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moonlightchess · 3 years

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a brief interlude in which a young mortician finally meets his patron saint.

(Diaphanous).

Around five years old, when he first started hearing them. Soft, muted weeping echoing lightly through the cavernous halls just beyond his bedroom door, and by ten he was accustomed to sliding out of bed, yawning, padding to his doorway to step out into the endlessly shadowed maw veining through the upstairs of his family’s home. The moaning creak of the floorboards was easily avoidable if you knew where to slide your feet, which by then he did, and he’d whisper into the dark: “You’re okay. It’s all over now, but stay as long as you need to. You’ll be getting along when you’re ready.” And even then, there was something profoundly tender and melancholy wrapping itself around little Theodore like an aura, to which the ghosts usually responded favorably. On occasion, they’d even slip into his bedroom after he climbed back into bed, gently tugging his duvet over him in thanks.

Sixteen, and Pere introduced him to the family business in the most definitive sense yet, bringing him down into the embalming room. There, he was shown how to drain the bodies, to sew their gums securely closed, to carefully apply powders and lotions to suggest sleep despite death. Pere helped him to remove the heart and lungs of a corpse in the preparation process of the old fashion, despite it having fallen out of favor in more recent years. Bellefontaine, Louisiana, lingered a decade or two behind much of the nation, in every way from embalming practices to racial sensitivity, both topics having already been addressed with young Theodore. “A person is a person, deserving of respect and love and dignity regardless of their skin, wealth, or any other such thing that the ignorant might think defines them,” Theodore senior had informed his small son firmly, long ago, meeting his midnight-blue eyes that were so solemn and sympathetic even then. “Do you understand?”

“Yes, Pere.” Theodore had not understood, not entirely, back then. But at sixteen, hunched over the dead body of a local bait shop owner whose wife made the softest, sweetest beignets he’d ever tasted, clarity rose sharp and bitter. “Monsieur Dumonde,” had escaped him before he could swallow the words in the interest of professionalism. “I knew him. Used to buy worms from him when the boys wanted to go fishing, but it’s been so long. I didn’t know he was sick.”

“Everyone dies, ti-Theodore,” and he’d been in love with the way his name rolled from his father’s tongue in a thicker cajun accent than his own - tee-tay-oh-doure, Theodore junior. It was enormously soothing, even now as he considered shaving Monsieur Dumonde’s thick mustache away for his funeral - but in the end, he placed the straight razor back onto his father’s table of sharp tools, aware that his decision had been a test. “No. We leave the mustache, he always had one when he was alive. He used to tug on it and laugh at our homemade fishing poles whenever we went into his shop. His mustache was a part of him, and it’s important that we send him to the next with as much of the man he was intact as we can.” He’d been a little nervous, meeting the dusk-colored eyes that he’d inherited from his beloved father, holding his breath.

“Good boy,” and he’d exhaled. “There are many who would have shaved him, cut his hair, put on some strange new clothes he never would have chosen himself. But you, my sweet and quiet boy, you understand.”

Mere had been a dancer, once. Ballet had been her life, her identity, until a careless would-be principal prince had stumbled into her leap - during a rehearsal no less, she’d been denied even the dignity of a grand disaster to end her career in the middle of a soaringly tragic performance - and her ankle had snapped, had never healed properly. She limped a touch even then, bringing sweet tea out to their wraparound porch thick with creeping ivy and heavy flowers bursting open at random, studding the lush green like jewels in a necklace, where her teenage son sat cross-legged on a battered loveseat long since dragged out to face the elements of the swampland. Together, they would count the darting fireflies, tiny pinpricks of golden light waging a valiant war against the encroaching southern dark. “I was beautiful once,” she’d said to him. “They all used to come watch me dance, in the city.”

“You’re still beautiful, Mere.”

She’d only sighed, slipping a hand into the pocket of her pea-green silk skirt to retrieve a shot bottle of bourbon, hoarded from the liquor store in town, and poured it into her tea.

They were both gone now, six, seven years proper. He’d prepared their bodies, and in death all of his mother’s pain and longing had been exposed to him with the first incision into her cold and rigid flesh for the draining, sixty-two years of ballet and resentment filling up the glass reservoir of the tubing’s end, dark red. She’d always done up her soft, honey-colored hair into elaborate braids, draped over one shoulder or both or trailing down her back or even wound up into a twisted crown if she was in a happier mood than usual. Theodore had sat beside her, holding her stiff milky hand with his own and with the other, scrolling through youtube tutorials on how to create the perfect fishtail braid until he was confident.

