Here and Again (10 page)

His head lay upon her left shoulder now and she turned, taking the full of him into her arms. “Is that how the glass was broken up there on his table? Someone sending love without a ‘Please pass this’ to the next person seated at the table?” she asked, gazing up into his shadowed face.

“I said that’s what it looks like to me.”

She kissed his neck quickly, sliding out of his arms and grabbing his hand. “Come on. Time for bed.”

“Is everything all right, daughter?” Grandpa Henry called from downstairs.

“What are you doing up?” Ginger asked.

“He wanted a piece of your apple pie.” Osbee’s reply came from the direction of their bedroom.

“Doesn’t anyone sleep in this house?” Ginger inquired, shoving Jesse into their room. “Good night to both of you.” Before either Henry or Osbee could answer, Ginger shut the door.

“In bed,” she ordered, and obediently Jesse climbed in. Shuffling in the darkness around to the other side, Ginger pulled the covers down and crawled beneath them. The bedsheets were cold.

“If you had gone to bed, the covers would be warmer,” she noted with a shiver.

“Come over here,” he said, his arm slithering through the blankets and wrapping around her waist. He pulled her beneath him, leaning his face closer for a kiss.

“We’re going home to Fort Bragg and then we’ll be back here next vacation. And this Kronos person and his table can just do without you ’cause that corn is gonna come up and Grandpa Henry will be waiting for help.” She waited.

“Okay,” he replied.

“Fine,” she said, turning to face him. She found him hovering over her, staring at her through the shadows.

“I will always return here,” he said softly.

She touched his cheek.

“To my orchard,” she whispered. She couldn’t hear it, but she knew he was laughing quietly as he kissed her neck, for his body gently quaked in her arms.

“And Henry,” she added.

“And Henry and your orchard and the corn,” he agreed, and then she kissed him.

•••

T
here was no alarm. There was the smell of bacon and a door opening. It was just light outside and without so much as a courtesy to Regard, Ginger flung the covers off and jumped out of bed.

“Wait!” she yelled.

“We’re gonna miss the bus,” Bea called up the stairs.

“I’m coming,” Ginger replied, shimmying into a pair of jeans and sliding a sweatshirt over her head. Quickly, she grabbed a pair of socks and stuck her feet into them as she headed down the stairs.

“Don’t kill yourself, Ginger, my dear,” Osbee said. The old woman appeared at the bottom of the stairs holding Jesse’s coat and her rubber boots.

“Why didn’t you guys wake me up?” she asked, pulling on her boots.

“You didn’t sleep at all yesterday,” Osbee replied, offering the coat.

“Yeah, but we’re together on this.
We
have to walk to the bus.” Ginger put the coat on and stepped outside. Though she was shocked by the cold, having just flung herself out of bed, Ginger had a sense that it had warmed up a bit from yesterday. Henry and Oliver were waiting for her on the porch, looking at their bikes. Bea was already down the drive.

“Wait, Bea!” Ginger called and, motioning to her sons, skipped down the front steps. They had to walk briskly to catch up to her daughter.

“You see my bike, Mama?” Oliver asked, his backpack bobbing up and down as he trotted to keep up.

“I did.”

“Grandma and Grandpa brought each of us one. Mine and Bea’s have the training wheels.”

“I saw that.”

“I don’t need training wheels,” Bea announced over her shoulder.

“Yeah, you will,” Henry said, adjusting Oliver’s backpack a little so it would stop bouncing so much.

“Will not,” Bea replied.

“We’ll see when the snow clears a little more,” Ginger said. “Maybe she’ll need them. Maybe she won’t.”

“I need mine,” Oliver said, taking his mother’s hand.

“Yes, you do. So, what’s your favorite part of
Harry the Dirty Dog
?” Ginger asked, looking down at her youngest. She knew, of course, that Oliver’s favorite part of that story was lying in bed with his brother, having it read to him.

“When he slides down the coal chute,” Oliver said.

“That’s a good part.”

“I like that his name is Harry,” Henry said. “Harry can be my name, too.”

