Robby and Ryan

Still from your POV.

“You remind me, of Robby,” he said resting his cheek in one hand and smiling. I stopped chewing.

“Not in that way, D. He would do the same thing when he tasted food like this.” And I started chewing again as I carved off another bite.

An hour passed. I was stuffed beyond belief. Ryan had stopped a few times to watch me as I made an unsuccessful attempt to devour that cow. It was the least I could do.

“We were never able to eat it all, D. Don’t make yourself sick.” He said. “These are like a pound and a half. We always threw them on the grill the next night,” and he crossed his knife and fork on the plate; signaling he was done. I did the same.

When the waitress came over Ryan addressed her by name. “Mandy, we’re going to have to take the rest with us. You kicked our asses again.”

“You boys were never up to the challenge, Sad Eyes,” she said and walked away with our plates.

Ryan kind of shook his head at what she’d said. “She was pretty hot back in the day, Derion. She looks like, Burta, off Two and a Half Men now but, that’s life, isn’t it?” And I laughed as she returned with what was left of our cow along with the check.

Ryan looked at it and laid a hundred down for a fifty-dollar meal and said keep the change.

“Mandy?” He said looking wanting to see more. Then he said as he took her hand, “Why don’t you go have your nails and hair done. You have beautiful hands.” he kissed hers' laying down two more hundreds’.

“Are you trying to buy me, Sad Eyes?” She asked with a smile as she puffed her chest slipping the bills between those big breasts.

“You had me at fifty bucks. Don’t be a stranger, Hun.” She ruffled his hair and started walking away as I shook my head. I knew he didn’t like his hair fucked with.

“Mandy?” He asked looking at the table. “Why Sad Eyes?” he questioned? His face made that look; the one when you don’t know if you’ll cry.

She stopped and turned. “I remember you; and the blond. I saw what was around you.” She said shaking her head.

“What do you see now?” He pleaded; want in his voice so evident.

After a long look, she said, “Not what I did then. Don’t be a stranger, Hun,” and she walked away. We sat in silence.

This was the first real validation I had about any of this. The colors and stuff; the blond.

We got back in the car and I thought about what she’d said and I knew Ryan was too. I asked, breaking the silence. “Is there significance to Woodbridge?” I knew he knew.

“What do you think, D?” he asked back. “You want to see the bridge, don’t you?” And I nodded.

We drove about ten miles and he pulled off into a picnic area. He stopped the car and I looked at a covered bridge that showed all of its two hundred plus years. It was like something from a calendar.

“There’s a path to the left. It’s on the center beam.” He flatly told me.

We both got out of the car and as Ryan rested on the hood I walked down then under the bridge. You couldn’t see much but I could feel it like brail beneath my fingers; just like he said.

“Do you actually remember this, Ryan?” I asked upon returning.

“I remember what Rob remembered. It’s not my memory, Derion.” And he started the car. I thought what a strange statement.

“When Rob came back the last time; when he was unconscious; this is where I found him.” And we pulled onto the road.

“I wrote about it. This is where he went to hide from me; from himself. But I found him that night. I saw everything he had done to himself. He was sorry every time. Have you ever watched one of those little card picture things; the pictures move around as you flip through it?” And I nodded at him.

He shook his head back and forth. “In a beat of my heart, I saw the repeated needle prick in his arms. I saw the scars grow on both arms. I saw and felt his sorrow that only grew every time he hurt himself or me.” And Ryan just stopped talking. He was reliving it all again.

After about an hour ride the sentries came into sight and Ryan stopped between them. “I know you want to walk from here, Derion. I’ll return Shannon’s car and meet you out back.” I got out of the car wondering how he knew and then slowly walked to the house.

I was on the deck when I noticed him sitting next to their tree. I watched him for a while then made my way down. I sat on the other side of the massive trunk and waited for him to talk.

I realized I was part of their story now. Ryan wrote about this. When they came back and Robby saw the rod iron sculpture for the first time. Ryan sat where I was now and Robby sat on the other side.

“You know, Derion? Bruno spread some of his ashes under this tree. I think that’s why the grass is so much softer here.”

“Why are you doing this now, RJ?” I asked.

“D, the last time I was here I tried to end my life. It was after Rob died. But Willow wouldn’t let me. I wadded into the freezing water and laid face down; I wanted to be with him that bad. I don’t know why the ice water didn’t kill me and I don’t really remember crawling up the bank.