Pere had gone five years after, the light in him having drained out as clear and real as every fluid in his wife’s body had eventually found its way into the belly of their aspirator in the basement. Pneumonia had taken his mother - she’d always had a poor and fragile immune system - but his father had been just shy of seventy and to this day, at thirty-two years old, Theodore had never been offered a satisfying cause of death for him. “Just his time, sug,” a nurse in powder blue scrubs had tried, patting his hand soothingly and because this was the south, “I’ll be praying for y’all - well, just you I suppose. Oh lord, you’re the only Bissonette left now, ain’tcha?”

He was. They’d left the entire mortuary to him, and with it all the responsibilities of being the local mortician and funeral director at such a tender age, and his head had at first swum dizzily with all the pressure and expectations. Theodore senior and his wife Lisette had been fixtures of their country community, familiar and comforting, always there whenever someone had passed on to arrange flowers and platters of cold cuts, to deliver gentle words to cushion the grief. They’d been known, trusted, but Theodore junior, well. Ti-Theodore Bissonette, so young to be running the whole house himself, and the folk of Bellefontaine just weren’t sure. Until the death of little Suzette Marchande.

Hit by a car, she’d been, some hideous beast driving drunk through the winding access road circling their little cajun town and pointed out toward Nola proper. He was in prison now, but Suzette remained dead, and in his huge, capable hands Theodore had poured every bit of his father’s knowledge and sensitivity into that girl. He’d dressed her in yellow, one of her own dresses supplied by her mother, but he’d also remembered that she’d loved frogs. She’d catch them in the swamp and hold them in both hands, laughing at their croaky sounds, but then she’d carefully deposit them onto some leaf somewhere. “They got big ones, in the jungle. The Amazon,” he remembered her saying when the Bissonettes had run into she and her parents in town once, years ago. “Big as cars, they are. I’m gonna go there someday and study ‘em.”

So he’d bought sparkly little green frog clips for her hair online, pinning it back from her freckled face. Her favorite stuffed froggie, named Monsieur Ourauron, Mister Ribbitt, had been lost in the crash, but he’d found one in the Amazon - or at least on amazon - that looked largely the same. When her parents had seen her during the open-casket service, they’d wept and clutched his hands, thanking him in a babbling blend of French, English and grief. That day had declared the end of one life and the beginning of another, as little Suzette had been delivered unto whatever waited after, but thirty-year-old ti-tay-oh-doure had been manifest and confirmed.

There was something to be said for how tall he was. He would have thought some would find it intimidating, difficult to relate to considering that he was six-seven or perhaps a touch over, impossibly long limbs and a hawkish nose, soft mouth borne of his Mere and his father’s nearly indigo eyes the color of a sky five minutes before the moonrise. His was soft, floppy, peanut-brown hair and a quiet timbre resonating in his voice that was immediately associated with the unthreatening sense of calm authority that his father had once carried around easy as an old sweater. Theodore would take care of everything, Bellefontaine knew. They’d be left free to grieve their lost, because he was here with his huge hands and endless legs and fleeting smile.

He lived alone, now. There had been flings, lovers, Audrey from Nola with her autumn-brown skin and fox-gold eyes, elegant and sure, but she hadn’t stayed long. “This place is charming, but you can’t actually expect to stay here all your life, can you?” she’d told him once, after the sex, the two of them naked and wrapped around each other in his sprawling bed with a gentle breeze from outside floating through his open window. She didn’t understand, and neither did the men, not even sweet Peter with his auburn curls and dimples.

“You’re all alone out here, doesn’t it get boring? Lonely? My god, you live in a mortuary.” His shiver had been all that Theodore had needed to kiss him tenderly and send him on his way. His father had been extraordinarily lucky to find Mere, he knew - so few understood, the nature of a curator of death. The ancient contract they’d signed, the tradition they’d inherited. It was sacred but horrifying to most, because everyone wanted the convenience of their holy order at the end of all things, but no one actually wanted to have to think about dying. About the fact that literally all of them, rich or poor, pious or skeptical, afraid or unafraid, was going to die. The repulsion, he understood, was instinctive, and he’d only made his lovers breakfast in the morning and never called any of them back.