“Henry is not Harry,” Bea said.

“It is, too. Daddy said King Henry was known as King Harry, too.”

“But Henry’s your name and you are not a king,” Bea replied.

“But I can be called Harry just like you’re Bea and Mama’s Ginger.”

“Oh.” Bea stopped.

As they passed her, Ginger looked back. Her daughter’s eyes were closed.

“‘
The gentler gamester is the soonest winner,
’” she said and, opening her eyes, began to walk again.

“Yep,” Henry said.

Ginger shook her head and gazed up, wondering if Jesse was sitting at Kronos’s table laughing at all this. Most kids could quote
Harry the Dirty Dog
or some other children’s story at eight years old. Ginger supposed only a child of Jesse Martin’s could quote
Henry V
with any accuracy. At that thought Ginger gazed down to Oliver.

“You know anything from
Henry V
, Oliver?” she asked.

Oliver shrugged.

Henry snickered and prompted his brother. “The dolphin king.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Oliver grinned. He stopped and lifted his right fist to the sky. “‘But tell the Dolphin I will keep my state, be like a king and show my sail of greatness when I do rouse me in my throne of France.’”

Oliver beamed up at her as he took his mother’s hand once more. Bea skipped by, giggling. Watching it all in wonder, Ginger smiled as her daughter went past them, for she hadn’t heard a giggle from Bea in over a year. Now Oliver could quote Shakespeare at five if prompted by his older brother. Perhaps things were settling back to an odd shape of normal. There was a hope.

“The bus!” Bea yelled and took off running. Henry was right on her heels and Oliver, shaking free of his mother’s hand, brought up the rear.

“Wait up!” he whined.

Ginger stopped where she was and watched them board the bus. Henry stopped at the door, letting Bea go in before him. That was just as Jesse had taught him to do. Then up came Oliver, and Henry helped his little brother reach the bottom step of the bus. That was just as she had taught him to do. Henry smiled broadly and waved at her as he climbed aboard. She waved back. The bus
doors closed behind him and she thought to herself how lucky she was to have them all.

Ginger didn’t move as the bus pulled away. It headed down the road and when it had nearly disappeared over the rise, she waited for the heaviness to return as it had done for a year and nine months. Today, it did not. All that filled her mind now was Oliver and his Shakespearean quote. She chuckled. She lifted her right fist to heaven.

“‘But tell the Dolphin I will keep my state, be like a king and show my sail of greatness when I do rouse me in my throne of France,’” she said. A crow cawed in reply from a tree far off in a field on the Creeds’ farm.

“The word is not ‘Dolphin.’ It is ‘Dauphin,’” a voice said behind her.

Spinning on her heel, Ginger turned and at the sight of him stumbled back, tripping in the ditch and hitting her head against the Creeds’ fence. Her heart came to a full and complete stop.

“Good morning, Virginia Moon,” Samuel said softly.

Heaven and Earth

S
amuel stood still, cap in hand, his uniform, hair, and bedroll exactly as it had been the last time she had seen him. Her mind floated inside her skull, having no direction or anchor, completely disconnected from the cold and morning light as she looked at him. Confused electrical signals flashed across her gray cells, trying to make sense of him. Why had he come back? How? Was he a crazy man? A weirdo? She tried to believe something of him. But there was neither belief nor sense. There was only the fear of a strange man returning to her family.

“Virginia Moon?” His eyes grew narrow with a look of sincere concern.

Without a thought, she slid toward Smoot’s farm, her back firmly planted on the Creeds’ fence.

“What is it?” he asked.

Ginger shook her head, moving sideways up the fence as if climbing a horizontal ladder. She needed to get away from him, unsure what he wanted or why he was back.

“Are you well, Virginia Moon?” Samuel was sidestepping, his face never turning to look where he was going, his eyes fixed upon her. They were soft and brown just as they had been when he stood upon the fallen tree.

A scream wound its way up her trachea, climbing into her throat. She shook her head again.

