Matteo Went Ahead - 1. Story Matteo Went Ahead

Matteo Went Ahead

Anthology 2024

Summer clung to its reign this year.

It was the second week of October, and the thermometer showed temperatures of about twenty degrees Celsius. Most of the trees were still green, with the occasional yellow dot.

Daniel and I stood in the wide-open sliding door. The newly renovated porch now had a ramp. Tall maples and harvested berry bushes hid the rusty metal fence to the neighbor’s plot. The sky was turning from blue to pink, and a chilly breeze infused the day’s warmth.

I shivered. “Don’t you think he’s getting cold?”

“Nah, he’s bundled up quite well in his scarf and the thick sweater. Besides, Dad loves the rays and the wind on his skin. It reminds him of living by the lake, and the neurologist said fresh air and sunlight are good for him. Morning, noon, and sunset; the changing light structures his days.”

I squinted my eyes against the setting sun. “He kinda looks like one of those Chinese paper-cut figures from the book Uncle Sean showed us when we were kids.”

My brother snorted. “I don’t think they ever cut out men in wheelchairs for those books.”

“Do you think we did the right thing? Bringing him here?”

Daniel crossed his arms in front of his chest. “Yes.”

I watched a robin inspecting the bird feeder. “I mean - is he happy?”

“I don’t know.”

“I constantly think, if I were in his place I’d rather be dead.”

Daniel balled his hands into fists. “What I do know is that every time he came home from the hospital, he became better, mentally and physically. If we’d listened to them and put him in hospice care, he would probably be dead by now.”

“Which means he is happy.”

“Maybe not happy, but content.”

“If we’d put him in a home-”

“You might as well push him from a bridge.”

“Jeez.” Sometimes, Dan could be horribly blunt. “Anyway, I’ll fetch him a blanket from his room. To me, he looks as if he’s cold.”

Back in the house, I found moving boxes still lined up against the living room wall, and the smell of fresh paint lingered. When I opened the door to Dad’s room, Bruno jumped from the bed and ran to the porch, wagging his tail. He was in such a rush to get to Dad, he didn’t even stop at his food bowl.

I grabbed a light, fluffy blanket and hurried back after the dog.

Bruno tried to push his ball into Dad’s hand repeatedly. Daniel finally wrestled the ball from his mouth and threw it to the far end of the garden.

When I carefully draped the blanket over Dad’s legs, he looked up. His eyes were clear, and an indulgent smile spread over his face.

“Thank you, love. It’s indeed a bit chilly tonight.”

Then it hit me. I swallowed. His smile wasn’t for me.

“The lake looks gorgeous today, don’t you think?” His gaze went right through me.

I nodded, even though only Daniel’s garden was behind me, where Virginia Creeper covered the old tool shed. Its colorful leaves rustled in the sudden breeze. The trees still bore a few last fruit. The garden smelled of fallen leaves, damp soil, and rotting apples—the scent of fall.

I quickly bent down and kissed his cool cheek. “I have to go home, Dad. I’ll be back on Thursday, and then we’ll have the entire weekend.”

When I passed my brother, he squeezed my shoulder. “He doesn’t know better.”

“Yeah.”

The next morning, I sipped my tea and watched the wind tug at a huge red wine leaf. It eventually would lose the fight, but for then, it persevered, like Dad. Daniel was right. When he wanted to go on, he’d leave, but for then he wanted to stay. With us.

In the evening, the red fighter was gone.

I was strangely aware of the change of the seasons this year. The single yellow dots became large clusters.

The first November storm stripped most trees bare.

Daniel had to go on a business trip. Even though I was a little scared having to care for Dad alone, I knew I could do this. Dan and I were in this together. And he’d given me a very detailed list.

Dad was so small and fragile. Where was the man who easily carried my sixteen-year-old brother to the EMT at the other end of the beach when he stepped barefoot onto a glass shard? Where was the laughing big man who showed us how to swim - the man who moved back to his homeland after his messy divorce to start anew?

Matteo owned a restaurant, and Dad loved their sugo di Mare. One evening, he asked the waiter a ton of questions the man couldn’t answer. In the end, he called Matteo, who wrote down the recipe and his phone number in case Dad had questions.

It turned out he had a lot of questions.

After a few months, Dad told us he and Matteo had decided to move to Italy together. We were shocked, to say the least, not because he wanted to move in with a man, but because we thought it might be too hasty. He was about to uproot his entire life for a man he only knew briefly. Then Dad reminded us that, at their age, they had to grab any chance for love.

For the last few years, he was the happiest I’d ever seen him.

Dad was already in his pajamas. He stared unseeingly at the TV. Sometimes a smile flitted across his face. Then he began to hum a song I didn’t recognize. I was in the kitchen sorting his pills for the night, watching him through the open door.

“Matteo!”

“Fuck!” I ran.

He held the picture frame which usually sat on the side table. The photo showed him and Matteo kissing, a breathtaking vista of Lake Maggiore in the background. Dad’s eyes glistened brightly with tears. “When?”

I closed my eyes. Dad remembered Matteo’s passing. I sat down beside him, my hand on his thigh. “In January.”

He nodded a few times, surprisingly alert. “Matteo went ahead. Typical. That man.” He chuckled.

After that, everything happened fast. The doctors said he caught pneumonia. We think he decided it was time to let go and fly away with the fall winds.

He saw us when he took Dan’s and my hand. His gaze became unfocused again when he smiled. ‘There you are...’