Some of the ghosts never left, as it was, and there were mornings in which he’d make his way into the kitchen to find his black tea already steaming, his chair already pulled away from the table. Some of them had found their peace here with him, and so he’d leave his cello out on occasion so that they could pluck the strings or plink a few keys on his mother’s old baby grand in the living room. He was happy too, his natural introversion leaving him largely content in his solitary life. There were those who sought comfort in his touch after the funerals of their loved ones, holding onto his hands a beat too long as he bade them goodbye, meeting his eyes meaningfully, but he always released them to the hazy swamp air outside. They were hurting, vulnerable, and he was a gentleman.

It rained the night the stranger arrived, or stormed rather - Theodore’s lights had been flickering throughout the manor all night. He’d collected candles and charged his phone, but his power had soldiered on even as the thunder crashed and jagged needles of lightning slashed open the churning charcoal sky outside. He’d yanked open the heavy oak door in response to some insistent knocking, only to find a man roughly his age standing there on the porch. He was oddly untouched by the rain despite no car present behind him, moon-pale, spilled-ink hair thick and soft over limpid, silver-mirror eyes, colorless as a deep-sea creature’s, slicing through the dark.

“Saints alive, are you lost? Are you all right?” The man, he didn’t know personally, but a truth and clarity rolled from him like steam off the swamp, and he felt enormously familiar somehow.

“I wouldn’t say lost, no. May I come in?” His voice, soft and polite, still clear and steady over the storm.

“Yes, forgive me. Please.” He stepped aside, watching him enter, translucent eyes sweeping over the yawning, shadowed maw of the grand old manor’s entryway. “Who are you? I’m sorry, but I’m not taking in any bodies until morning.”

“I understand. Terribly sorry to intrude upon your evening like this, but you and I, we have a matter to discuss.” His accent was not local, nor was it unfamiliar. It felt like a forgotten dream, abruptly remembered, an old song once loved playing on the radio years later.

“I’m afraid I don’t recognize you, Sir. Have you been to one of my funerals?”

“Sweet Theodore, I have been to all of them.”

“I don’t understand.”

The stranger clasped his hands behind his back, idle as a museum patron, gazing thoughtfully up to the enormous and heavily framed oil paintings of Bissonettes past lining the walls of the entryway. “It’s my fault for allowing myself to become so fond of you, but you’ve never really understood just how rare a person you are, have you Theodore? I shouldn’t have come here, but I had no choice. I couldn’t let you leave here tonight, that tree would have rendered your car to a smoking wreck and your body to worse. And you, sweet Theodore, you deserve so much better. After all the respect and care and compassion you have shown so unfailingly to myself and my vocation over the years - I’ve come to love you, and you deserve a soft and quiet end. So much sweeter than the one planned for you, I had to make sure you didn’t die in that crash. I had to come here, on this night. For all your kindness, tonight I will be kind to you.”

Drunk, perhaps. Some sauced-up tourist stumbling through the bayou after a bar crawl, but - this far from the city proper? “I’m afraid that you’re still losing me, will you please tell me who you are?”

He turned then, colorless gaze meeting Theodore’s, an echo of sorrow in his faint smile.

“You know who I am.”

In the end, it was true. He supposed at least a part of him had known from the moment he’d opened the door.

“I do. I didn’t think I’d meet you this young in life, but I’m pleased to find you a gentleman, Sir. I can only hope that in the time you’ve allowed me, I’ve done you proud.”

“You and your whole dear family. You don’t know how much I owe you, all of you. You would have lingered, in pain, on life support, for months. It was unbearable, unacceptable. Not you, not my Theodore who has served me so gently and so diligently for so much of your life.”

“I suppose it’s time, then.” He was not afraid. Death, he knew. He’d existed out here in a kind of stasis for years, honoring his patron saint, the man standing before him in a soft black sweater and reaching out to slip an arm through his.

“It is. But I think the storm is winding to a close, and the mists are always so lovely. Why don’t we go see.”

Nodding, Theodore allowed himself to be led to the door, turning briefly to look back just one last time into his beautiful old house, his shrine to a softer death than most knew existed. He’d always done his best, to make the transition as easy as possible for those on their way to some other place, and now it was time to go.

