The Death of Percy Meyer

Dear Elizabeth,

It is with great sympathy that I announce the death of the once honorable Percy Meyer. His funeral should be held July the 2nd, at the place you know. Time, largely irrelevant. Your attendance is most recommended. Despite the differences between you, he loved you very much.

Signed,

Yours.

“I should’ve hoped you were dead,” Ellie huffs. Her accent was once the consequence of a little African American girl, coming to England when she was ten. Now that she’s thirty, it almost sounds as though she belongs here.

“Only as I live and breathe,” mutters Percy, always English, equally thirty, eyes set on the cottage door. Mr. Barry’s house.

“If that monstrosity on your finger got any bigger, your hand would fall off,” Percy quips, the ever-bright glint of the diamond teasing his periphery.

She rolls the stone into her palm. “Green never suited you.”

She’d only seen the back of him, but she knew he looked the same. Sun-kissed skin and a jealous pout. The sleeves of his white button-down were rolled up to his elbows, and his suspenders as messy and loose as the dirty-yellow curls spilled atop his head. She wondered about his tan. Percy Meyer would never know the outdoors if it weren’t for needing to be somewhere he wasn’t. Percy liked books, or so claimed the decorated scholar.

“I expected a casket at least,” she says. “It’s unlike you, not to commit—I’m shocked.”

He shrugs. “Perhaps time increases the rate of unlikelihoods. Did you see them on your way over?”

“The mounds of uncut grass, scratching my chin?” Ellie quips, swatting at a mosquito. “Couldn’t miss it.”

“No,” Percy sneers. “The elephants.”

“Ahh,” Ellie whispers. “Invisible things.”

“Only to you,” Percy mutters.

He steps ahead of her then, and knocks on the mahogany door three times. Like always, at first there’s nothing. Suddenly the door comes open, and the winds pick up to a thousand miles per hour and push them from the porch into the house. They lose their footing, stumbling inside; they land tangled across the rickety floorboards, as the winds force the door shut behind them.

“Well I certainly didn’t miss that,” Ellie huffs, pushing herself up from the floor, clapping the dust from her hands. Finally, he sees her. Ellie looks the same as last time. She wears the old red cardigan with gold buttons; her curls fall over her shoulders, and hug the curves of her chest. Her lips are red and bloody—chewing on them, always. He almost smiles, remembering the always. He wonders whether smiling would send her away.

“Withers,” Ellie calls, for the orange cat who doesn’t answer. “Withers!”

“Perhaps he got out,” whispers Percy, as Ellie looks, ducking her head behind the furniture to search for him.

Mister Barry’s house is very strange, but at the very least, familiar. Trees sprout from the living room ceiling; the branches pour in all directions, creating balconies or bridges, between the four corners of the house. Spilling from the back balcony and the trees is Barry’s staircase; a large golden telescope bolted to the mid-step. On the ground the couches and chairs lie buried under dust and white sheets. Stacks of newspapers, books, and magazines coat each open space of the floor. How anyone bigger than Withers can move around this place, Percy has yet to figure out.

And then there it is, another always; the walking stick, leaning against the bookshelf.

“Well, the drive was pretty horrible,” says Ellie. She pulls the chair from the two-person dining table, and sits, never breaking eyes with Percy. She pulls the dusty fabric napkin from the place setting, and fans it out, setting it on her lap. The ring, turned upright, gleams beneath the window light. She pretends Percy didn’t notice. “I hope we’re to do more than choke on dust,” she says. “Put on the water, would you?”

She still says water the same.

Ugly and American.

“Already hot,” Percy says, setting his palms on either side of the kettle, steaming on the stove. He takes it by the handle and carries it to the table, setting it between them. He watches her eyes narrow into pleasant crescent moons as she stares at the empty plate on the table, toying her fork and knife back and forth. “I haven’t had these in ages,” she admits. But she doesn’t take a bite, of the invisible these.

She shakes her head then, snapping out of it. She sets her utensils back on the table, and sucks the smile into her mouth. She takes the burning kettle by the handle, and begins to pour it in her cup. The water’s as invisible as the berry ‘nilla cakes on her plate. She swirls her spoon in the cup nonetheless, and tips the empty sugar bowl into the tea.

“You’ll be in a coma one of these days,” Percy quips, watching the sugar. His eyes flicker toward the walking stick again, before they’re back to Ellie. “When’s the last time you’ve been here?” he asks.

She nearly scoffs. “When did we last say goodbye—When’s the last time you’ve been here?”

He dares to chuckle. “When did we last say goodbye?”

Her gaze softens a little, though her eyes remain on the stirring spoon, and never Percy. “Since then?” she asks. The words barely above a whisper.

“Same as you then,” Percy shrugs, the nervous smile battling the corners of his lips. He throws the napkin into his lap, crumpled, useless. “But you’ve always loved this house more than me.”

“Well I used to believe in more than you,” Ellie sneers, setting down the spoon. She pushes herself from the table, and begins to examine the near shelves— dust, books in dust, trinkets in dust, photos in dust, the walking stick. She nearly thinks to touch it. She shakes her head, not. When she turns, Percy is there, waiting still at the table. His legs folded one over the other, his eyes lasso her.

