Twenty Years Later

by Charlie Donlea

Walt said none of those things, though. He just closed his eyes and held her tight, feeling her heart thud against his own.

Later, though, the untamable lure of unconditional love found her, and the natural bond that ties daughters to their fathers emerged and forced her to tape the pieces back together and read her father’s words.

At the bottom of every glass of rum, he found guilt.

You know, when a loved one dies young your perception of them is placed in a time capsule. You’re only able to remember them as they were then, not as they would be today.

Walt wondered if examining the dead had taken its toll on Dr. Lockard, as if each trip into the body of the deceased pulled the man further from life. Not so much toward death, but rather to some in-between place that left him alienated from the living and only able to associate with the corpses that filled his days.

“The voice of insanity safeguarding against the voice of reason.”

He realized that the memories had not so much faded and disappeared, but had instead been warehoused. Stored away and slowly covered by the dust of life—the accumulation of years and the distractions that accompanied them.

made him wonder if he had wasted the last three years on heartache when they might have been better conquered by facing life head-on and allowing the natural progression of time to wash his pain away.