“You’ve hit your head. Let me help.” He reached out his hand.

“
No!
” Ginger screamed, and in that second her floating mind found anchor in her feet, which then realized it was time to move, and fast. Cold from standing in the water of the ditch, they jumped from the sinking mud, racing next to the fence toward the house.

The house
. So far in the distance. So white. So warm. Was she coming any closer to it? She could hear her own scream as if it were someone else’s terror far away. Running now, she was slow, the weight of her own muddy feet hindering her speed. She wasn’t sure she was even moving.

Suddenly, Samuel was at her side and his nearness caused her to trip over her own heavy feet and fall down into the muddy snow.

“Virginia, you are afraid.” His voice was gentle, nearly a whisper.

“Going home.” She breathed, struggling forward on her hands and knees, the snow and mud seeping into her jeans and jacket. Her eyes gazed desperately at her white house on the little rise ahead.

“I have been trying. There is a bridge now across Laurel Creek and I have endeavored to cross it twice. I enter but find myself exiting through your bridge in the orchard.”

Ginger didn’t look at him. She tried not to see him, tried to focus only on her white home up ahead. But inexorably her eyes
were drawn to his feet, which were planted right next to her; they were not sinking, but simply standing upon the snowy mud. She froze, staring at his tattered leather boots. Glancing back over his path, she found not one of his footprints anywhere in the mud and snow.

“How?” she whispered.

“I want to go home, but something draws me back here. Are you calling me, Virginia Moon?”

“Ginger!” A hand touched her shoulder.

“No!”
she screamed and, flipping over in the ditch, found Eloise Schaaf standing over her. Ginger blinked, closing her eyes tightly and opening them again. The silhouette of Eloise Schaaf bent toward her. Shuddering, Ginger leaned forward, away from the fence, looking up and down the road. Samuel was nowhere to be seen. There was only Eloise Schaaf’s pale yellow Ford truck stopped next to the ditch and Eloise herself hovering overhead.

“Ginger. Are you okay?”

“I—I—”

“Come here.” Taking Ginger by the hand, Eloise lifted her from the snowy mud and together they walked up onto the asphalt. Reticently, Ginger looked over the truck. Samuel wasn’t there, either.

“Wh-what happened?”

“You hit your head?” Eloise asked.

“My head?”

“You were facedown in the mud. Come on. I’ll take you home.”

Ginger turned around and found she stood exactly where she had been when she waved good-bye to Henry.

“I ran.” She coughed, holding her right temple as Eloise led her around the bed of the truck to the passenger side. Opening
the door, she helped her in. The car was very warm, as the heater was on full.

“I’m muddy,” Ginger said, trying to climb back out.

“It’s all right. We’ll clean it up when we get you home.” Eloise shut the door and trotted around the front of the truck. Though of the same age as Osbee, Mrs. Schaaf appeared to be older. Her hair was short and gray-white in color and she had it neatly set by a beautician every two weeks. Eloise looked like a grandma. That was very comforting at the moment.

“I saw you slide in the mud,” Eloise said as she climbed into the cab of her truck. “You hit your head? It looked like it but I couldn’t tell. I was still coming around the corner.”

Ginger held her temple. Engaging the engine, they drove toward Smoot’s farm.

“You saw me fall?”

“Don’t you remember?”

“Did you see anyone else, Eloise?” She scanned the Creeds’ field and their dark gray house to the left and then the Schaafs’ trees to the right, looking for Samuel.

“No. Just you. You okay?”

Ginger shook her head. “I don’t know.”

Pulling up the gravel drive, Ginger saw Osbee standing on the porch. Eloise stopped the truck and opened her door.

“Osbee, help me with Ginger.”

“I think I’m all right,” Ginger said quietly, opening her own door and sliding out.

“What happened?” Osbee exclaimed. “You’re muddy.”

“I fell.”

“She hit her head on the fence,” Eloise added. Carefully, Ginger climbed the steps of the porch as she held on to Osbee’s hand. Once inside the house, they headed up to the second floor.

