Driving With Dead People (5 page)

“I’m Dave Kilner, a friend of your dad’s,” he said, and held out his hand.

I forgot the scrapes and looked up. I was staring at “Kilner” from Kilner and Sons Mortuary. I shook Dave’s hand and wondered if it had touched Sarah Keeler.

He was saying something about the barbecue, but I was staring at his face.

I’d imagined “Kilner” to be short, pale, and creepy with greasy dark hair and maybe a black cape, but this man was downright gorgeous. He was blond, with a Barbie-and-Ken-type smile, and he wore a bright blue sweater with khaki shorts.

I was instantly in love with Dave Kilner and his tan legs.

He pointed toward a picnic table. “Those girls over there are mine. Would you like to meet them?”

“Okay,” I said, wondering where the “sons” from “Kilner and Sons” were.

I followed him over to the three girls. I was surprised that an undertaker would have a normal, non-zombie family, and disappointed that my dad sold hand tools instead of funerals.

“This is Julie, Liz, and Amanda,” Dave said.

“Hi,” I offered.

“This is Monica. Her dad’s a friend of mine.” I wished he’d quit saying that. Dave turned to me. “Julie’s on a softball team in town.” Julie smiled with her mouth closed. She had wavy black hair down to her shoulders, a small turned-up nose, and beautiful green eyes surrounded by thick black lashes.

I wasn’t allowed to play softball in Elk Grove because it was too far for Mom to drive me to practices and games.

Julie and I stared at each other.

“Well, I’m going to leave you kids to your fun,” Dave said, patting my shoulder and walking away.

I turned to Julie. She looked at me. I looked at Liz and Amanda, who were a lot younger than we were. Liz looked just like a boy. I couldn’t even imagine that she was, in fact, a girl. Julie was picking a scab on her knee.

“So, your dad owns the mortuary?” I asked. Julie looked up, surprised. “I was there once,” I added for clarity.

“What does your dad own?” Julie asked.

“Buzz saws,” I answered. “But I own a collie.”

“I have a beagle,” Julie said. “His name is Sparky.”

“My dog is Buddy, but she has cancer.”

“Sparky has allergies,” she countered. Damn, that sounded worse than cancer.

“Terrible,” I said.

Julie smiled with her teeth showing. “Let’s eat,” she said, and we ran toward the food line. Liz and Amanda stayed at the picnic table.

Julie and I spent the day climbing tall Black Walnut trees that surrounded the Rotary Club. The walnuts were lime green and filled with brown juice that squished out, staining my hands and sweater. Julie and I picked them off branches and hurled them at predetermined targets: a trash can, a gray rock, a rotting tree stump. Each time we hurled one, barely missing a parked car or a squirrel, we howled with laughter. Mom was going to kill me for acting like a “heathen” in public, but I didn’t care. Julie climbed higher than I did, even though I was a good climber. I gathered the courage to follow her, and way above the barbecue, we spied on people we knew.

“Your dad is hilarious,” she said, indicating the laughter coming from the barbecue pit.

“Yeah, he’s funny,” I said.

“You’re lucky,” she said. “My dad’s
so
boring.”

“He seems okay,” I countered.

“He’s not like your dad,” she said. I looked at Dad. He did look okay. In fact, he looked almost handsome, like someone I’d want to know but didn’t.

“That’s my sister Becky,” I said, pointing to the swings. “Her hair’s so long, she can sit on it. If she doesn’t hold it up, it gets in the toilet.” Julie’s eyebrows flew up, impressed.

The tractors were huffing and puffing over at the tractor pull, and from up in the walnut tree, we could see black smoke coiling up in the air and my Papaw sitting in the black metal seat of his red Farmall tractor. He was turned around backward, watching the pile of gray cinder blocks that had been loaded onto the pallet he was pulling. The front two wheels of his tractor weren’t even touching the ground as he kept gunning the engine.

“I think my papaw’s going to do a backward roll on his tractor,” I said, pointing toward the action.

Each time a tractor made it past the finish line, the crowd cheered and clapped as another weight was added. The last tractor still moving at the end would be the winner.

Papaw had four trophies with tiny gold tractors on top sitting above his television already, and it looked like he was headed for his fifth.

Jamie and my cousin Paul were perched on a white wooden fence, watching the competition.

