The Last Day

October 12, 1984, 11:30am
Poplarville, Mississippi



The news she had feared had come to pass.

Cancer.

I cannot handle this, she thought. I know what happens during exams, during chemo, and I can't put my family through that. It would be better if I took care of it right now.

He husband was home today, there being no work for him during this supposedly prosperous time. Her son was at school. She felt bad that he would grow up without her, but she felt she really had no choice.

"Hello," John said as she walked into the kitchen. "What did the doctor say?"

She just looked at him and said one word, "cancer."

"What are you going to do?" he asked.

"I'm not going to anything about it."

John looked shocked, and it took a lot to shock him. "You mean you are just going to let it kill you? You're going to let the boy watch you slowly kill yourself?"

"I've made up my mind. Don't make me change it."

But that is exactly what John spent the next hour trying to do. All of his arguments had to do with their eight-year-old son: you can't do this to him, it will ruin him for life, you'll rob him of a normal childhood...

"His childhood has never been normal," she spat back. "Look who he has for parents. A couple of old people who had no business bringing a child into this fucked up world."

"You wanted to have a child," John said. "You said it would cement our love, bring us closer together."

"Bringing Sean into this world was a mistake!" she screamed. "I wish I had gotten rid of him when I had the chance!"

John fell silent. He couldn't believe she was talking crazy like this. Sean was his boy, his second chance to make up for not being there for his seven other children. He was going to do all the things with this son he didn't do with his older sons.

"But, then," she continued, oblivious to his thoughts, "you had to name him after your father. You wouldn't let me name him what I wanted to name him. But I let you do it."

"Will you stop talkin' crazy, woman?" he asked. "You ain't gonna just sit there and let the cancer you say you have kill you. You can be healed. Leave Sean out of this right now. He's just a child!"

She then did something that absolutely floored him. She went into their bedroom, to her bedside table, and removed a gun.

"Maybe I'll just end it all right now!" She pointed the barrel to her head. "Maybe I'll fuckin' blow my brains out!"

"You'll do no such thing. Have you completely lost your mind? Put the gun down."

"No! I can't go through the cancer treatment. I seen how they do it and it ain't what I wanna do."

John felt he had to talk some sense into his wife. He didn't want to lose her to her demons. "But it will save you. You'll be able to see Sean grow up and become a fine young man, someone you will be proud of."

"I'm doin' this to spare Sean a sick mother!"

"I don't see how that will spare him. It will change his life forever to lose his mama."

"I'm gonna do it before he comes home from school. An' you're gonna help me."

"The hell I am," John objected. "If you're gonna do this, you're gonna do this alone. I ain't gonna get in trouble and lose my son because of your selfish ways."

He then walked out of the bedroom, into the kitchen. His mind was reeling. He couldn't believe that she wouldn't give treatment a chance to save her. However, her irrational behavior in times of stress didn't surprise him anymore.

For as long as he knew her, she struggled with her demons. The ones who told her to talk crazy and to hurt the people she loved. When she became pregnant at age forty-one, she seemed to calm down. Her life, to him, seemed to make a little more sense, since she had two teenage daughters to raise and a baby boy on the way.

For the first few years of Sean's life, their lives together were calm and peaceful. Sean was a good baby and cheerful toddler, but shortly after his fifth birthday, his mother seemed to change. Being too young to realize it, he thought it was because he was bad, and did his best to be good and make his mama happy. And, for a little while, it appeared to work.

Then one day, the demons returned. John came home one afternoon to hear Sean screaming, and water splashing in the bathtub. He went to see what was going on, and he saw his wife trying to drown their son!

He grabbed the terrified boy out of the tub, gave him a towel and sent him to his room to dry off. John dragged his wife off the floor of the bathroom and took her to their bedroom. Talk didn't seem to work, so he backhanded her so hard she passed out. Unbeknownst to him, Sean had seen the whole episode from the doorway.

John still got upset when he thought about that, so he tried his best to forget. Sometimes, relief came in the form of a hard drink at the bar.

He heard his name being called from the bedroom. He went to go check on her, and saw that she was in bed. Maybe she'll take a nap and feel better later, then we can discuss this sanely, he thought. He soon found that is not what she intended at all.

