The Truth Against the World (26 page)

In the end, we didn't have to do any climbing. If Gareth and I had been more patient, or less tired, we could have walked along the fenced-off area for another quarter mile and found the gate where the construction worker had entered. There was a large gap between the fence and the gate, which was secured in place by a padlock on a chain. With some difficulty, and a disapproving look from my mom in her fancy sweater, we all squeezed through the foot-wide opening. Gareth and I took the lead, walking along the path to where the ruined church lay. It looked just as it had a week earlier—deserted, mid-construction. My parents and Mr. Lewis followed us over to where the cromlech stood, stolid and unchanging, the humble cairns piled over to one side.

When I showed them the plaque marked
Olwen Nia Evans
, Gareth's great-grandfather slowly dropped to a crouch in the dirt and bowed his head.

I moved a short distance away. I couldn't help thinking about Mr. Lewis's story. He'd said it was awful during the war, leaving his home in London, where he had nothing left, for a place where he was a complete stranger. But because of how he'd acted, Rhiannon had had to leave her home too. She was forced to leave everything she knew. Had she felt, in the end, that it had all been worth it? Or had she regretted leaving some things behind?

When Mr. Lewis looked up, it seemed to unfreeze our quiet tableau. Dad opened the backpack again and took out the metal box, empty now, and Rhiannon's small memorial urn, which was a plain wooden cylinder with a lid. He knelt down next to Mr. Lewis. Gareth and I crouched on either side, and Mom stood behind Dad, watching.

My dad carefully, reverently, placed the urn of ashes inside the metal box and closed the lid, taking out the tiny key to lock it up again, forever this time.

“Wait,” I said. I reached around behind my neck and unfastened Gee Gee's locket—the one with the baby picture. I placed it inside the box next to the urn. I would keep the other locket forever, the one with the photo of Gee Gee and Olwen, but this one felt like it had to be returned to Gee Gee.

Dad took out a trowel we'd borrowed from the gardener's shed and carefully dug a shallow hole just in front of Olwen's grave marker. He reburied the metal box and covered it with dirt. Gareth picked one of the lilies that grew semi-wild nearby and laid it on the freshly tamped-down earth.

Ar lan y môr mae lilis gwynion
… The old melody floated through my head, vivid and clear, but this time the words carried a sense of peace with them that hadn't been there before. Nothing was going to be quite the same, of course, but I'd known that for a while now.

I turned to Gareth as he got up, and we walked together, lagging behind a ways, as our group left the fenced-off area to hike back to the car.

“Did you hear—?” he whispered.

I smiled and reached for his hand, inordinately happy when he laced his fingers through mine. We walked like that for a while, not talking, his hand keeping mine warm in the cold, windy air.

“So what are you going to do now?” I asked, finally breaking the silence.

“I think I'm going to stay with my great-granddad for another week,” he said. “We finally had a decent conversation about everything this morning. He could use the company right now.”

I nodded. It hadn't been easy for any of us, especially Mr. Lewis. But things would be better now. I was still going back to the U.S. in a few days, with a packed sightseeing schedule between now and then, and I didn't know when I would see Gareth again. But I had no doubt we would stay in touch. After all, Gareth was my first and only faithful blog reader.

I squeezed his hand, and he squeezed back. I could sense him smiling even though he wasn't looking at me.

I would be back. I didn't know when, but I knew. And one day I would read Gee Gee's diaries for myself. I didn't know when that would happen, either, but despite everything else coming to an end, I felt like time was stretching out ahead of me like a promise. Like rolling green hills, like an ocean.

I felt a sudden prickle at the back of my neck, as though the wind was stirring the tiny hairs at the base of my skull. Reflexively, I turned around. For just a moment, I thought I heard a snatch of melody, thought I could see a mother and child standing together on a grassy knoll overlooking the sea. And then, like a waking dream, it was gone.

Acknowledgments

This is the first novel I ever wrote to completion, and since I finished that long-ago initial version about ten years ago, I owe a lot of people a
lot
of gratitude.

This book would never have left the safety of my brain in the first place, or reached new heights, without my YA writing group. Thanks to those of you who were there during the early days: Katina Bishop, Tanita Davis, Jaime Lin-Yu, Erin Blomstrand, JoNelle Toriseva, Meeta Kaur, Jennifer March Soloway, Kim Yan, and Sarah Zacharias. And thanks, too, to those who read more recent versions: Tanita and Jennifer, Yat-Yee Chong, Kelly Herold, Sara Lewis Holmes, and Anne Levy. You are all amazing and extremely patient. Special thanks to Jennifer for a phone conversation that changed everything (and saved my sanity).

More people without whom this story never would have existed: Kathryn Reiss, Tom Strychacz, and the Mills College MFA Program in Creative Writing. Thanks also to Shin Yu Pai, Corey Sattler, Beth Tevebaugh Maday, and my mom, Bonnie Pavlis, for feedback and encouragement in those early days and beyond.

Major gratitude to a huge list of people for helping me with historical, cultural, and linguistic information, even though I'm sure they've long forgotten doing so by now (which makes it even more fun to thank them here): Harry Campbell, Carwyn Edwards, Roger Fenton, David Lewis, Louise Ostrowska, Andy Whittle, and especially my good friends Greg Cooper and Mark Stonelake, as well as numerous others from Cymdeithas Madog and the (sadly now defunct) Clwb Malu Cachu listserv. Thanks to my cousin-in-law Sam Horner for helping me not to butcher current British slang. (Any remaining butchering may be blamed on me.) I also owe a huge debt to Raynes Minns (
Bombers and Mash
)
and Leigh Verrill-Rhys (
Parachutes & Petticoats
and
Iancs, Conshîs a Spam
) for their wonderful books about the lives of British and Welsh women in the Second World War; to the OpenLibrary.org copy of
The Proverbs of Wales
, compiled by T. R. Roberts, 1885; and to the extremely entertaining Effingpot British Slang website.

I am forever and always thankful for my far-flung online network of writing and blogging friends, who are always there with words of encouragement and support. I am honored to be part of the Kidlitosphere with you.

Some people I'll never be able to thank enough: Brian Farrey-Latz and Sandy Sullivan at Flux, for sharing—and sharpening—my vision over the course of the past few years. Jennifer Laughran, who is as smart and hilarious an agent as I could ever hope to have. And my family, especially Rob.

Photo by Lee R. Bailey

About the Author

Sarah Jamila Stevenson is a writer, artist, graphic designer, introvert, closet geek, good eater, struggling blogger, lapsed piano player, ukulele noodler, household-chore-ignorer, and occasional world traveler. She is also the author of
The Latte Rebellion
and
Underneath
. She lives in Northern California with her husband and two cats. Visit her online at www.SarahJamilaStevenson.com.