“I suppose now you only believe in the things you can see,” he says.

“Well, it’s quite hard to deny them,” Ellie says— and then there is Withers. “Well, aren’t you fat?” Ellie japes in a whisper, as Withers rolls his orange and yellow body between her legs. The space where his eyes should be, sewn shut. His little nose wriggles back and forth, taking in the scent beneath the new perfume she wears.

“That’s not very nice,” Percy mutters.

“Why am I here?” she asks, as opposed to acknowledging.

“I thought you’d enjoy a present,” Percy says, forcing himself from the table.

“I’m still recovering from your last present,” Ellie quips, attention engaged to Withers, as opposed to the man who saunters to the kitchen, and digs through the old cabinets.

“Huh,” Percy huffs, frozen against the cabinets. “How is the old girl?”

“She’s two,” Ellie says. “Doesn’t know who she’s missing.”

He nearly forgot to breathe. Nearly.

“Well, I’m sure her life is very full,” Percy mumbles. “If the monstrosity is any clue.”

“Jealousy is futile, when you knew the terms,” Ellie says.

“Every man went.”

“England did not go.”

“Every man on my street,” Percy says. “They went to the States, and they signed up, and they stood for something. It was only fair I go too.”

“You volunteered for ignorance,” Ellie reminds him. “I told you I wouldn’t love a changed man, and it did not stop you.”

“You are selfish.”

“Are you changed?”

He bites his tongue before he answers. It comes out angrily. “I am changed.”

“Then it seems our decisions were fair,” Ellie says. “Well, I’ll bet you’re dying to tell me,” she says, sauntering to the dusty couch, falling arms wide. She sinks into the old springs, and fans her arms over the backrest. “What’s it like to blow the head off a Vietnamese farmer for nickels and dimes?”

He swallows. He’d learned once that swallowing often traps the bubbling dreams, day or night. And digging his fingernails deep into his palm. And grounding his feet. He pretends what she said didn’t drive his mind back to the fields. He swallows, again.

“Did you get my letters?” he asks.

She nearly laughs, to remember them. Dear Elizabeth, I’m sorry to tell you this way, that I’ve decided to go after all. Dear Elizabeth, I’ve never seen a place like this, Dear Elizabeth, it’s ugly here.

Dear Elizabeth,

It is with great regret that this letter may find you, when you have well moved on. I heard you’re getting married now, to the man who sells the papers. I once promised never to take any such action, that I would become a great interference to your life. I imagine you’ll believe this letter to break that promise; I fear you’ll think very little of me. I suppose if I’m ever to send this, I must choose to believe that if you do not know me by now, then perhaps you never will.

I’ll be at the place this coming Sunday, at noon.

Sincerely yours,

Percy.

“I thought I was here for a gift,” Ellie says. Soon she’s up, following the cat, who nudged her along before leading the way. The hall wasn’t any better than the living room. Hanging pictures in dust, wall sconces in dust, end tables in dust, the guest room. The comforter in dust, the wooden floor, creaking beneath her heavy boots— in dust. She saw herself in the vanity mirror, before she sat on the bench.

“You used to wonder about that,” says Percy. She sees him from the neck down in the mirror, and notices how far his Adam’s apple protrudes. He gazes at the brushes and combs and hairpins, each made of silvers and pearls, the finest of things the old queens could’ve asked for— only they were invisible, hiding on the vanity table. “If they’d be just as pretty when we grew up, or if everything would be different when we were older. What do you think?”

She shakes her head, but can’t dare her lips to part.

“Well you haven’t gotten to play with these in ages,” Percy grins, reaching past her for the string of old pearls, lying in the jewelry dish along with the other invisible jewels. “These must be worth a fortune by now! Think I can get something good for ‘em?”

“You can’t!” Ellie jumps, trying her best to snatch them from Percy, who holds them high in the air. The giggles and the grins, failing to portray what she hoped to pass as anger. “Barry gave those to me!” she squeals. “They’re mine! All mine!”

“All mine, all mine,” Percy teases, bringing them down. “Everything’s always Ellie’s.”

“Exactly,” Ellie says, snatching his hand which holds the invisible pearls. She presses them into his chest. “Well don’t just stand there. Make yourself useful.”

She turns from him, and holds her hair above her neck. He brings the pearls slowly across her throat, and they send a wave of ice down her spine. He toys with the clasp, trying to open it with his thumb. “Man,” Ellie mutters.

“Woman,” Percy retorts in a whisper. “There you go,” he says, necklace clasped. He watches her, the way her hand instinctively travels up to roll the invisible pearls between her fingers. The way she tucks her bottom lip between her teeth, to chew, always. He notices the ring, then he chooses to notice her eyes. “Still pretty,” he says.

They realize then how close they are, and Ellie tears away.

“Well what’s the point of being here, if we can’t even see anything?” she huffs, pushing past Percy, and the cat, barging through the hall, back to the living room. She snatches the walking stick from where it leans, and she lifts it high in the air. She bangs the bottom half against the floor— one bang, two. Suddenly it all wakes up.

