When Murphy Died

Did you ever have a friend who brought out the best in you.... made you bigger and better than you are; someone who made you feel good about yourself and the whole world? I was fortunate enough to have someone like that. Lianne Murphy was my best friend in highschool. We were always together. Fric and Frac, my English teacher called us and sometimes Tweedledum and Tweedledee.
She was just Murphy to most people; Murph to me (unless I had a few beers and then she was Murrr). She became known exclusively by her surname because of a habit she clung to religiously throughout highschool. You see, Murphy was not a morning person. Every morning in home-room would find her slumped over her desk, sound asleep. That's why she always chose a desk at the back of the room, usually behind a massively built football player. When the teacher took attendance and called "Murphy,"it was my job to poke her awake so she could answer, "Present." When that failed and the teacher called a little louder and meaner,"MURPHY", I often answered for her. I could do a fair impression of her voice. I still can. She had a sweet, lilting, musical voice, perhaps harking back to her Irish roots.

When Murphy woke up, the sun came out. She was brilliant. She was beautiful to look at, beautiful to listen to,  just beautiful,  down to her soul. She was filled with joy and humor and she shared both generously. She was spilling over with music, always singing. When the teachers told her to stop singing in class she would hum. When they told her to stop humming, she would whistle under her breath. We took violin lessons together and played well in tandem. We played many duets at many assemblies and theatrical productions. She played better, without a doubt. She was everything I was not and wanted to be but I was never envious of her.

Oddly enough, she was jealous of my drawing talent and my job, writing for the school newspaper. She could speak and sing like an angel but she could not string a handful words together on paper. Nothing would delight her more than when I drew a funny little cartoon and passed it to her in class or wrote her a limerick or rhyme. Many a note was intercepted by teachers and sometimes we were detained after school. But a time or two I caught the teacher smiling at some little picture or poem of mine.

Boys clustered around Murph like bees around an exotic bloom. She was as golden haired as I was dark. But we were as close as Siamese twins and I benefitted from that and was included in all the fun and frolics that followed her from place to place. I was even asked for dates by boys who probably wouldn't have looked twice at me if I wasn't in Murphy's posse.

But all was not rosy in Murphy's life. Her parents had begun to argue a lot and snipe at each other and even worse were the cold silences that could last for days. One night, I was startled out of a deep sleep by a tapping on my bedroom window. I was about to scream for my dad when I heard Murphy's voice calling my name. I opened the window and she practically cannon-balled into my room. She had tears streaming down her face and was talking so fast I could not understand her. I shushed her and got some tissues and a glass of milk and told her to talk slow and keep her voice down.
Between sobs and gasps, I gathered that her father had walked out on her mom; out of the house and as it unfolded, entirely out of their lives. He later married a younger woman and moved from the province. Murphy was devastated. She adored her father. She cried herself to sleep, curled up on the end of my bed. I stayed awake for a long time thinking about the contrariness and selfishness of adults. I never thought he would be so callous as to abandon his beautiful daughter so completely. I realized then,  as never before,  that I was the fortunate one. I was cherished by my dad.
Some of the sunshine went out of Murphy after that. Oh, she was still charming and funny and charismatic but something was gone and she didn't sing so often any more.

When Murphy died ..... 2

Murphy didn't speak of her father at all after the night she came to me and cried her heart out. She threw herself, almost frantically, into a hectic social life. She became involved in a fairly serious relationship with a very nice guy. I remember his name was Graham and he was an A student. He was a track star and won trophies for the school. He was good looking in a Ryan Seacrest kind of way. There was ongoing speculation about how involved they were. Graham was interested in medical research and so he would be in school for a long time. The rest of us knew we were too immature for serious relationships. We just wanted to have fun and shyly, tentatively edge our way toward having sex or lying about it, at least.

Summer was the best time of all. Those glorious sun filled days when we were bursting with energy and hormones and endless possibilities. Many of those days were spent at our favorite beach, Port Elgin, a popular resort in Ontario.

Most of the kids in my immediate group of friends had European sports cars of varying vintages and in various stages of rehabilitation, according to their financial situation. At that time, in Canada, they were fairly easy to come by and not very expensive. I had an old red MGA (probably worth something now).  A couple of friends had Triumphs and I remember Greg Forte had an Austin Healey (definitely worth something now).  Greg was huge.  I could never figure how he crammed his bulk into that car.

It was a contest to see how many bodies we could squeeze into those little two seaters. I could pile two people in my passenger seat and two more sat on the trunk with their legs dangling behind the seats. All the stragglers and less popular people climbed into the back of an old pickup belonging to a nice but geeky guy named Don Shuster who kind of followed us around but stayed on the fringe of the group. Off we would go in a caravan down the highway and we didn't go slowly.

Geez Louise, If I saw my kids taking chances like that I'd freak . Fortunately they have a lot more sense than I did.

One particular halcyon day we arrived at the beach shouting and singing at the top of our lungs and drove to our favorite spot where the sand was packed nice and hard and we could take the cars fairly close to the water. Murph and I liked to stroll along the water's edge and collect clam shells and fossils and bits of interesting driftwood. So, we wandered off while the others cavorted like retarded seals in the water. We spoke now and then. Our silences were comfortable. She told me she was very much in love with Graham. I wanted to know if she could see herself married to Graham but we both spotted a tiny rowboat dragged up on the sand and the question went out of my head.

"Let's take it out,"she said with a mischievous Murphy grin.

"Why not?"said I.

We shoved off and jumped aboard. We rowed enthusiastically and because Murphy pulled so hard on her oar we travelled in a big circle.

"Ease up a bit," I told her. She did, but even so, we moved in bigger circles until I just gave up in disgust.

"We're going nowhere like this," although I noticed we had drifted out some.

Murphy thought it was funny. I smiled at her and we laid back in the boat and looked up at the hot blue sky. It was so peaceful being rocked by the waves and lulled by the lapping sounds, I was almost seduced into a doze.

Lake Huron is mercurial and can go from smooth as glass to rough and choppy in a moment. I noticed we were being buffeted by the waves that had soothed us a short time ago. I sat up just as we were broadsided by a fair sized wave and tipped to portside.  We hung on and I suggested we row like hell back to shore.  We had drifted out quite far from the beach. Again we circled, until I cried, "You row, you're stronger", and I ducked under my oar and fell to my knees in the bow.

I was overwhelmed with fear for Murphy, she couldn't swim . She worked those oars like Wonder Woman and got us about twenty feet from shore. Then the boat skewed sideways and was broadsided again. Murphy outweighed me and her weight, sliding to my side of the boat, tipped us over. Fortunately the lake is shallow for quite a distance from shore and we came up spluttering and laughing. We dragged the boat back up onto the beach minus an oar which I managed to retrieve from the water and made our way, sandy and soggy, back to the party of shrieking teens.

A couple of hibachis appeared and Greg grilled up a feast. He always did. He was magic. I don't know why his food always tasted so good. Maybe it had something to do with the day, the sunshine and the utter joy of being young. We drove home happy and replete. I learned an important lesson that day. I couldn't bear to lose Murphy.

To be continued