Faceless

The visitors came in heats. In swarms of nameless faces. The herds blundered after one another, each seemingly more prolific than the last. They pressed into the room in shadowy thickets, compressing the place like a hot air balloon, the endless train of smiles and sympathies trundled on until, finally, under the night’s safe haven, it stopped. The visiting room gave a sigh of relief as the house settled into a deep, exhausted sleep. It was these long periods of silence that I enjoyed most, although by enjoy I mean… well… As much as i could anyway.

The timeless silence did not last. And as night rolled out and the new day dawned, the herds of faces came again. I wanted them to stop. But even the thought of telling them made my muscles weak and my head heavy. I was simply too tired to say no.

First came the McCreerys. Who were only there for what I call the three ‘P’s. Pleasantries, prestige and press. I wondered what the headline would be. Maybe: The McCreerys send sympathies to grieving family. Or perhaps: Bran McCreery proves he is truly a man of the people. I thought back to their visit, barely hours after we’d heard the news. The expensive roar of a slick back car, shining as if fresh out of the factory, pulling through the muddy streets in a crawling speed. I looked at it idly as it came, wondering what a car like that was doing on this side of town. As it neared, I understood why its wheels slid at a snails pace, and simultaneously why the vehicle was here. As from the side of the car a hand stuck out, moving back and forth methodically. It moved with both an air of slight enthusiasm and of a certain calculated poise. I recognised it at once. It was the kind of wave that had been practiced in the mirror, the one I had seen so many times on our tiny television set in the dining room.

There was no mistaking it, the mayor had come to visit.

Of course! It was almost laughably predictable. “The mayor that fights for the people”, they called him, “The one that hears our voice!” Thinking about it now, I wondered why I’d never really considered how the myriad of images and stories of his honorifics came about. How he always seemed to be at the right place at the right time; rescuing kittens, compensating fires, frolicking about the children. A man of the people my ass, I thought as I watched as the wrinkled grey hand greet the unsuspecting pedestrians. Even through the car’s tinted windows I could feel those shining white teeth glinting at me mockingly as he smiled. For it was just another day for him, visiting another broken family whose name he’d probably never even heard of before this day. All things considered, it was truly amazing, how little he actually cared.

I looked over at little Jay, his chest rising and falling to the beat of the ticking clock and wondered how mum was doing, shut away in her room. I hoped for her own sake, that she was, too, asleep.

Leaving the comfort of my little brother, I quietly closed his door behind me.

Breathe. I thought, as I prepared for the first visitor.

The McCreerys were the only visitor that day. As I had expected, they only stopped by for a brief moment. The paparazzi, of course, pressed against my porch unapologetically. How convenient, I thought bitterly. They shouted and gestured instructions, which the mayor pretended to ignore. He couldn’t fool me, though. I saw the sway of his body as they told him to face the camera. The way his expression switched with every word he spoke. Sincere, worried, encouraging, sympathetic. I wish now that I had slapped that bastard right then and there. Wouldn’t that make a headline!

After the initial greetings were said, and McCreery’s little photoshoot squad was satisfied, the rest of the family climbed out of the vehicle. The wife picked herself gingerly across the muddy path, and the children walked studiously behind her. Poor kids, I thought, as the little one, Mason, I think, handed me a plate of cookies.

“I’m sorry for your loss, ma’am.” He said as his mother shot him a look as cold and as sharp as steel.

“Thank you.” I replied.

Sure enough, there I was, at the front of the paper the next morning, the mayor at my side. God, I looked awful. The Headline read in giant quotation marks: “WE, THE MCCREERY FAMILY, STAND WITH YOU!”. Well, my guesses were close enough.

I started to read.

Mayor McCreery sends his regrets to all those who have lost their family or loved ones over the past three months to unfortunate mining accidents, and assures that the investigation into these tragedies remain ongoing. However, he encourages the RMK’s continued progress on the opening of Rookbay mines and insists on the worker’s continued efforts…

I shut the paper, hard, the force stirring tiny particles in the air, making them dance angrily in the sunlight. A hotness rose to my cheeks as my body shook. My father was gone. Gone! And still, they sent more men to the line. How many more would have to be sacrificed? All for the mayor’s what- Pride? “We are mere steps away! One more mine and that could be it!” he had shouted as the people roared with approval. I remembered when I was people. How many more does it take? How many more rotting corpses, fractured bodies, widowed wives. How many more broken children?

Jay would not eat, even after I made him his favourite meal of pancakes and golden syrup.

“How ‘bout we add a scoop of ice cream, huh?” I poked his stomach, the way I always did.

He stared blankly back. A dead look. I was only grateful for the colours of the rubik’s cube moving back and forth between his fingers. It was the only way I could tell he was still alive. Still... In there.

Mum was worse, in a way. Her door may have remained shut, but her sobs betrayed her presence. I tried to drown it out. I talked to Jay just that little bit louder, hid under my blankets, pillow over my ears. Blasted music into my eardrums as I watched the world fade away. But those sobs... they traveled like a disease, spreading through every wall, window, crack in the floor. There was no escape.

I lay silently as tears rolled down my face.

The visitors all blurred together. Some I recognised. Charlie, his sister, John, the park ranger, the neighbours. Most I didn’t recognise. Strangers from the other side, their Louboutin matching their Louis Vuitton. They carryed with them a strange concoctions of smells. Vanilla, basil, tangerine. And came in a variety of garmets, a favourite of which seemed to be a black, feathered hat.

“Just some charity work,” I could imagine them saying to each other, bragging about the myriad of gifts and kindness they showed to the "Poor broke kids".

Little did they know that their assortment of lilies and brownies lay confined in the depth of the rubbish bin.

With each stranger I welcomed, fewer words seemed to be said. Sometimes I simply said nothing. Staring at the far, kitchen wall while bouts of white noise bounced inaudibly off my eardrums. Later I stopped bothering to take my earphones out. Drowning in the world of classics. Mozart, Vivaldi, Debussy. Unconventional, I know. I stopped locking my door, answering knocks with simply “Yes” or “Come in”. I stopped leaving the couch or standing in greeting. I stopped looking at them altogether.