Digging a hole

“Hi Dad,” Max said, walking across the glistening wet lawn.

“Hi Max,” Joe replied.

“What are you doing?”

“Digging a hole.”

“Why?”

“Just seeing what’s under here.”

Max looked at the hole, it was already down to his Dad’s knees. “It’s pretty big. Have you found anything?”

Joe looked up and smiled. “I have actually. Take a look at this,” he said, putting the shovel down and retrieving the thing he found while digging.

It was a teddy bear. It used to be fluffy brown but now it was filthy, matted and covered in dirt. Joe found it when he started digging and rinsed it off under a tap so it was also sopping wet but it was familiar and Max instantly recognised it.

“Is that…”? Max asked, his eyes widening.

Joe nodded, “It’s Barnaby.”

Max reached out and grabbed the dirty teddy from Joe and hugged it.

“Eww he’s smelly,” he said, laughing and holding him away. There was a wet, muddy streak on his face where the teddy had touched his face and a wet patch on his top.

Joe laughed with him and tousled his dark hair, “Don’t worry, buddy.” he said. “I’ll wash him and get him as good as new.”

“Thanks Dad!” Max said with all the enthusiasm only an 8-year-old can muster for such things.

Joe went back to digging while Max sat on the wet grass holding Barnaby. A frown crossed his face and he asked, “Dad, why was Barnaby under the ground?”

Tossing one more shovelful of dirt out of the hole, Max leaned on the shovel and thought about it. “Time,” he said eventually.

“Time?” The frown remained and then he brightened up, “I can tell the time! I checked before. It’s 10:30 in the morning.”

A smile crossed Joe’s youngish face and he felt his eyes misting. He wiped them, wondering why he felt like crying and then laughed.

“That’s good, Max. But I didn’t mean what the time was. I meant that the reason Barnaby was underground was because of time.”

“I don’t get it.”

Max grabbed a drink and took a sip, “You stopped playing with Barnaby when you were five. It’s normal, you grew older, moved on from teddy bears and focused on other interests, namely soccer.

“So Barnaby became less important to you and became buried, first in your toy chest and then in the basement when we cleaned out your toys…” he paused and frowned. “Though I was sure we threw him out.”

Shaking his head, he dismissed the thought, “I must be mistaken.”

Max seemed happy with the explanation though it was clear he didn’t understand it. 

Joe grabbed the shovel and started digging again, a constant motion of dig, lift, toss and the hole got wider and bigger. 

“How far are you going to dig?”

“I reckon I’ll go until I get to the centre of the world.”

“Cool!” Max said with that same 8-year-old enthusiasm.

“Want to give me a hand?”

Max’ eyes lit up like Christmas and Joe couldn’t help but smile. “Can I really?”

“Of course, son. Grab a shovel and lets go.”

Max hurried off, running across the dewy grass as fast as his little legs could and returned moments later with his little garden shovel.

He jumped into the hole and started shovelling furiously, splattering Joe with dirt and he laughed.

“Slow down, son. There’s no hurry. Let’s enjoy the time we have together.”

They worked in a rhythm, digging, lifting and tossing the dirt outside the hole. The ground was soft, the dirt wet, which made it easier for them to dig and soon they’d doubled the hole’s depth.

“Hey, what’s this?” Max asked, pointing at something lodged in the dirt.

Joe stepped over and crouched down with Max doing the same. Like an archaeologist and his assistant examining a newly found fossil. 

With Max’ smaller shovel, Joe carefully dislodged the dirt around the fossil and dug around it, careful not to touch whatever it was.

“Maybe it’s a dinosaur bone!” Max said excitedly.

“Maybe,” Joe said with a smile. The kid loved dinosaurs. He picked up the newly discovered item and frowned. 

“Oh” Max said quietly once he saw what it was. It wasn’t a dinosaur bone but it was familiar. 

“Is this my Amazing Spider-Man #15?” Joe asked. “The one that went missing?”

Max said nothing and Joe wiped away dirt from the soggy, ripped comic book revealing Spider-man caught in a net with the villainous Kraven the Hunter, his first comic book appearance, approaching. It was worth a lot of money.

