Do Not Stand At My Grave and Weep; T
Title: Do Not Stand At My Grave and Weep
Rating: T
Characters: Danny, Ethan
Warnings: character death
Spoilers: all of series 4
Summary: Do not stand at my grave and weep, I am not there, I do not sleep.
Notes: Poem credit goes to Mary Frye.
They ask him to read at the funeral he’d fought not to attend. He’d tried to refuse, to tie down his family’s last shred of resistance. Two years was hardly enough time to pronounce someone missing, presumed dead. Presumed, he’d shouted. That hardly meant they had a body! Two years and what had they done but argue over what way to help, when he’d been out there doing everything he could? He’d been on his way to becoming someone, to doing something with his life, but he’d dropped it, all of it! He always had! He’d do anything for Patrick, but they were just … giving up!
“It’s closure,” They’d said.
That’s exactly the issue. He doesn’t want closure. Closure means an ending, and Danny doesn’t want one. What’s Patrick going to think when he gets back?
But when he says this, they just look on sadly.
Twenty five years old and he’s being asked to read at his baby brother’s funeral. It’s not fair! Two years doesn’t mean someone’s dead, it can’t. Patrick can’t be gone.
But they won’t let up. He has to read or else, and he has to attend. He has to sit there in a suit and tie and try not to cry; he’s already the son they wish wasn’t there. Patrick is the prized son, Danny is the failure. He was all right with that until he wasn’t, until it meant he was the only son and nothing he did could hold a candle to the fact that Patrick wasn’t there anymore.
But it’s all right. He can be the son that gets Patrick back. He can do that for them, for Pat.
But they’re taking that away.
He refuses to mourn a brother who isn’t dead.
Only, they’re asking him to read. They’re forcing him to read. It’s not his choice, they say. Patrick would want it, they tell him. He wants to tell them they’re using the wrong tense but they’d tell him he’s in denial, that he’s being childish.
So he rewrites the meaning of eulogy. He keeps the meaning to himself and stands in front of “family” and “friends” who are letting themselves believe that Patrick is dead. Danny thinks they’re stupid. They’re sheep; they’re followers. They let themselves believe it because they want to think it’s easier than his being alive somewhere, struggling to remain that way.
But Danny’s a copper now. He can do this. He can find his baby brother and he’ll prove them wrong.
He just has to read this poem first.
He expects to choke up, even though he’s practiced. He expects to not be able to read it. But there’s a sort of strength in the words when he starts reading, staring ahead into the crying crowd and knowing his words mean something different from what they think. He knows as he speaks with a subtle strength that he’s stronger than they are, that he’s right, and nothing they can do or say will take his baby brother away.
“Do not stand at my grave and weep, I am not there, I do not sleep.”
He can hear them sobbing, hear them. His parents have these tiny, watery smiles on like they’re proud of him, that he’s finally accepting this and moving on and he almost laughs. He’s proving them wrong with every word. It’s the first time he’s defying them - it might not be open, they might not know it, but he’s not giving in.
He’s not giving up.
“I am a thousand winds that blow; I am the diamond glints on snow. I am the sunlight on ripened grain; I am the gentle autumn rain.”
His mother is crying. Danny’s observant now, he’s been a copper for over a year. She isn’t touching his father’s hand; they haven’t held hands for some time now. He notices that, he always had.
He’s speaking to Patrick, not about him. He’s the only one who knows that. While they sit out there thinking that he’s talking about Patrick’s death, he’s talking about Patrick, alive. I’m there for you, he’s saying. I’m there for you.
“When you awaken in the morning’s hush, I am the swift uplifting rush, of quiet birds in circled flight. I am the soft stars that shine at night." No matter where you are, Patrick. No matter where you are I’m there. He has to know that, no matter where he is, no matter who has him.
“Do not stand at my grave and cry.” The words are hushed, whispered. He’s speaking about him now, about Patrick. He’s seen the headstone. How stupid to have a headstone for someone they can’t bury. For someone who isn’t dead. But he keeps that to himself because he doesn’t want to ruin it, this moment.
“I am not there. I did not die.” Those last four words are biting, but spoken with a force he knows his audience will take the right way. A different way that he hears them. They’re weeping now, crying, and Danny feels a sense of pride for what he’s done.
They’re still sheep.
“Still here, Pat.” He whispers as he takes his spot among the pews, ready to face the rest of the day.
--
Dust collects on his pants, turning their dark blue color gray. He collects Patrick’s head in his lap, running his fingers through hair that’s darker than he remembers. Words are murmured, words that don’t really matter just as long as he’s speaking them. Danny is seven again, nine years old and his baby brother was only just born. Everything’s all right, they’ve got years, a lifetime! Nobody can take that away, they’re only children, it’s all right!
Patrick moans.
“I’ve got you, Pat.” Danny says, and the way he’s so quickly forced back into the present is almost painful. “I’ve always got you. Don’t worry, baby brother.” The blood blossoming on Patrick’s shirt makes Danny nauseous, but he won’t look away.
Patrick blinks up at him and Ethan is gone, dead, it’s just Patrick. Just his baby brother without the fractured mind the anomalies caused. It’s no longer the story of two brothers haunted by rips in time; it’s just them, just Danny and Patrick Quinn.
Patrick opens his mouth to speak but Danny shakes his head, stopping him. “Don’t try-“
Patrick’s voice is weak. “Do not stand at my grave and weep.” The murmur turns Danny’s mouth dry and he chokes, trying to answer. When he does, his voice is strained.
“I am not there, I do not sleep.” He strokes Patrick’s arm. “You were at the funeral.”
“Made it back.” He says. “Went home and everyone gone. Went to church. To pray. You were there. Talking.”
There are tears running down his cheeks, and he feels as though he’s the one dying. “I’m sorry. So sorry, Pat.”
“I thought … you’d given up.”
Danny whimpers. “Never.”
“I decided to hate you. So wrong. Never stopped, did you?”
Danny strokes his baby brother’s cheek. “I never will.” He knows that’s true. It always has been. Twenty years of his life are coming to end here on the ground. It doesn’t matter, who the man is whose killed his brother. In the twenty first century, they’re long dead. What matters is that Danny couldn’t stop it, couldn’t stop the man from killing his brother. Couldn’t stop the man from killing Ethan, the man who took the life of his wife and two sons.
Danny couldn’t stop any of it.
“I’m never giving up on you.” Danny says, combing his fingers through Patrick’s hair. “You’re my baby brother.”
“I am a thousand winds that blow.” Patrick whispers. “I am the diamond glints on snow.”
Danny remembers back to watching his audience cry, but it’s as though he’s looking inwards. This is it. This is twenty years, coming to an end. “I am the sunlight on ripened grain; I am the gentle autumn rain.”
“When you awaken in the morning’s hush, I am the swift uplifting rush, of quiet birds in circled flight.” They’re finishing it together, they’re finishing this together, the only one that ever really mattered.
“I am the soft stars that shine at night.” Danny leans down and presses a kiss to his brother’s forehead.
“Do not stand at my grave and cry,” Patrick says, words as faint as falling leaves. “I am not there.”
His last word ends with a sigh and Danny chokes back a sob. He doesn’t need to press his fingers to his brother’s neck to know that there’s no pulse. Patrick is dead.
“I did not die.”
The last surviving Quinn finishes the poem before brushing his hand over his little brother’s face to close his eyes. He wipes his face on the shoulder of his shirt to stop the tears from falling downwards. In the distance, the anomaly glows.
He’ll go through it.
They’ll go through it.
It’s the last.