The Destruction of
Angels
by
Leah Mueller
Barreling down the
highway towards my brother’s memorial, I glanced at the dashboard thermometer.
It remained stuck at 99 degrees, with two hours to go until sunset. June is the
hottest month in southern Arizona. The sun threatens to immolate everything in
sight. Even air conditioning becomes useless. No way to cool off except drive.
I’d only visited
Josh’s memorial a few times. Twenty years had passed since he rolled his car,
half a mile from the Douglas prison. Josh usually ran late for his guard job.
He didn’t relish the task of babysitting convicted felons. But jobs were scarce
in southern Arizona, and the hefty paycheck kept him coming back for more.
Though my brother
had used part of a recent inheritance to buy a BMW, he didn’t bother to
purchase new tires. One of the retreads blew out, and his vehicle flipped into
a field. The impact killed him instantly.
Perhaps Josh had a
death wish. Not surprising, considering our mother, Polly. I had a death wish,
too, at his age, but I lasted long enough to outgrow it.
Josh lived with
Polly until she died from throat cancer. His choice stemmed not from
compassion, but from necessity. A classic mama’s boy, Josh’s relationship with
Polly was one of mutual contempt, interwoven with toxic dependency. I often
wondered whether they’d been an unhappily married couple during a series of
previous lives.
When Josh died, I
lived two thousand miles away, in Washington state. The prickly desert heat
didn’t agree with me. A year later, my sister and her husband commissioned a
local
artist to build a steel angel sculpture at
his crash site. Not the corny, cherubic variety, which all of us hated. A
slender, adolescent man with wings on his back, preparing to ascend into the
Arizona sky.
The artist poured
cement three feet into the flinty ground and set the pedestal inside. He
affixed a heavy placard with Josh’s birth and death dates to the angel’s feet,
plus the words “We love you” in cut-out letters. Ericka was tight with Josh,
and she didn’t cut corners. She wanted the structure to last longer than her
brother had.
*************
I didn’t see the
memorial until 2020, eighteen years later. My husband and I fled Washington a
few months after his cancer diagnosis and bought a dirt-cheap house in Bisbee.
Washington spit us out like a grapefruit seed once we could no longer afford
its craft cocktails.
Though I cooked
elaborate meals and drove Russ to Tucson for multiple chemo treatments, he
couldn’t outrun the cancer. We finally opted to discontinue treatment. During
his final month, Russ reclined in our living room, tethered by gravity to a
rollaway hospital bed. His frail body grew increasingly emaciated, his muscle
tone evaporated, and he lost his ability to speak, eat, or control his bowels.
My husband died in
the wee hours of a chilly May morning, twenty months after his diagnosis. I
slipped away to catch a few hours of sleep and finally returned to his bedside.
Russ lay on his back, mouth akimbo, hands folded across his chest. His expression
looked bewildered yet fascinated, like he had expired while studying a bug on
the ceiling.
I turned off the
breathing machine and called the on-duty hospice nurse. Then I watched
the two funeral home employees strap my
husband’s body to a stretcher, cover him with a red cloth (why red, I wondered)
and load the entire apparatus into the back of an SUV. I marveled at their
efficiency as they slammed the rear doors, climbed back into their vehicle, and
drove away.
Shock is a
beautiful thing. It helped me arrange for cremation and take an impromptu,
four-day road trip to northern Arizona. After returning home, I dragged most of
Russ’ clothing to the homeless shelter. He’d embraced minimalism with a fervor
and didn’t own much of anything.
The sight of his
13th Floor Elevators and Nirvana tee-shirts filled me with rage and
self-loathing. My husband, a gifted guitarist, rarely had time to practice his
own art. He was too busy supporting his family with jobs he hated. Supporting
ME, so I could sit on my ass and write poetry.
Russ couldn’t play
guitar during his final months, after neuropathy crippled his fingers. He tried
to strum instead of pick but gave up in disgust. My husband never made peace
with his imminent demise. Despite his devotion to rockstar heroes, Russ didn’t
espouse a live-fast-die-young lifestyle. He once said that a hundred-year
lifespan was insufficient, so he wanted the cosmos to grant him an extra
century.
*************
A small drawstring
bag of Russ’ ashes jiggled in the passenger seat. The remainder rested in a
sturdy wooden box at home. The mortuary director had asked if I wanted to keep
a portion separate from the main batch, and I’d said yes. It seemed like a nice
gesture. Everyone at the funeral home was polite, but lackluster, in the stiff
manner of death industry employees.
I hadn’t touched
any of the ashes yet. After placing Russ’ box atop our living room bookcase, I
collapsed onto the couch and sobbed. Even the little bag exuded a powerful,
repellent energy.
Decades
beforehand, my mother had lamented the scattering of her husband’s remains.
Humans aren’t supposed to touch each other’s bones, she’d said. We were never
meant to get so close.
