Saving Cicadas (26 page)

Later that day, Mama picked up the telephone. Rainey and I were at the kitchen table eating some grits that Mama forgot to salt and butter. Rainey's face looked funny as she tried to gum her way through her bowl. “Yuck,” she said, and got up to get the butter herself. Mama walked out of the kitchen, the phone cord trailing behind her, and started talking real low. But I could hear her.

“Hi, this is Priscilla Macy. I need to make an appointment. Yes, I realize I canceled the other one, but I've changed my mind now.”

Rainey cut two big chunks of butter from the stick and licked her lips as she plopped them in her steaming grits.

“Yes. I'm sure,” said Mama. “Between eight and nine weeks. Thank you. Friday? That's . . . two days. Fine, I'll see you then.”

Chapter Forty-three
A PURPOSE IN LIFE

{Mona}

If there's one thing I've learned, it's this: our purpose in life has very little, if anything, to do with ourselves. Sadly, this is a fact most discover much too late. We spend our days making decisions that will better ourselves, our goals, our quality of life, only to find later that those same decisions are the ones we regret the most. This is not an easy lesson. I, in fact, learned it the hard way.

With no one else around to explain things to Janie, it had fallen upon me to teach her what I knew. I wasn't sure how Janie would accept the news about her role in the Macy family and the fact that she did, indeed, have a part to play in it. A very important part.

Now that Harlan had disappeared as I knew he would, and Priscilla had pushed Fritz away and had come up with the cockamamie idea that she had—that she could not bear her baby any longer—well, sure as the stars, I knew it was time again for me to get involved.

I found Priscilla whimpering and babbling one night in the dark. “Oh, dear Lord, there is nothing left for me to do. I'll have to get a job. I'll get a job so I can stick the baby in day care so that I can go to work to pay for the day care! I'll spend the rest of my days slopping pancakes while he's off riding Marilyn.” I moved in and sat next to her. She stilled when I put my hand on hers. “Wouldn't it be more humane to . . . why would I want to bring a child into a world with no father, where people don't keep their promises . . . and the world is overcrowded anyway . . . and the terrorists, I mean, it's just a matter of time . . . war and sickness . . . not to mention . . .”

I rubbed her forehead and ran my hand along her crown. “Oh Priscilla, dear child. You are making the biggest mistake of your life if you do this. Or maybe second biggest. Third, counting Harlan—no, fourth, counting cutting your hair when you were younger.”

I smiled in the darkness, but she rolled over and shunned me like she was doing everyone who loved her. I took the hint and exited quietly. For a moment, it felt like it did when she was a little girl, except back then she was in the green room. That feeling a mother, a parent, has, of leaving the room with a sleeping child safe behind its doors is like nothing else in the whole world. It's as if in those moments everything makes sense, seems manageable, is worth waking up for the next day. No matter what struggles the daylight will bring, it's that moment of exiting your child's room that refreshes a parent. Fortifies a mother.

But on this evening, middle of July, knowing the trouble my grown-up child had gotten herself into and knowing how hard it would be to dig her out, I walked heavy-footed out the door, the weight of the family on my shoulders. There was no happy feeling to be had.

I walked to the green room where the girls were supposed to be asleep, but when I peeked in, I saw Janie sitting straight up in the dark. Her back was to me and she was facing the faint light from the window. She was holding something in her hands and rocking.

Soon as the door creaked, Janie shuffled and stuck it—whatever it was—under the covers. Rainey was breathing heavy and slow. Janie turned my way.

“Just came to say good night. Wanted to check on you is all.”

“I'm fine,” she said.

“Janie.”

“Huh?”

This was one of the toughest moments I could remember. I just needed to say the first words, to get started and build some momentum.

“Get on up and come with me, child. I've got . . . something to show you.”