Was.

Until it went missing a few years ago.

Joe reeled on his son, who shrank back, looking guilty. “Do you know anything about this?”

Max was looking at the ground and shook his head.

“Max,” Joe said sternly. 

Silence.

Anger started to build within and Joe took a deep breath, trying to calm himself. He looked up. The day was cool and the air hung heavy and wet and dark, grey clouds moved, threatening rain.

“Listen to me, Max,” he said quietly, looking back at him. “I need you to tell me the truth.”

“I don’t like it when you talk like that,” Max replied, head still down.

“Max...” he warned.

Max looked up and there were tears in his bright blue eyes, “I’m sorry, Daddy.”

The anger swelled within his belly and Joe was on the verge of yelling, raging at his son for lying to him and destroying a valuable comic, the most valuable of his collection. 

“Do you know how much this comic was worth?” he growled. The anger continued to build, roiling within and he felt like a volcano about to erupt. “Pristine condition. $20,000 down the drain.” He sighed, “Why did you do it?””

Max was standing there with his hands behind his back, his shoulders hunched and his head bowed. He looked so small and fragile.

“I like Spider-man,” he whispered. “I wanted to see the pictures.”

And just like that the fire was extinguished. The volcano dormant and the anger all but disappeared.

It was an accident, a small voice in the back of his mind was saying. You have to accept that and move on. You can’t stay angry forever.

Joe sighed and knelt before Max, pulling him into a hug. “It’s ok,” he said softly. “It’s my fault, I should have paid more attention. I’m not angry, not with you.” He held him at arm's length and gave him a smile, “You are more important than a silly comic book. You are, and will always be, my world.”

He tossed the comic out of the hole and it landed next to Barnaby on the wet grass.

Wiping a tear from his son’s cheek, Joe said, “Let’s keep digging, yeah?”

Max sniffed and nodded, breaking into a wide, toothy smile that was infectious and Joe couldn’t help but smile back.

“Dad, why are you crying?” Max asked, giving him a strange look.

“I am?” He touched his cheek with his fingers and they came away wet. “Well so I am,” he laughed.

“You’re weird,” Max giggled.

Grabbing their shovels, they continued shovelling, the blade digging into the soft dirt and tossing it aside, until they found the next buried treasure.

“It’s my old soccer ball!” Max yelled, louder than he meant. Excitement getting the best of him.  “I remember when this broke.”

Joe nodded, “That’s right. It got a puncture and we couldn’t patch it up. It happened a couple of weeks ago. Do you remember what our deal was?”

Max thought about it and then smiled and Joe could almost see the lightbulb above his head as he remembered, “You said I had to pass my maths test.”

Nodding, Joe said, “That’s right.”

“And I did it!” Max announced. “I got 9 out of 10.” Then he started dancing, hopping from one foot to the other while swinging his arms in the air while singing, “I get a new soccer ball! I get a new soccer ball!”

Laughing at his son's antics, Joe produced a brand new, fluro-yellow soccer ball from behind his back, “Here you go,” he said, handing him the shiny new ball.

“Yaaaaay!” Max yelled, grabbing the ball. “Thanks Dad!”

He started dancing again, singing “I got a new soccer ball! I got a new soccer ball!” while Joe watched with a smile on his face. Max danced around tossing the ball in the air and catching it. 

After the third throw-and-catch, he looked back at his Dad, “Where were you hiding the ball?”

Confused, Joe asked, “What do you mean?”

“The ball was hidden behind your back.”

Joe smiled, “I was always meant to give it to you. I just never got a chance to do it. Until now.”

Satisfied with the answer, Max climbed out of the hole and kicked the ball from foot-to-foot while still singing, His voice faded away as he chased the ball.

While Max played with his new ball, Joe continued digging with the sun breaking through the clouds and half shining into the hole as he dug deeper and deeper.

Soon he was so deep he couldn’t see above the rim of the hole and he lost sight of Max as he played with his new soccer ball. The rhythmic sound of the shovel biting into the dirt, lifting and tossing it soothed him.

Bite. Lift. Toss.

Bite. Lift. Toss.

