Chapter Text
Marvin heard the doorbell just as he was putting the kettle on. It was Sunday. Trina had already come to take Jason, so Marvin wasn’t expecting anyone. Maybe it was Cordelia. He knew Charlotte had a shift at the hospital and Cordelia didn’t fancy being alone lately.
He turned on the stove and headed to the door. When he opened if he found a woman he didn’t know. She looked in her late twenties and stared at him confused. Something about her eyes was unnerving.
“Can I help you?” asked Marvin. Maybe she was selling something, though she didn’t look like that kind of people.
The woman got out of her trance. “Oh, um, hello. Is Jonah here?”
Marvin sighed, bored. “I’m sorry, you have the wrong apartment”
He moved to close the door, but the woman stopped it with her hand. Marvin was starting to get annoyed. Her eyes were pleading.
“Wait! Wait, um-” She opened her purse and took a handful of envelopes out. Marvin stared as she looked for a specific letter. She found it and seemed to read looking for something. “Whi- Whizzer! Is Whizzer here?”
Marvin didn’t know what taking a bullet to the chest felt like, but he imagined it would be pretty close to this. He’d gotten better these last few months. Every day it hurt a little less. His crying turned to laughs as he remembered him. He thought about him every day, but every day he knew what he would feel. This was another thing entirely. This came without warning. Here was this girl, asking him about the love of his life, as if he were still alive.
This was going to be horrible.
“Who asks?” inquired Marvin, doing everything to keep his voice from faltering.
The girl looked pleased. Boy, this was going to be really hard.
“My name is Sarah Brown, I’m his sister.”
And it hit Marvin like a thousand bricks, why her eyes looked so unnerving. They were his eyes, staring back at him like a mirage. Like a ghost of what he lost.
He didn’t answer, so the girl, Sarah, continued. “I- I just found out he lived here, and I haven’t seen him in years. It’s a long story, can you tell me if he lives here?”
Marvin took long in realizing she was asking him a question. A question he didn’t want to answer. Get a hold of yourself, a voice in his head told him.
“Yes. I mean-” He scolded himself. “He did. Not anymore.” He doesn’t even live anymore.
He didn’t say the last part, though he would have to do it. Soon.
“Well, do you know where he is?” Asked Sarah, getting impatient. “Did he move?”
Marvin took a deep breath. It had to be now. There was no good in delaying it.
“He’s dead.”
And now his voice cracked. And he realized he had never said it. Not out loud. The people he saw usually were people who already knew Whizzer was dead. So, he never had to say those two words. Never, until now. It hurt more than he thought it would.
And it hurt worse, cause he also got to see this woman’s face fall in disbelief and pain.
“What?” she whispered, and he could see the tears forming in her eyes. Those eyes. “When?
Marvin tried to compose himself. There couldn’t be two people crying. He had to take the place of the comforter, instead of the comforted.
“Six months ago,” he said. Though it felt like years.
Sarah stood silent for a whole minute, and Marvin could see the gears rolling in her brain, trying to understand what he just told her, trying not to crumble in the weight of her grief. He understood. He wished he didn’t.
“Oh, my God” she finally said, and started sobbing.
“Hey, hey” he said, holding her by her shoulders, trying to prevent her from falling. “Come in.”
She let herself be guided by him, towards the sofa. He sat her there and moved to close the door.
“I’ll get you some water.” He said as she passed her and went to the kitchen.
He filled a tall glass with water and grabbed some tissues. Just then the kettle started to whistle, so he turned the stove off.
When he returned Sarah had composed herself. She was still crying but she wasn’t sobbing anymore. She was just staring at empty space. Marvin gave her the glass, that took her off her trance, and placed the tissues on the coffee table.
After drinking a few gulps, she placed the glass next to the tissues and looked at him.
“How did he die?” she asked, her voice shaking.
“It was a, uh, rare disease” he answered. “Doctors couldn’t do anything about it.”
They tried, he thought, thinking of Charlotte. Sarah looked angry now.
“I can’t believe it.” She snapped. “Son of a bitch!”
Marvin got angry himself. “Hey, I know you’re grieving, but that’s no reason to call him-”
“No, no.” Sarah stopped him, sensing his anger. “Not him. My- our father. He’s the son of a bitch. He threw him away.”
“Of course.” He said.
Marvin knew that Whizzer had been thrown away from his home. It was one of the reasons why Marvin wanted to keep their relationship a secret in the first place. He didn’t want to be thrown out too, didn’t want to be kept away from his son. He thanked God every day for Trina, he hurt her but she never held a grudge, she was one of a kind.
Sarah seemed to realize he knew nothing about the man who had told her of her brother’s death, who had comforted her when she cried.
“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, were you his friend?” she asked.
Marvin recoiled at the question. He knew this moment would come too, but he still wasn’t prepared. People’s reactions were like throwing a coin, you never knew what you were going to get. But Sarah looked nice, and if she knew Whizzer’s father had thrown him away, she had to know why, right?
“I was his…” Marvin started but couldn’t finish. Lover? Boyfriend? Soulmate? Love of his life?
However, he didn’t need to complete his sentence. Sarah seemed to understand.
“I see.” She said, and gave him a little smile.
Marvin sighed in relief.
“I never got your name.” she said suddenly.
Marvin smiled. “It’s Marvin.”
“I assume he never told you about me.”
“I knew he had a sister and that his parents had thrown him out. He told me they wanted nothing to do with him.”
“That’s not true!” exclaimed Sarah, almost exasperated. “At least not in my case. Like I said, it’s a long story.”
