Grief Like Rot Beneath the Chassis by dave ring 

“This is Eric, Matthew’s roommate,” Dr. Vaughn says to her neighbor, her hand on my shoulder. “He’s staying with us for the weekend.”

Our eyes meet but Dr. Vaughn doesn’t say anything else. The room’s gravity bends around her like the double string of pearls encircling her throat. The cap sleeves of a black sundress hug the muscles of her arms. Mr. Vaughn drifts in and out wearing a too-small dress shirt, his black jacket abandoned on the back of a chair.

I’m half-swallowed by the plush velvet couch beside her, already overlooked. No one knows what to say to me. I try not to grimace as I sip my tea. The other guests drift around us.

“She always said he had a weak heart,” a neighbor says before his wife shushes him.

Opposite where we sit, a white moth flutters between the net curtain and the window, trapped between them. The noise drains away from everything except the thud of its useless body against the glass. Sweat slicks my back; the shadows sprawl drunkenly. I know I’m losing time, lulled into torpor by grief and the whitenoise of strangers. I can’t imagine Matt knowing all these boring people. But he must have. These were his neighbors.

The crowd around Dr. Vaughn thins, well-wishers depositing casserole dishes in the kitchen. A severe woman in a police uniform slips through the front door like a letter opener into an envelope. Martinez, her uniform says. The first not-white person I’ve seen in this town. I perk up a bit, I don’t know why. Fake wokeness? To be respectful?

Martinez leans in but Matthew’s mom flinches. “Not here,” she murmurs, lips barely moving. “Come back later.”

Officer Martinez notices me looking. I turn away; she leaves before I look back.

Soon the room is empty and Dr. Vaughn is clearing away tea cups. I try to help, but she sends me to the den. Mr. Vaughn watches football, feet up on the ottoman, volume high enough to discourage conversation. He’s unbuttoned his dress shirt at some point, exposing the thatch of dark hair protruding from his threadbare white undershirt. I can never stay interested in sports. I stare at Mr. Vaughn’s grey toes while the announcers blare on.

Dinner creeps up on us. In the kitchen, we’re surrounded by a small army of casseroles. Dr. Vaughn puts two or three into the microwave, seemingly at random. I count the seconds while the tray spins. Dr. Vaughn doesn’t wait for the countdown to get to zero; she stops it a few seconds beforehand and resets it each time.

No one talks under the dim light of the overhead lamp.

After we finish plates of tasteless chicken, inoffensive mashed potato, and limp broccoli, Dr. Vaughn takes some notes on a yellow legal pad and passes her husband a little white cassoulet. Five pills rattle inside. “Take your vitamins, dear. Honey, do you want a vitamin too?”

I blink back at her. Before he died, Matt and I would take our PReP every night at dinner time, and he’d say almost exactly the same thing. We weren’t seeing other people, and we were safe, but it was almost like the pill stopped things from being more serious than it was. Like we were keeping the window open.

“Sure.” I’m suddenly on the verge of tears. “Why not.” I catch Mr. Vaughn’s eyes by accident, and the undertow from the sympathy there catches me off guard.

Dr. Vaughn brings over my own little white dish with three pills: two pale circles—one robin’s egg blue and the other a yellow that matches the kitchen walls—and the third an oversize multivitamin. One looks like a downer I’ve taken before and the possibility of relief looms; I would like to feel either more or less, and these might do the trick. Dr. Vaughn is an endocrinologist, isn’t she? Not someone who would normally prescribe these. I dry swallow them.

“I put your things in Matthew’s room. Top of the stairs on the right.” Dr. Vaughn nods, as if we’ve just signed a lease. She pats my shoulder. “Sleep well, dear.”

The stairwell is encrusted with dated portrait photography. I don’t dwell on them; Dr. Vaughn is watching from the bottom of the stairs.

Matt’s room is easy to find. It could have been plucked from a Sears catalogue. A desk, a dresser and a nightstand in stained pine. Everything is blue and tan with punches of red, like the bedside lamp, its base a painted wooden firetruck. A dozen framed photos hang on one wall: sports teams, class photos, candids with his grandparents. A stuffed bear in a Patriots uniform.

The door doesn’t lock.

