Title: Resurrection
Pairing: Jack/Ennis AU
Rating: PG for language in this chapter, but up to and including NC-17 in future chapters
Summary: This picks up right at the moment in the canon that Ennis receives that infamous post card informing him of Jack's death ... but this is not a Jack!Dead story. This idea is not completely original, but I believe that my interpretation of it is something fresh, uncliche-ed, and enjoyable. Please feel free to leave fair and honest feedback.
Disclaimer: Inspiration for this story and all characters (so far) belong to Annie Proulx
Chapter One
If the incident hadn’t happened, Lureen never would have done it. She was sure of that at least. She was no fool, and believed that she was rational, sensible. But the incident made her panic, made her need control. In this one aspect of their marriage, she had relinquished the control, allowed him to have this, partly because she didn’t know how to stop it, partly because she didn’t know if stopping it would be the best thing. The incident convinced her otherwise though: if this is what happened when she left things up to fate or to Jack, then it was not the best thing.
So once she made her decision, she did it without questioning it again. The plan came to her all at once: it seemed so reasonable at the time, and she hadn’t gotten where she was by second-guessing herself.
She enlisted the help of a friend who knew about these things and she knew wouldn’t ask questions or open his mouth about it to someone else. He owed her a favour, and she had been saving it up for something big. And this? This was big.
* * *
Ennis strolled out of the post office, gripping that week’s roll of mail in his hands, feeling an easy happiness for some reason, he didn’t know what. Maybe it was because he had a Thursday off when he normally worked thirteen out of fourteen days, maybe it was because he had seen Jenny this morning unexpectedly, had bumped into her as he was leaving the diner and she was on her way to school, had talked with her for a bit, making him feel warmth moving through him, galloping through his veins, as it always did when the rare unexpected happy surprise came his way, like he always did when he saw his girls. Or maybe it was because among the bills, flyers, and other junk he held in his hand, there was a postcard. Ennis had not even glanced at it yet, didn’t even know what the picture was, but he only got postcards from one person, so he knew what it meant. It’d have to be a response to the one he’d sent not too long ago. It wouldn’t say much, but even just two words from him gave Ennis that warm galloping feeling. Getting that feeling twice in one day was more than Ennis was used to, but he wasn’t complaining.
He had taken one step onto the street when he decided he wouldn’t wait until he got back to the truck, would pull the thing out right there, read what it said, get that good feeling again. Barely glancing at the picture on the card, he flipped it over to read the words written on it and saw only one word, stamped across the card in bright red letters, marring the simple pen and ink that covered the card underneath. At first, Ennis wondered why Jack would send him a postcard with a stamp on it, then he saw his own signature at the bottom of it, and wondered what it could be doing there. And then he read the word. DECEASED. Deceased … meant dead. Dead, why would it say that? Who was dead? Why—no. No, it wasn’t that; it couldn’t be. He couldn’t—no. There was some explanation, a mistake …
But what sort of explanation could there be? Ennis didn’t want to, but knew he had to. Couldn’t try to send another one, not knowing. Couldn’t even make it back to that old shack without knowing anything. He didn’t know what would happen when he called, but didn’t see any other way.
Knew where to find the number. Kept it in his wallet, scrawled on a bit of cardboard ripped off from a pack of smokes, same place it had been since Jack had given it to him years before “just in case.”
So he made the call. Barely remembered speaking, though he could remember the conversation later on. Was like he was standing there, watching himself talking, seeing the words fight their way out of his mouth that just didn’t want to do anything, didn’t know how to talk, was never good at it in the first place. Was watching himself as he saw something else happening in his head, what that little Texas voice was really saying, coming to him like ice sliding … sliding along a stream, unable to resist the chill, sliding, sliding …
Got back to his place somehow. At first, was more confused than anything else. Seemed like it just didn’t make sense. But as he pulled out a beer, settled himself at the little table, tried not to let it all come up. It did anyhow and he knew that it made sense, sure, it made all the sense in the world. Was what he knew would happen from the start. What he’d always been afraid of. And after all, he hadn’t stopped it. And now he was—didn’t want the word to cross his mind, but couldn’t stop it, though he’d never considered whether he was this or not, just presumed, and now he knew: alone. Hadn’t been before, and now he was, and he couldn’t hardly stand it.
* * *
When all was said and done, Jack only lost a week and even then, parts still came back to him in snippets: opening his eyes occasionally to get flashes of light, sometimes sun, sometimes fluorescent; Lureen by his side, sometimes silent, sometimes talking, sometimes holding his hand, sometimes holding a book; Bobby fidgeting in a chair, mumbling about football and school; doctors and nurses who had no faces. In his memories of that week, sometimes Ennis was there with him, and that’s what told him how unreliable those memories were. Sometimes Ennis was right there with him, always sitting on the bed, not beside it, but sometimes he was only a voice, saying It’s gonna be all right, bud, and sometimes Jack fucking Twist, look what you’ve gone and done to yourself now. Sometimes that voice was playful, sometimes accusing. The days slid by like water running in a stream, no stopping them, barely seeing it go by, sliding away.
But slowly, groggy became lucid and he began to wake up, began to piece together what happened. A nurse—her name was Lucy—told him how some men had attacked him by his truck, beat him real bad, but he was going to be all right. Was pretty grim in the first twenty-four hours, but he had pulled through, was going to be fine and back to his old self in time.
