Marie slithered out of her brother’s house onto the slick street. She knew, she’d never forget the last two hours: Sean’s final gasps for air, sure one would be the last, but surprised when he gasped another morsel of air, twenty seconds later. Then the third, thirty seconds later came, a pitch higher and a tad shorter. Each one, a little higher and a little shorter. And then, a total silence that reminded Marie that it had been raining all day long, this cold day near the end of March 1965. Boston had never looked so dismal to Marie, not in her twenty-eight years.
Mrs. Wilkerson came up to her, put her hands out onto his chest with a frenzied question in them. Mr. Sarnoff mouthed wordless questions he refused to hear in his approach. Little Ethel from across the street, she came out, her saucer eyes popping out of her head. Joey Levy came. They came thirty seconds apart, then twenty seconds apart, then fifteen, then ten. More and more people, as the news of death spread in the community, they all surrounded Marie with their condolences, their ears, their questions, their shock, their popeyed expressions, these people who didn’t listen to her say, I need to be alone, I don’t love you, I loved my brother and now he’s dead. Go talk to my mother, she’s inside the house. Let me be.
But they kept multiplying, these friends and neighbors, until Summit Avenue resembled a street party. Marie felt her chest tighten, her heart rate accelerate, her breath speed up, her stomach churn. She opened his mouth to scream and nothing came out, nothing except the bitter taste of mourning.
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