My duffel bag is both too small and too tattered for this carefully arranged scene. I didn’t bring enough clothes, not really. I strip off my shirt and pants, open the closet in search of a hanger. Matt’s school uniforms stare back at me—he went to a private high school.

Teenage boys, especially gay teenage boys, hide things. Where did Matt hide things?

I reach under his desk, but find only chewed gum. The closet is immaculate. The nightstand drawer is full of odds and ends—mints, guitar picks, a mountain of loose change—but nothing especially interesting. Something moves in the drawer and I flinch, discovering a tiny worm, a bright green caterpillar. I let it climb onto my finger. I would throw the worm out the window, but they don’t open. Not locked, though. Maybe the sash has swollen too much in the jamb.

I put it down on the window sill. “I think you’re stuck in here with me.” It’s starting to rain outside.

Something in the room beeps faintly. It reminds me of an old watch that needs its battery replaced. My phone screen says it’s only 9:30m, but time feels heavy, like slow-stretching taffy. Dr. Vaughn’s “vitamins” must be kicking in.

I root through Matt’s dresser. The top drawer is filled with neatly folded white briefs, handkerchiefs, and yellowed jock straps. From the middle drawer, I fish out shorts and a Hard Rock Cafe t-shirt with the sleeves cut off. They’re too big but they’ll do. The thought of teenage jock Matt buying this shirt on a junior high trip to Washington, DC makes me smile.

I open the bottom drawer and jump back, my skin crawling.

Tiny worms, hundreds of them, new leaf green with black heads, wriggle on top of Matt’s khakis. The mass undulates and the worms climb over each other, falling and climbing again. I close the drawer, almost slamming it shut. I’m cussing I think and everything itches. I have to take the t-shirt and shorts off, make sure they’re wormless, and even then I only reluctantly put them back on.

That can’t be real. I’m tired, and my brain is juiced up on whatever pills Dr. Vaughn gave me. It’s not real. I could open the drawer and look again, but I won’t. No, I have to—no. I won’t.

            I turn off the lights and get into bed. I’m sure I won’t be able to sleep—the sheets are awful and just the thought of all those worms—but I’m so exhausted it didn’t matter until the whine of the screen door startles me awake. There’s talking just below my window. I can’t quite hear the words. It’s still raining.

I slip out from between the rough sheets and peer down. Two people stand close together under a black umbrella. Dr. Vaughn is talking to Officer Martinez. Martinez isn’t in uniform—she was dressed for a jog maybe. They’re arguing. I can’t hear much, but one exchange floats up to the window: “I need more, Linda. Roger has a lot more meat on his bones.”

“If you monitored his intake like I showed you that wouldn’t—”

Something creaks outside the door. I abandon the window and open it. It’s hard to see in the hallway, but something breathes in the blackness like an animal. The palest part of the shadows oozes forward, groaning. Matt’s dad is naked almost, only wearing a pair of y-fronts. “Mr. Vau—” I start to say, but I swallow most of his name. His eyes are open, glassy. He’s not awake, not really.

When he reaches the top of the stairs, I almost grab his arm—what if he fell?—but something about grabbing my dead boyfriend’s naked dad’s arm seems a bridge too far, so I follow him down instead, placing my feet lightly to minimize the creaking.

The casserole dishes are now all banished to the inside of the refrigerator. They seem to daunt Mr. Vaughn, standing before them, bathed in the cold light. Eventually he finds the milk, pops the cap off, and starts drinking from the carton. Skim milk. Basically milk water.

 Mr. Vaughn closes the fridge, but he leaves the milk on the counter. He nearly walks through me again, milk dribbling down his chin. His chest hair has an unusual pattern, nearly the same as Matt: a tight line running up his belly that becomes a triangular shape on his pectorals until it merges with the hair on his back, crawling up his neck to meet his beard. Except Mr. Vaughn shaves his face, so it only makes a sort of ring around his neck.

When Matt and I first met, he shaved his chest almost religiously. Said it was “cleaner.” He only stopped after half my body got a beard-burn from the stubble.

What would happen if I held him, or kissed him? Would Mr. Vaughn wake up? Or would he just kiss me back, thinking I was his wife? Would it be like having Matt for a second, just to—no.