I should have frozen to death under this tree, but I didn’t. He showed himself to me one last time. He touched my heart again, Derion.”

I could tell Ryan was struggling with tears. It was a long pause.

“I wrote about what happened but what I didn’t say was this. When I woke up I was warm and dry under this tree.” And he looked up.

I stood and rounded the tree sitting next to him. He dried his eyes and said, “Rob would say each tear was a picture into your heart and soul. He used to come up with some poetic shit sometimes.” He stopped and just sat there watching the birds.

When he spoke again it kind of startled me. “I had watched him for a week. He sat in the early morning with the most colorful of them around him. I didn’t get it.

A week or so later I saw him sitting in the same flowerbed but his arms had wrapped around the flowers of orange and purple pulling them to each side of his face. He’d sit naked in the dirt.” At this moment I’d wished Art had told me not to go.

“A week after that I realized what he was doing. He held three of each flower in his hands and Hummingbirds drank from them inches from his face.

A month had passed and they were eating from his hand. Those fuckin birds would swarm him ignoring the flowers. He would have five or six drinking like sailors from his hands.” Ryan stopped, got up, and walked to the house shaking his head.

I followed and found him sitting at the piano softly playing random stuff and I listened. “What do you need to tell me, Ryan?” I finally asked.

“Even after the diabetes life was good, I guess. We got used to it and found what normal was now. Even with diabetes, we did live. But it was hard. School was good for Rob and gave him a reason other than me to stay on track.

We walked after dinner, or would work out; some nights we would run, miles sometimes. It brought his sugars down and he could take a smaller shot.

He was barely twenty-one, D. But he owned it like a cross he needed to bare. Personally, I hated it. I hated him for having it. He ruined our life; him and his fuckin diabetes. And then the drugs.” And he stopped playing. He turned away from me but I could tell his chest was shaking and he wiped his eyes.

“Ryan? You seem to need someone to be mad at for where you are today,” I said, kind of under my breath, but he heard me.

“Nobody’s life is perfect. I have heard you blame Robin. You have said you blame Rob. Don’t blame anyone, Ryan. Life is what it is, in spite of what you want it to be. There is no fault.” I was surprised at what came out of my mouth but it caused Ryan to think.

“Are you preaching to me, Derion? You think I don’t understand Phyc.101?” He asked.

“You still don’t get it.” his tone becoming sarcastic.

“I know what could have been. I know what should have been. What was supposed to be? It’s not my fault. I didn’t rune everything.” He finished.

I didn’t answer and he started to play again. Ryan refused to accept any blame, but blamed himself for everything. It made him feel better to be the one left behind; the one who tried to fix but was unsuccessful. He seemed to only exist for the torment he imposed on himself.

“Do you think you could have changed anything, Ryan? Do you think if you had done something different you wouldn’t be sitting here right now?” I asked. I couldn’t help it. He was acting like a fool.

“What I’ve felt for the last twenty-plus years, Derion needs blame. There needs to be fault for things to wind up, the way they have.”

His playing changed and became dark. There were no more, soft, strokes; his fingers were locked in hooks as he abused the keys. Everything about him changed. His body became rigid and his face contorted as he continued. “Could we have a fire?” I finally asked.

He immediately stopped and relaxed. His face softened into a smile and he said, “Your wish.”

We sat in front of the fire for a while and he asked what I wanted to do tomorrow. “The place will be crazy setting up for the wedding. We could go up to West Virginia and around the Appalachians.

We could go into DC and maybe walk the mall or go to Arlington and watch the changing of the guard. Maybe Shannon will loan me her car again.”

“Let’s do it all,” I said.

We sat on the sofa watching the flames in an oversized fireplace. It was a corner room with three windows on two sides; each being about four feet across with two feet of stained glass at the top. Willow trees being the theme of each but not the same.

I kind of had an out of body experience. I was floating above watching all the seines that had played out in my mind as I read of them on the floor in an old comforter. I had pictured it, the two of them being who they were to each other.

Everything in this house was big. The fireplaces were all overly large; I guess to match the rooms. I looked down on them doing things he’d shared with us; the love and tenderness that they shared with us.

Like the night before he took a bottle from the bar and I watched through the window as he did like last night. Wrapped in a blanket he threw it from his shoulders and took more than a long swig then threw the bottle in the water. I called Art.

From your Author:

To those of you who comment I want to say a big… thank you. As for Derion; He is, and always be, a godsend. RJC.