15 Apr A Lonely Call

My brother Vincent died during Covid.

He had choked in his bed, needing a ventilator we couldn’t afford, and I didn’t even know it until it was too late…

He died on the top bunk, alone and struggling to breathe while I was out trying to find work. Mom found him and saw there was no life left in his eyes.  She blamed herself for not watching him more closely.  I didn’t even see his body leave the house…and Dad left not long after that.

I promised myself afterward that I would take care of Mom.

She changed the night that he died, I think.

We don’t talk about Vincent at all or what happened to him.  It’s like there is an emptiness in the house that just won’t go away.

I want to keep Mom safe from everything, even herself, but I’m not sure I can anymore.  I’m not sure she wants to try anymore.

I just miss him so much.  Part of me thinks it’s because we couldn’t have a proper funeral.

We thought about doing Zoom, but honestly, we have always been a close-knit family; besides us,  Mom was convinced no one would even show up.

It made me so angry that I went behind her back and made a dedication page for my brother.

I decided to be sneaky about it just in case she ever checked my shit and kept the memorabilia on a dark web forum.

Somewhere that only I can find.

It felt good to be able to just glance at old memories from time to time.  And to watch videos of happier years of my life.

One thing happened, though, when I made the website; I noticed that the emptiness in me was only growing stronger.  Almost unbearable.

I knew it was because I missed Vincent so much.

“What the hell am I supposed to do without you, bro?” I whispered to my monitor as I touched his picture.

To my surprise, I heard a voice.  It was soft and reflective and familiar.

It was coming from my computer’s mic.

“Come find me, little brother,” it said in a garbled tone.

I opened my eyes from the tears I was shedding and looked toward the webcam to see a bright and strange light forming.

A screen popped up, and it looked like a door that was foaming.  It was a sort of puddle of light on my screen, pulsing with a power that lingered as I drew near to it.  My screen felt warm to the touch.

“What is this?” I asked.

“Your freedom,” the voice answered back.

I felt my heart beat a little faster and clicked on the link.

It was a still image of my room, but instead of me sitting on the other side, I saw Vincent.  The color from the walls was fresher than before, and the sounds of my little box television were clearly more cheerful.

I squealed with delight and wanted to hug the monitor, trying not to burst into tears.

“Vincent, is this real?” I asked.

I didn’t even want to let go.

“It’s very real little bro; it took a lot of strength to get that link open,” he said as he got me off his chair and then stood up.

“How have you been?” I asked him.

“Alone,” he muttered as he gestured around the quiet room.

“Is this…are you dead?” I asked.

“I am, and for the moment, while you’re here connected to me…you are too.  But your body still exists on the other side too in the real world,” Vincent explained.

“That’s kinda cool…” I admitted as I looked back toward my own surroundings.  Nothing seemed different, but I couldn’t deny that this definitely felt like I was connected to the great beyond via the dark web somehow.

“You said it required a lot of energy to open the way?” I asked.  I had a lot of questions.  The world around him seemed so inviting.  I wondered what other secrets it held.

“It’s complicated,” he admitted.  “We don’t have time for that.  I came to talk to you.”

“I wish you were here back with us,” I admitted.

“It doesn’t work that way, I’m afraid.  Once you’re dead, there’s no way to go back.  I’m stuck, doomed to waste my days away in this wasteland,” he explained.

“It doesn’t look that bad,” I admitted.

“I’ve done what I can to spruce the place up a little bit,” he told me and added, “What makes it hard is that I am all alone.”

“What?  You mean no one else is there?” I asked.

“Don’t you get it?  The two sides aren’t connected.  This room, this space, is all I’ve got.  It’s where I died, so I guess it’s where I have to stay the rest of my eternity,” he muttered angrily.

“That’s horrible,” I realized.  I looked at the walls.  They seemed a bit more wobbly than they had a moment ago.  Was it glitching?

“I’ve tried so hard to communicate with you in the past.  It’s been mind-numbing to feel you near me and be powerless,” Vincent admitted.

“How did you get a message across to me?” I asked.

“I didn’t…your heart opened the way…it opened because you wanted to be here, little brother…” he answered.  “To be with me.”

“Really?  Now we can see each other whenever we want to?” I asked.  That sounded pretty good, to be honest.

“No… no, I don’t think the link will sustain this much longer,” he admitted as he walked toward the door again and said, “I was hoping….wishing that you might want to stay with me…longer…”

“Stay?  What do you mean?” I asked.

“I don’t want to be alone anymore!  I just want to have someone to talk to, to do things with! You were my best friend!  And I know you’ve missed me too!!” He answered.

“How do you know that?” I asked.