I pick up the milk cap and open the fridge, sliding a casserole dish out of the way, but my fingers suddenly go clammy. A dull black revolver rests in the place where the milk should go. I can’t leave it there. The gun enters my grip like an unwelcome guest. Was it loaded? I don’t even know how to check. His mom is outside, I could bring it to her. Instead, I put the gun in the top drawer of Matt’s dresser and pour myself back into those sandpaper sheets. I dream of Matt, milk dribbling from his lip. Standing beside him in front of a mirror that cracks over his chest, a spiderweb of lines that get bigger and bigger until the pieces clatter on the floor. I wake up, heart pounding, sweaty and trapped in my clothes, Matt’s clothes, so I take them off. I breathe slowly, one two three, one two three, trying to calm my racing heart, and there’s that beep again. It’s coming from above me, near a bit of empty molding in the ceiling, where a lamp or a ceiling fan might once have been. I imagine Matt up in the attic, peering down at me through the hole, and before I know it, I’m wanking furiously. When I bust, staring up, a red light flashes in the recesses of the hole. I clean myself off and look back up at it, forcing myself not to blink. I don’t see it again.

            The next day, I wrap the gun in one of Matt’s t-shirts and head down. Dr. Vaughn is wearing jeans and a pink collared shirt. Mr. Vaughn has on sweatpants and an athletic shirt.

I lay the swaddled gun down in front of Mr. Vaughn. “You left this in the fridge,” I say. “I think you were sleepwalking?”

Mr. Vaughn unwraps the shirt—VISIT FLORIDA it says, arms cut off crookedly—and looks at me, wide-eyed. “We don’t own guns in this house, son. Where did you get this? And tell the truth this time.”

My mouth gapes as his voice gets louder but Dr Vaughn leans between us and picks the gun up with a tissue, wipes it off. She pops the bullets out like a pro and tucks it into the waistband of her jeans.

I don’t know what to say. Crimson blooms at the base of Mr. Vaughn’s throat, traveling up his neck as he crosses his arms.

“Maybe I should go,” I say finally. “You’ve been so kind to have me here, but it’s really not necessary—”

Mr. Vaughn pushes his chair away from the table. He won’t look at me either. He fetches the car keys from the ceramic candy tray.

“Fine. If you insist. I’ll get the car ready.”

“Don’t be silly, dear,” Dr. Vaughn says. “You’re more than welcome in this house. Matthew would want you to be here.”

Mr. Vaughn stills, the keys jangling slightly in his hand.

“Honey, isn’t it time for you to go to the garage?”

“Yeah,” he says, voice flat. The keys drop back in the tray. He walks out, the screen banging against the doorframe.

“It’s fine, dear, relax. Toast? Coffee?”

Dr. Vaughn’s words snap me out of the sense that I am watching their entire interaction play out on television. “Sorry. Yes, please. What’s in the garage?”

“His exercise equipment. It’s important for men his age. You like sugar, right?”

She plops a cube into the mug. I stir it briefly. When Dr. Vaughn holds out her hand, I relinquish the spoon. “If you—where—”

“Dear, you can’t get him worked up.” She touches my wrist with two of her fingers. Neither of us speak; she must be taking my pulse. “It’s my gun. He can’t carry one anymore. Because of his medication, you see. It’s not safe. I think you know why.”

“Right, I’m sorry,” I say. “That makes sense.”

“Want a copy of the crossword?”

I say yes; she heads through a pocket door next to the pantry. The ancient drone of a Xerox keens up the stairs. We eat the rest of breakfast staring at our respective puzzles. Dr. Vaughn finishes it before I even get a third of the way through.

She glances down at the clue I’m stuck on. 12 Across. Keeping time underfoot. Eight letters, third letter is an E. She taps it with the eraser of her pencil. “TELLTALE. 3 Down isn’t PICKLE.”

As I start erasing, she spins back to the kitchen. I put down my pencil. “Can I help with anything?”

“No, honey. I have it. Why don’t you go for a walk or something? Get some air?”

“That’s a great idea,” I say, trying to be polite, but honestly as soon as I say it, it really does sound like a great idea.

It doesn’t take long to get to the cemetery. The suburban town Matt grew up in is pretty run-down. I pass by a boarded up Starbucks and a decrepit burger joint. The cemetery smells like cut grass and hot asphalt and fresh-turned earth.

