He Was Just Here
Patricia Harney
David Malcolm
Word Count 1207
David and I danced at a jazz club, then walked a mile uphill across campus toward my home. The clock hands in the bell tower had long swept past midnight as we trailed through the snow covering Cornell’s main quad. We talked about dreams we’d had the night before.
“I was flying,” he told me, “like a bird over the valley.” There was hope in that image. The future stretched before us like the night’s star-speckled sky. We stopped at a stone bench with a view of the lake to the north. Gusts of wind whipped around as we read words carved in the granite.“To those who shall sit here rejoicing, To those who shall sit here mourning, Sympathy and greeting, So have we done in our time.”
As David leaned into me, my blood surged like the water that rushed in the gorge below.
Days later, we met for lunch on the south side of campus. Our conversation felt stilted, which was a surprise, given the intimacy we had started to share. Now I have a better sense of how vulnerable we feel when we start to reveal the soft underside of desire in early romance. After we ate, we walked to the museum, an I.M. Pei building that people say looks like a sewing machine. We sat on a bench framed by windows in a corner on the top floor. From there, we could see inside and out, a sculpture beside us, the snow-covered hill that sloped toward the lake at our backs.
“I’ve been thinking about love,” he said. I looked at him with surprise. I imagine that’s why our conversation over lunch felt more constrained. We were about to have the talk, about what we were doing, where we were headed. We’d been co-workers and friends for a few years but our romance had taken off just a month before. I’ve had that talk several times over since then. I now know its contours, how one person’s feelings don’t always mirror the other’s precisely, at the same time. But this was my first.
“I tend to fall in love fast,” he started to say. “And I’ve gotten hurt. I want to see where this goes. But I feel self-protective.”
I wanted to reassure him.“We are just getting started…there’s no need to rush…”, I replied, but then laughed and thought, what the hell. Uncharacteristically bold, I said,“Well, I’ve been in love with you for a long time.”
His broad smile widened slowly, deepening the crease that encircled his mouth.
“Really. . .” he said with a laugh. Now he seemed surprised. I guessed I’d kept my cards pretty close to my chest before then.
“I know what we could do… ” he started. His words quickened in pace, a little bit eager, maybe anxious, as he came up with plans we might make in the near future. I’d never told someone I’d loved them before, not in that way, but I wasn’t troubled that he didn't respond exactly in kind. He’d just said he felt cautious. I thought I could coax him along. He didn’t want to get hurt. It might take a little time, but I hoped he would come to trust me as true. I’m grateful I said this in the clear light of day, not in the heat of the night.
Just one week later, I was alone in my apartment when the phone rang. I answered it quickly, as I hoped he was calling. This was my turn to feel anxious, since I’d just been so open during our lunch. Instead of hearing his voice, though, a woman spoke into the line. She was a co-worker I knew just a little from the group home where we all worked.
“I wondered if you could cover my shift today. I don’t know if you’ve heard that David Malcom was found murdered at the shelter downtown. I’m too upset to go in.”
The soundtrack of the day suddenly muted. The hum of the refrigerator quieted, and the noise from the street disappeared. No matter how thunderous a calamity, breaking news of disaster always sounds like silence. Then, I dropped the phone as my scream rang through the room. In the next instant, I silenced my scream and took the phone back into my hand.
I’ve wondered since then why we scream in moments like this. I’ve been told this response is hard wired. A scream signals a need for help to the world when we’re in danger. If people don’t bring us safety, we collapse like a possum who plays dead to ward off a threat. For me, the news of David’s murder stunned, then seemed to crack at my head.
“No, I haven’t heard,” I said more quietly. “You probably don’t know that we’ve been seeing each other. . . We’ve. . .been. . .involved.” I pushed the words out of my mouth weakly, my voice falling to almost a whisper. She apologized and hung up. We never spoke again. I ran into her several weeks later. She stared at me from a distance, not saying a word. I didn’t think of it then, but I can imagine now how hard our brief conversation must have been for her too. My scream must have had an impact on her.
News of a murder stops us cold in our tracks. Knees buckle and muscles fall slack. Things we are holding may drop from our hands, as if we can’t bear the weight of the news. For these reasons and more, telling someone about a traumatic death, what professionals call the death notification, should involve planning and care. The moment leaves an indelible mark. But news travels in haphazard ways. When we’re tapped with the task, we don’t know what we’re stepping into. A death might come on the heels of a private, crucial moment like an argument or break-up. Or a declaration of love.
The way I learned about David’s death knotted my grief even more. At the time, I was told very little. The woman knew only he was found dead at his workplace. Overwhelmed on her own, she couldn’t show much care about me.
I put the phone in its cradle and sat on the brown couch in the living room with my feet on the floor, my gaze fixed out the glass door that led to the porch. How could this be, I kept wondering? My mother has said she remembers my call to her that afternoon, even though I don’t. Three decades later, she still says, “I’d never heard a scream like that before.” It makes sense to me that I’d call her after this shock. I followed an instinct to root back toward home. She wanted to drive the six hours upstate right away. I told her to wait.
“You were going to bring David down to New York for spring break,” she still says. I don’t remember those plans either.
I only remember sitting in my apartment for a long time, breathing into the silence around me. I looked down at the floor at the place we had lain in an evening of passion when my roommates were away. A thought passed through my mind.
“He was just here.”
Patricia is a writer, psychologist and musician who lives in the Boston area. Her previous articles and essays have appeared in Slate Magazine, Dorothy Parker's Ashes, WBUR's CommonHealth Blog and Psychology Today. She's also been interviewed in Australian ABC Radio's podcast, All in the Mind, on the topic of traumatic loss. An Assistant Professor of Psychology in Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and graduate of Grub Street-Boston's Memoir Incubator, she's completing a work of narrative nonfiction, Grief in the Margins.