Wayne Michael DeHart  (August 9, 2022)

On the 40th anniversary of a fatal fire at his parents’ house, Patrick Simon knelt at gravesite #39 in a small cemetery that slumbers in silence on a lightly-traveled country lane skirting Lisbon, Maine.  Every year on this date, he had made the 130-mile drive to his hometown from his drab basement apartment in Canterbury, New Hampshire.

His only keepsake of them was a wind up alarm clock they gave him when he left home at 19. A sound safeguard against being late for work, its raucous ring had reliably announced each new day, including this one, for 46 years – with one notable exception.

On this October 7th, his 65th birthday, he struggled to recall images and sounds from his years growing up. He muttered aloud in cold, callous and cynical tones, closing with a detached shrug, rather than fond words of remembrance or farewell.

A robin whirled overhead, then darted downward, bringing sudden boyhood memories of Teresa Tunney, an uppity, condescending classmate who relentlessly ridiculed him, chirping “Simple Simon, one for the birds.” Folks in Lisbon were devastated when she was found floating facedown at age fifteen in the Androscoggin River. How? Why? The questions remain unanswered. He wanted to smile, but he couldn’t.

He stood, and upon turning, was suddenly startled at the nearby presence of a statuesque young woman looking right at him. Her arrival had been silent. He looked past her, toward the small gravel parking area at his steel blue truck, the only vehicle in sight. Patrick wondered who she was, where she came from, and how she got there.

He walked directly toward her, out of both necessity and curiosity. She never moved as he approached. Her intense green eyes locked on his. As he drew closer, he became anxious, nervous, apprehensive. Should he say something? Do something? Nod in acknowledgment without breaking stride?

She remained motionless, holding her position in the narrow pathway, blocking his departure. She stared him into utter unrest as he stopped two steps in front of her. He searched for words that didn’t come. He felt a sense of inexplicable, undefinable familiarity. He also felt a heaviness in his chest. He panicked.

“Patrick, you look troubled. Please, come sit with me.” “Sit? Sit where? And you called me Patrick. Do I know you?”

“There, on the large prayer rock just beyond that maple. And of course you know me. It’s Jane. Jane Baker. I kissed you once in the fifth grade and you ran away like your fanny was on fire. Everyone laughed at ME, made fun of ME. It was the second worst day of my life.” She moved toward the rock. A befuddled and shaky Patrick Simon followed her, his mind racing as fast as his heart.

He did indeed remember Jane Baker and that klutzy kiss and running away because he didn’t think he “did it right.” He heard the taunts and jeers and assumed they were aimed at HIM.

No way this twenty-something, copper-haired beauty was Jane Baker from, what, 55 years ago? His legs weakened. His breathing faltered. “Are you Jane’s daughter or something, here to harass me all these years later? What’s your game? How did you know I’d be here today? Have you been following me? I don’t feel right at all, something’s wrong. I think I should go now.”

“Why didn’t you ever get married, Patrick? Was my kiss so distasteful that you chose a life of abstinence? You told people I was unhinged and unbalanced and that you were leaving after graduation to escape from me. Plain Jane Baker, insane trouble maker. Sound familiar?”

A delusional Patrick was trying to convince himself that he was okay, just having a bad anxiety attack. It was this woman’s fault. What was she trying to prove by confronting and taunting him here, of all places, ridiculously pretending to be Jane. “Who sent you?” He frantically looked around in every direction. “Who’s watching us? Where are they. Tell me.”

The woman finger-poked his forehead, restoring his focus. “You know it’s me, I know you do. After you left, your parents, in despair, said I stained your soul, darkened your heart, maimed your mind. Over one stupid kid kiss gone bad, you went rogue, abandoning and ignoring them while dishonoring yourself, hiding and wasting away, a no-excuse recluse. Over time, they gained perspective and accepted me, befriended me. I’d go to their house for dinner. We’d talk, play cards, watch television. Then that night . . .”

At this point, Patrick was reeling – physically, mentally, emotionally.

The robin reappeared, hovering briefly over his head, distracting him just as the woman suddenly vanished. Flat out gone. Her voice, however, remained.

“I knew you would be here today because you’re here every October 7th. Was it fate that the fire raged on your 25th birthday, the day you got fired for being late because you forgot to wind that damn clock? I think not. Welcome to my world, Patrick, where every day is October 7th!”

He dropped to his knees, gasping for breath. He shook, shivered, and lurched forward, face-first, fittingly and forcefully kissing the rock with a bone-crushing thud. Ironically and poetically, he had met his Maker in a fall, in the Fall.

Close by, observing from the weed-covered, flat footstone marker of the long-forgotten Teresa Tunney, the robin finally rested.

A handwritten note, discovered soon after his passing in his Canterbury apartment, told the sordid tale.  (A Canterbury Tale, some noted at the time.)

Patrick Simon had silenced the noise of Teresa Tunney in the noise of the river. Ten years later, he set his parents home on fire. Because he didn’t just decide to leave their home at 19, they kicked him out, and when they handed him that alarm clock, they told him he could come home when the time was right. Then they laughed and waved goodbye.

A guest, Jane Baker, had heroically pushed his folks to safety, only to trip, fall and perish in the flames. The townsfolk paid for her beautiful granite headstone – the one on gravesite #39. The one Patrick visited every year.

His parents cried at her funeral, then moved to Denver and never came back. Patrick was dead to them forty years before his face broke and his heart stopped under the maple.

On the back side of a poorly-maintained New Hampshire cemetery sits a small, nondescript marker. It reads, “Here lies Patrick Simon. Simple Simon – one for the birds. Especially the robins.” It is said by the locals that no one has ever been seen visiting that site, except for a mysterious, statuesque, green-eyed vixen who seems to appear from out of nowhere, every October 7th.

____________

Absent the revelation of that new and noteworthy Canterbury tale, only a mentalist, a lurking Lisbon robin, or a nearby northern King carving mystifying, yet mainstream, novel and needful things from his fabled castle rock, could have deciphered the hints, described the horror, and taken the stand to swear to the events described herein.

#

Writer’s Note:
Newly relocated sleuths Jane & Lisbon cringe at the sight  of Patrick Simon’s fractured face at the cemetery.  The low-keyed Detective Lisbon was heard muttering, “Shit, I bet that hurt.” Consultant Jane quipped, “You ain’t lyin’, girl.” They agreed it appeared to be an accidental death due to an unfortunate fall while being “fat and old.” If only they knew then what they know now about the note he left behind . . . they probably would not have left to get doughnuts right after this photo was taken.)

“THE MENTALIST”

Starring . . .

Simon Baker as Patrick Jane  /  Patrick Simon & Jane Baker

Co-starring . . .

Robin Tunney as Teresa Lisbon /  Teresa Tunney & the Robin in Lisbon

Saw someone who wasn’t there.
Heard a bird in the Autumn air.
Dazed, disturbed, and in despair,
learned too late that life IS fair.

“Kissed a girl, made him cry.
 Kissed a rock, made him die.” 
– Rhymin’ Simon met his Fate, not a pieman. 

 “or a nearby northern King carving mystifying, yet mainstream, novel and needful things from his fabled castle rock, could have deciphered the hints, described the horror, and taken the stand to swear to the events described herein.”
 – A homage to fellow New Englander Stephen King? Of course!
A graduate of the now defunct Lisbon Falls High School in – where else – Lisbon, Maine. 
(A Needful Thing to know if one takes The Stand to describe the horror of October 7th.)

Discovered in a New Hampshire basement apartment: 
The 25th Canterbury Tale   (Note: G. Chaucer unable to comment at this time.)