The tombstone’s lines are still crisp as fuck, of course. A dozen butterflies have been carved into the stone as well. I crouch down and trace the dates, his name. When I touch the first butterfly, I flinch—it’s like one of them bit me. I suck copper from my fingertip.

I sit down and I say his name again and again and I knock my head into the grave a couple times just to feel something but I feel empty and full at the same time.

When the sky opens up, little pinpricks of coolness punch through my apathy, until I’m soaked to the skin. It feels like armor. It finally protects me long enough to cry. And as soon as I start, I’m bent over, sobbing.

It doesn’t feel good. It feels like lancing a boil.

I don’t realize that Officer Martinez is calling my name until maybe the fifth time. Eric. Eric. Ericericeric.

She looms over me in heavy-duty rain gear. “Let me drive you back to the Vaughns,” she says.

I say no, but a clap of thunder booms and my heart quivers like a rabbit. “Okay.”

            She holds open the passenger door of the cop car and I slide onto the vinyl. Rivulets of water stream into the seat’s tiny furrows.

            She drives in silence. I can’t focus on anything but the water dripping off my hair. The rain lets up as soon as we pull away. When Martinez pulls into the driveway besides the family Honda, Mr. Vaughn is putting plastic covers on the lawn furniture. His body language shuts down when he sees the cop car.

I get out and say thanks.

            “Anytime,” Martinez says. She shifts her weight on her hip and turns to Matt’s dad. “Is Linda home?”

            He nods curtly and looks away. “Eric, do you mind helping me with these?”

            Martinez drifts away while I follow Mr. Vaughn. There are three chairs he doesn’t have covers for. I think they were put outside for the wake. They aren’t heavy, just bulky. We grab them as the sky opens up again. I think about speeding up, but Mr. Vaughn grunts. He has a bum knee, I realize. He’s going as fast as he can. I let the rain spill over me but it doesn’t feel like armor any more. Just a second coat of paint.

When we get to the garage, we’re both drenched. Along with the usual clutter, there’s a pull-up bar, an all-in-one resistance system (the sort you’d see on a 90s infomercial), a dozen free weights, and a bench. A car’s there too, a vintage white thing.

“Look at that.”

Mr. Vaughn grunts. “That’s my baby. Been working on her for years.” He lifts up his shirt to wipe off his glasses, but the fabric is too damp to do anything but smear them more. I try not to stare at his belly.

I’ve never been good at talking about cars. “She’s a beauty,” I try out.

He smiles. “She is, isn’t she? Just about to turn the key in the engine. Maybe we can even fire her up while you’re here.”

“Oh,” I said. I peer at the car, at the shadows poised between it and the rickety garage door at the back. The garage windows face a muddy dirt access road. “So it’s broken?”

Mr. Vaughn makes a noise like that was the wrong question. “She’s a 1963 Triumph Spitfire. They don’t make cars like that anymore. She had plenty of rot in the sills and the bulkhead, but that’s okay. They need a lot of love. Matt and I worked on her whenever he was home.”

His breath catches and I fight not to cry. Especially since I know Matt hasn’t been home in a few years. But I don’t say that. “He must have really enjoyed spending time with you here.” The tears start halfway through. Hiccuping tears. I don’t think my last words even made sense.

Mr. Vaughn comes closer, his face spasming with indecision. But then he reaches out, tentatively enveloping me in his arms. We’re both cold and soaking wet but I let my face spasm into his wet shirt for what feels like forever. He doesn’t let go until I stop. He cups my chin in his hand. “You’re a good boy. I’m glad our son had you in his life. We—”

He’s interrupted by a loud ringing. Beside the car, there’s a wall-mounted phone with a long cord hooked onto a sheet of particle board. He tries to talk over it. “You should go before—” but the sound is too much. “I’m sorry.”

“Lin—” he answers, but something makes his face shift. It looks harder. He hands me the phone.

“There’s a package for you out front, dear.” It’s Dr. Vaughn. “You should bring it in.”

“Of course,” I say. “I’ll get it now.”

I hang up and look back outside. It’s really pouring now, slashing sheets of rain. I dash from the garage around the side of the house. Officer Martinez’s car is gone. At the front door, already wet as hell, there’s a plain cardboard box from Amazon addressed to me. I pick it up and retreat inside. The screen door slapping shut could have been a palm against my cheek. All the living room furniture is covered now with protective vinyl covers.

