Douglas Kennedy: The Pursuit of Happiness

John Joseph Malone

August 22, 1922 - April 14, 1956

John Joseph Malone. Also known as Jack Malone. Also known as my dad. Who suddenly left this world just eighteen months into my life - yet whose presence has always shadowed me. That's the thing about parents: they may physically vanish from your life - you may not have even known them - but you're never free of them. That's their ultimate legacy to you - the fact that, like it or not, they're always there. And no matter how hard you try to shake them, they never let go.

As my upstairs neighbor, Christine, embraced me, I glanced over her shoulder. Charlie was now walking towards our father's grave. The woman was still standing there. But once she saw him coming (and evidently knowing who he was), she immediately backed away, giving him clear access to Dad's plain granite monument. Charlie's head was lowered, his gait shaky. When he reached the gravestone, he leaned against it for support - and suddenly began to sob. At first he tried to stifle his distress, but within a moment he lost that battle and was sobbing uncontrollably. I gently removed myself from Christine's embrace. Instinctively, I wanted to run right over to him - but I stopped myself from such an outward show of sibling sympathy (especially as I couldn't instantly forgive the pain that my mother silently suffered about his absence over all those years). Instead, I slowly walked towards him, and lightly touched his arm with my hand.

'You okay, Charlie?' I asked quietly.

He lifted up his head. His face was tomato red, his eyes awash in tears. Suddenly he lurched towards me, his head collapsing against my shoulder, his arms clutching me as if I was a life preserver in high seas. His sobbing was now fierce, uninhibited. For a moment I stood there, arms at my side, not knowing what to do. But his grief was so profound, so total, so loud that, eventually, I simply had to put my arms around him.

It took him a good minute before his cries subsided. I stared ahead into the distance, watching Ethan (having just returned from the toilet) being gently restrained by Matt from running towards me. I winked at my son, and he repaid me with one of those hundred-watt smiles that instantly compensates for all the exhausting, endless stress that is an essential component of parenthood. Then I looked to the left of Ethan, and saw that woman again. She was standing discreetly in an adjoining plot, watching me comfort Charlie. Before she turned away (again!), I momentarily saw the intensity of her gaze. An intensity which made me wonder: how the hell does she know us?

I turned back to look at Ethan. He pulled open his mouth with two fingers and stuck out his tongue - one of the repertoire of funny faces he pulls whenever he senses I am getting far too serious for his liking. I had to stifle a laugh. Then I glanced back to where the woman was standing. But she was no longer there - and was instead walking alone down the empty graveled path that led to the front gates of the cemetery.

Charlie gulped hard as he tried to control his sobbing. I decided it was time to end the embrace, so I gently disentangled myself from his grip.

'Are you okay now?' I asked.

He kept his head bowed.

'No', he whispered, then added: 'I should've, I should've...'

The crying started again. I should've. The most agonizing, self-punitive expression in the English language. And one we all utter constantly throughout this farce called life. But Charlie was right. He should've. Now there was nothing he could do about it.

'Come back to the city', I said. 'We're having some drinks and food at Mom's apartment. You remember where it is, don't you?'

I immediately regretted that comment, as Charlie began to sob again.

'That was dumb', I said quietly. 'I'm sorry'.

'Not as sorry as me', he said between sobs. 'Not as...'

He lost control again, his crying now ballistic. This time, I didn't offer him solace. Instead, I turned away and saw that Meg was now hovering nearby, looking dispassionate, yet waiting to be of assistance. When I turned towards her, she nodded in the direction of Charlie and arched her eyebrows, as if to ask, 'Want me to take over here?' You bet. She approached her nephew, and said, 'Come on, Charlie-boy', linking her arm through his, 'let's you and I take a little walk'.

Matt now relaxed his grip on Ethan, who ran towards me. I crouched down to scoop him up in my arms.

'You feeling better?' I asked.

'The toilet was yucky', he said.

I turned towards my mother's grave. The minister was still standing by the coffin. Behind him were the cemetery's grounds-keepers. They were keeping a discreet distance from the proceedings, but I could still tell they were waiting for us to leave so they could lower her into subterranean Queens, bring out the earth movers, plug the hole, then head off to lunch... or maybe the nearest bowling alley. Life really does go on - whether you're here or not.

The minister gave me a small telling nod, the subtext of which was: it's time to say goodbye. Okay, Rev., have it your way. Let's all join hands and sing.

Now it's time to say goodbye to all our company...

M-I-C... See you real soon...

K-E-Y... Why? Because we like you... M-O-U-S-E...

For a nanosecond, I was back in the old family apartment on 84th Street between Broadway and Amsterdam. Six years old, home from first grade at Brearley, watching Annette, Frankie and all the Mouseketeers on our crappy Zenith black-and-white set, with the round picture tube and rabbit-ears antenna, and the imitation mahogany cabinet, and my mom staggering towards me with two Welch's grape jelly glasses in her hand: Strawberry Kool-Aid for me, a Canadian Club highball for her.

'How's Mickey and his pals?' she asked, the words slurring.

'They're my friends', I said.

She sank down next to me on the couch.

'Are you my friend, Katie?'

I ignored the question. 'Where's Charlie?'

She suddenly looked hurt.

'Mr Barclay's', she said, mentioning a dancing school to which adolescent prep school boys like Charlie were dispatched, once a week, screaming.

'Charlie hates dancing', I said.

'You don't know that', Mom said, throwing back half of her drink.

'I heard him tell you', I said. 'I hate dancing school. I hate you'.

'He didn't say he hated me'.

'He did', I said, and turned my attention back to the Mouseketeers.

Mom threw back the rest of her drink.

'He didn't say that'.

I think it's a game.

'Oh yes he did'.

'You never heard him...'

I cut her off. 'Why is my daddy in heaven?'

She went ashen. Though we'd been down this road before, I hadn't asked about my dead father for nearly a year. But this afternoon, I had arrived home with an invitation to a Father/Daughter evening at my school.

'Why did he have to go to heaven?' I demanded.

'Darling, as I told you before, he didn't want to go to heaven. But he got sick...'

'When can I meet him?'

Her face now betrayed despair.

'Katie... you are my friend, aren't you?'

'You let me meet my daddy'.

I heard her stifle a sob. 'I wish I could...'

'I want him to come to school with me...'

'Tell me, Katie, that you're my friend'.

'You get my daddy back from heaven'.

Her voice was weak, tiny, diminished.

'I can't, Katie. I...'

Then she began to cry. Pulling me close to her. Burying her head in my small shoulder. Scaring the hell out of me. And making me run out of the room, terrified.

It was the only time I ever saw her drunk. It was the only time she ever cried in front of me. It was the last time I asked her to get my father back from the celestial beyond.

'Are you my friend, Katie?'

I never answered her question. Because, truth be told, I never really knew the answer.