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Home  Browse All Articles Writers Showcase Fiction: Respect for the Dead
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Fiction: Respect for the Dead |
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Written by Jim Idema
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Saturday, 25 February 2006 |
A short story written by Jim Idema.
“It’s the singing that’s the worst,” he said out loud. His voice echoed from the back wall and out into the hallway prompting a loud “SHUT UP!” from a voice further down.
“Don’t misunderstand,” he said to an imaginary interviewer. “Death Row isn’t the Hilton. It’s just that when Cooper starts his singing, the realization of the chair and life beyond it, if there is any, is harder to deal with. I’m supposed to die tonight and I just can’t cope with dying when some stupid rap song is on someone else’s mind. See? There he goes again.” The boom-chick-boom-boom of some distant song wafted through the corridor, allowing Wendell Colgate to demonstrate his point. The interviewer, only visible to Colgate, nodded his head in agreement and noted it in his Mead notebook. Wendell wrung his hands together and suddenly became aware of how the skin on the inside of his hands was almost white yet the rest of him was as black as coal. All African-Americans are aware of this (obviously) but it just now struck him as funny. Not funny strange but funny ha-ha. Why is this? He started to ponder it when his head jerked back in the direction of the bars that kept him contained.
“Of course I know why I’m here! What kind of stupid question is that? I’m here because I killed all those people at that beach house in Corpus Christi. My lawyer says to say ‘allegedly’ but if it were ‘alleged,’ I wouldn’t be here, now would I. He’s trying to get the Governor to give me at least a stay of execution and eventually a new trial but I’m not betting the bank on it and so far, I’m right as usual. That idiot couldn’t get a fart out of his ass. He said he did all he could to keep me from the chair but I told him not to waste his time (he is anyway, though). I’m ready to die and I’d be more ready if Cooper would keep his pie hole shut.” Wendell got up from his bunk, strode to the bars that held him, and screamed at Cooper to shut his trap or he’d shut it for him. Feeling relieved, Wendell resumed his seat, straightening out a fold in his gray, STATE PRISON blanket of his unkempt bunk. He ran his hair over his matted hair and down to his full beard.
“They’re going to shave all this, you know. It’ll be the best shave I’ve had in the forty-one years I’ve been on this earth.
“Talking to yourself again, huh Colgate?” asked the burly guard who strolled by, his baton making a dull ringing sound as it hit each bar of Wendell’s cell. “Who is it this time, Dan Rather?” The guard laughed so hard Wendell thought he was going to choke and die right then and there – Wendell hoped he would.
“Don’t pay any attention to him,” Wendell said. “He just doesn’t get it, not that anyone ever did.” Wendell bowed his face into his hands.
“Sure, I’ll tell you how it happened, as long as it doesn’t take more than a few hours. I’ve got a date with angel, remember?
“It started a little over a year ago. I was walking on the beach minding my own business; you know, taking in the sights and all that, when this volleyball hit me in the back. I turned to retrieve it for the people that were playing with it and this white kid; couldn’t have been older than eighteen, yells, “Don’t touch that ball, nigger!” That just pissed me off so instead of picking it up for him, I kicked it into the ocean. Well that just turned his face the color of his hair and he took a swipe at me. Of course he missed by a mile but I didn’t. My fist landed squarely on his nose, adding even more color to his face. That’s when Red’s buddy, a much bigger guy bulging with muscle, came over to me. I was ready for him. I picked up one of those big seashells; you know, the kind you can hear the ocean with – even at the ocean, and I caught him in the side of the head with it. That’s when the lifeguards came down from their tower and started running towards me. I had had quite enough of this so I ran up to the closest beach house. Inside I found this squirrelly little bald guy making it with some young thing but I ignored them. I ran all over the house trying to find something to defend myself with because I knew that suddenly a lot of people were after me and they sure as hell didn’t want to play volleyball. I found a .44 in the drawer of the nightstand in a back bedroom and went back to the living room where Baldy and this sweet thing (and she was sweet, let me tell you! What she was doing with this guy was beyond me) were. Of course, by the time I got to that room, they weren’t the only people there. The house was crowded with people in bathing suits and the place reeked of suntan lotion. When these people saw me, they started towards me with anything they could get their hands on; lamps, books, curtain rods, anything that could do damage. Needless to say I panicked and started shooting. They fell like flies. I mean, it was weird. Once the first few dropped the rest stopped rushing me but I kept on shooting. Eventually, everyone was on the floor, covered in blood, except me. I threw the gun at Baldy but obviously he didn’t catch it, or anything else again (or so I thought at the time) and I flew out of that house of horror like nobody’s business. The crowd that had gathered (likely because of the sounds of my shooting) let me pass like a hot knife passes through butter but I didn’t get far. Someone had called the cops and they came rushing up the beach on their quads, dragging me to the ground and beating the hell out of me. See this scar here next to my eye? That’s from that. I could hear them calling in for backup but I wasn’t going anywhere. They had me on my stomach on the ground with my hands cuffed behind me and some fat-assed cop was sitting on me.”
