On ‘Plainview 10’ I hate funerals, I don’t really have any idea why. I work the public address system at my church, and am sometimes called in to work at funerals – mostly of people I didn’t know, and didn’t know anyone who did. Yet after the first time, I always make sure that I have a large supply of hankies just under the mixing desk. I howl like a baby. Yes, I know it’s stupid but I can’t seem to get myself out of it. It is far, far worse when it is someone I know. I’m inconsolable. Perhaps I emote too much. But here’s Marty at a funeral, and he copes fine.   Plainview 10 – May 2023   One last time, and after this I knew I’d never be coming back again. There’d be nothing for me to come back to. The house had the realtor’s sign up outside, and Mom had come to the decision to sell at a discount just to get rid of the place. She had no family except me and Charlie, so she was moving down to Kansas City to be near to us. We had one last ritual to do: the wake. Then the removal men would come in a pack everything away in boxes, strip the house of anything individual, and leave it a shell for the next occupants to make their mark on. The committal had been a solemn affair, leavened only by the unseemly rush for cover when a passing supercell had decided to drop marble-sized hail on our bared heads. Dad was well enough known for there to be reporters covering the event at the same time as reporters were amongst the mourners. Whether he had given particularly good copy, I didn’t know, but a relationship of some sort must have grown through the years. The police were at the cemetery in force, too. They had said publicly that there was no likelihood of an assassination attempt on State Representative Mayer’s family, but I don’t think they wanted to take a chance, not after missing the plot first time round. They kept their distance, and held the obviously curious away from the genuine townsfolk who had come to pay their respects. First there’d been a memorial service at the Lutheran church. No Pastor Brughouse, but another white-haired man who knew Mom but not me. They’d relayed the service outside for those there in person, and webcast it for those who couldn’t make the journey. Then a stately procession in a fleet of black cars to the cemetery. We laid him in the ground in the shade of a plane tree. It was a dignified end, and I don’t think anyone can be equivocal about their own father’s funeral. Then back to the house and all its memories. For the first time in her life, Mom had hired caterers. The food looked fine, but this was to be no Irish wake. There’d be no storytelling, no songs around a badly-tuned piano, no excess of whiskey and no unseemly fighting in the street afterwards. Neither would it be Kaddish, candlelit and close, with recollections and prayers, truths and lies. This was a strict Protestant affair. Lots of "sorry for your loss," and "anything I can do to help," and a distinct lack of emotion. I’m sure those folk were sincere. I’m sure they were good people. Just that we were button-tight like our shirts when a little wailing and raging might have been more appropriate. It wasn’t as if Dad had died in his bed at a ripe old age, surrounded by his kids and grandkids. He’d been killed by a single shot to the head. The Feds knew from the ballistics which make of early twentieth-century sniper rifle it was, how many were registered and who they belonged to. It didn’t help them in their investigation. Okay, he was never going to be Governor, not after Charlie’s crash. But he was a respected senior Reconstructionist who died in a professional hit, seemingly without motive. It was a waste of a life. We should have been angry. We should have stamped our feet and shouted out "Why?". Instead, we shook hands and murmured to each other like we were in a library. After I had had enough of meeting people whose names I would never remember, I stepped outside into the yard. The climate control was set to a clear, cool Spring day. There was none of the sticky heat of the real weather. Through the polarising filters I could see the strato-cumulus stack up all the way to the jet stream where the tops of the clouds were blown ragged and strange. "My condolences, Mr. Sorenson." "Thank you," I said automatically. I half turned, expecting to see one of Dad’s Unicameral colleagues. It was a cop, had to be; something slightly downbeat about him, the sag in his suit, the lived-in face. The bulge under the left arm. "Detective." The man hauled his face up into a brief smile. "Agent Marsh. F.B.I." "They put you on the case, too?" "Yessir. Flew me up from D.C. specially." "So the investigation’s going nowhere." Marsh pursed his lips, and looked off down to the back fence. "These things take time. Big computers working on this now, matching people to places, watching for patterns, integrating information." "Crank the handle, see what comes out?" "Something like that," he said. "I’m surprised that you haven’t asked to interview me." "Would it be worth my while?" It was my turn to smile, even at a time like this. "I’m just surprised, that’s all. You must have read my file." "Ex-army, demolitions expert. Purple