“I was about to make some tea,” said Marvin, remembering the kettle. “We can talk about it. About him.”
Marvin wanted to know more about him, about things he maybe didn’t tell him. He wanted to know his sister, this part of him that was sitting on his- their couch.
Sarah smiled. “I’d like that”
They both went to the kitchen. Marvin offered her the tea box he had. Since Whizzer had started living with him again, he made sure they were well stacked with different kinds of tea, even though Marvin only liked black and Whizzer only drank chamomile. He tried not to tear up when Sarah chose the exact same kind as her brother.
“That was his favorite.” He said.
“Really?” She asked, moved. And Marvin had to catch his breath, cause in that moment she looked like Whizzer the most.
When they finished making their respective teas, they sat on the couch again. She didn’t miss a bit and started telling her story. Marvin was thankful there wasn’t small talk first.
“I was fifteen when he left.” She started. “I was returning home from school when I heard the shouting. I found mom crying in the kitchen while dad and Jonah argued in the living room. Dad was calling him awful things. Mom told me to go to my room and I did. The next thing I knew my brother had left and we were forbidden to speak his name. I didn't understand. I always knew his relationship with dad was difficult but he loved me. I couldn't believe he had left me. I was angry, I didn't know why he did it. That until a classmate of mine started mocking me and calling him a faggot.”
Sarah shifted on her seat, clearly uncomfortable. Marvin didn’t speak, sensing there was more to the story.
“I was angry at him.” She continued. “Mom always used to tell me I shouldn't care about him cause he chose his sinful ways over his family. And for a long time, I believed her. Why wouldn't I? He never wrote, he never called." She paused and took a sip of her tea. "Three months ago, my mom was diagnosed with breast cancer. It was caught late. In her last days she confessed she missed Jonah, and told me he missed me. I dismissed her, thought she was trying to make me feel better. After she died I went through her stuff and I found these.”
She showed Marvin the stack of letters se had before. There had to be about a hundred, maybe more. His heart constricting, Marvin could see Whizzer’s handwriting on some of them.
Sarah started tearing up again.
“He wrote me for three years, and she hid them from me. In one of these he wrote he changed his name to Whizzer, and in another one there was an address of the place he worked in. I went there and they told me he didn't work there anymore, but that he lived here. They never told me he was sick.”
“They never knew.” Said Marvin.
Whizzer quit his job when his condition got worse, but he didn’t want to tell his boss he was sick, so he told him he had found a better thing. And when he died, Marvin thought it didn’t matter if he told him or not. It wasn’t like he was family.
“I was so stupid,” said Sarah, getting Marvin’s attention again. “I hated him for so long.”
“You didn’t know.”
But that didn’t comfort her. “I can’t believe I’ll never get to see him again.”
And in that moment Marvin got an idea. It was fitting, cause he hadn’t gone that week.
“I could take you to him” he said.
And so, they went.
They spent the car ride in silence. He only asked her if it was her first time in New York, and she replied it was.
Great, he thought, her first time in the big apple and it gets tainted by this.
At least she’ll get some closure.
When they got to cemetery it was almost empty, save for some people who were also visiting loved ones. Marvin guided Sarah through the tombs, all decorated with the star of David. Sarah pointed out that while their father was a raging catholic, their Jewish mother raised them on her faith.
“At least he lived with a nice Jewish man.” She said, and Marvin laughed.
They took a few more steps and arrived at his grave. The epitaph read: ‘Whizzer Brown. 1952-1981. Eternally loved by those who were lucky to know him.’
Marvin stood behind while Sarah kneeled before the tomb. She reached out and lay her hand on it.
“Hey, big bro.” she started, her voice cracking. “Sorry for not coming sooner. I had so much I wanted to tell you. I wanted to hug you, to say I’m sorry. I’m sorry I never wrote. I’m sorry I hated you. I'm so sorry.”
She was crying now, and Marvin refrained himself from comforting her. This was her moment. Their moment.
After a couple of minutes of crying, she composed herself and stood up.
“Also,” she added before turning. “I think the name Whizzer is stupid.”
Marvin couldn’t help but laugh and she did too.
“I love you.” She finished, and then she looked at him. “Thank you.”
“I’m sure he’s happy.” He answered. “Wherever he is.”
She nodded and slowly walked away, leaving Marvin alone with Whizzer. He looked at the grave.
“I bet you didn’t expect that.” He said to the stone. “I didn’t either. But she seems nice. I bet you had something to do with it.”
Marvin smiled and looked at the ground. It was never easy. He didn’t think it was ever going to be. But he bore it, and he would do it a million times, cause knowing Whizzer was worth every inch of pain in his body.
He said goodbye, told him he loved him, and headed towards the parking lot.
Sarah was waiting for him next to the car. They both hoped on and Marvin started driving.
"Where are you staying?" he asked when they were on the driveway.
"In a friend's house in Brooklyn" she answered.
"I can take you."
"Actually,” she interrupted, “I was hoping we could go back to the apartment and maybe you could tell me about him. Maybe show me some pictures. I'm not ready to let him go."
Marvin looked at her and saw those eyes again, Whizzer’s eyes, staring back at him, pleading.
He couldn’t say no, and he didn’t want to, cause he wanted to tell her about Whizzer as much as he wanted to hear about him.
He wanted to tell her how he beat him at racquetball every time. He wanted to tell her how much he loved his son. He wanted to tell her that anyone who met Whizzer loved him dearly. He wanted to tell her how her brother changed him, and made him one of the happiest men alive.