“Double the Man, Double the Fall” by Cam Reirden ’21

handed it to me. I looked at the brownish orange drink with two ice cubes in my hand. The pungent scent pierced my nose, the memories of January 5th crashing back on me like a wave at a beach. People say that you can physically feel your heart break. I can vouch for that. Usually the first couple seconds are disbelief. “There's no way, no chance this happened.” Then the realization, “I’ll never see them again, I’ll never get to see her smile, hear her laugh.” Then the grief. The overwhelming, the gut-wrenching, the indescribable feeling of loss. What happened next I can’t even describe. I honestly don’t remember it. Just black. Just darkness. My dad in the months after spiraled out of control. He drank everything in sight. There hasn’t been one night since January 5th he hasn’t drank. It’s July 23rd today. The liquor cabinet, which at one time would have lasted him years, was empty within a couple weeks. But I understood how he felt. The whisky on the top shelf above the refrigerator whispered its ugly name in my ear before, prodding me to give in, but I refused; I don’t want to give up like my father. My mom wouldn’t have wanted that. I snapped out of it to see Luca waving his hand in front of my face. “You good, dude?” he asked me with a questioning look on his face. “You were just staring at your drink for probably the last two minutes.” “Yeah I’m ight,” I responded, still staring at the whisky in my hand. “I don’t want this though.” “You sure, bro? What’s wrong?” “Listen man, I just don’t want it. My mom would be pissed.” “Well your mom isn’t here, is she?” He smiled. “You’re right.” I fell silent. Being a quiet kid, I didn’t usually talk about my feelings that much, but all of a sudden I found myself gushing everything out. I told him about the months leading up to January 5th, seeing my beautiful mother wilt and succumb to the cancer like a sunflower without water. I told him about the moment she died. The moment I felt my heart snap in two. My dad and his downfall. For the first time, I let someone into my heart, I let someone understand how I was feeling. We put a couple dollars down on the table and walked outside. The sky was dark now, the remnants of the pink and purple fade stripe sunset long gone by now.

“You wanna keep talking about it?” he asked me. “Thanks.” We ended up walking through downtown Nashville for nearly two and a half hours that night. He became my best friend on the team, and later my best man at my wedding. We coach our six year old sons together today. He helped me move on. He helped me understand that I can honor my mom through my actions in my life. He brought me out of a dark place and showed me the light; all he had to do was listen. And for that, I am forever indebted to him.

Unknown Number: Hello, John

John: Who is this, How did you get my number

Unknown Number: You know who I am, John.

John: I would really like to know who this is

Unknown: Jonathan, We met at the club two nights ago on 5th street. I would explain our actions, but your memory should start coming back soon.

John: My memory?

Unknown: Yes, I briefly removed the memory of the last few nights. I hope you don't mind. It was.. Necessary

John: What happened? If this is a prank, it's not funny John again: I want to know what's going on. I will call the police.

Pause a minute

Unknown: If I would have known you were going to be so hostile, I would I have picked a different target Unknown: But oh well, I'll follow my plan

John: Suit yourself

Double the Man, Double the Fall

by Cam Reirden

John calls the police.

Unknown: Ah yes, The infamous phone call, They won't help you.

John: They are running your number as we speak. It's over.

Unknown: John

John: What?

Julian: Call me, Julian.

John: Why

John receives a text.

2nd Unknown number: Hello John! This is Julian, your police operator; please call this number. 9191991919. We will discuss the details moving forward.

At that moment, John finally realized what he was dealing with. This was not a prank call from one of his friends, or even some of his students. This number or man, for that matter, could have all of my information or even my family. Where did we meet? What had I told him, does he know my secrets? So many things were flowing through my brain, I truthfully don't know what to do.

John: What do you want, I'll give anything, I'll pay

My mind now raced. How much would I pay him, truthfully I would pay him anything. This is precisely what my parents always warned me about—the prep school life, The Ivy League college. There were many ways for me to get involved with the wrong people or the crazy crowds. In my opinion, I did a great job of avoiding these types of relationships and activities all through the early years of my life.

John: Please, I'm begging you.

Bryan: Call me, Bryan.

Bryan then sent a slew of emojis. There seemed to be a sort of connection between them, but I certainly could not decipher the meaning of all of them. The only thing I possibly thought I could do was put the emoji message into google and see if something perhaps popped up.

What I then saw sent a shiver down my spine.

The message immediately directed me to a picture—a picture of my parent's old cape house that we had sold many years ago. But the closer I looked. The more I realized and recognized the picture. Beer cans in the yard, whiskey bottles floated in the pool. This was the scene of my father's suicide. My father fought with depression and addiction for many years, and it increasingly became apparent when I was a sophomore and junior in college. It all came to a breaking point one day in July of '05. My father had returned from a work trip to New York City when he found himself all alone at the Cape house for the weekend. My mother had been at the airport waiting for me to return from my summer abroad in Italy. This left my father with an unattended liquor cabinet.