“That’s my brother, Jamie, over there,” I said, pointing.

“He’s cute,” Julie said. I was startled by this, so I didn’t say anything. Finally, Julie asked, “Where do you live?”

“Galesburg,” I said.

“You live really far from me,” she said. “I live in Elk Grove.”

I felt my face flush. I wanted to live in Elk Grove too—especially in the funeral home.

“Let’s go on a hayride,” I suggested, changing the subject.

We climbed down and ran toward the hay wagon, sawdust blowing around our bony ankles. It was a perfect day.

After the trophies were awarded (Papaw got second place) and the homemade ice cream was served and eaten, it was time to get into the station wagon and head home.

Dave Kilner patted my back. “You’ll have to come to the house one of these days,” he said. I was giddy with excitement, picturing myself playing Twister in the mortuary.

“I would love to,” I told him.

“Well, see ya,” Julie said, shrugging her shoulders.

“See ya,” I said as I climbed into our station wagon next to Becky. There was no way I was getting a window seat.

As we drove off, Dad gave a “great guy” wave to his friends. We’d barely pulled onto Highway 64 when he growled, “Quit kicking my goddamn seat.” I wasn’t kicking his seat, but I smiled anyway. I’d just met the undertaker-father of my dreams, and his family.

Dad wasn’t going to ruin my day.

The night before I started fourth grade, I couldn’t sleep because I was worried about my new classroom. Fourth grade was in a bigger building with a pink steel tube snaking out of the second floor and slithering to an end on the asphalt playground. If there was a blaze, I worried that teachers would toss us headfirst into that dark, winding fire escape and we’d zip to the bottom, landing in a huge pile of skinned knees and chipped teeth on the blacktop.

In fourth grade I’d have to change classrooms for the first time in my life. I was supposed to stay in Mrs. Eaton’s room all day until two p.m., and then I had to walk next door to Mr. Nash’s class for science. After that, it was back to Mrs. Eaton for homeroom. I would never remember it all.

I was so worked up during breakfast, Jamie offered to walk me up there.

“I won’t hold your hand, though,” he said.

“Don’t hold mine either,” I snapped over my shoulder as I got up to get dressed.

That morning I didn’t even watch Sam Lunsford get on the bus. I leaned my forehead against the window and worried.

After Wanda had thrown up and Dad had passed us at Liddy’s house, Jamie escorted me to fourth grade. As we clomped up the stairs, Jamie said, “I don’t know why you’re gettin’ all worked up. I’m the one who has to take algebra.”

“Because I’m the one who has to be in a new place,” I said.

“I’m the one who has to take shop with Mr. Smythe, the dictator,” Jamie continued.

“I’m the one who barely survived Mrs. Baker’s class last year,” I said, “since she
hated
me.”

“She liked you, but you wouldn’t stop talking,” he said. I rolled my eyes.

We rounded the corner on the top floor and I saw her—my salvation—my chance at a new family, a family that lived in a mortuary, where the dead side of me would be welcomed. Julie Kilner was standing right beside the doorway to room 214, Mrs. Eaton’s room.

She was wearing a bright red cotton jumper with a blue-and-white-striped turtleneck and wire-rimmed glasses shaped like two octagons. I ran to Julie.

“Are you going to be in my class?” I asked.

“I guess so,” she said.

“I’m Monica. Remember me?” She looked vague. “We rode in the hay wagon.”

Julie nodded.

Waving off Jamie, I turned to her. “This’ll be a piece of cake. Let’s go in.”

Jamie walked back downstairs and I put my arm around Julie’s waist, as if she were one of the senior citizens down at Marigold Manor nursing home, and guided her into the classroom.

“Well, hello, girls,” a sweet voice called out. I turned and saw something I had only seen about three times in my entire life: a black woman. Mrs. Eaton, my new fourth-grade teacher, was
black
. Her hair was the same length all over and curled under just below her ears. She wore her navy sweater around her shoulders like an elegant cape that was clasped just below her neck with a stylish red stickpin. She was beautiful.

“I’m Monica and this is Julie Kilner,” I said. “She’s new.”

“Are you from Bloomfield School?” Mrs. Eaton asked.

“There’s not school there anymore,” Julie said.

Mason County was closing many of the smaller county schools and consolidating them into one. It turned out there were three new kids from Bloomfield School in my class.