“Will it hurt?”

“Not for you, no.” The stranger opened the door then, and Theodore couldn’t be sure that the new world laid before him looked the same to both of them, but he smiled at what he saw.

“You were right. It’s beautiful.”

The house and the ghosts left wandering its halls signed in unison with the departure of their beloved Theodore, but the rain had slowed and the moon had risen and they were patient enough to wait a while. Someone would come, someone as warm and bright as him, someone who would take care of them as tenderly as he had, some new Theodore born. In the end, after all, nothing ever really died, and daylight was coming on soon, sure as a promise.

#writeblr #writing #my writing #fantasy #death #louisiana #i'm still feeling shy about my writing but i'm completely obsessed with this character right now #just a little something i hope y'all like it

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mikeyd1986 · 5 years

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MIKEY’S PERSONAL BLOG 146, March 2019

Over the past few days, I’ve started to feel very rundown with significant sinus issues a dry throat and nasal congestion. I wondered whether I should cancel my appointments with my support worker and occupational therapist today but decided against it as I wasn’t sick enough to be bed-bound. Plus when I’m not feeling 100%, I tend to throw everything I can think of at my body to help it recover: herbal remedies (Vitamin C, Zinc, Echinacea, Garlic, Liquorice, White Willow), cold flu & sinus tablets (Phenylephrine Hydrochloride, Paracetamol, Chlorpheniramine Maleate), sore throat lozenge, tissues, water and bed rest.

On Tuesday morning, I attended my first social outing with Mentis Assist called the Op Shop Tour. Meeting new people can generally be a daunting experience for me and that’s how I felt in the waiting area inside the Mentis Assist office. There was another 4 participants (Brenden, Julie, Pauline, Carol) and 2 support workers (Sam and Brendan) who facilitated today’s activity. Everyone was very down to earth, understanding and inclusive even though we all had very different personalities.

Brendan drove us around in a mini-bus along the Mornington Peninsula coastline from Safety Beach to Rye. It was quite scenic looking out at the beach, boathouses, caravans and local shops in each of the towns. Sam tried to break the ice with us all by playing a game of “I spy with my little eye”. Being the quietest person in the group was something I was trying to accept and embrace. I can also get quite self-conscious and appear “lost” to others.

The fact that I was still congested and had sinus issues added an extra layer of difficulty but I tried to not let it bother me. Plus we all had a good chuckle in between stops. When it comes to Op Shops, I generally focus on specific areas of the store such as music, movies and books as they reflect my interests. My attention span doesn’t take long to stray but thankfully we only spent about 10-15 minutes browsing at each location.

We stopped by “Shazza’s Takeaway” for lunch located in an industrial area somewhere in Rosebud. The poor girl behind the counter basically got bombarded by the lunchtime crowd including a few tradies, truckies and bus drivers who pulled up there. She did eventually get some assistance. I ordered a burger with the lot and a bottle of water. The group continued to exchange personal stories outside while we were all eating our lunches.

I think I mainly saw today’s outing as a chance to mingle with others who have experienced significant mental health issues and therefore will have compassion towards others. Plus I really crave social company, even if I don’t really say too much. I think that it’s really important to be around other people to avoid social isolation and true loneliness. I did get a little overwhelmed with all the NDIS jargon I had to contend with as I hadn’t signed my service agreement yet but hopefully that will sort itself out in the coming week. https://mentisassist.org.au/what-we-do/our-programs

On Wednesday morning, I went to see my GP Dr. David Tai Kie at First Health Medical Centre Casey Central. What was originally going to be an appointment to get my blood test results now turned into needing a medical certificate and antibiotics prescribed for my sinus and congestion issues which have persistently stuck around for the past couple of days. https://www.webmd.com/drugs/2/drug-1531-3295/amoxicillin-oral/amoxicillin-oral/details

But back to the blood test results: the main areas of concern were my iron levels dropping from 100 to 56 ug/L over the past six years. While its not in the red zone yet, it’s still something I need to keep an eye on and it could also explain my constant tiredness and low energy levels during the day. So basically I need to eat more iron-rich foods. https://www.labtestsonline.org.au/learning/test-index/iron-studies