Heart. Ukraine, Nigeria, New York. Now, if it had been a car bomb, things might be different. Anyone asked you about enemies your father might have had?" "I saw him for the first time in eleven years, Thanksgiving twenty twenty-one. Not since. I couldn’t even tell you who his friends were." Charlie stuck her head around the back door. "Marty? You okay? Mom’s asking after you." "I’m fine," I said, nodding my head at the agent. "Helping with enquiries." "I’ll tell Mom you’ll be a little while. Folks are beginning to leave." I waved at her, and waited for Marsh to make his pitch. "I shouldn’t keep you. There’s plenty of time for this later," he said. "Not that much time. I’m off to Europe on Thursday; London Metro Zone. Used to be in England." "Sure it did. I remember. Business?" "Business. You know what I do, right?" "Cybernetics. A bit creepy if you ask me, wiring up a human being, but each to his own. It’s not illegal." I cut to the chase. "What did you want to ask me, Agent?" "Well now, Mr. Sorenson. Got a good memory?" "Fair." "When did you stop living with your parents?" "Sixteen. That’d be…" "Twenty oh-seven. And your father joined Reconstruction twenty oh-two. Who did your father annoy when he was starting out? Who might hold a grudge for twenty years?" Despite his drab clothing, I could sense that Marsh had a smart mind. "You’re not worried about digging up ancient history, then?" "No sir, I’m not. Some people, they’ve got good memories, too good. They remember every last detail, every word spoken. Then they start to remember things that could have happened but didn’t, and it’s a long, slow walk down that road called Hate. Convince themselves that they’re doing right when they’re doing wrong. Not delusional, just spiteful. Who’d want to hurt your father, Mr. Sorenson? Who’d want him dead?" I let him finish, and thought for a while. The list I was compiling was long: in those first few years, Reconstruction had changed everything; the old mayor, the school board, the sheriff, the state Representative that Dad beat. Those people who suddenly found themselves doing illegal bad things when before they’d just been bad. Chris and Pete Mayer. Old man Mayer didn’t like guns, but Pete? Who knew? Sneak across the border and take out the man he held responsible for turfing him out of his home and turning him into a refugee? It wasn’t the Pete I mailed every other day – using some hardcore encryption – but he could be lying to me. I looked through the roof of the yard in case I could spot some flying pigs. "Could be anyone from a hundred people. You’ve got records, Agent." I raised my hands, a figurative washing myself free of the past. I wasn’t going to have any part of his witch hunt. Could have been someone connected with the recently dead Governor. Could have been a rival in the Unicameral. Could have been someone higher up the Party that Dad had annoyed enough to order a hit. Could have been someone completely untouchable. "Records give us the facts, Mr. Sorenson. I was hoping for emotions." "Don’t take this the wrong way, Agent Marsh. I’m sure you’ll get your man in the end. You look like the persistent type. I’m just reckoning on the man who ends up in court not being the man who did it. Makes me sad." "We don’t do that, Mr. Sorenson." "Someone will, even if it’s not you. The chances of catching my father’s real killer are slim to nothing. The chances of convicting some inadequate suffering from chronic future shock are high to certain." Marsh sucked in his cheeks and looked sour. "That’s not very patriotic of you, Mr. Sorenson. Downright disrespectful." "I’m a veteran. I earned the right to criticise. I’m sure you did your tour of duty, too: we reached different conclusions, that’s all." "I was expecting a little more co-operation from you, sir. Seeing on how it’s your father you just buried." I searched within my heart for anything: love, regret, pity, shame, guilt. There was a little of everything, but nothing so strong it stood out. I felt bad for my Mom; she had lived for him, and now that she was on her own, she was adrift, rudderless, on an empty ocean. "I guess I’m just a rotten son, Agent Marsh. He deserved better." Marsh dug his hands into his coat pockets. "Too much to ask that you don’t leave town?" "Tickets are bought, meetings arranged, hotel rooms reserved. I finally get to go to Europe, after all these years of dreaming about it." "You were in the Ukraine." "Only to kill people. I don’t think that counts. This time I want to be a tourist, not a soldier." I caught Charlie’s quizzical stare through the patio windows. I’d been a long time with the G-man. "You got a dream, Agent Marsh?" "Aside from doing my job well, Mr. Sorenson?" I turned away. "The buffet’s getting warm, and I’ve got guests to say goodbye to." As I walked back to the house, he called after me. I knew he would: standard cop trick. "Wasn’t you, was it, Mr. Sorenson?" "No, Agent Marsh. I didn’t care enough one way or the other. The opposite of love isn’t hate. It’s indifference." Charlie met me at the door. "What did he want?" "Everything. Nothing. Let’s see these people off the premises, and get on with the rest of our lives."