THE FINAL WHODUNNIT 

What killed Dave? Was it the heart attack as he checked out of the hospital. A result of uttering words too perfect not to be immediately made his final ones by a massive coronary that left him crumpled on the floor. 

“Hate doctors. Looove nurses” 

Head hitting the tiles but probably already dead by then. A sight Andrea would only later describe as a mess to her nephew, who was on the phone with her, learning for the first time what had happened to his grandfather earlier that day. Hadn’t even known he was in the hospital. 

“A total mess. Don’t ask” 

Or had it maybe been the previous five days that had killed Dave? Bedridden with a purple face and not taking his heart pills. Not eating anything and no one seeming to think this was a bad sign, even though this was the same Dave who had once still taken his full English breakfast while looking nearly green from appendicitis. The same Dave who would scrape every smudge of egg yolk from his plate, no matter the stomach flu. And now this same man moaning over as little as the sight of soup. Wanting everything to be taken away immediately. No appetite at all and usually half asleep and somehow no one even thinking to let Andrea know what had happened.  

“The doctor’s said he suffered a brain bleed at least a week ago. A week ago!” 

So maybe it was the fall that had finally done him in. An accident that couldn’t have come as a surprise to anyone, not since his stroke had got him always going down the stairs backwards. No one able to convince him otherwise since it was now the only way he could make sure his good hand stayed firmly ahold of the bannister as he descended them. But a week ago, missing a step and tumbling all the way to the bottom and smashing his face on the corner of a table. Turning his whole face the color of a plum with eyes peering out. Misshapen and thick with blood like an English sausage . A face so bad you couldn’t have looked at it and not immediately known something was seriously wrong. 

“And they just put him to bed like that. Didn’t pick up the phone even though I’m just down the goddamned street. Just let him lay there dying. Couldn’t even call. Now, would you explain to me what the hell is wrong with these people?” 

Andrea claimed it was Bruce and her mother that were responsible. That it was negligence that ultimately killed her father and wasn’t shy in making this clear to her brother.  

But Bruce, when he talked about what had happened later on, didn't agree.  Didn’t think there should be any surprise at all about what ultimately killed their father. That it was hate, pure and simple.  

“I think Mom finally got her chance and took it. He was bedridden and she just hated him to death” 

He talked about how he couldn’t help but think about all that time he was all alone by himself in that bedroom, dying as it turns out, and how it must have finally dawned on him in there that it was no joke. Her hate was real. That she had always meant it and now he was totally fucked. 

Bruce shook his head. “Jesus Christ, just imagine being in that situation and only having Mom to save you” 

“And you, Bruce. You were there too” 

He nodded his head. Didn’t deny he was there, or that he was also to blame, but wanted everyone to remember what had been happening in that house for the last twenty years and how she had been pulling that same shit right up until the end. How even when her husband was sick and dying she couldn’t help herself, still talking to him in nothing but that weird voice of hers. The one that made her talk like a baby. That she would use whenever she was calling her idiot husband a useless son of a bitch. 

Only now she didn’t have to go all around the house hunting for him like a crazy person. She knew exactly where to find him. Went in there bugging him dozens of times a day, standing at the foot of his bed saying the most horrible things to him. Whatever she could think of to make sure he knew how much she hated him. Like making sure he knew how disgusting his bruised purple face was to her and how stupid it looked with his white hair sticking up on top. That it was uncombed and that he should be ashamed. That he looked like a thousand year old clown. That he was a do nothing asshole and he should get out of bed already. Going in and out of his room all day long, leaving for a few minutes, and then coming right back in to say the same things to him all over again. And all Dave could do as he lay there was moan and refuse his soup and feebly try to wave her away. 

“If you want to know what killed him, that’s what killed him. The fact that his wife was such a mean, miserable bitch” 

“And because you didn’t call me” 

Yes, that too, he admitted. Of course, of course. He never denied it. But as usual Andrea was completely missing the point of what he was trying to say and didn’t know what the fuck she was talking about. Bruce didn't even know why he was trying to explain it to her. She hadn’t lived in the house for so long, but pretended everything was like how she left it forty years ago. Wouldn’t believe their mother ever meant any of the things she had said.  

“It’s not like she actually hated him, Bruce. Not really. Who could have hated dad?” 

He had given her a good life, after all. She had nothing to complain about.