~~~


James Rothatch

James Rothatch, of Lilac Hill, beloved husband of Agnes Rothatch; loving father of Shelby Oak; dear grandfather of George Oak and William Oak, fond brother of David Rothatch and Edith Camlet, devoted farmer and teacher to many. Memorial visitation 4 to 8 p.m. Sunday at The Home of Agnes Rothatch, 3 Cardinal Lane, Lilac Hill. Memorial Service 11 a.m. Monday at same location. In lieu of flowers, memorials to Windmill Community Service, 2140 S. Arrow Ave., NS B4D 5S5.

~~~

          We picked this spot for James Rothatch because it is beneath his favourite tree. They pulled out two large boulders and hit bedrock five feet beneath the earth. They used handsaws to break the roots that reached across the rectangular opening. His wife, Agnes, bought him a casket made of pine, but layered with a nice varnish that added a certain sense of elegance one might find in a casket made of brass or chrome. Agnes said he wouldn’t have wanted anything more, but many disagreed. It didn’t matter anyway, did it? He was long gone. I saw the corpse, hard and unanimated. I touched his bristled cheeks and felt no warmth.

I thought coming here might solve something. I read the inscription on the little stone set amongst wild roses and shaded by the leaves of the tree. Stone, foliage, a patch of pale soil baked in the sun and colonised by ants, a tree. But no James Rothatch.

~~~

No Rothatch could die easily, and the Grim Reaper had his trouble claiming James. Uncle Robert Rothatch slipped off a roof, his head breaking his fall, and lived. Great grandfather Murray hanged himself to prove his neck would not break and his lungs would still function. Cassandra Rothatch walked out of the burning wreckage of a train as the only survivor, and Allen W. Rothatch lived to be 94, maintaining a weight of three hundred pounds from 20 on, and still lived an otherwise healthy life according to doctors. He entered the Guinness Book of World Records as the fattest man to run and complete a marathon. “With,” he would add, “no stops.”

The Rothatch’s were the last ones to farm on Lilac Hill. You could see them—sometimes as many as ten, sometimes as few as two—in the field. In their arms: bundles of wheat. In the crates: potatoes, tomatoes, beans. In their mouths: pea pods. See them with a set of binoculars, their overalls stained with soil, their hands dry and calloused, their feet protected by boots or on a nice enough day, left bare. Rain would spray across that field and still the ladies would crawl on their hands and knees through mud, their white fingertips plucking at weeds. The hottest days of the year you would see the men tilling the earth with hoes, sweat glistening on the back of their roasted necks.

No one saw for sure what happened twenty years ago when, late into the evening, James Rothatch got his hand stuck in a machine. It was not a day set for crying. The sky was clear and birds rejoiced in the trees like hopeful children. Somewhere, the stain of lips were left on the rim of a glass. Somewhere, a warm hand stroked the head of a cat, and somewhere completely different a pair of eyes spotted their flower, and their heart came to life. And on Lilac Hill James Rothatch’s hand slipped and disappeared into the rotating blades of some machine.

“It’s not as bad as it looks,” he said when his wife, Agnes, responded to his cries. The blood flowed as freely as a wailing infant's tears. The bulge at the end of James’s arm looked like ground meat, twisted and mixed with knucklebones.

They brought him inside and it was the first time his daughter Shelby had ever gone to a hospital. The entire family went.

Would you believe the next day James Rothatch farmed again? Would you believe the night he stayed at the hospital, his fingers grew back, one by one, in a matter of hours? I wouldn’t have believed it if I hadn’t seen it.

~~~

I would say I have the same charm to avoid death as my family does. I had colon cancer just last year, and that’s cleared up. Parkinson’s set in at an early age and went away again after just a few months of bother. I was hit by a car when I was six and broke my leg. I spent the summer in a cast. Doctor’s said I should have died. My grandfather spent so much of his life doing daring things, he shouldn’t have died the way he did. The best death one could ask for is the one that sweeps over you as you are buried beneath a warm quilt and the one you love, in his case grandmother Agnes—beside you. It may be the best death for most people—even me—but not for Grandpa. He should have been torn to little bits or shot saving a woman and her children from a bank robber. He should have been there when a house was on fire, thrown himself through a window and brought an unconscious child into the street before he doubled over and died of smoke inhalation. Mr. Rothatch deserved the death of a hero, and my mother agreed. Her father was not the man you would expect to see go to sleep and never wake up.