Minutes after we got on the Mass pike, We received the call. It was the authorities in the area. My father was dead, suicide from a gunshot wound. Our car instantly came to a stop in the middle of the left lane. My mom was in shock. She could barely mutter out the words of what she had just heard, but once I had the idea, we both sat there and sobbed. From the moment forward, nothing truly has been the same. Losing my father, the role model in my life, crushed me beyond anything I could imagine.

Looking at the picture in front of me brought back all the memories, the picture was the first image I saw when I got to the scene.

John: Why?... Why would you send me that

The image began to pixelate and shift into letters quickly. The message read:

Meet me here, at midnight sharp. July 21st.

That was the day my father died. This man or woman or agency, whatever it was, knew every single thing about me. I had never been more scared in my life. What about my mother? Where is she? Could they have gotten to her?

I quickly opened my phone; I went to text "Bryan" or whatever the hell their name is. Then the messages and number started to pixelate like the message on the picture. It all disappeared.

My mind now raced in all different directions. I was fighting the battle with whoever Bryan was, but now I was fighting my self-consciousness on what to do.

A few days passed, and I finally came to my decision. My world seemed to be falling apart, and the only way I felt things could get back to normal was to meet Bryan at my father's death site. I called my mother the morning before I left to check on her. She quickly picked up, relieving my stress, and I told her I loved her then hung up.

I felt an intense sadness then come over me. I stared out the window of my small, one-bedroom apartment and felt warm; wet tears start to form on my eyelashes. As my eyes watered more and more while I thought about my current situation. I could never understand why all the bad in the bad things in the world always seemed to fall upon me.

"Your drive will take you three hours and forty-seven minutes."

The time alone made my decision to drive to my old house very difficult. It seemed to take an eternity to get down to the now old run-down house. The once neatly trimmed shrubs that lined the front fence now were overgrown between the fences and vines grew between the cracks in the sidewalk. The windows which provided beautiful natural light and shadows were now boarded up and sported many new colors of fresh graffiti. This house that used to be the safe haven in my life had now turned into more of a nightmare than what I had initially expected. I had arrived about three hours early to inspect the scene and see what type of condition the house was in. As soon as I saw the state of the property, I left immediately. I didn't know what to do, so I found a parking lot. I opened the bottle and started drinking.

Do you remember me, Jonathan?

I stared at the man around my age, something about him looked familiar to me, but I couldn't quite piece it all together. I surveyed his face; I knew I knew this man but from where?

A scar lined his right eye; he almost resembled Anakin Skywalker with the scar.

Then I got it.

The theme of chills going down my spine continued as this may have been the scariest moment of my life. Timothy Joseph. The man or kid shall I say, that has followed me since the 9th grade at Trinity-Pawling. Timmy and I had been best friends all through high school, and when college decision time came around, I suddenly had four more years with my' best friend'. At first, I didn't know how to feel about this, I loved that I

would be with my best friend for many more years, but I also was genuinely looking forward to all of my new freedoms of being in New York City. Columbia was my future, but Columbia was now just Timmy.

At first, the college went great; It was much easier to room with someone I had known for many years rather than someone who I had just met. It became much easier to make other friends, and I always had someone to help with my homework while Timmy was around. I had no complaints for the first three years in all honesty. That all changed; however, when the responsibilities of the senior year came along. I had thought all the competition regarding school had come to a close after taking my standardized tests and class ranks in high school was over, but once again, I was wrong. Columbia pushed all of us to get better and better grades the first semester to set us up with an internship starting the second semester. The class quickly turned into a game, and this was no more apparent than between Timmy and me. Our friendship was now a rivalry, and the only talk we had between the two of us was jawing about what internship we both were going to get.

Fast forward two months. I had been working at Goldman as an intern and was doing such a good job I was nominated to be promoted to a real floor trader the day after I graduated. This position had been dwindled down to two students. I was one, and Timmy was the other. I knew this job meant everything to Timmy, more than it meant to me, but I needed the job. Me having this type of job would ease the burden off of my mother.

Timmy, like my father, had fallen into the drugs and alcohol trail. There was nothing scarier than seeing Timmy after a trip, or when he was drunk, he became very violent and cynical. These actions became more and more common as the decision on who was to be hired closed in. I began to fear for my safety, but I refused to tell anyone as I believed there was still good in Timmy.

Tic. Tic. Tic

All I could hear was the clock.

John, are you happy?

John, this is amazing. I'm so happy you'll be working here!

My mind raced, I saw Timmy angle straight for the bathroom after the decision was made public. From that time forward until I returned to my dorm room that night, it was a blur.

The next morning, Timmy was all over the school, and NEWYORK news.

What I saw, I didn't believe it.

It said, he disappeared into the night.

This couldn't be true. I didn't believe it. So I called, straight to voicemail. I called again, Straight to voicemail.

I didn't know what to do. I checked our room for any sort of message or signal.

Nothing.