside of their fifth dorm building. Fisher was intoxicated at the time. When the argument escalated, Walker threw a beer bottle at Fisher, missing him by a couple of feet. He retaliated by taking out a gun given to him by his father, attempting to shoot Walker. Fisher missed her by 3 feet, the bullet going into the 5th and 4th dorms’ alleyway, shooting bystander Cavis Harris in the side of his head. The victim died instantly. Hank Fisher was charged with manslaughter among other charges, and sentenced to 8 years in prison.
“This was most of what the local newspaper printed about you. I read it over and over, Cav. Over and over and over. I don’t even know why. I was so sure I was looking for something-- I was looking for you… your smile? The aura you left behind? I don’t know. Then I tried playing all your old video games on the console over and over for the same feeling. I beat all the games I always shrugged off when you tried to get me to play them with you, maybe because of guilt? Once that was done I threw myself into an actual job, just to get out of the house. Dad was being a spaz, Mom was hoarding your junk, and I just couldn't take it. I tried to never think of you. But I just couldn’t--” She broke out into a sob, finally stopping her long string of words.
Cavis found himself on the opposite side of comforting, gripping her tighter to him.
“I-I couldn’t forget you. I couldn’t stop reaching for the news report at my desk anytime I had a break from work, I couldn’t help visiting your grave, I couldn’t stop seeing your face in the morgue, jesus, barely stitched together, hole through the side of your head, them asking me over and over and over, ‘Is this your brother?’ ‘Are you okay?’ ‘Can we show you the bullet that went through your brother’s fucking brain--!’”
Beatrice gasped out a breath, attempting to breathe through her tears. I hurt to see her like this, his mother like this, looking as if Cavis had punched her in the side, the Tanes like this, scared and distant, wondering if they would ever get their son back. Why does everything hurt? Every time Cavis heard about the past from the people he loved, it was always something laden with agony, with guilt, with him.
He was a relic from the past who had overstayed his welcome in the memory of his family. He was a silly child who decided to never grow old. The repercussions punched him in the face years after the fact.
Cavis sighed, wiping the tears from his eyes. He distanced himself from his sister, closing his eyes. The fear of death tingled underneath his skin and stole his breath away, but his resolve was set.
“Beatrice. Mom. Dad, if you’re listening. I am so sorry, sorry for everything. I need you to let me go.”
He said this calmly, like he had finally found his life’s purpose. It was not behind a video game console, in Carl’s basement, or in any minimum wage job he would have gotten even if he had actually scrapped through college.
“What? No, Cavis…”
“Mom, I died. I died a useless adult who never wanted to live my life. And look,” he said rather hysterically, feeling the carpet dig into his knees, “I got what I wanted! You guys act like I would have really done something with my life if I didn’t kick the bucket, but you knew. You knew dad was right. I would have just played Mario in this house till I was as old as I should be now. You guys are tearing yourself up over something that doesn’t exist anymore. I died. And even if Raris doesn’t come back,” he looked up at the Tanes apologetically, “It’s not like you can keep me here. For the sake of yourselves, please let the past go.”
Cavis had no idea when the Tanes had begun to tear up. He had no idea when his mother got onto the floor in front of the door as well, and wrapped her arms around him. But he did have an idea of when this feeling started, in his core, a weary, content, vacant feeling. His mother and sister smiled at him with an overwhelming sadness, but finally, the look was not lost. It was one of understanding.
“You didn’t even get to play the Switch…” his mother whispered, melancholic, into the warmth of his small family’s little huddle. Cavis gave a wry smile.
“It’s okay. Video games are for kids anyway.”
Suddenly, or maybe it had been the accumulation of years or eons, maybe days or months, a split second or an eternity of the feeling deep in his core violently spreading throughout his body; but suddenly, Cavis was not really Cavis anymore. And Raris was not really Raris either.