“Can you make it?” Osbee asked, following her.

“Yeah. I need to get out of these muddy things.” Stepping into the bathroom, she flicked on the light and looked in the mirror. She pulled her muddy brown hair up, and just where her ginger-colored roots were growing back in over her right eye, she found a small gash and a growing knot.

“Here,” Osbee said, leaning into the small bathroom with a fresh pair of jeans, a clean sweatshirt, and neatly folded underwear.

“I’m okay. Just a lump. I think I’ll take a shower.”

“Eloise and I will wait.”

Letting go of her hair, Ginger gazed over to Osbee. There was a red ribbon on the end of her braid.

“Wait? Wait for what?”

“We have an appointment in Winchester. But we’ll wait to see how you are coming out of the shower. Eloise said you took quite a spill.”

“
We
as in you and Eloise or
we
as in
you
have an appointment and Eloise is driving you to it?” Ginger’s stomach turned. She felt sick.

“Take your shower.” Osbee smiled brightly and shut the door.

Ginger stood motionless for a minute, wondering if her nausea was from the bump on her head or from Osbee’s appointment. She shivered a little, which brought her mind back to her muddy state. Stripping out of her clothes, she climbed into the heat of the shower. It burned her extremities as warm water always does on cold skin and as she washed she thought of Samuel on the road. Perhaps he wasn’t really there. Perhaps she had slid, hit her head, and then passed out. He could merely have been a dream or something in her unconscious state. Did she not run? She remembered running, but when Eloise pulled her from the ditch, it was quite
clear she hadn’t moved an inch closer to the house than where she had been when she waved good-bye to Henry.

By the time she opened the bathroom door, freeing the steam to float away like a warm, friendly spirit, she was absolutely convinced Samuel was just a dream—a thought from Bea’s conversation left unprocessed by her sleep the night before.

“How you feeling?” Osbee asked, standing at the top of the stairs to the right.

Ginger rubbed her head. “Okay.”

“Good. Go back to bed.” Osbee pointed to the bedroom. “You were up all day yesterday and you probably tripped because you’re still tired.”

“I think I sh—”

“Bed.” Osbee pointed again.

“What’s your appointment?” Ginger asked as she obediently made her way to her bedroom.

“Nothing for you to concern yourself with. There are biscuits in foil on the stove. Coffee’s all set to brew. Just press the button when you get up.”

Ginger climbed into bed and as soon as she lay down Osbee drew the covers up under her chin.

“Tucking me in?” Ginger smiled.

“Someone needs to take care of you. You don’t do it yourself, you know.”

“You always say that.”

“It’s always true.” Osbee kissed the bump on Ginger’s forehead. “All better?” she asked, smiling.

Ginger nodded.

“Good. Sleep well.” With that, Osbee left the room, pulling the door behind her so that it was just slightly ajar.

Ginger closed her eyes, listening to the two women talk quietly as they moved around the house. The front door opened.

“No!” Osbee yelled. “Out!”

“Come here, Beau!” Ginger called.

“He’s an outside dog,” Osbee yelled up the stairs. The door burst open and in came Beau.

“Have a good appointment,” Ginger said, taking her hand from beneath her covers and scratching the dog’s head.

“Lie down,” she whispered, and as Beau slid to the ground next to the bed the front door closed. Ginger could hear more muffled conversation and laughter. The car doors shut and the engine turned on. The wheels crunched as they backed down the drive. All was quiet.

Her eyes closed, her breath even, Ginger moved Osbee’s red ribbon across her mind.

Something draws me back here.

Ginger’s eyes popped open.

There is a bridge now across Laurel Creek and I have endeavored to cross it twice. I enter but find myself exiting through your bridge in the orchard.

She sat up. He was a dream. She was certain of it. Gazing out her window, she looked over in the direction of her orchard. There was the covered bridge—a covered bridge over a dried-up stream in the middle of a hairpin curve of the Shenandoah.

“What use was that?” she whispered, and then shuddered.

