Driving Blind

Me. Myself. I.

No! I thought. I looked again. Yes!

I jumped. I ran.

Lugging a folder of pictures, I flew to Roswell and, sweating, grabbed a cab to reach Roswell High at twelve noon straight up.

The graduation procession had begun. I panicked. But then as the young men and women passed an immense calmness touched me. Destiny and Providence whispered as my gaze wandered over two hundred young faces in line and at some late-arriving wild smiles, manic with joy now that the long haul was over.

And still the young moved on their way to good or unborn wars, bad marriages, fine or awful employments.

And there he was. William Clark Henderson.

The other me.

As he walked, laughing, with a pretty dark-haired girl, I traced my own profile in my high school annual long ago. I saw the soft line under his chin, the unshaven cheeks, the unfocused half-blind eyes that would never understand life but hide out in libraries, duck behind typewriters.

As he passed, he glanced up and froze.

I almost waved, but stopped for he could not make himself move.

He staggered as if struck in the chest. His face grew pale as he groped toward me and gasped.

“Dad! What’re you doing here?”

I felt my heart stop.

“You can’t be here!” the young man cried, tears brimming his eyes. “You’re dead! Died two years ago! Can’t be. What? How?”

“No.” I said at last. “I’m not …”

“Dad!” He seized my arms. “Oh, God! God!”

“Don’t!” I said. “Not me!”

“Then who?” he pleaded and crushed his head against my chest. “What’s going on? Christ!”

“Please.” I broke his grip. “They’re waiting!”

He fell back. “I don’t understand,” he said, the tears flowing.

“I don’t understand,” I said.

He lurched forward. I raised my hand swiftly. “No. Don’t.”

“Will you,” he mourned, “be here … after?”

“Yes,” I said, agonized. “No. I don’t know.”

“At least watch,” he said.

I was silent.

“Please,” he said.

At last I nodded and saw color in his face.

“What’s going on?” he asked again, bewildered.