I punch through the tan packing tape and pluck open the cardboard flaps to expose a six pack of men’s white briefs. Y-fronts, size medium.

“You should change, dear,” Dr. Vaugn calls from the kitchen. “You’re soaking wet.”

She’s not wrong. I take the box to Matt’s room and peel off my wet layers. Someone has laid a fresh towel on the bed. My teeth chatter as I stand there naked and tear open the plastic. I pull them on resentfully. I grew up wearing this kind of underwear, but as soon as I began buying my own, I’ve always worn boxer briefs. On Matt—and Mr. Vaughn—they look manly, like every macho dude in an 80s movie, but when I put them on, I look like a lanky child, even with the tattoos and piercings. I put on another pair of Matt’s shorts and another shirt with the sleeves cut off. I don’t open the drawer with the worms.

There’s a knock at the door. When I open it, Dr. Vaughn is holding a laundry basket in her arms. “I’ll take those, dear.”

She extends the basket and I deposit my wet things in it obediently.

“I’ll just put these in the wash and get dinner ready, okay?”

 I pat my pockets after she leaves. My wallet and phone are still in my shorts. Time stretches again, dolorous without the scrolling and hearting and clicking to occupy me.

At dinner, we play casserole roulette again. Tonight it’s red beans and rice, green beans and onions, and some sort of cauliflower dish. “William and I were thinking, honey. What if you stayed a few more days? School doesn’t start back up for another few weeks, right? And we could use the company.”

“Well, I only have someone watching Giselda for the weekend,” I say. “That’s our cat.”

“Oh, you mean Nancy? She called earlier, and forgive me for being presumptuous, but I asked her if she wouldn’t mind watching the cat a little longer. She thought it was a great idea. Said she could use the time away from her place.”

It was weird of her to do that but it does sound like Nancy—any opportunity to stay somewhere other than her grouphouse situation, she took. I pick at my rice while I think about it. The idea of going back to the apartment and Matt just...not being there—it feels unfathomable.

“That might be alright,” I say haltingly. I’ll have to text Nancy. “It’s nice to not be alone right now.”

I try to make myself feel that way even as I said it.

“Good,” Dr. Vaughn said. “You’re family now.”

The doorbell chimes. No one moves until Dr. Vaughn says, “Well, who is it dear?”

Mr. Vaughn answers the door, comes back to tell Dr. Vaughn that Officer Martinez is here. Again. He says her name with an icy reserve.

“William, do you have something to do upstairs?”

He holds her gaze for a moment—his plate is nearly full still—and then nods.

“I’ll be just a moment, dear,” Dr. Vaughn says. “I’m so glad you’ll be staying with us another night. Maybe I can make cookies? Can you clean up for me?”

Something must have shifted—why am I allowed to wash up? But I nod and I’m smiling so hard it hurts my face. As soon as she’s gone, I reach for my phone and its absence needles its way into me. I’ll do the dishes after I check my updates.

I open the pocket door and head downstairs. Just at the bottom, the photocopier dominates a dusty but majestic dark cherry table. The dryer bangs off kilter with a loud irregular noise, like it’s been loaded unevenly. There’s a table half-full of folded laundry, a leather reclining chair and a huge television. The TV is covered in another thick layer of dust. I can’t see my phone or wallet anywhere. But while I root through the couch cushions—maybe it fell between them—a door I didn’t notice creaks open.

Just inside is a solid wooden desk covered in notepads. The desk is dwarfed by a huge wall of television screens, three of them stacked on top of each other, each bifurcated and split by four black and white security cameras feeds. There’s the empty kitchen where we just were, the front driveway with the Honda and a police car beside it, the bed in Matthew’s room—my breath catches when I see it’s a bird’s eye view—and the living room. Dr. Vaughn is bent over the couch, neck turned uncomfortably. Officer Martinez leans over her. They’re making out, I realize. My eyes flick to the next television, where a camera points at Mr. Vaughn. He’s naked—the frame starts with a view of his hairy ass—and facing the corner. He barely moves. Only the slight rise and fall of his shoulders lets me know the feed’s not frozen. Below him, there’s one camera with a broken display—it just looks like white static.