Picking up the phone next to her bed, she dialed home. Her clock read eight thirty a.m. It was five thirty a.m. on the West Coast. The line picked up.

“Hello?”

“Mom?”

“Ginger?”

“Hey, sorry for calling so early.”

“Tim! It’s Ginger!”

“No. Don’t wake Dad.”

“We’re up, honey. We’re taking inventory.”

Another line picked up. “Ginny Moon,” her dad said, his voice quiet as it always was. “It’s early there. You just get off work?”

“No. Day off.”

“Good, good. What’s up?”

“Um . . . I have a question.”

“You need something?” her mother asked.

“It’s kind of a crazy question.”

“Oh, our favorite kind.” Her parents laughed together.

“Hypothetically speaking.
Hypothetically
.” Ginger rubbed the knot on her forehead. Just a dream. She looked out at the bridge.

“Hypo-theti-cally,” her father repeated.

“How would you get rid of a ghost?” She shut her eyes tightly, cringing at her own words. Ridiculous. The line was silent. Eight thirty-one a.m. Eight thirty-two a.m.

“Monica, baby?” Her father’s quiet voice sounded like he was speaking through a megaphone after such silence.

“Yes, Tim?” her mother replied.

“Did our most practical, pragmatic, no-nonsense daughter just ask us how to get rid of a ghost? Did I hear that right?”

“I think so. Did we hear you right?”

Ginger grimaced at her bedcovers. She offered no answer.

“Ginny?”

“Yes.” A one-word reply was all she’d give them. Somehow, this felt as if she were back in dance class, submitting to their view of the world.

Her father chuckled.

“You have a ghost, Ginger?” her mother asked.

“Hypo-theti-cally,” her father whispered through his gentle laughter.

“I don’t know.”

“Tim, shh. What makes you think you do?”

Ginger thought of what made her think she did. If she said any of it, she’d feel like an idiot. “Do either of you know how to get rid of a ghost? Surely you have an answer amidst all that spiritual stuff in your store.”

“The answer depends on the ghost,” her father said. “Hypothetically speaking, is it a nice ghost or a mean ghost?”

“Nice.” The answer popped out of her mouth so fast, she tripped over her own tongue. That’s all she was going to say. One word.

“Didn’t need to think about that answer, Monica, baby,” Tim said.

“Well, that’s a relief, Ginger.”

“The simple answer, the one that might be most helpful, is simply to tell the ghost to step into the light,” her father said.

The light.
How many times had she heard that statement? Not only from her parents, but in many a bad movie.

“What light?” she asked.

“The light of eternity, Ginny. The Universal Mother. The Creatrix. The Alpha and Omega.”

“The ghost sees it,” her mother said, interrupting her father. “You can’t see it and neither can I, so I can’t explain it to you. Just tell the ghost to look for the light and then head into it.”

“That’s all?”

“Well, it should be all. How are the kids?”

Ginger gazed up at the ceiling. Ghosts to children. Her parents’ way of looking at things could move fast like that. Their stream of consciousness ran ethereal and ephemeral at the same time. There was no separation. Heaven wasn’t elsewhere. God wasn’t elsewhere. To them, they were walking inside of God and God was walking inside of them.

“Good. They were quoting Shakespeare on the way to the bus
stop this morning. Even Oliver. I didn’t really know how much he had learned before Jesse . . .” Ginger trailed off.

She hadn’t really talked to her parents about Jesse since the funeral. The memory of the funeral simply made her homesick. She’d rather speak of anything but that cold gray day. Cold and gray just as it was this day.

•••

G
inger stood, the triangle of the American flag held tightly to her chest with her right arm and little Oliver, just three and a half years old, sleeping on her left shoulder. The flowers on all the arrangements fluttered in bright colors like butterflies suspended in a wire mesh, unable to light and fly away. Osbee held Henry, who still sniffled, in her right hand and Bea, utterly quiet, in her left. The Martins walked away in the distance, speaking with the army chaplain who had given the service. The grave was covered. The sky was gray. Seagulls cried overhead.