Chapter Forty-four
MIDNIGHT STROLL

{Janie}

It was nighttime. I barely ever went outside in the nighttime, and certainly never left home when I did it, but on this night, Grandma Mona was with me. I'm not sure why this made me feel better. She wasn't my favorite person, although I knew she loved me if only in her strange way. Family members have to love each other. It's a rule. Maybe having a grown-up say it was okay, no matter who it was, made it all right to be outside in the dark where damp air could make me catch cold and who-knew-what was waiting to grab me. But still. Something inside me knew a young girl never leaves the house in the middle of the night in a strange new town, even if it is to see something “of the utmost importance,” like Grandma Mona had said it was.

We had no flashlight, so my eyes searched for any light they could find. The world was surprisingly blue after my eyes adjusted to the darkness. Everything looked different—our gingerbread house was just a dark structure no different from Mrs. Shoemaker's yellow one across the street or the other houses along Vinca Lane. We walked along the sidewalk with the quiet
click-brush, click-brush
of Grandma Mona's old lady shoes. I couldn't see the flowers in the sidewalk cracks. They'd become invisible along with everything I remembered this way. We were headed in the direction of the library and of Uncle Fritz's church.

“Where are we going?” I asked again.

I felt the long, hard fingers of Grandma Mona brush against me, then she took my hand and held it gently. I didn't pull away. The feel of her hand in mine brought back memories of Poppy's small, padded hand, how his heat would calm my soul. Somehow, maybe the simple act of connecting with another human being, even if it was Grandma Mona, was just what I needed now. I held her back, and we walked hand in hand.

“Oh Janie, I know this last month must have been difficult for you—your mother's big news, leaving home, coming here to Forest Pines, and to top it all off, your father. Not to mention Grayson. Oh, I know how close you were to your granddaddy. I'm real sorry for how sad it makes you, missing him the way you do. I miss him too, you know.”

“But he's in heaven, and we'll see him again one day. Right?” I said this more to comfort my grandmother, but I found the saying of it to be a comfort for me as well.

“Yes. Absolutely,” she said. “We will be with Poppy again one day. He's in heaven, and it's the finest place you ever want to go. Once you get there, you'll never wish to leave again.”

“So where are we going now?” I asked one more time.

“Janie, you and I are taking a little walk to go visit with Poppy.”

“Visit with Poppy? In heaven?”

“Well, what I mean is . . . some people find comfort in visiting the graves of their loved ones . . . after they're gone.”

I stopped in my tracks, and Grandma Mona turned to face me. In the moonlight, I could see a glimmer in her eyes.

“Don't be afraid, child.”

“But I don't like cemeteries. There's ghosts and stuff, and it's dark, and anyway, Poppy's not even there. He's in heaven. There's no reason to go, and especially no reason to go at night.”

“Janie, I heard every word you said, and I know how you feel.” She took my other hand and bent down lower to my face. “I'm going to ask you to trust me right now, and it's not the last time I'm going to ask you this. I know I haven't always seemed like the nicest person, but I love you. I always have. I love your Mama and Rainey, Fritz, and I still love Poppy, even though he's gone. But I need you to trust me right now. I am older than you. There are some things I know that you need to know. So we're going to the church right now. Not another word, please.”

And with that we continued walking, and my mind filled with Poppy and headstones and Grandma Mona's eyes glittering in the moonlight. And how I shouldn't speak another word of protest. But my senses grew sharp in the darkness. I could hear the squeaking and flapping of bats, and my eyes searched out lights on front porches and streetlamps. Before I knew it, one foot had led after the other and I could see the well-lit words on the sign for Covenant Church.

A deep chill blew through me. We were here. In the dark. At a cemetery. There was no turning back.

I had never been to a church at night. It was strange how something so glorious-seeming in the day could seem scary and foreboding when the shadows swallowed all the bright-white places. I gripped Grandma Mona's hand tighter and we moved slowly around the church to the left. We walked right past the manger with the Mary, Joseph, and empty hay cradle. I was glad it was dark for just a second so Grandma Mona couldn't see what was missing.

