FATHER’S DEATH APPARITION
It had began, precisely, on the 11th January 1979. No, that wasn’t quite true – the background to the scene was set long before that.
But on that night, he had the experience of his father appearing to him in his room. Which was a bit strange – he hadn’t seen his father for six months, and that had been when he had been driving one-way along Ann Street in the city, going from the Valley towards George Street. He had been one of the hundreds of drivers in pre-peak hour traffic, warily watching the lights and other drivers, when suddenly he saw his father walking in the opposite direction on the foot path, on his right hand side. He had resisted the impulse to wave – he couldn’t stand the man. Not what one should think about one’s father, at least not in polite society. But how do you explain vindictive, relentless, stupid cruelty to polite society?
His father didn’t see him, or he was pretty sure he didn’t. And he had looked like death warmed up – his face drawn and pale, with a sort of shadow about it, and an almost demonic cast to the sullen, angry features.
Then he’d driven past and that had been the end of it. Apart from despising him.
The last time he’d seen his father before that was another six months, and that was when the old man had kicked him out of the family home, which was shortly to go under the hammer due to his parents’ divorce.
And that had been the symbolic end of his father’s role as dedicated family man.
True, there’d been a sort of impulse to go and visit him for a few days before his father’s death. He’d resisted it, but if he had to describe it the impulse, the only thing he could have said was that it was sort of “spiritual”, a feeling that just would not go away, quite insistent at times. But hatred and bitterness had won, and he had refused. But the feeling, the persistent impulse to visit – where had it come from?
So on the night of the 11th January 1979, his father visited him instead.
He remembered the setting well. It was January, hot in Brisbane, and with the feeling of persecution he occasionally experienced, he had shut and locked all the windows and doors, except for the bathroom window. He didn’t have much choice in one sense – there were no security screens or bars, and all of them opened onto the balcony or back landing. So if they had been open, anybody could have gotten in. And with his hearing loss, he was unlikely to hear somebody unless they made a lot of noise.
The old double bed had a sag in the middle of it. He had spoken to the landlord about it, but the landlord has simply pointed out the lease said “partly furnished”. By which he meant that if Bob wanted a better bed, he could buy it himself. So far he hadn’t, and as a result he always rolled into the middle.
And it really had been hot and humid. He had to get up at 4.30am, since he started work at 6am, and he had a long way to travel. He had tossed and turned, and finally drifted into a fitful sleep, lying face down, which was how he normally started dozing.
Then at some ungodly hour, he’d felt something shaking his back. He shrugged, and tried to go back to sleep. It happened again, almost as though somebody was trying to wake him up.
So he woke up and turned over. Odd – he must have imagined it, as there was nobody there.
Then something misty began to appear in the corner of the room, near the bedroom door. It seemed to sharpen, and his father appeared.
He watched in amazement as his father approached the foot of the bed.
“Hello, Robert” he said. Yet Bob had the sense his father was not really looking at him, but was mainly focused on something behind him, and above his head. His father did glance at him, but then looked up again, almost enthralled.
Bob was startled. “How the hell did you get in here!” he demanded.
The question remained unanswered. “I’ve come to apologize for the way I’ve treated you” his father said. “We had no idea of what you were going through”. He looked at Bob again, then over his head.
Bob was angry. “You mean you had no idea what you were doing to me!”, he replied bitterly.
At this his father appeared distraught, shook his head in fear, and held both hands over his face, as though he could not stand what he was seeing.
Then he seemed to recover, and he resumed looking above Bob’s head, as though gazing at something beautiful. Then at times he would again cover his face with his hands, and a tortured, frightened expression would come over his face.
His father looked devastated. “I’ve completely wrecked your life” he burst out. “I’ve destroyed your confidence!”
Then he added “I did it deliberately!”
Bob broke the silence. He had been thinking about the years of intense verbal cruelty his father had lavished upon him, and the intense frustration that had resulted.
“Why!!” he demanded.
The answer was almost immediate.
“I was jealous” was the reply. “I didn’t have the same opportunities that you did. It wasn’t easy for me either, you know. And I didn’t have the chance to see anything like this!”