The lights flicker on, spilling the warmth of sunset. The cold walls flush red, and the photographs emerge clean from beneath the dust. The living room furniture was no longer covered in sheets, but stood out in the open, hardly used. The stew on the stove stirs itself, boiling and bubbling. The tea she’d poured, overflowed onto the table. The berry ‘nilla cakes, lumpy, and slouching over on her plate, drooling raspberry sauce and vanilla cream. She feels for the pearls round her neck. They’re cold, solid between her fingertips. She can hear the singing of the elephants, through the cracked windows. Butterflies flutter by her head, before they’re off to the trees.

“Barry said we’d stay children forever, if we stayed in this place,” Ellie says, when the floorboards creak beneath his feet. She can feel him, behind her. She stares ahead at the white phoenix birds, soaring through the high ceilings. “Everything we could imagine, would be real. We just had to imagine it.”

“Then Barry grew older, and died,” Percy mutters. “Still you believed.”

“Says the man responsible for the elephants,” she mutters. “Did you always dream you’d kill a man? Between the scholarships, and the oil money, and the Bentleys I mean? They say war’s the sport of the desperate, and that you were not. It must have been for the thrill, yes?”

“Money doesn’t make a boy a man,” he says, stalking her through the living room, past the staircase, toward the back door. “Battle turns boys to men.”

“Well so should—,” she begins; suddenly she bites her tongue.

“You had responsibilities, before you fled,” she grumbles, snatching the door handle and twisting it open. The bubbles float around them, fairies trapped within the soap. Withers nuzzles between her legs. Beyond him, the elephants trample the grass, swinging their trunks between their feet. “Well are you going to feed the bloody elephants or must I do everything around here?”

“I’ll fetch the water,” he says, putting on a twisted face.

Water, he teased, ugly and American.

“You’re a classist then,” he says, doubling over the trough to reach the hose. “Poor boys become soldiers, and soldiers become changed. You say changed men are undeserving of wives.”

“I say men who choose the change and thirst for marriage, should seek wives who can manage it,” Ellie says, ripping apples from the trees. “You wanted this more than me, you know. Eternal childhood.”

“Then we learned it wasn’t true,” he mumbles, just to him. “What is her name?” he asks out loud.

“Jude,” Ellie says, throwing the last of the apples into the basket. She sets it on her hip, and stands there, still as the statues in Rome. Her back to him, all the same. “Judith, after—.”

“My mother,” he says.

“She hasn’t met her,” Ellie says. “She’s only a baby, but I don’t know how to explain your mother, without having to explain. . .”

“Well,” Percy mumbles. He nods to himself, three times. “I’m sure it’d be difficult for her. To understand my role.”

“She’ll ask one day,” Ellie admits. “I suppose I have till then, to figure it out. Something better than the weight of knowing she was my great love, forged from grief.”

“She’s more than grief,” Percy says.

“Well I’m the one who knows that,” Ellie says, finally looking at him. “You’re the one who fled—I should’ve seen it coming,” she says, starting for the elephants, an apple in hand, basket balanced on her hip. “When Barry died, you chased the idea of man like no other. You kissed me because it would make you a man, and when it didn’t, you got a job, and when that didn’t, you made Jude, and when the idea of her didn’t forge you, you grabbed a gun. Are you grown now?” she asks, and the elephant curls its trunk around the apple in her palm.

“I wonder that often,” Percy admits. “I’ve always wondered what he meant. . . I remember the day we met Mr. Barry. Remember? The ball we played with escaped the yard, and somehow it rolled down the sidewalks, and down the hills, and down the roads till it landed here, right here in that spot,” he points. “Then Withers came outside, and you played with him because you’re a nut. Mr. Barry came out and scared us. He asked us if we’d ever seen the Invisible Things. . . He said we wouldn’t grow, if we stayed in this place. And though we got bigger and he got older, I believed him somehow.”

“Well, I’m sure the elephants did much of the convincing,” Ellie quips. “Fairies didn’t hurt. . . If you say he meant we’d stay young at heart, I’ll slash you. You’re too traveled to be a cliché.”

Percy smiles, closed-lipped. Hands in his pockets, he shakes his head. “My heart’s older than God these days.”

“You promised me a gift,” Ellie reminds him. “Even better, a funeral.”

He nods, and pulls them from his pocket. A set of keys, and a crumpled paper.

“Deed,” Ellie reads aloud, unfolding it. “One property on 27-50 Allen Lane. . .”

Ellie reads the address twice. Then his name. Then hers. Then his signature.

She looks at the keys in his palm. Of all the things she had imagined— she’d never thought. . .

“Barry left this place to both of us,” Percy says. “And I relinquish my half to you. . . Jude should stay little, as long as she can. Even if we can’t believe.”

She nods.

The chores were many for a house that runs itself. The elephants were fed, but then there was Withers, the fairies, the phoenixes and the stew boiled over and the oven burned the cake. When the work was done, she looked it over one last time. Then Ellie grabbed the walking stick, and banged it once.

Cold, quiet, dust.