Short Stories
The Beautiful Death of Joshua Breem
There lies a curious sort of therapy reserved for the interstellar souls of men long dead, and women too, but no children. When a child dies, they travel somewhere kinder than these cold and lonely stars.
When Joshua was living, he was full of mundane splendor. He was a creature of electricity and taco grease, and while driving Rachael to preschool, he missed a stop sign. It was all that would have stopped Thomas Lamb’s 2021 Ford F-150 from crumpling the driver’s side of Joshua’s meat-red Honda Civic.
He died there, in that driver’s seat. His daughter died too, but he did not know this. In timeless interstellar space, there is a cruel juxtaposition of life and death and black, utter heartlessness, and love, and molten hate like the fusion of our beautiful sun, and it was here in this Salvador Dali dream that Joshua would receive his grief counseling. He was both atomically close to home, and impossibly, unforgivably far.
He sits across from a faceless manicured woman. Her hair is wired machinery with a polished shine. She is cold, but not unkind. She is a bastard. Her electric-pink nails click and rattle as she writes.
“So Joshua,” she says, “Do you remember dying in your bed?”
“No.”
“You died in bed,” she says. “You died in bed, at 89.”
“No I didn’t.”
“I know it’s hard, remembering these things. That’s totally normal.”
“It is?”
“Yes, of course it is,” she says, writing all the while.
“But I didn’t die like that.”
“Like how?” she asks.
“In my bed at 89. I didn’t die like that. I was driving Rachael to school. I was driving her to preschool, and then that truck blasted me.”
She stops writing.
“Blasted you?” she asks.
“Yeah, on the driver’s side, it hit me hard. It hit me really, really hard, oh my god is Rachael ok? Is she
alright?” Joshua scrambles to stand, and then he’s standing, and searching the room for a door.
The faceless woman pinches her eyes.
“Joshua, I can’t understand what you’re telling me.”
She sighs.
“You’re acting very strange,” she says. “That’s fine. It’s normal, but you are acting strange. You’re disoriented. I need you to slow down. And Rachael is fine.”
Josh stops. He breathes a bit.
The room is a boxy rectangle. The walls look like painted diorama cardboard. They are a dark ocean blue, and they are cheap. The ceiling is a bright black color, like outer space, because that’s exactly what it is. There
actually isn’t a ceiling. Where the ceiling should be is a deep oil pool of stars. It looks thick, like something
that should show your reflection, or something that should drip, and that you would put a bucket under. But it
just hangs there, heavy.
Joshua sits back down on a plush brown loveseat. It smells like flowers, or like a nursing home.
“I apologize,” Josh says. “I’m just a bit disoriented, is all.”
The woman nods.
“That’s alright. I’m used to folks freaking out a bit. You just died after all. You died in your bed, at 89.”
She puts on a big bright toothy smile.
Josh sighs, and begins to speak.
“I don’t mean to be difficult, so you’ll have to forgive me a bit. I don’t remember dying like that. I don’t
remember it like that at all.
“I was in my car. It’s this faded red Honda Civic. The seats are cracked leather. I like them, the seats. They’re
lived in. But I was in a rush, this morning. Rachael was late to preschool, which isn’t really all that important
in the grand scheme of things, but she thought it was important, you know? And I wanted her to be happy,
and honestly I wanted her to stop crying, because her first day of school — well not school, but preschool — it
shouldn’t be a sad thing. Maybe a bit sad, but she’s only five, so of course she was freaking out. I was freaking
out too. And so, I drove a little bit faster than I should’ve.”
Josh is quiet, for a moment.
“I drove much, much faster than I should’ve. I think I blew a stop sign.”
Josh is quiet again.
“And then that asshole in the truck slammed into us. Or blasted into us. Whatever. The car flipped. I didn’t
know cars could do that.”
He is quiet for a long, long time.
Then, he speaks.
“After that, I don’t really remember much. There was blood, and fire, and the world was upside down. I
couldn’t move. I coughed, and coughed, and I just kept coughing. It was too hot.”
He bites his lip.
“It was just too hot.”
He bites his nails. Then, he looks at her, the woman sitting across from him. Her smile is gone. She is
listening.
“What is your name?” Josh asks.
“Karen.”
“I remember fire, Karen. I remember fire. The smell of sausage burning. I remember the sirens too, and the
smoke, and I remember the screaming. It wasn’t screaming. It was howling. Like an animal. It was horrible.
“But at first, it was crying. My daughter, she was crying. And then the heat came. She howled. And I tried to tell her it would be alright, that it would be ok, honey, it would be alright, but I couldn’t move, and she couldn’t move, and I ran out of breath, and then out of words, and then Karen I was screaming, because Rachael
became quiet. She was burning, but she was quiet.
“She was so, so quiet.”
Josh looks up at the pitch-black tarpit, full of bright swirling stars.
It is silent, for a time. The silence is pristine and precious and very nearly made of glass.
And then it is broken, as the woman speaks.
“Josh, please look at me.”
He does not respond.
He hears her sniff.
“Please, Josh.”