“I know it wasn’t easy! Why do you think I was so patient! I knew that by the time I was twelve!”
His father looked deeply ashamed, and shocked, as though realizing for the first time just how much his son had understood, and from what an early age.
But his next reply came as a bit of a shock. “You weren’t very patient”.
Bob was taken aback. He’d thought he’d been very patient, considering just how vicious his father’s diatribes had been. He remembered the constant humiliation, the dripping sarcasm, the cruel comments that followed his every little mistake, or child’s effort to do something. Yet here was his father saying he hadn’t been patient.
Not patient? Compared to what? He’d like to know. He wondered how many other people would have put up with so much deliberate contempt for so long without cracking.
There was another moment of silence, as father and son reflected on their situations, the son facing his father and his father facing something that could not be seen.
Bob turned around to see what his father was gazing at with such an enraptured expression. But all he could see was the plasterboard, behind which he knew was the brick wall at the end of the building.
He turned back to his father. “What is all this, a dream or something?”
His father looked slightly bemused. “No, it’s not a dream. I died tonight.”
Bob shook his head. “What?”
His father replied again. “I died tonight.”
There was mutual silence.
Then his father raised his hands in front of his face again as though appalled. Whatever he was looking at seemed to relent, and the enthrallment was back again.
“I served the devil. You do too, but you’ll become a Christian.”
Bob stared at him. “I’m an atheist”.
His father looked bemused again. “You’ll become a Christian.”
Bob’s curiousity got the better of him. “So how’s all this supposed to start?”
His father glanced at him, briefly. “You’ll meet a pastor. You’ll think he’s great, but all he’ll do is discourage you even more!”
Now Bob was beginning to get annoyed.
“You know what really gets to me! Because of the way you’ve treated me, I’ve now treated Jennifer badly”. But he knew he wasn’t being fully honest – there were two particular instances of behaviour on his part that bothered him.
His father then somehow seemed to be hovering right over him, with the usual bad tempered look on his face, that had been so much a part of him for so long that he did not have a bad temper – he had become a bad temper.
“Don’t blame me for that!!” he almost seemed to shout. “That was your decision”.
His eyes were like black pits. Bob shrank back, a bit difficult since he was lying on his back in bed.
But Bob knew his father was right. But it also struck him how quickly his father was on the offensive as soon as he had a particle of ground to justify his stance, as though the twenty years of cruelty he had inflicted were of no consequence. The other bit was, how did his father know what the two instances were? He had never told him. Oh, he’d insinuated it was an option at one stage, but that was as far as it went.
Then his father disappeared, or seemed to. But as Bob recovered and sat up again, he could see him against the bookcase.
This time his father looked forlorn. “Son, you’ve got to forgive me!”
Bob rebelled. “You treated me like dirt for twenty years, and now you want forgiveness!”
“Son, it’s not for my sake. It’s for your sake. It’s too late for me. All I was expected to do was look after my family, and I didn’t even do that! If you don’t forgive me, you’ll destroy yourself!”
Then it seemed he was running out of time. “Son, you’ve got to keep away from Jennifer and her mother”.
Bob misheard him. He thought his father said “your mother”. He replied back, “How can I? They’re my responsibility!”
His father answered, in seeming anguish. “Oh, I meant …she’ll use you!”
It was a long time before Bob understood his father was talking about his girlfriend’s mother, and not his own mother.
Then his father seemed to become even more desperate. “Son, you’ve got to believe me!” And a look of complete dejection came over his father’s face.
Then he added “I’ve been an absolute mongrel to you!”
Bob was angry. “Why should I (forgive you)? You’ve spent the whole of my life …”
But he never finished. As he was talking, his father was turning to his right, Bob’s left, as though he could see something in the distance. He seemed to be taking fright, and said “No!”
Then louder “No! No!”
Then finally, he screamed in sheer terror, shook from head to foot and raised his arms in what appeared to be an attempt to ward something off, something hideously frightening. It was so terrifying, Bob started to scream hiimself.
Then his father disappeared into eternity.
Bob was left staring at the bookcase, in the darkness, alone.