Mrs. Eaton showed us to our seats. Julie sat in the third row because her last name started with a
K
, but I was back and toward the middle because of the
P
in Peterson.

Two weeks later Mrs. Jenkins, the music teacher, told our class we’d be dancing to “Meet Me in St. Louis” for the fall music festival. There weren’t enough boys to partner all the girls, so Mrs. Jenkins pointed to me and said, “You’re a boy.”

I was furious as I stood there in my pleated skirt and white knee socks.
Do I look like a boy?
I wanted to know. It had to be my crappy short haircut that doomed me.

My partner turned out to be Julie Kilner because I was tall and she was short. We spent our time at rehearsal talking and laughing instead of dancing.

Julie was becoming my very best friend.

At the open house that fall Dad actually showed up. But when Mrs. Eaton came over to talk to him, he started stammering instead of speaking. That’s when I remembered Dad hated black people. I had forgotten that Mrs. Eaton
was
black.

As we were walking back toward the car, I heard Dad say, “I didn’t know the coons were going to be there.” He laughed.

“Don’t start, Glen,” Mom said.

“What did I say?” he asked, grinning. I wasn’t even sure.

“Let it go,” Mom said.

“What, the nigger in there? I just didn’t know I was paying taxes for a nigger to teach my kid, that’s all.” Mom shook her head and glanced at me. My mouth flopped open in shock, and a wave of fury swept over me.

I never wanted him near Mrs. Eaton again. I worried she knew Dad hated her. I worried she would think I was the same.

One Saturday afternoon Mom took Granda to JC Penney’s to buy a new nightgown.

At around five o’clock our local radio station reported a tornado had been spotted on the ground. As soon as Dad heard the news and checked the falling barometer on the dining room wall, he shoved our reluctant hind ends into the station wagon and drove seventy miles an hour toward Flora Meyer’s farm.

“That’s where they’re brewin’,” Dad said excitedly to no one in particular.

“Great,” I said, making Jamie laugh.

“You’re gonna love this,” Dad said, flipping on his movie camera as he drove. He glanced at our pale faces in the rearview mirror and smiled. He knew we were petrified, which made him positively giddy.

I couldn’t figure out which was more worrisome, seeing a real tornado or Dad losing control of the station wagon, hitting a phone pole, and ejecting us out into Curly Tillison’s cornfield.

In the backseat Jamie was sitting by the window, then me, then Becky, and JoAnn by the other window.

The four of us figured it was only a matter of time before we met death by car or by weather. Maybe today it would be both. If there were such a thing as death by humiliation, we would have been dead already.

Jamie looked over at us and mouthed, “Holy shit,” but he was smiling.

“We’re dead,” I mouthed back, making a slashing gesture across my throat. I was only half-kidding.

Becky elbowed me. I pointed to her and rolled my eyes at Jamie. JoAnn faced the window, silent.

As if it weren’t harrowing enough, Dad rolled down his window and stuck his head out, preparing to film as we sped down the narrow country road.

“I see one. Look right over there,” he crowed. “I knew it. I
knew
it!” He pointed with the hand that was supposed to be guiding the steering wheel. We swerved, but he managed to maneuver the car back onto the road.

I craned my neck to see what he was pointing to, and there in the western sky were four tornados dipping up and down. They were skinny and black, winding against the sunset. I grabbed Becky’s and JoAnn’s knees. “I see them,” I said, holding my breath.

“Four at once!” Dad yelled back to us. “We hit the jackpot!” He whipped the car into a tight U-turn and came to a stop facing the other direction.

“You gotta get out and see this,” he said. “You might never have another chance.” He bolted out of the car.

Our stomachs were still getting over the U-turn as we opened our doors and grudgingly stepped out. I was starting to get mad now. We were at the mercy of a crazy man.

Dad’s face looked completely different: open, hopeful. Here was a chance for us to be a part of his life, to have him include us, yet none of us could even speak. We stood by a barbed wire fence, watching the tornados heading straight for us.

“Oh shit! It flattened something. Did you see the debris?” Dad said, one eye squeezed shut, the other pressed against the viewfinder of the camera.

When he didn’t hear a response, he looked over at our stunned, angry faces. “You bunch of cowards,” he said. “You don’t think this is exciting?” he asked.