He stops looking at Heaven and looks in her eyes. They are shining, like water shines, because she is crying. She sniffs, and wipes her face with her sleeve.
“You didn’t die in that car, upside down like that. The paramedics came. They pried open the car door with a strong metal tool. I don’t know what it’s called. A firefighter had the tool. He pulled her right out of that fucking car. He was big and strong. Rachael thought he was an astronaut. That sounds like her, doesn’t it? It’s something she would say?”
“Mhmm,” he says. He is crying. He is a mess.
“She did say it, because she lived. She survived. And you did too. You both did. You were taken to Johns
Hopkins. You were taken there, and they treated your burns, and your broken ribs. And Rachael was alright.
She was alright. It was a miracle. It was all over the news.
“Don’t you remember that, Josh? That it was all over the news?”
Josh shakes his head, because he does not remember.
“I don’t remember that.”
“It’s normal, Josh. It’s normal to not remember these things, but that doesn’t make them any less true.”
She gulps.
“She was so lucky to have you. She was so, so lucky.”
Charon stands to her full height, for of course it was she, and walks to him, to comfort this dead dying man, to let him know that everything will be ok, that everything will be alright.
And so she sits next to him, and she waits. He cries, she cries. They both cry.
It takes a while for Josh to look at her, but after a time, he does. Charon looks at him, too.
“Rachael didn’t…?” he says.
“No.” she says.
“She’s still…”
“Yes, she is. Of course she is. Of course she is, Josh, of course she is.”
Josh is quiet for a moment. He sniffs.
“Did she have a good time.”
“What?”
“At preschool,” he asks.
Charon smiles softly.
“Yes. She absolutely loved it.”
“She was never all that lonely?”
“She was bright and beautiful and everyone loved her, Josh. Everyone loved her.”
“So she grew up, then?” Josh asks.
“Yes! Yes, she did.”
“And she went to college?”
“Yeah. She did. She did go to college. She went to Notre Dame. She graduated at the top of her class. She went for architecture and graduated at the top of her class.”
“I don’t remember that. I really don’t remember. I don’t remember any of it.”
“That’s ok,” Charon says.
“I don’t remember a single thing.”
“I know. But it’s normal to not remember these things right away.”
“Are you sure?” Josh asks.
“Yes.”
“Are you absolutely sure?”
“I would never lie to you, Josh. I would never, ever lie.”
“She didn’t die?”
Charon looks away.
“She is here, still.”
“And we both didn’t die in that horrible crash?”
“No. You died in your bed. You died in your bed, at 89.”
Josh nods.
He sniffed a final time.
He held himself tightly.
Charon helped him stand.
She guided him upwards, to find his place among those cold and lonely stars.
When Joshua was living, he was full of mundane splendor. He was a creature of electricity and taco grease, and while driving Rachael to preschool, he missed a stop sign. It was all that would have stopped Thomas Lamb’s 2021 Ford F-150 from crumpling the driver’s side of Joshua’s meat-red Honda Civic.
He died there, in that driver’s seat. His daughter died too, but he did not know this. In timeless interstellar space, there is a cruel juxtaposition of life and death and black, utter heartlessness, and love, and molten hate like the fusion of our beautiful sun, and it was here in this Salvador Dali dream that Joshua would receive his grief counseling. He was both atomically close to home, and impossibly, unforgivably far.
He sits across from a faceless manicured woman. Her hair is wired machinery with a polished shine. She is cold, but not unkind. She is a bastard. Her electric-pink nails click and rattle as she writes.
“So Joshua,” she says, “Do you remember dying in your bed?”
“No.”
“You died in bed,” she says. “You died in bed, at 89.”
“No I didn’t.”
“I know it’s hard, remembering these things. That’s totally normal.”
“It is?”
“Yes, of course it is,” she says, writing all the while.
“But I didn’t die like that.”
“Like how?” she asks.
“In my bed at 89. I didn’t die like that. I was driving Rachael to school. I was driving her to preschool, and then that truck blasted me.”
She stops writing.
“Blasted you?” she asks.
“Yeah, on the driver’s side, it hit me hard. It hit me really, really hard, oh my god is Rachael ok? Is she
alright?” Joshua scrambles to stand, and then he’s standing, and searching the room for a door.
The faceless woman pinches her eyes.
“Joshua, I can’t understand what you’re telling me.”
She sighs.
“You’re acting very strange,” she says. “That’s fine. It’s normal, but you are acting strange. You’re disoriented. I need you to slow down. And Rachael is fine.”
Josh stops. He breathes a bit.
The room is a boxy rectangle. The walls look like painted diorama cardboard. They are a dark ocean blue, and they are cheap. The ceiling is a bright black color, like outer space, because that’s exactly what it is. There
actually isn’t a ceiling. Where the ceiling should be is a deep oil pool of stars. It looks thick, like something
that should show your reflection, or something that should drip, and that you would put a bucket under. But it
just hangs there, heavy.
Joshua sits back down on a plush brown loveseat. It smells like flowers, or like a nursing home.
“I apologize,” Josh says. “I’m just a bit disoriented, is all.”