“The trial didn’t take very long. Apparently Baldy and his squeeze survived the shootings and they, as prime witnesses for the prosecution, were the ones who sent me here. The jury only took an hour to decide on the chair and I’ve been in this hole ever since. My lawyer said the public was against me but that he wasn’t. Of course, if he was worth that huge salary the state paid him to take my case; I’d be out on parole or something. Instead, I’m facing the chair in a few hours and I know I deserve it because I could have stopped shooting those people, I just didn’t.”
“Well, there you have it. I know it’s not much of a story for someone like me but you asked. Like I said, my lawyer is trying to get a stay but I’m not holding out much hope of that happening. By the way, I know you plan on running this after I’m gone, but could you make a copy for me anyway and drop it off at my gravesite? I know I’ll be dead but who is to say what the other side is like? Maybe I’ll be able to read it. If I can, I want you to make me look good, even if what I did was bad. Give me a little respect, at least, OK? I was a guy that was just minding his own business until some white kids tried to push me around. I don’t know; just say something like, ‘Colgate Just Wanted Respect’ or something like that. Hey, here’s my barber. Wanna stick around to watch? No? Well, OK, just remember to put the headline on my grave, all right?”
“Colgate,” laughed the guard as he unlocked the door for the barber. “Maybe there will be other imaginary reporters down in Hell with you and you can tell your story to them.”
“Knock it off, Rafferty,” said the barber to the burly guard. Rafferty, started by his co-worker, mumbled something about not giving a shit under his breath and left the barber to do his job in silence.
“Just a little off the top, OK?” laughed Wendell as the barber wrapped the oversized bib around his neck. The barber, obviously having heard that joke at least a thousand times in his fourteen years at the prison, simply clicked the electric razor on and proceeded to shave Wendell’s head and beard. Wendell listened in silence as the buzzing sounds echoed through out the concrete walls, and as his hair scattered throughout the cell, his heart dropped another inch in his chest as each strand hit the floor. Cooper’s singing had even died off which made Wendell feel a little better, even if his nerves didn’t agree.
After the shave and cut, Wendell ran his hand over his bald head and face. “No after shave?” he joked, trying to make light of a dire situation.
“Where you’re going, there’s no one to impress,” answered the barber blandly. He packed up his razor and bib into a small leather bag and yelled for the guard to let him out. Rafferty, teasing the other inmates several cells down, ran as fast as his three-hundred pound frame would take him and he quickly unlocked the door to Wendell’s cell and let the barber out.
“At five, someone will come for your dinner request, OK Colgate?” said Rafferty as he relocked the cell door.
“What time is it now?” Wendell asked, no longer wearing a watch.
“Three.”
“OK.”