Lureen was there a lot, sitting beside him, talking to him, acting sweeter than she ever had in all their years together. He appreciated her kindness, understood how what had happened must have given her a scare. Sometimes she looked sad, sometimes nervous. He squeezed her hand back, tried to tell her that look, he was just fine, it was no big thing. He didn’t think about who might have done this just yet and no one talked on it. He wondered when he could ask her for a postcard and to send it for him, because he wanted it to get there in time, and he felt an urgency to let Ennis know that something had happened, but it was all going to be OK. He didn’t think about the fight last April. He didn’t remember the beating that had put him in this hospital bed in the first place.
One afternoon, Lureen stood by his bed looking at him, and told him there was something they needed to talk about. Jack didn’t want to talk about what had happened just yet, wasn’t ready, why couldn’t they at least way until he got home? Lureen, always in a hurry, wanting to get things done.
But that wasn’t what she wanted to talk about. “I don’t suppose you remember me giving you some news last week? Some bad news from Wyoming?”
His first thought: “Something with my folks?” His parents had never contacted him in Texas in all the years he had been living there.
“No, Jack, not at all.” She sighed. “So you don’t remember.”
“What is it?” Thoughts of the other one who was in Wyoming were beginning to cross his mind, but no, it couldn’t be, what would she know about that? Must be someone else, a more distant relative, or a client they had all the way out there—sure, leave it to Lureen to be wanting to talk business by his hospital bed, a week after coming within an inch of his life, but that was the way she was, so be it. Or maybe it wasn’t anything personal at all; maybe there something had happened in Wyoming, bad weather or something, and she just wanted to pass the time, talk about the weather, that was all, just—
“It’s about your fishing buddy, Jack. That Ennis Del Mar.”
Just hearing her say the name gave him a jolt. Hadn’t ever heard her say it, didn’t even know if she knew it. “What do you know about Ennis Del Mar, Lureen?”
Something flashed in those bright eyes for a moment, and words seemed about to fall from her lips like the crack of a whip, but she stopped herself, and instead they came out softer, in a voice she rarely used: “I’m sorry to have to tell you this, Jack, when you’re feeling so poorly, but his ex-wife called … or, I should say, someone called on behalf of his ex-wife. Well, there’s no easy way to say this: your friend got into a bad accident Jack, on the highway. I’m afraid your friend didn’t make it.”
Jack heard the hum of machines behind him, the squeak of wheels distantly somewhere outside the door, tried to piece together what he had heard, make some sense of it, but the concept seemed difficult to grasp. “What do you—what was Ennis doing on the highway? He never goes anywhere.”
Lureen blinked. “Well—well I don’t know Jack, but what does it matter?”
“Why did Alma call me? Why would she even care?”
“She found your number among Ennis’s things. Thought you deserved to know.”
“Don’t see why she’d think that.”
“Jack—”
“When’d it happen? Seems funny, us both being hurt around the same time.”
“He isn’t just heard. He died, Jack. Do you understand that?”
“Think there’s anything in that though? Just seems so weird.”
Jack heard the shake in his voice, but this mystery of the coinciding of his and Ennis’s “accidents” just seemed to interesting, he didn’t want to tear himself away from it, because if he did, then he’d have to think about—no, no, it wasn’t like she said. How did her saying the words make it true? It hadn’t been true half an hour ago before she had come into the room, so it wasn’t true now, though she had told him this thing. This thing that wasn’t true, so what difference did it make?
“Jack, do you get what I’m telling you?”
Jack became aware that he was shaking his head, but he said, “Yeah.”
“I’m so sorry, Jack, I know you and him were real close.”
“Yeah.”
“Listen, I’m gonna go into work for a few hours and give you some space. I wrote down the details of what I was told on the phone at home, so I can bring ’em to you once you’re ready to think on ’em. You need someone to talk to, you call me.”
“Yeah.”
He didn’t notice her leave. He was busy trying to peace it together, but suddenly all he could hear was, He died, Jack. It just wouldn’t go away all of a sudden. And then he was falling and clawing at nothing because nothing made sense, he had nothing. They weren’t supposed to see each other until November, and that had seemed like forever, it couldn’t be now that it really would be forever.
And then suddenly, the green curtain around his bed and the bag of clear liquid above his head attached to his arm by a tube, and the golden band on his left hand that Lureen had slipped back onto him the day before all seemed to be closing in on him, and he wanted to fight them, to yell, to do something, but he couldn’t because he was trapped in this bed and everything hurt so fucking much and he refused to think about anything at all because he couldn’t hardly stand it.
* * *
Lureen got home the night after she told him and drew herself a hot bath. She immersed herself into the steaming water, leaned back, closed her eyes, allowing the warmth to sink into her. Her first moment of pleasure in over a week. She let that sink in too.
It was done. No going back now: they had both been told. She’d have to deal with the aftermath now, but that would pass, and then it would be better. Jack was hopped up on pain killers now, he probably would have accepted nearly anything she might have said to him, but she had done everything right, so that shouldn’t matter. Tom had told her that folks often felt the need to contact as many people as possible to give them the news, whatever the circumstances of their past were. And the more information she could give to Jack, the less inclined he’d be to go looking for more answers elsewhere. Still, he’d had all those questions. But that must have been the shock and the meds talking.
He would be a mess for the next while, she knew that, but he was already quite a mess from the incident, so she was killing two birds with one stone. He’d be all right eventually. He would be better than all right, and he would be safe now. There wouldn’t be any more incidents because she wasn’t going to lose a husband that way and her son wasn’t going to lose a father that way either.
The bubbles she had added to the tub were already evaporating, leaving the water translucent and it suddenly didn’t seem as lovely as it had been only a moment ago.
No comments:
Post a Comment