Polly was wrong,
as usual. We are supposed to touch each other’s bones. One person relinquishes
their body, another remains to do clean-up. It wasn’t the first time I’d faced
the latter task. Early in our relationship, Russ helped me scatter some of Josh’s
ashes. I wanted to complete the circle by sprinkling a portion of my husband’s
remains at the sculpture’s base.
I passed a small
roadside bar. Dusty, nondescript, so diminutive that it lacked signage. Still,
a landmark of sorts. My usual signal to start looking for the memorial. Double
Adobe Road was tedious and flat. A motorist could easily pass the structure without
noticing it.
Seconds later, the
memorial popped up on the right-hand side of the highway. I pulled over and
turned on my emergency flashers. With exaggerated care, I plucked Russ’ bag
from the passenger seat. Then I emerged from the car and trudged through the
prickly weeds.
Something was
wrong, however. The statue leaned leftward at a jagged angle. Usually, it
pointed towards the sky. Had someone tampered with Josh’s memorial? Anything
was possible in rural Arizona. The locals had a lot of time on their hands.
A closer look
confirmed my suspicions. The statue’s base had detached from the ground. Its
exposed concrete foundation revealed numerous cracks. How could a person crack
cement? Obviously, the perpetrator hadn’t used his body to wreck the monument.
Someone must have hit it with a vehicle.
A moment later, I
noticed a set of tire tracks. They began at the highway’s edge and created a
jagged trail that ended at the base of the memorial. A hapless motorist had
rammed into the statue with great force, enough to uproot and destroy cement
that had remained underground for nearly twenty years.
The driver must
have sustained serious injuries, at the very least. Maybe worse. Most likely,
the poor asshole was blind drunk and driving well above the speed limit.
The whole setup
seemed inexplicable. No engine parts on the ground, no spilled oil, no remnants
of destruction. Had someone hit the memorial on purpose? A large truck could
have uprooted the statue and emerged relatively unscathed. Still, pickups cost
a lot of money. Even a little bit of damage would be expensive to repair. It
wouldn’t be worth the trouble.
On the other hand,
Josh oversaw a lot of prisoners. Perhaps one of them had emerged from the
slammer after twenty-plus years and decided to destroy the monument. Word of
Josh’s death must have traveled through the prison. Many of the guards had
attended his funeral.
I studied the bag
of Russ’ ashes. No way in hell could I scatter them now. Josh’s memorial had
always been a tranquil spot, a somber place of remembrance. In the distance,
the prison complex hovered like a huge, malevolent gargoyle. Ever vigilant,
ready to snatch up lawbreakers at a second’s notice.
The prison must
have been sleeping on its job. I traced the angel’s body with my forefinger and
gazed at the wreckage. Would anyone be able to fix Josh’s monument? Such a task
would require a dedicated team of strong individuals.
The merciless
desert sun beat down on my head and shoulders. Its harsh light made me dizzy. I
backed away from the memorial, returned to my car, and placed Russ’ ashes on
the passenger seat.
After I fired up
the engine, I noticed that the dashboard thermometer read 98 degrees. The
digital clock said it was 6:30. The sun would set in less than an hour. No
wonder people got drunk and slammed into things.
I did a U-turn and
headed towards home. A minute later, I spotted the tavern and had an
inspiration. Perhaps one of the locals would know what had happened to the
memorial. It wouldn’t hurt to ask. At least, not very much.
I pulled into the
enormous gravel parking lot. Obviously, the proprietors had big aspirations.
You never know when hundreds of people might want to drink beer in the shade of
a medium-security prison. Today, however, the lot was almost empty.
After I killed the
engine, I glanced down at the bag of Russ’ ashes. I didn’t want to leave them
in the seat. It felt like my husband was alive and I expected him to wait for
me inside an overheated vehicle while I grabbed a quick beer.
On the other hand,
I could hardly carry a sack of Russ’ remains into a roadside bar. I locked the
car and strolled towards the door. Four people sat at a picnic bench in front,
surrounded by half-full beer bottles and cigarette packages. They regarded me
with detached curiosity.
I opted for the
direct approach, my usual modus operandi. “Can I ask you folks a question? Are
you familiar with that memorial a half mile up the road? The metal angel?”
One of the men
spoke first. “Yeah. I don’t know who it belongs to, though.”
“It’s my
brother’s,” I replied. “He died twenty years ago on this day. I wanted to pay
my respects, but someone destroyed it.”
The group shifted
uncomfortably in their seats. “I’m sorry for your loss,” a woman said.
“Thanks. You don’t
even know half of it.” I tried my hardest to smile. “You think the bartender
might have some info?”
“Oh yeah,” the man
said, clearly relieved to be let off the hook. “Go right inside. Bartender
knows everything that goes on around here.”
Somebody had
propped the door open to allow for ventilation. The joint was too flimsy and
ancient for air conditioning. I wandered inside and took a seat at the bar. A
middle-aged man hovered on a stool at the far end. A couple sat in the middle,
gazing at the overhead television.
The bartender came
over. I’d expected a wizened local, someone familiar with the area’s darkest
secrets. Instead, the woman was around thirty, Hispanic, and cheerful. “What
can I get you?”
