The Family Firm

Chapter 40

The graveyard was nearly silent, with the exception of the long, spindly yew tree branches cracking and waving slightly in the bitter wind, and the distinct sounds of the city in the distance. In Glasgow, there was a thick sheet of snow covering everything; the streets, the buildings, the cars, even the people. DI Wallace had collected a fair amount himself; though it wasn't snowing, the white flakes had billowed up and whipped around him in the drifts, and had built up on his shoulders like barnacles on the belly of a boat. He had been standing there for so long and so still that he could have been mistaken for one of the many large statues that dotted the cemetery's perimeter.

He looked into the blank white eyes of St Cecilia, whose large, marble figure stood motionlessly a few paces away. Her eyes were cast downward serenely, her lithe fingers fastened around a miniature organ. She appeared to be dancing, her skirts forever flowing in non-existent motion to music frozen in time. Cecilia had always been his Kelly's favourite saint. She loved music. It was only right that he buried her where she could always protect her.

He closed his eyes, and an immense sadness washed over him. It was Boxing Day, the anniversary of his daughter's death. Fifteen years ago to the day, Brandon Duffy had beaten his sweet, loving Kelly until she had stopped breathing. And, as if by some cruel twist of fate, he would be leaving prison and on parole in exactly three weeks. Wallace had been counting the days.

The hatred and anger inside of him was all he had left. He was afraid to let go, fearing that if he did, Kelly would leave him, too. Already he couldn't remember the smell of her hair, nor the touch of her skin. He couldn't recall if she chewed on her pencils on the right side, or the left. Did her hair shine more red in the sunlight or gold? She was slipping away from him and he needed her desperately. Without her, what would he do? How had he lived this long without her?

He hadn't prayed since she died, nor gone to church. It was as if there was nothing but silence in his mind where his spirituality once was. Kelly had been his spirit. A living, breathing spirit that provided him hope for the future. Without her, he was an empty shell, a husk of the man he once was. He lost his religion. What kind of God would take away his Kelly and let the world keep turning?

His wife had changed, too. Sandra's dark eyes had permanently lost their sparkle, the sparkle their lovely, lovely girl had inherited. She'd aged over-night. The day of Kelly's funeral, Sandra looked like an old woman. Not yet forty at the time, she was hunched over as if she were sixty or older. Her stark black hair had lost its life and lift, and hung limply on her shoulders. She walked the earth like an apparition, a wisp of her former self. Wallace was afraid that if he touched her, she'd disintegrate into sand and blow away with the wind.

While Sandra hung somewhere in limbo, Wallace dove into his work. He became obsessed with justice and criminals, began working outside the books. He realise how unjust the justice system really was, and decided to take things into his own hands. Sandra had retreated further and further into herself until they hardly saw heads nor tails of each other. As it stood, they were two separate entities sharing the same home. Divorce was on the horizon. If not that, then separation. They'd fallen out of love. Wallace supposed these things happened, but he had never loved another woman in all his life and didn't think he would again. And he would never love another human being like he loved his Kelly.

Warm tears had spilled onto his cheeks without him noticing, as he turned his attention from the statue to the snow-capped headstone beneath it. The inscription read:

KELLY AMBER WALLACE

3 MAR 1965 – 26 DEC 1985

OUR ANGEL HAS RETURNED HOME

He brushed some snow from its brass surface and sighed softly. In his mind's eye, he could see his Kelly lying perfectly still six feet below, in the beautiful blue dress she had been buried in—her favourite dress. She would be thirty-five now. Next, he pictured her as she was at age nine, all long legs and copper hair, hop-scotching alongside him everywhere he went. He imagined her raising her arms like the zombies in the films she'd seen far too young and moaning out ethereally as she staggered towards him. She loved making fun of the old pictures, and knew how to make light of a morbid situation, no matter what it was.

He found himself laughing at the thought. Soon, he was crying. He would never know a sweetness like his daughter possessed again. She had been a lovely, lovely girl.

Before he realised it, a prayer formed on this tongue and spilled out from his lips. 'St Cecilia, please watch over my sweet Kelly. Keep her safe until I join her. Oh Kelly, my sweet Kelly . . . '

He let his head rest in his hands, and a hush took over the cemetery once again. The sky was dusky, the trees barren, the moon appearing as a faint sliver against the blue horizon. People made their way home from work in the distance, car horns blared periodically, a lone dog barked. Life went on. And so must he.