"Not fair? Not fair?" sputtered the Long Cool Woman. "You kill me and tell me I'm not being fair?"
After the funeral, Gibb had quit his job, the same job he'd been worried about losing that night of the accident. Keeping it would have been a laugh in the face of responsibility. Kierkegaard would have rolled over in his grave. So Gibb had taken a sabbatical at St. David's Monastery down by Tombstone as he contemplated his future. Three months later, his conclusion was that the ethical thing, the existential thing, the responsible thing, would be to live the life of the man he'd killed. His goal was to fulfill the dreams of the dead man, so at the age of 29 he'd become a highway patrol officer.
"I was trying to be responsible. I was trying to—"
"Shut up. Just shut the hell up. It's because of your irresponsibility that I died. It's because of your misplaced responsibility that I have not passed through the shroud."
"No. The violence of the accident is what kept you here." He glanced up at Rev Boscoe. "Tell him, Rev. Tell him it was the violence that kept him from passing on." Gibb trailed off as he noticed the sad look in Rev Boscoe's eyes. "What? Tell me."
Rev Boscoe cleared his throat before he spoke. "Memory and heartache. Sure, the violence of the death carries a certain resonance. But unremembered, the soul will pass on just as quickly as if he'd died in his sleep."
"I don't understand," Gibb said, looking at the shrine he'd erected. "Do you mean that these," he said pointing to the cross atop the concrete based, "are responsible for keeping the souls in place."
Rev Boscoe nodded.
"But they're no different than tombstones in a cemetery," Gibb argued.
"They are very different," Rev Boscoe said. "These things along the road commemorate the event, rather than the person. In a graveyard, only the person is remembered. Graves are where people are buried. Shrines are where memories are buried."
Gibb stared at the shrine in shock. What had he done? He hadn't meant to make matters worse. He'd only thought to pay respect and be responsible. "But these are everywhere," he said.
"Yes," Rev Boscoe sighed. "They are."
"And now you're a policeman," came the edgy voice of the Long Cool Woman.
"Yes. I thought it was the proper thing to do."
"To replace me?"
"No," said Gibb. "To show respect for you."
"By becoming me?"
"Yes. No." Gibb suddenly found the need to defend himself. "By doing the things you had done so that the world wasn't at a loss."
"What the hell kind of logic is that?"
"It's good logic. It's the way a great many people believe. It's about responsibility and existentialism."
"It's about you wanting to make yourself feel better," said the Long Cool Woman. "That's it. Nothing more."
Then the Long Cool Woman released his hand. Her eyes narrowed, then closed, her face returning to the soft features of a woman asleep.
"Wait," said Gibb, picking up the limp hand. "Come back. Please," he sobbed.
Rev Boscoe knelt beside him and gently, yet forcefully, removed the hand of the Long Cool Woman from his grasp. He placed the hand back on the woman's chest, then placed the other on top of this one.
"I—" Gibb's chest felt incredibly tight. Tears burned his eyes.
"I never forgave my mother, either. Not only didn't she deserve it, but I can hold a grudge if I want to. I can be pissed off. If she'd killed me, I'd have haunted her," Rev Boscoe said as he finished smoothing out the Long Cool Woman's dress.
Finally the fist around Gibb's heart relented allowing him to release a long sob-filled sigh.
"Kind of selfish to take things into your own hands, don't you think?"
Gibb stared miserably at Rev Boscoe as he stood, then extended a hand to help Gibb to his feet. When they were both standing, Rev Boscoe continued. "Did you think he'd be eager to accept your apology? Life and death is not some Rodgers and Hammerstein Broadway show. My mother found that out when my Dad shot her with the pistol we kept up on the refrigerator. According to the police report I read when I'd reached adulthood, she was singing a song from Oklahoma." His voice switched to a cappella sing-song as he sung, "O what a beautiful morning, O what a beautiful day. I've got a beautiful feeling, everything's going my way." Rev Boscoe shook his head, as he gestured for the bikers