The Story of Dean Gibbard
There were only feverish scribbles left when we found him there, limp, his eyes uncharacteristically glazed over and lifeless. His pencil was jabbed into his throat by his own hands, we surmised. And through the blood stains on his yellow legal paper, we saw transcriptions of the Pali Canon and a simple scrawl in all-caps that read: I’M SORRY.
His funeral wasn’t well-attended. Many knew him but were too scared to face his parents, for we all felt somehow responsible for this ending, and to trade eye contact with his genetic sources would be too hard to shake. Jen and I showed up, and so did some professors who he had impressed during his short time in school.
“Dean was always dissatisfied,” remarked one bearded professor, “yet his yearning to discover hidden truths always defeated that latent unease. I so wish he had chosen the dissatisfied life over the uncertain afterlife.” Dean’s mother, at this point, sobbed uncontrollably, while his father looked at his feet in quiet despair. Jen closed her eyes, and the whole time I was left wondering whether Dean would have laughed at the whole affair: “Get on with it,” he may have said, “either join me or stop wasting your tears.”
Though I was sad to learn of Dean’s death, I wasn’t surprised, and it helped that he didn’t seem so torn up about the decision to off himself. I only wonder about the pain; how must he have suffered to travel to a place that we all wonder about? And to realize, at some point, that it may or may not exist. That would be the only real question in my mind: was he met with excitement at some truth or disappointment at the blankness of reality?
I drove Jen home and spent most of the night with Dean’s parents, consoling them, telling them how glad I was to have known him, how I will never forget him. You could see how upset they were, and you could tell that this was the tragedy that would define the rest of their lives, but they loved him so much and were glad to hear that they weren’t alone in thinking that he was quite special. There was no doubt he was.
“Nico, is that you?”
“Yes, now, shh, just go back to sleep.”
I had slipped in next to Jen late at night. Her eyes were swollen from tears as I laid my body down next to hers.
“Do you think Dean made it?”
“What do you mean?”
“You know, do you think he found nirvana or satori or some kind of peace that only those mystics find?”
“Jen, I have no idea. I sure hope he did, but I really cannot say.”
“I hope he did. That would make me so happy…”
She dozed off, and I stared at the ceiling, wondering, still, why I wasn’t more upset about the whole darned thing. I concluded that it must have been because Dean still spoke to me — in my head that is — he spoke to me and reassured me that it was what he wanted. I then began thinking about whether I should try to kill the Dean in my head to make it finally hit home. But this made me queasy, so I dropped the topic altogether and instead thought about all the essays I needed to get done: Dean’s voice would help me with them.
“Nico! We just heard. How are you feeling? I can’t believe he did it — and at his parents’ house no less.”
“I’m just glad the term is over.”
“We’re here for you if you need someone to talk to. We know you both were close. No shame in feeling any bit of anything.”
“Thanks guys. I’ll definitely let you know.”
Some people seem to enjoy the noise of human drama, though they wouldn’t admit it. It’s something to be tamed or otherwise mastered. But when it becomes acute, you realize just how damning it is, and you suddenly long for silence; and it is only then when you can appreciate the dullness of a history lecture or the faint whistling of wind on a flat walkway late at night.
Dean’s voice kept jabbing at me: “Nico, when will you carve your own stake of existence? What are you waiting for?” Dean always had a way of dramatizing every aspect of his life, but it wasn’t for show; it was truly how he perceived the world: make it mean something—otherwise, don’t complain.
But that’s too much pressure. I just wanted to hold Jen at night. Or lie on the grass and let the senses partake in the heavenly beauty of the sky. Or walk with a cigarette and an unfettered mind.
I just couldn’t be left alone by Dean.
I visited his parents almost every weekend when I could. They would make me tea and cookies, and we would talk about mundane things. They had grown weary over the months, and their age was beginning to show. Happiness no longer coursed through their faces; melancholy and wisdom had taken its stead.
“And how are your studies, Nico? Good, I presume?”
“Yes, Mr. Gibbard.”
“Your parents aren’t too worried about you, are they, with them all the way in California?”
“No, not overly so.”
“How about that election? Crazy world, isn’t it?”
“Yes, indeed.”
The conversations were always these stencils we used to cover up what I was: their last meaningful connection with their son. And though I was partially ashamed of knowingly playing the role, I felt that it was my obligation to both the Dean in my head and those people who brought him into existence. I would nibble on some biscuits, drink some tea, and share in the silence that Dean’s death had supplied us. Finally, I would leave and imagine Dean saying, “There you go; this, this here, this is meaningful.” What a betraying thought it was.
Jen and I got married. I had no best man. It seemed wrong to have one.
Mr. and Mrs. Gibbard were at the wedding. They were so happy for me; I hadn’t seen such joy in their eyes since — well, since Dean was around.
It was a great day. The noise was adequately tamed. And it had become something more, for the noise was no longer the default. The default was now a synchronicity, an alignment of worries between me and Jen, between us and the Gibbards, between them and our parents, between all their friends and ours.
I gave a speech: “I look forward to nothing more in a day than to see Jen and know that we love each other. Nothing melts my nerves away more than her smile, and nothing replenishes me more than a single look into her eyes.”
The difference between flair and truth is that the former has an intended effect and the latter does not. Truth is the spontaneous revelation to others of how you do, in fact, perceive your life. At this thought, Dean crept up in mind; I could see him beaming proudly in my direction from the end of the wedding hall.
That night, as Jen lay in bed, she asked me, “Do you think at all about Dean still?”
“All the time.”
“Me too.”
“Really?”
“Yes, of course. And, Nico, I think he did it.”
“Did what?”
“I think he found peace. I think he found some kind of eternity.”
“You think?”
“He’s never left us. He was here; I felt it.”
“So did I.”
“He did it. He really did.”
I held Jen tight, looked up at the ceiling and smiled.
