Detroit’s annual fireworks display is one of the largest in the country. It’s held in late June rather than July for several reasons, but one of which is that it’s intended to celebrate both Independence Day (4th of July) and Canada Day (July 1st), for our neighbors in Windsor (across the river), hence the “International” in the title. Interestingly, although I’ve lived in Detroit all my life, and last night was the 51st year of the celebration, I’ve never been to the fireworks. My little sister and I were the youngest of our parents’ children and I guess because they were getting older when we were coming up, our parents didn’t take us to things like the zoo or the circus, or to parades or the fireworks as they had done with our older siblings. I remember that I’d always ask my parents if we could go to the fireworks, but we never did.Later, as a teenager and then as a young man, although I wanted to go to the parades and the fireworks, I still didn’t… It just didn’t seem like the kind of thing I’d have enjoyed doing by myself. Sometimes I’d watch those events on television and I’d imagine myself there with someone I loved, but I just didn’t want to go by myself. When I was in the Navy Reserve, I drilled with a Navy Unit at Coast Guard Station Detroit, which is right on the Detroit Riverfront. Every year, during the fireworks, all the personnel including the Navy detachment would bring their families down to go out on the river on a Coast Guard barge to watch the fireworks. Every year I’d make up some excuse for why I had been the only member of my unit not there… I learned to hate July drill weekends, because every year, my shipmates would talk all weekend about how much fun they’d had with their families or their dates during the fireworks, asking me why I never came.
Later when I was running a Detroit district for HRB, my offices were on an upper floor of the historic Dime Building. And as is the tradition among downtown employers with great vantage points for the fireworks, I’d host a viewing party (that I never attended) for any of my 300+ staff who wanted to come down and see the show from the comfort of the district offices. Afterwards, many of my employees would question me about why I hadn’t attended my own party. I have to admit that I’m sure it did seem strange, but I just didn’t want to be there alone, surrounded by folks who seemed to have the only thing I really wanted… Someone they cared enough about to bring. And so it wasn’t until Stephen Christopher Harris came into my life that I began think, “Maybe someday, I’ll get to see the fireworks…”
General Motors Headquarters on the Detroit Riverfront In June of 2007, Stephen was working for GMAC at GM World Headquarters, which is right on the river, directly in front of the fireworks display. I remember being very excited that this year; I’d be going with him to see the show from his office. I knew that just like at the Dime Building and the other buildings downtown, all the offices at GM would be hosting viewing parties for their staff and families. As it got closer to the date, I was anxiously waiting for Stephen to mention to me that we’d be going. He never did… (I’d long since told him about having missed out on seeing such things when I was younger.) I know he was aware that something was bothering me (beyond the usual mistreatment) as the week of the fireworks show arrived, but he never asked me what it was. I’m sure he knew… Finally, on the morning of the fireworks, while he was eating the breakfast I’d prepared for him, as I did every day, I asked him what he wanted me to prepare for his dinner. It was only then that he told me he wouldn’t be home for dinner that night and he’d get something while he was out. He said he’d be working late… So I asked him about the fireworks party.
In looking at him that morning, waiting for him to reply, I could almost see into his head and see the lies he was about to tell form in his mind. At first, he denied that there was a party, and then after he admitted that there would be, he said he’d be working from another site that day and wouldn’t even be downtown. After a few more questions, he finally admitted that was a lie too, but then said he had replied to the HR email about how many tickets he wanted for friends and family, that he wanted none. We had words about it all the way to the front door, where he finally said, he’d given his tickets to Mike Fisher and another nameless friend and that he wasn’t going and that’s why he hadn’t asked me to go. So with that said, I asked again what he wanted for dinner since he’d be home after all. He said he didn’t care as he kissed me and walked out the door.
As I watched him drive away that morning, in my heart of hearts, I knew he’d lied to me… I knew he wouldn’t be home for dinner… I knew he was going to the party… and I knew he was going without me, but that he wasn’t going alone. Nevertheless, after work, I came home, I cooked, I set the table, and I waited. When he wasn’t home by seven, I called him. It went to voicemail; I sat alone at the dining room table for hours watching the ice in the water goblets melt. At ten, when the fireworks were about to begin, I went to bed. As I lay next to where he’d risen that morning, listening to the distant boom of the fireworks on the river, I cried myself to sleep as I had done for many years as a child… disappointed that yet again; another year’s chance to see something spectacular had come and gone without me. He didn’t come home that night, and that was the beginning of our first breakup.
Last night, I went to bed just as I was able to again make out the muffled distant boom of the fireworks exploding over the river. In my mind’s eye, I imagined what it must have looked like to Stephen and whomever he took that year. I imagined the brilliant blaze of a thousand points of multicolored light right before his eyes, almost close enough to reach out and touch… and the scene below on the street, a crowd numbered in the hundreds of thousands all looking upwards to see that same spectacle. And then, as a silent tear escaped my heavy eyelids as if to say, “Why?” I wondered to myself, “Why is there no truth in Stephen Christopher Harris?” Finally wiping away my pitiful tears, I turned to where he once had been, to the pillow that he no longer rests his head upon and I bid him good night as I had every night from even the first night that we slept together, “Good Night Stephen, I Love You…”
*****
“Fear Eats the Soul”
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