She still held the gun. She babbled on about killing herself, so she wouldn't have to undergo that evil chemotherapy, be poked and prodded like a side of beef, so her son wouldn't have to watch her suffer and not understand. Then she told John,

"If you ever loved me at all, you'll help me die."

"The fuck I will!" he protested. "If you are so bound and determined to do it, then fuckin' do it already!"

"You gonna help me."

"No."

"Do you love me? Did you ever love me, John? Or was I just a convenient way to get a son."

"Baby, you know I love you. Sean is the best gift you ever gave me. I don't want you to die this way."

"But, baby," she said," it's the only way. Please, if you ever loved me, you'll help me die."

At that moment, John made a fateful decision. He would try and take the gun away from her.

He lunged onto the bed and grabbed her wrist and squeezed as hard as he could to make her let go. Her grip on the gun's handle was like steel, and she wouldn't release. Finally, she dropped the gun.

"Now shoot me, John!" she screamed, "shoot me!"

"No! I can't! I won't!"

She looked up at him, and he saw that she had tears in her eyes. "Please," she sobbed, "please help me die."

He couldn't stand to see her cry. She must want this bad, he thought. If he did as she asked, no one would have to know she didn't do it herself.

"Okay, I'll do it," he said, "but I'll let people think you did it yourself. I won't tell nobody I did it."

"Good," she said. "Now, I'll show you where to shoot me so I'll die right away." She showed him a place on her body that would hasten the process by her bleeding to death. He was to place the gun in her hand after he shot her, then call the sheriff before Sean came home from school.

"Keep Sean out of the house as long as possible," she further instructed. "Don't let him see my dead body before my funeral."

John aimed the gun at the spot she designated at close range. Before he pulled the trigger to fire the fatal shot, she told him something she wanted him to pass along to their son.

"Tell the boy I love him."

==================

John was sitting on the porch with his head in his hands when his niece showed up at the house. She was going to take Sean out for ice cream.

She saw right away something was not right. John was despondent, his words not making any sense. When she asked him to repeat himself, he said,

"She's dead! She's fuckin' killed herself in the bed. I found her when I come home!"

She registered shock at those words and had many questions, the primary among them was, "Did you call the sheriff?"

"No," John said, "I wanted to wait until I calmed down enough first."

"How long has she been dead?"

"I don't know, an hour or so."

"I'll call the sheriff, okay Uncle John?"

"I don't know how I'm going to tell Sean."

His niece went into the house, and had to pass the bedroom on the way to the kitchen to use the phone. She looked into the room and saw it covered in blood. She saw her aunt's body in the bed, but could not make out any real details except for her upraised hand with the gun still in it.

She vomited into the kitchen sink, then called the sheriff.

=======================

As the school bus drove up to the house, Sean saw the Pearl River Sheriffs cars and the ambulance out front. He bolted off the bus and up the porch steps. His cousin blocked his way into the house.

"Sean, don't go into the house. There's been an accident."

Sean didn't hear her, as he was halfway down the hall. He saw his father in the kitchen talking to the sheriff and the paramedics. He knew immediately that the accident had happened to his mother. He looked in the direction of his parents' bedroom and saw the door closed.

"Sean," his father said, "your mama's had an accident."

"What happened? Is she going to be okay? Can I see her?"

"No," the sheriff said. "Not now, son."

"Why?"

"There's been an accident to your mother. It's best you didn't see her now."

Before any of the adults could react, Sean opened the bedroom door and entered the room.

Then, they heard him scream.

"Mama!!"

=======================

February 27, 1995, 4:00am
New Orleans, Louisiana



He awoke in a cold sweat. He had been having this nightmare every night for months, but he didn't know what it meant in the grand scheme of things.

He looked around. He was still in the same place; nothing had changed.

Eighteen year old Sean Charbonneau was still in the Orleans Parish Prison, having nightmares about the day ten years earlier he found his mother's corpse lying on her bed.

He knew in his heart she didn't take her own life. He was sure his father, now also deceased, killed her. Her death was officially ruled a suicide, and he decided that one day, he would find out the real truth and have it changed to homicide. But that one day was far in the future.

He had to get out of jail first, and that day was three years away, at least.


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