The next two hours passed slowly for Wendell. He tried desperately to make up his mind on his final meal but found he couldn’t concentrate. His mind kept wandering back to his life before the shooting. He, his wife Betty, and his boy, Wendell Junior, had lived a happy life together. They weren’t rich or anything but they were happy, even though Betty had been supporting the family for a year at her job at the hospital as custodian. Wendell had been unable to find work for himself due to his lack of education (he quit school in fifth grade to help his mother raise his six brothers and sisters). Wendell instead spent his days shooting hoops with the guys or taking long walks along the beach, if for no other reason than to watch the white people burn themselves in the sun. But then came the shooting. After finding out what her Wendell did, Betty took nine-year old Wendell Junior and headed back home to New Orleans. Wendell hadn’t heard from either of them since.
“It’s five, Colgate, what’ll it be?” Wendell looked up and saw Rafferty outside the bars, notepad in hand.
Wendell thought for it a moment, then answered, “Lasagna from Tortelini’s. They have the best lasagna in the world.”
“You got it,” responded Rafferty, his large fingers scratching the request in the notebook.
“Anything else?”
“No,” replied Wendell, his head starting to sag. As Rafferty turned and started to walk away, Wendell got up and hurried to the bars, gripping them as though his life depended on it.
“Rafferty?”
“Yeah?” the big guard answered.
“There really wasn’t anyone in here with me, was there?”
Rafferty stared at Wendell with a ‘you really ARE nuts, aren’t you?’ look. “No,” he said dryly. There wasn’t. Wendell returned to his bunk, buried his face in his hands and cried.
After finishing the lasagna, the guard cleared away the plate and utensils and almost ran head first into Reverend White, the prison clergyman. The reverend was an old man of seventy-seven but Wendell respected what the man had to say. His mere appearance made the fact that the time was near really hit home. Despite that, Wendell made his peace and ultimately cried again, his whole body shaking against that of Reverend White.
“It’s time, Colgate,” said the gruff voice of Warden Kent Hill. Wendell dried his eyes and gallantly stood up. He barely felt the shackles as they locked in place around his hands and feet. Gently, the warden led Wendell by the elbow from his cell, Rafferty and Reverend White making up the last of the doomed procession.
As they passed the other cells on Death Row, Wendell felt uplifted by the ‘Good Luck’s’ and the ‘Nice knowing you’s’ yelled out by the other prisoners. Even Cooper wished him well.
When they reached the first of two doors, the unlocking of it by Rafferty stung Wendell’s heart more than his cell ever did. The second door and the imposing view of the electric chair made it even worse. Wendell was guided to the chair and he went cooperatively, half expecting the red phone inside the chamber to ring, but knowing full well it wouldn’t. As the shackles were removed and leather straps replaced them on his arms, legs and chest, Wendell closed his eyes, disregarding the witnesses that sat on the other side of the glass, and hoped his mind would wander. Instead, his mind stayed blank, like a clean, new sheet of notebook paper. Rafferty sponged Wendell’s bare head and attached the skull cap, his eyes now staring into black as the attached patches covered them. When Wendell was fully strapped in, he barely heard the Warden read the verdict. Instead, his heart pounded loudly in anticipation of the phone call that never came. His mind floated from blankness to a beautiful angel with long hair and supple wings wrapping around him as his body jerked in response to the high voltage that suddenly ran through him.
After the funeral, Wendell Colgate’s casket lay above the hole recently designated for it. As the worker’s lowered it into the ground, the Times front page floated mysteriously on top of it.
“Leave it,” said John Black to his co-worker. “He may need something to read.” Both men laughed as they attended to their work. As Black and his partner finished lowering the casket all the way down, the headline lay above Wendell’s head stating in bold lettering, ‘Colgate Says: I JUST WANT RESPECT.’
About the writer:
Jim Idema has been a freelance writer for over ten years and has published both fiction and nonfiction for various publications. In his spare time, Jim coaches his son, plays dolls with his daughter, and somehow manages time to work on four different books, all in various stages of completion. His favorite place on earth is Hawaii and someday hopes to be writing his next novel from the comfort of his palm tree-shaded hammock on Maui. He has two websites, http://identcc.blogspot.com/ as his personal writing site, and http://www.hot-psychology.com/ where he is the Editor-in-Chief.
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