The moon was almost full. Behind the church it illuminated the cemetery and the backs of tombstones, little squares dotting the ground, a tall cross every now and again, a tree, the sidewalks.

After a minute or so I started squirming, and Grandma Mona said, “Let it out, Janie. Take a deep breath.”

I gasped and inhaled and coughed, inhaled again.

“You know, I've never been a believer in coming to visit graves,” Grandma Mona said. We stood among the tombstones and she paused before taking the path to the left. “Not on a regular basis, anyway. Occasionally I'd come when there was a funeral or shortly thereafter, a couple times maybe, just to assure myself the person wasn't coming back. Like my first husband, William. I remember when I heard he'd passed away, your grandfather brought me and your Uncle Fritz to see his grave all the way in Louisiana just so we could say good-bye and have some closure. That's the kind of man your Poppy was.”

“So we're coming here to say good-bye and have closure with Poppy? What's closure?”

“Closure is when you've closed that chapter in your life. When you can move on with your life instead of hanging on to the past and what was left behind there. It's a healthy thing to have closure. Lots of people don't ever get it. But no. We're not here to have closure, Janie.” “We're not?” I was usually smart and good at figuring out what grown-ups had to say, but here, I was stumped.

Grandma Mona put her hands on my shoulders from behind. She pulled me into her legs and held me tight, wrapping her arms around me. I felt the heat of her all over the back of me, and the cool breeze blowing on my face. We stood there looking over Poppy's grave and all the others, and I felt like running. Then Grandma Mona said, “Oh child, you can say your final good-byes to Poppy. You can try to have some closure there. But what I'm about to tell you might change all that. Honey, we're here so I can tell you a ghost story.”

I wondered if there could be anything worse than a ghost story in a graveyard. I craned my neck to look up at her but she didn't look at me, only at Poppy's tombstone. “But I don't want a ghost story,” I said. “Not here. Please!”

“Oh honey, I wish it could be different. I do. But I'm afraid there's no other way.”

I didn't dare say anything back to her after that. Fear had gripped me and wouldn't let me go.

Chapter Forty-five
FEELING IS BELIEVING

My eyes had adjusted to the darkness. The bright light from the moon cast deep shadows, turning everything white or black, no colors in between. Grandma Mona said, “The reason I brought you here, Janie, is there's something on Poppy's tombstone I want you to see. Like a clue.”

“Like a mystery?”

“Exactly. Like a mystery. You're a detective, and you must find your first clue. Now this is what I want you to do. Bend down like I am, honey.”

Grandma Mona took my right hand and placed it on the gravestone. I jerked it away. “It's okay,” she said. “There's nothing to be afraid of.”

“But I don't want to. Cain't we just come back in the morning when we can see?”

The moonlight on the back of the stone made it impossible to read the front.

“No, Janie. I'm sorry. Now, I want you to listen closely. Just because you are not able to see things hidden in the darkness, doesn't mean there aren't things hidden there just the same. I want you to touch this stone and tell me what you learn about it. There are some things you can only learn by feeling. Telling or seeing may not have the same effect.”

“But what if there's snakes or something?”

“Janie . . .”

I whispered then, “Or what if a hand reaches out and grabs me?” “Honey, that'll be my hand if you don't just do what I'm asking you. Now, come on. Be a brave girl and give me your hand.”

Against my better judgment, I did just that. Grandma Mona took my hand, and with her fingers out flat and interlaced with mine, we felt the cold hardness of Poppy's tombstone. Along the top it was smooth and then an edge. We drifted down to the front of the stone and my fingers touched an indentation. I followed it around and recognized it as the letter
G
. Then we moved to the next letter and traced it,
R
. I knew what we were doing now. Rainey and I had played the letter-guessing game many times over the years when we were bored. One person would draw a letter with her finger on the other one's back. Then you'd have to guess what the other one was trying to say. We taught ourselves so much about letters and reading that way. I wished I was back at the house, drawing letters on Rainey's back.