I checked out the
row of bottles above the bar. Cheap American brews. Corona was the best they
had to offer. Not surprising. I ordered one, and the bartender fished a bottle
from the refrigerator. She took my money and smiled. “What brings you to these
parts?”
“Well, I’m hoping
you can help me. You know that memorial half a mile up the road? The metal
angel? My brother flipped his car at that spot, twenty years ago. I just went
over there and noticed that someone totaled his statue with a vehicle. Uprooted
it from the ground and everything.”
The bartender
gasped. “Sure, I know the spot. But I haven’t heard anything about an accident.
That’s terrible.”
I nodded. “They
slammed right into it. Hit it so hard the foundation cracked. I’m sure the
impact damaged the car. Probably the driver, too. They must have been injured,
at least. Maybe even worse.”
The bartender
shook her head. “Weird that I haven’t heard anything. I’ve driven past that
memorial for years.”
“Weird that they
had an accident in the same spot as my brother, and nobody even knows about
it.” I took a gulp from my bottle. “Kind of like the Twilight Zone, huh?”
“I was just going
to say that.” The bartender turned her attention to a tiny window behind the
bar. A cluster of moths was beating against the pane, trying its hardest to
escape. They attacked the glass with military precision, retreated momentarily,
then resumed their onslaught.
“Goddamn moths.”
The bartender swung her rag in their direction. “They’re especially bad this
year. All over my house. Then I come here and they’re at the bar. I hope
monsoon season comes quick.”
The moths
possessed a will to live that humans could only admire. Their freakish survival
skills and penchant for self-immolation existed in perfect balance. The dry,
hot weather had created an infestation of these pests, with more on the way.
I sipped my beer
and allowed my brain to wander. Russ had only been gone for six weeks. After a
month of weeping, my emotions had retrograded to a default state of shock. The
paralysis had settled into my deepest tissues. It compressed my chest and shoulders
like the weighted blankets a friend sent when Russ first entered hospice. 2021
brought a bumper crop of blanket gifts. Folks love to give warm covers to sick
people.
The man at the end
of the bar turned towards me. “Did your brother work for the DOC?”
“DOC? What’s
that?”
“Department of
Corrections.” The guy leaned forward and placed his elbows on the bar. “Lots of
DOC employees die on the road to work. Or they retire, but they find themselves
back on this highway. Like the gal who got hit by a car last year on her bicycle,
a mile from here. She had just retired from the DOC. Guy that killed her worked
for the DOC, too. I wouldn’t be surprised if whoever hit your brother’s
memorial turned out to be a prison employee.”
I’d seen the
bicycle memorial, perched in the weeds beside the road. Russ and I had passed
it twice, on our trips to Josh’s statue. We never bothered to find out the
story behind the wreck. Too much drama in our own lives. Such a terrible way to
die, though, while having fun on a spring afternoon.
I studied the
man’s face. Could he be lying? Did he know more than he was telling? It was
impossible to gauge. The bar inhabitants were a tight-knit group, and perhaps
they had taken an unofficial vow of secrecy.
His expression
looked open, ingenuous. Obviously, prison employees were clumsy behind the
wheel, and their luck was bad. The destruction of Josh’s memorial would forever
remain a mystery, at least to me.
I took a final
swig of beer and set my bottle on the counter. “I’d better go. I want to get
home while it’s still light. Thanks for your help.”
I passed the
outdoor group and said goodbye. An unopened pack of discount cigarettes lay on
the far end of the picnic table. Why were these people still alive? They were
trying their hardest to kill themselves. My husband hadn’t even made it to
sixty. He’d come up short on the genetic roulette wheel and was predisposed to
colon cancer on both sides of his family.
No cosmic reason
for any of it. A nonstop series of random, freak accidents. Hapless folks get
mowed down by drunk drivers. Or they ride their bikes on a two-lane highway,
and a driver checks his texts or spills his coffee. Or they have blood in their
shit but no health insurance. All of us arrive at the same destination. Some
people get there faster than others.
Russ ashes waited
patiently in the passenger seat. I checked the rear and sideview mirrors and
pulled into traffic. Half an hour remained before sunset. I could make it home
by dark, prepare dinner, and fall asleep in my king-sized bed. In the morning,
I’d do my best to figure out how to live the rest of my life alone.
* * * * *
"The Destruction of Angels" was
previously published by the Spotlong Review.
Leah Mueller's work appears in Rattle,
NonBinary Review, Brilliant Flash Fiction, Citron Review, The Spectacle, New
Flash Fiction Review, Atticus Review, Your Impossible Voice, etc. She has
been nominated for Pushcart and Best of the Net. Leah appears in the 2022
edition of Best Small Fictions and was nominated for the 2024 edition. Her two
newest books are The Failure of Photography (Garden Party Press, 2023)
and Widow's Fire (Alien Buddha Press, 2023). Website: http://www.leahmueller.org.