The bench I’ve been working on is near completion. I remember the barn three years ago when Grandpa helped me complete my kayak. I remember the smell of his shirt, like smoke and garlic, and I remember the way his hands steadied the little boat as I worked. It would be nice to sit on this bench when it is done and have one more conversation about nothing: about orchestras and travel. The only person I could talk about nothing with. His eyes were so lively. The last time I would see him, laying in that pine box like some poor man, his eyes eternally shut, was the perfect day for crying. Seagulls soared above, the barn was closed, and the grass was green against the grey sky. The sound of silence in a group of people and ominous organ tones. Grandpa without the slightest idea his entire family was mulling around. You half expected him to rise from his position and say, “Surprise!”

“Once the rain starts, I guess we’ll have to bring the casket inside,” said Mom. I nodded.

When no one was looking, and the world stopped spinning, and the grasshopper paused in mid-jump, I leaned down and listened to Grandpa’s last words, my ear nearly pressed against his lips. But suddenly, time started again, and I missed it.

~~~

My father, dead? James Rothatch, the ruler of Lilac Hill, farmer, husband, father. My father. I could not make the salad on the funeral day. My mother, Agnes, had occupied herself with making food for everyone. Curry, stevia, flour, dates, a mixture of fruit in orange and apple juice, radish, spiralling pasta, chicken, and a casket with James Rothatch inside.

“Did you pick a place to bury him?” I asked.

“Oh, Shelby! Don’t be silly. We’re burying him beneath the tree in the back field. It’s all legal. Why did you say it wasn’t legal?” Agnes Rothatch was such a strong woman. A good mother. Her hair was grey, and so was her soul, but a fire burned somewhere in her heart.

“I thought we would need to use a cemetery,” I said.

“Shelby, dear, so sorry to hear about your father, sweetheart.” I wondered where this voice was coming from.

“Thank you. Sorry, but I don’t believe we’ve met.”

“My name is Hilda. Is that egg? I’m allergic to eggs.”

“There are plenty other things here to eat.”

“I see that. Will you join me?”

I shrug. I wonder who Hilda is. I wonder if my mother knows who Hilda is. I wonder if my father knew who Hilda is. Nevertheless, I can’t seem to enjoy stuffing crackers and pepperoni down my throat and listening to her tell me about her medication.

“There is a pill I got just recently called…Zena…Zenaphi…I don’t quite remember, but it is suppose to regulate my bowel movements. Diarrhoea is a huge side effect of mine. Don’t tell anybody though. That’s what eggs do to me, too. Diarrhoea. And I break out into a rash if I eat too much citrus.”

Gorging Vegetable Thins, Ritz, marble cheese, mild pepperoni, black current wine, and sadness. Outside, my father is in a pine box and somewhere, dispersing into the atmosphere, are all his thoughts and the times he spent pushing me on the swings at the playground, the lullabies, the Christmas mornings.

“Don’t cry, sweet heart,” said Hilda.

~~~

Sure, James Rothatch and I go way back. I always loved to give him a hug at Home Depot when he strolled in looking for something. I’ll miss the awkward embrace and the way he pretended like he didn’t know me. Who could forget me? Who could forget their cousin Hilda?

~~~

Some pit settled deep down inside Boris Lamphette when he heard James Rothatch was dead. He lost connection with the world around him. He saw it in the paper when he was eating cereal. He hadn’t had a chance to get changed. He read the obituary and dropped his spoon. He stared straight ahead into the mirror on the other side of the kitchen. Outside, someone mowed their lawn. The television in the next room spoke about things that hadn’t a thing to do with Jimmy. Cars drove by—people on their way to get ice creams, go to the beach. People singing.

“What’s the matter with you?” said Darla Lamphette.

Boris closed the paper. “Do you know Jim Rothatch?”

“Who is he? Is this a trick question?”

“Just an old friend. He’s dead.”

“I see. Well, I have to go to work.”

Jim stared at his wife. “You don’t care?”

“Well, I don’t know the guy. Life goes on, Boris.”

She was out the door by the time Boris could stand again. “It certainly does,” he said, pouring out the rest of his soggy cereal.

~~~

The dream world had somehow leaked into reality. Matter could be altered with the use of mind power. I tried as hard as I could to make it happen. I touched my husband’s whiskers, stroked his cheeks and held his stiff body close to my own.

“How could you do this?” The first burst of tears erupted. “Oh my God.” The second. “What the fuck…How could this happen? Don’t be happening. Sweet heart, don’t, okay? Okay?” Begging for an answer was no use. The tears did not cease. The third, the fourth, the fifth eruption. Even pounding on his chest with my fist didn’t work or cure the overwhelming grief.

Later came the van, the men taking him away in a bag. They hadn’t even allowed him to put on his slippers. They brushed them across the wooden floors to slide him from the mattress and into the bag and suddenly they were all gone. Everything was all gone.

I wanted a home service. The funeral directors could attend, of course. A kind gentleman named Steve who let me cry all over his suit.