I sift through the yellow notepads. Dr. Vaughn is very committed to documenting her husband’s caloric intake. There’s a rat’s nest of crossed out notes where she’s tried to estimate the nutrition information contained in each of those mystery casseroles. But not only that—there are other reports. Weights and measurements. Blood pressure and stool samples. Volumes of semen.

A stack of new legal pads is set aside from the others. My name is written at the top in slanted cursive. A wave of deja vu runs through me at the similarity between her and Matt’s handwriting—something about the aggressive dot above the lowercase i. Beneath my name, she’s written some notes about my sleep schedule. One time is circled and starred—I’m sure that’s when I had that wank.

My face scrunches up. This is too much. Now is the time to go. While Mr. Vaughn is...doing whatever he’s doing, and Dr. Vaughn is distracted by Martinez.

But where’s my shit? The banging of the dryer suddenly feels like an answer. I pry it open, hot humid air hitting my face, and yes. There they are amidst my clothes. What a psychopath. My phone is completely fried. And of course my goddamn wallet is empty, but that’s my fault.

I creep back upstairs. Now I hear the panting, the lustful shortness of breath. Was Dr. Vaughn slipping, or was she performing for me? I drift towards the ceramic tray, where Mr. Vaughn puts the keys to the Honda, but they’re not in the dish. I break out in a cold sweat. What do I do? Can’t call a car with a busted phone. I could walk to the station, but it’s miles away.

I shift my weight from one foot to the other and the linoleum creaks.

“Eric?” Dr. Vaughn calls out, only slightly breathy. “Everything okay? I’ll be right there.”

“Everything’s fine,” I call back, voice creaking in sympathy with the floor.

I slip outside, careful to close the screen door quietly. The grass is still wet beneath my feet, and everything smells like ozone.

“Eric? Where’d you go?”

Martinez.

I zipper across the yard. The garage door knob turns easily in my hands, and relief floods my chest. Then confusion. At first it seems like it’s snowing. But the cinematic snowflakes are each a sliver of winged cream speckled with a handful of brown dots. Moths. Hundreds of them, no, thousands.

I press myself against the door and cover my face, close my mouth. There’s so many of them.

“Gosh, it’s dark out here. Stay still, honey.” Dr. Vaugh’s voice is muted, but getting closer. “You might get hurt. You’re probably scared, aren’t you? I’ve got your vitamins. For your heart.”

“Listen to Linda, son,” Officer Martinez says, then lowers her voice. “Would he be in the garage?”

I can’t just wait here. The garage door seems suddenly flimsy as I lock it.

Walking through the swarm of moths is a lot more like going through a whiteout than it should be, the winged bodies obscuring everything. I trip over Mr. Vaughn’s twenty-pound weights and then a jerry can. The cork board under my fingers helps me feel my way along the wall until it meets the door. I grip the garage door handle and try to yank it up, but it makes an awful groaning sound and gets stuck a couple inches off the ground. Not nearly high enough for me to crawl out.

A stupid idea enters my head. Didn’t Mr. Vaughn say that he was ready to turn the key?

I get in the Triumph just before someone—Martinez probably—starts battering at the door.

The starter clicks valiantly, but it doesn’t start. I squint at the dash—there’s nothing in the tank. Was that gas can full or empty? I scramble out and inhale a moth by accident. I cough and sputter as it struggles, wet-winged, inside my esophagus. More of them flutter against my sweat-drenched face, my closed eyes. I crawl toward where the can fell. I exhale when I’m cradling its rounded geometric planes in my arms.

As the gas glugs noisily into the tank and the sweet smell of benzene floods my nose, the garage door crashes open. I can’t see them but I hear Martinez swearing a blue streak, swatting at the cloud. I twist the cap back onto the tank and throw myself inside the car.

This time, the Triumph sputters to life, engine shuddering beneath me.

“Darling, wait!” Dr. Vaughn’s voice breaks as she yells. It could almost be a lasso tightening around my shoulders.

Time slows down. Sound falls away.

I press my bare foot against the pedal and the car jerks forward.

Shots ring out, punching holes in the door, in the corkboard, in the Triumph’s back windshield. My palms are sweaty against the wheel, I can’t breathe, I can’t slam my foot any harder on the gas.

What if—but no, the car thuds against it, glass shattering. The garage door buckles and breaks, moths spilling out into the air like cherry blossoms defying gravity, like television snow, like whitenoise, and I’m gone.

I’m gone.

##