No one answered. Dad shook his head and looked back toward the west. His face didn’t look open or hopeful anymore. He swung around. “Get in the car. Hurry. Get in the car. It’s changed directions.”

All five of us climbed over one another trying to scramble back into the station wagon. When Dad made it into the driver’s seat, he turned the key and stepped on the gas without making sure we were all inside. Jamie’s door wasn’t even closed yet.

On the way back he drove just as fast, the movie camera, which was now turned off, bouncing across the passenger seat.

We skidded into our driveway and the four of us kids bailed out, running toward the basement stairs. Dad stayed in the car. As we made it down into the basement, I heard him hit the gas and squeal away.

We all reacted differently to our volatile home life. Jamie played sports, JoAnn dreamed of “77,” Becky pretended everything was fine, and I continued to tell lies.

Wearing my red-white-and-blue poncho with the white fringe around the edges, I sat cross-legged on the playground at school, playing jacks. My mom had permed my hair over the weekend and it bounced in shrunken ringlets around my face while I dropped the ball, swooped up jacks, and talked in a low, secretive voice. The other fourth-grade girls were huddled around listening. Leslie Hathaway, the only fourth grader with red hair, asked questions.

“How do you know she wants to kill you?”

“Because she gives me clues while she’s directing the choir.” I bounced the ball and grabbed the last two jacks.

“Like what?”

“Like Tuesday when we were practicing in the auditorium for the concert, she pointed at me and mouthed, ‘You’re next.’”

“No way. Mrs. Jenkins?”

“Wait and see.” I shook the jacks in my closed palms and watched them scatter.

“When?”

“In the middle of the winter concert, when no one can hear the shot or know where it’s coming from.”

“She’s going to shoot you?”

“Yes.” I rolled my eyes and scooped up more jacks.

“That’s crazy. Why would Mrs. Jenkins want to shoot you?”

“I don’t know. She’s been interested in me for a long time.” I bounced the ball.

“Do you know which part of the concert?”

“While we’re singing ‘Embraceable You.’”

“That’s a spooky song.”

“Exactly.”

The bell rang, signaling the end of recess.

The winter concert came and went without a single shot fired. I was annoyed that no one was surprised. Wasn’t anyone taking me seriously?

One Wednesday night in early spring, the phone rang and it was Julie’s mom, Joan Kilner. I heard my mom say, “Yes, that would be fine. I’ll pick Monica up on Saturday.” Julie’s mom had invited me to spend the night.

It would be my first overnight and it would be at Julie Kilner’s mortuary/house. Would there be beds or coffins? Would there be wilted flowers in their house left over from funerals? Would someone die in the night, causing all of us to wake up and get busy?

I was bouncing off the walls. I would need a sleeping bag, I figured, and some new pajamas. Mom figured I didn’t need either.

Friday I climbed onto the bus with Mom’s square green suitcase packed with my yellow pajamas, my toothbrush, a pair of panties, socks, jeans, a long-sleeved shirt, a brush, and my macramé belt. Kyle Whitmore was curious.

“Are you running away from home?” he asked in his dry voice.

“No, I’m spending the night at Julie Kilner’s,” I informed him. I was
so
much older than him now, even though he was a whole year older than I was. “I’m going home with her right after school, so I won’t be on the bus tonight.” Kyle looked at me blankly. I flipped my nonexistent ponytail and hopped up the stairs of the bus. I couldn’t wait to get to Julie’s house. This day was going to last forever.

When school finally ended, I walked beside Julie and was surprised when we climbed onto a school bus. The mortuary was within walking distance of school.

As we rolled past St. Mary church, Julie said, “I have two friends that go there.”

My head jerked up; maybe she’d known Sarah Keeler. I would remember to ask her later.

I looked out the window. The bus rolled right past Kilner and Sons Mortuary and headed out of town.

“Don’t you live in Elk Grove?” I asked in a panic. After all, the mortuary looked just like a house.

“Yeah, but out by the bowling alley.” She was brushing her hair. Julie carried a brush, Dr Pepper–flavored ChapStick, and pencils with her name on them in a plastic navy purse. No store ever had things with
my
name on them. Monica was a weird name, a goofy name. I didn’t even know where Mom got it.

All I wanted to be was normal—like a “Jill” or a “Laura” or, and this was the best, a “Julie.”