The woman nods.
“That’s alright. I’m used to folks freaking out a bit. You just died after all. You died in your bed, at 89.”
She puts on a big bright toothy smile.
Josh sighs, and begins to speak.
“I don’t mean to be difficult, so you’ll have to forgive me a bit. I don’t remember dying like that. I don’t
remember it like that at all.
“I was in my car. It’s this faded red Honda Civic. The seats are cracked leather. I like them, the seats. They’re
lived in. But I was in a rush, this morning. Rachael was late to preschool, which isn’t really all that important
in the grand scheme of things, but she thought it was important, you know? And I wanted her to be happy,
and honestly I wanted her to stop crying, because her first day of school — well not school, but preschool — it
shouldn’t be a sad thing. Maybe a bit sad, but she’s only five, so of course she was freaking out. I was freaking
out too. And so, I drove a little bit faster than I should’ve.”
Josh is quiet, for a moment.
“I drove much, much faster than I should’ve. I think I blew a stop sign.”
Josh is quiet again.
“And then that asshole in the truck slammed into us. Or blasted into us. Whatever. The car flipped. I didn’t
know cars could do that.”
He is quiet for a long, long time.
Then, he speaks.
“After that, I don’t really remember much. There was blood, and fire, and the world was upside down. I
couldn’t move. I coughed, and coughed, and I just kept coughing. It was too hot.”
He bites his lip.
“It was just too hot.”
He bites his nails. Then, he looks at her, the woman sitting across from him. Her smile is gone. She is
listening.
“What is your name?” Josh asks.
“Karen.”
“I remember fire, Karen. I remember fire. The smell of sausage burning. I remember the sirens too, and the
smoke, and I remember the screaming. It wasn’t screaming. It was howling. Like an animal. It was horrible.
“But at first, it was crying. My daughter, she was crying. And then the heat came. She howled. And I tried to tell her it would be alright, that it would be ok, honey, it would be alright, but I couldn’t move, and she couldn’t move, and I ran out of breath, and then out of words, and then Karen I was screaming, because Rachael
became quiet. She was burning, but she was quiet.
“She was so, so quiet.”
Josh looks up at the pitch-black tarpit, full of bright swirling stars.
It is silent, for a time. The silence is pristine and precious and very nearly made of glass.
And then it is broken, as the woman speaks.
“Josh, please look at me.”
He does not respond.
He hears her sniff.
“Please, Josh.”
He stops looking at Heaven and looks in her eyes. They are shining, like water shines, because she is crying. She sniffs, and wipes her face with her sleeve.
“You didn’t die in that car, upside down like that. The paramedics came. They pried open the car door with a strong metal tool. I don’t know what it’s called. A firefighter had the tool. He pulled her right out of that fucking car. He was big and strong. Rachael thought he was an astronaut. That sounds like her, doesn’t it? It’s something she would say?”
“Mhmm,” he says. He is crying. He is a mess.
“She did say it, because she lived. She survived. And you did too. You both did. You were taken to Johns
Hopkins. You were taken there, and they treated your burns, and your broken ribs. And Rachael was alright.
She was alright. It was a miracle. It was all over the news.
“Don’t you remember that, Josh? That it was all over the news?”
Josh shakes his head, because he does not remember.
“I don’t remember that.”
“It’s normal, Josh. It’s normal to not remember these things, but that doesn’t make them any less true.”
She gulps.
“She was so lucky to have you. She was so, so lucky.”
Charon stands to her full height, for of course it was she, and walks to him, to comfort this dead dying man, to let him know that everything will be ok, that everything will be alright.
And so she sits next to him, and she waits. He cries, she cries. They both cry.
It takes a while for Josh to look at her, but after a time, he does. Charon looks at him, too.
“Rachael didn’t…?” he says.
“No.” she says.
“She’s still…”
“Yes, she is. Of course she is. Of course she is, Josh, of course she is.”
Josh is quiet for a moment. He sniffs.
“Did she have a good time.”
“What?”
“At preschool,” he asks.
Charon smiles softly.
“Yes. She absolutely loved it.”
“She was never all that lonely?”
“She was bright and beautiful and everyone loved her, Josh. Everyone loved her.”
“So she grew up, then?” Josh asks.
“Yes! Yes, she did.”
“And she went to college?”
“Yeah. She did. She did go to college. She went to Notre Dame. She graduated at the top of her class. She went for architecture and graduated at the top of her class.”
“I don’t remember that. I really don’t remember. I don’t remember any of it.”
“That’s ok,” Charon says.
“I don’t remember a single thing.”
“I know. But it’s normal to not remember these things right away.”
“Are you sure?” Josh asks.
“Yes.”
“Are you absolutely sure?”
“I would never lie to you, Josh. I would never, ever lie.”
“She didn’t die?”
Charon looks away.
“She is here, still.”
“And we both didn’t die in that horrible crash?”
“No. You died in your bed. You died in your bed, at 89.”
Josh nods.
He sniffed a final time.
He held himself tightly.
Charon helped him stand.
She guided him upwards, to find his place among those cold and lonely stars.