“It doesn’t matter!  What matters is I need you, bro,” he insisted.

“But if I stay…won’t that mean I have to die too?” I asked.

He nodded with a sparkle in his eye.

“I’ve seen you sulk around the house like a lost little puppy dog.  You aren’t happy with mom, and she certainly isn’t happy with you.  If you stay, we can be happy together.  And we can be together forever!” Vincent said excitedly.

“Wait.  I thought you said that this was the first time you could communicate…how have you been watching us?”

This conversation was getting a little strange too.  Why would my dead brother encourage me to take my own life and be stuck somewhere forever?

“You said it yourself!  You would do anything to be with me!!  This is your chance!  You don’t ever have to be alone again!”  His eyes looked like they were hiding something.

“This doesn’t feel right,” I told him.

“Why are you trying so hard to convince me to kill myself?” I asked.

Vincent frowned.  “What?” His face glitched for a second, and I thought he looked different.

“I mean…if you’re telling the truth, then you’re stuck in purgatory, right?” I muttered.

“What do you mean by that?  Are you trying to make it sound like I’m a monster?”

“No, I mean…I’m sorry…” I muttered, looking down at my feet.  He shook his head in disappointment at me.

“I’m trying to give you a choice, bro.  The choice I never had!!  It’s because I love you.  I want you to stay, but I want it to be your decision,” he told me.

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have doubted you,” I told him weakly.

“There’s something else you have to do if you want to stay,” he told me abruptly.

Somehow I could tell that his tone of voice had changed.  “There’s a weapon under your bed. Dad’s old service gun.  He left it there.”

“What the…Vincent, how do you know about that?” I asked in shock.

“You want to be with me, right?  Then you have to pull the trigger and come to the other side,” he told me, gesturing toward himself.  The image glitched again.

“What…no…I can’t do that…” I said.  It felt wrong to even consider looking for the weapon.

“This is the only way we can be together.  You have to do it,” he said, his voice frantic and strained.

I decided to look.  This was already strange, but it was even weirder when I discovered he was right.  The chamber had five bullets in it.  One was already gone.

“Vincent…did you kill yourself?  I thought you choked from Covid,” I whispered.

“What does it matter?  Don’t you want to just come with me?” he asked.

“I can’t leave Mom…”

“Don’t worry about her.  Dad left her, and you can, too.  Besides, this is what she would want!” he insisted.

“Seriously?  No brother, you have it all wrong.  Mom needs me,” I said, putting the gun down.

“Mom lied about how I died!  I took my own life because she was micromanaging me!!  I couldn’t even live under her thumb.  Dad knew the truth and left.  You need to get out too!!”

“I can’t do this…”

“Listen to me, you little prick,” he boomed as he got up in my face.

That didn’t sound like my brother at all.

“This is the only way.  It has to be this way.  You have to do it soon,” he snapped.

“And if I don’t…?” I asked hesitantly.

“Then we can never be together again.  Ever, not now; not ever.  You’ll lose your chance to be with your brother again,” he told me.

“I…” I cocked the pistol, and I looked down the barrel of the gun.  It would only take a second.

“I can’t do it, Vincent.  I can’t,” I stammered as I started to sob like a baby.

His eyes got heated, and the screen glitched again.

“Quit being a pussy and pull the damn trigger!!” he yelled.

“You’re scaring me!!” I stuttered.

Then the facade of the Vincent I knew faded away, and I saw what was truly left of my father instead.

His eyes were dark, sunken and filled with fire.  His skin was eaten away by drugs, and half of his face was drooping from what I guessed was a stroke.  His skin was sickly and jaundiced and covered in lesions and boils.

He reached for me, a look of desperation in his eyes as I prepared to log off.

“Kill yourself, be strong like your brother, and do it!  Make that bitch suffer!!!” his voice screamed as I shut the website down.

I could see his dark reflection standing there glaring at me as I held the gun firmly in my hand.

This had been a trap all along.

I looked toward the window again, and I heard the sound of that same laughter.

The world felt much more empty without Vincent and definitely lacked the same color as it did when he was alive.

But as I looked back toward that grim phantom of my father, I realized that maybe that was okay.  If my brother hadn’t died…what sort of abuse would we both have endured?

His suicide led to my freedom from that life.

I walked downstairs to where my mother was preparing our dinner, clutching the gun firmly against my chest.

She gasped when she saw it, and tears welled up in her eyes.

“Mom…” I said, my lips trembling, “I want to talk about what really happened to Vincent…”

“You found it,” she said, barely able to contain her own grief.  “I didn’t want you to know….”

I held her.  “It’s okay, Mom… it’s okay.  I’m not mad.  But please don’t hide things from me…”