The other thing was my Thyroid Function Test. I got a borderline result of 0.45 mIU/L for the Thyroid Stimulating Hormone. It may suggest hyperthyroidism due to high stress levels but it is only just under the normal range so I don’t have any reason to panic about it. My GP suggested that I should do a follow-up TSH blood test in two months to see if there’s any cause for concern and rule out any thyroid-related issues. https://www.labtestsonline.org.au/learning/test-index/tsh

On Thursday morning, Mum and I attended the CHILL OUT: How To Keep Your Cool In Stressful Situations information session at Balla Balla Community Centre in Cranbourne East. Presented by Troy Macris from the City of Casey, this presentation is a follow-up to the Be Well mental health session from last year. Today’s session focused more on ways to deal with and manage stress in our everyday lives. https://www.ballaballa.com.au/programs-activities/special-interest/

Firstly, Troy got everyone in the group to brainstorm ideas about What Is Stress? We came up with a list which includes: anxiety, depression, overwhelmed, worrying, feeling pressured, fear, physical illness and uncertainty. However, the universal definition of stress relates it back to a biological and psychological response to a threat which is also known as the fight or flight response. This was very useful back in the caveman times when humans had to share their environments with dangerous predators such as sabre-toothed tigers.

In modern times, stress is often thought of as an unpleasant or negative experience as well as an indication that something isn’t right. However, there are several benefits to having stress which includes: increased alertness, gives us energy, boosts memory, helps up to perform under pressure and allows you to escape from life threatening situations. Stress and growth also tend to go hand in hand.

The first thing to recognise when it comes to stress is Reading The Signs e.g. health declining, headaches, irritation, heart palpitations, avoidance, rashes, inflammation, disrupted or poor sleep. The next thing is to Know Your Triggers e.g. making deadlines, people, relationships, feeling stuck, work-related, being late, impacts of chronic illness, frustration, disabilities.

The final step is How Do We Deal With Stress. One way is to use The Serenity Prayer which is: Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference. The power of acceptance means less suffering. It takes courage to step out of your comfort zone and this provides more opportunities. Wisdom is gained though learned experience.

Another way to deal with stress is to Engage in Healthy Relaxation Habits. These include:

Taking 5 deep breaths e.g. using a guided meditation or mindfulness technique

Go outside into nature e.g. walking in the park, talking the dog out for a walk

Talking about it with somebody e.g. GP, counsellor, friend, family member

Be creative e.g. art, music, writing, drawing, colouring

Having faith e.g. religious belief, spirituality, feeling connected with others

Seeing the funny side e.g. making a joke, embracing our imperfections, having a laugh

On Friday night, I attended my Boxing small group fitness class at CinFull Fitness. Considering how unwell I’ve been feeling for most of this week, I honestly didn’t know if I’d have the energy to come along to a class. But I’ve been missing the gym and the other clients a lot while I’ve been in my sick bed (in recovery mode) and I was starting to feel physically better today. So I figured I’d make the effort to come tonight.

It was just myself, Fiona Sack, Ashlie Bingham and Samantha Nio Hellesoe in the class tonight. I was feeling more fatigued and puffed out than usual probably because I hadn’t been to the gym in over a week. But my performance was surprisingly really good. I felt like I was connecting well and hitting the pads with a decent force amount of force. We were doing some lunge pulses and squats with combos of 20 jabs and 20 uppercuts, standing on 10 and 15kg plates and that’s when we were all feeling it. OUCH!

We finished the class by doing a series of combos: jab, cross, jab, uppercut with pauses and movement. Plus 10, 20 and 30 reps of jab crosses, uppercuts and highs. I was physically shaking and breathless by the end of the class but felt really good that I managed to go out to at least once class this week. Hopefully my immune system will be stronger going into next week and I’ll be able to get back into my fitness routine again.

“I made a stupid mistake. And my world crashed down all around me. Oh, I made a stupid mistake. And I threw it all away, threw it all away. I got lazy on the wrong side of love. Now I'm searching every face, every crowd. For you, for you, for you, for you.” Darren Hayes - Stupid Mistake (2011)

“The airline lost my luggage, still got all this weight. And all the things I’m done are showing up again. Something it’s like nothing is going my way. Even though I know I’m getting up on that stage. I got reason to believe, just the sight of you is getting the best out of me.” Sigrid - Sight of You (2019)

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