“I just don’t know what to do,” I said. And it was true. Nothing quite seemed real. Things were rushing past. I could walk down the street and no one would know my husband was dead. The night he died, I had kissed him. I had awakened during the night and felt his body heat, had heard his breath. His clothes were still in my house and his coat still smelled like him, and the unfinished painting still stood in the living room.

“You can get through this, Mrs. Rothatch,” said Steve.

“Is this real?”

“I’m afraid so.”

“I feel like he’ll come home again. Like he’s gone away for a walk but will be back tonight. What am I going to do?”

“There is only one thing you can do. Cry.”

~~~

Lilac Hill was founded by the Rothatch’s. Grandmother Springstead said they were all witches. She said we were not to venture into their gardens and vineyards surrounding the perimeter of their property. It was rumoured that every square inch of their yard was home to a plant. Grandmother Springstead said well into her senile years that she had brought an apple pie to their doorstep and they had not accepted. They simply tied a thin red rope around her wrist, and she had to burn it off for the material would not snap between scissors and the knot was too tight to loosen manually.

She told me when he died. “He’s got to be in hell,” she said, and hung up.

~~~

The corpse looked quite nice. With a restorative artist as talented as Jose, how couldn’t Mr. Rothatch be a pleasing remake of life contained inside a human body? I don’t mind hanging around with mourners at their home. I am pleased to talk to people. I am pleased to hand out little sheets the grandson typed up about his grandfather, with a little picture of the deceased, and a poem. Was it short enough to be a haiku? I don’t remember the rules of poetry, so wouldn’t know.

Just cry. Crying is a release. Release your emotions. Bottling them up hurts your heart. You feel bottled up grief in your chest, in your throat. Crying doesn’t hurt anything. Neither does screaming, if that helps. Release it all, and soon you will feel better. Hold it back, and you may lose all hope. When I think of my sister, her blond curls stained with blood, I can feel that rock inside me, frozen in time.

~~~

I don’t remember James Rothatch well. Did he play baseball with me? He’s never played baseball? That’s strange. I was sure he could bat like a pro.

~~~

I gave it a few months before I decided to go up the hill to the Rothatch home and see if I could be of some comfort to the beautiful Agnes Rothatch, a fellow member of the Lilac Hill Wild Orchid Society and a sweet human being. I came to her door in a light tweed jacket, corduroys, and a ball cap. She was in slacks and a blue blouse.

“Martin,” she said. “What a pleasant surprise.”

“I hope you aren’t busy,” I said.

“Not at all.”

“I didn’t get a chance to talk to you at the funeral too much. How are you doing?”

“Okay,” she smiled. “Come inside.” She was a kind hostess. She brewed a pot of tea, she laid out a tray of cookies, even when I asked her not to trouble herself with such things.

“So, how are you doing?” I said when she sat down.

She sipped her tea, looked into the dark mixture. “Good days, and bad.”

“Yes. I know how you feel.”

“You do?”

“Eight years ago, my wife Selma passed away.” I expected her to become sympathetic, to tell me how sorry she was for that to have happened. Instead, her eyes portrayed a sort of reality. An understanding of the pain we shared.

“Is it easy now? To cope?”

“No. It’s easier. I can get it out of my mind. I can live. But it’s still hard to wake up alone. It’s still hard to go to bed by yourself and plan a day for one.”

“I know.” We sipped our tea some more. She broke the silence with her sweet voice. “Do you ever feel like Selma is still…around?” Her eyes were a mysterious grey, her lips the colour of cranberry.

“Yes, all the time. In fact, I think she is. Do you ever feel that way?”

She nodded. “All the time. Do you think James is still here? A ghost?”

“Maybe. I think Selma’s spirit is still around. I feel her sometimes, you know? Like a warm comfortable feeling.”

Agnes nodded in understanding. “I don’t know if I believe in that.”

“Well, I think they’re both still around. If not ghosts, they’re around in your memories.” I reached across the table and put my hand on her left bosom, felt her heart pulsating beneath. “And here.”

Agnes held my hand there and smiled. “I don’t want to be alone anymore.”

“Me either.”

~~~

I left that spot where James Rothatch was buried, a knot somewhere inside me and a soft pressure in my ears. It is a perfect day to cry, but I can’t seem to find anything to cry about. For myself? For Agnes, who can now only see in black and white? For James Rothatch? He is beneath the earth this very instant. I know, because I was there when the Rothatch’s lowered that pine box into the hole and covered it over in the same night. I was there when tulip petals fell from the sky all over the field. There is a box down there, with James Rothatch, and all his quirks, the things he would say, the flare of his nostrils, his strength, his joy. Visit as I might this spot under his favourite tree, nothing ever comes back. Stone, foliage, a patch of pale soil baked in the sun and colonised by ants, a tree. But no James Rothatch.