Bite. Clang!

“What now?” he grumbled. He tapped again with the tip of his shovel and it made a metallic clang in reply. He dug around it, whatever it was, it was long and thin. Eventually he was able to get the shovel underneath and pried it up, revealing a long metal pole.

Putting the shovel aside, he picked it up. The pole was as tall as he was, with a four prong base at one end and a hook at the other.

Realising what it was, he dropped it in shock. Above him the sun disappeared behind the clouds, casting the hole in darkness and Joe fell to his knees, the pole laying in the dirt before him. 

Memories flooded back. The honking of a truck, the doppler effect blaring in his mind. The squeal of tyres. The crunching of glass and the twisting of metal. The beep-beep beeping of a patient machine. The white, sterile room. The smell of antiseptic. 

The IV bag hanging off the same pole he held in his hands.

They all vied for his attention, the memories as clear as if he was living them then and there.

He saw a church, people in black, an expanse of emerald green grass.

The sun disappeared, replaced by dark grey clouds and rain began to fall. Slowly at first but then getting heavier until it poured and puddles formed at his feet.

As it did, Joe stared at the pole with a mix of sorrow and melancholy. The idea of digging the hole seemed silly, why was he even doing it?

“Dad?”

Joe looked up, Max was standing before him with a confused expression. “What’s wrong Dad?”

As he asked, the rain stopped and the sky brightened as the clouds moved on and Max smiled, “Nothing, son.” He tossed the pole out of the hole with the rest of the things they’d found.

“Where’s your new ball?”

Max shrugged, “Up there,” he said, indicating above them.

“You didn’t lose it?”

“I wouldn’t do that, Dad.”

Joe smiled, “Shall we?”

“How long until we reach the centre?” Max asked, tossing more dirt aside.

The hole was now as wide as a car and so deep that it felt like they were in a vertical shaft with the sky a small pinprick of light far above them.

“Not far to go now,” Joe said with confidence. He wiped sweat from his dirt-strained forehead.

“We’re pretty far down,” Max said, sweat running trails through his own dirt-covered face.

They reached their destination not long after. The shovels hit something hard. They cleared away all the dirt revealing a flat, wooden surface.

They looked at each other, excitement etched on their faces.

“What now?” Max asked.

“We break through,” Joe told him and slammed the tip of his shovel against the wooden base. Max joined him and the hole rang with the sounds of splintering wood until they finally broke through, creating a small hole.

“We did it,” Joe said. “We made it. The centre of the world.”

“Dad.”

“This was pretty cool wasn’t it?”

“Dad. It’s time we talked.”

Joe frowned. He’d never heard his son so serious. So...mature.

He turned to his son, but he was gone. 

What?

A moment ago he was standing there but now, nothing. Gone. Disappeared without a trace.

“Max?” he called out, spinning around. 

Where could he be?

“Max? Max!” he yelled, his voice reverberated around the dark, dirt walls. He turned in circles, still calling his name. The hole was too deep for him to climb out and there was nowhere else to go, except...

He looked down at the hole in the timber floor where they’d broken through.

Joe fell to his knees and peered in through the hole.

What he saw made him gasp and cry out. “Oh no. No!”. He started banging on the wood with his fists. The timber creaked and cracked until it finally split and splintered and he ripped it apart piece by piece like he was the Hulk.

Inside was Max. Laying there in a suit. His eyes were closed and he looked so tiny, so peaceful and Joe started to cry. Racking, chest heaving sobs.

“No...no…this was all my fault,” he whispered.

“Dad.”

Joe looked up and through tear-filled eyes he saw Max, his Max. He was standing beside him. “Max…” he croaked.

“Dad. It wasn’t your fault.”

“I was driving...I wasn’t paying attention.”

“Dad. It was an accident. It wasn’t your fault, I don’t blame you.”

Joe sniffed, “But you’re gone. How do I live with myself knowing I am the reason for it?”

Silence.

Joe looked up. He wasn’t in the hole anymore. He was on the grass in the cemetery, next to a gravestone that read:

Here lies Max Patrick Harvey

2013 - 2021.

Rest In Peace.