Why Did She Have to Die? (7 page)

“M
om, I want you to take me to Kathy’s grave. I’ve never been there. Dr. Nash says that because I was in the hospital during her funeral, I never got to say good-bye.”

Elly’s request had stopped her mother in midstep in the kitchen. School was out for the summer. Although it was only nine in the morning, the temperature was climbing outside. The kitchen fan hummed noisily.

“Are you sure you want to go?”

“I’m sure.”

They drove to the cemetery before noon, entering through the wrought-iron gates and winding down the road, past the deep green grass. Elly clutched a small bouquet of daisies in her lap. Hues of white, yellow, and green glimmered in the sunlight as it poured through the car window.

She thought the grounds were beautiful and peaceful, shaded by weeping willows. Vases of flowers stood like exclamation marks, in row after row. Elly’s anxiety grew as their car curved past fields of plaques and simple headstones. She wanted to see Kathy’s, but at the same time, she didn’t. One of the girls in her support group had told her, “I think I accepted my mother’s death when I saw her gravestone. Up until then, I kept thinking it wasn’t real.”

The car halted and Mrs. Rowan pointed across a wide expanse of lawn toward an ash tree. “It’s over there, to the right of the tree. Do you want me to come with you?”

Elly decided to go alone, and she crossed the green lawn. She glanced to the right and left at names she didn’t know. The warm summer sun beat on her bare shoulders. She’d worn an embroidered white sundress because Kathy would have been pleased to see her wearing something besides her usual funky garb.

Elly saw a bronze plaque, ringed by an etching of bronze flowers. Her head thudded.
Kathleen Anne Rowan
, it read, along with the date of birth and death. That was all. It was so simple. Tears formed in Elly’s eyes.

Her hands shook as she stooped and traced the raised letters with her fingers. She laid the bouquet very carefully at the bottom of the marker, just under Kathy’s name.

Elly breathed in the smell of freshly mown grass. A brilliant blue sky spanned above, decorated by puffy white clouds. The sound of sprinklers broke the quiet.

“Good-bye, Kathy. I love you.”

Elly rose slowly, wiping the back of her hand across her cheek. “I wish I could talk to you.” She backed off, knowing that her mother was waiting in the hot car. She should go. She’d said her farewells. She started toward the car, and then turned once more to see her sister’s grave.

In the distance, a sprinkler spun. As the rays of the sun shot through the water, something wonderful happened. A rainbow formed, perfection positioned in the air above Kathy’s grave. The sight made Elly catch her breath. She watched as the shimmering droplets caught the sun and spilled their beauty onto the grass below.

* * * *

The strains of “Happy Birthday” faded. Elly leaned forward and puffed heavily at the fourteen candles on her birthday cake. The flames died, and her mother flipped on the kitchen light. Mr. Rowan and Joy applauded happily.

“Not bad, Elly. You got them all in one puff,” her father said. “I always said you were full of hot air.”

“Daddy!” Elly wailed, but she beamed at his teasing smile.

“Let me cut it,” Mrs. Rowan said, sliding a knife through the thick chocolate frosting.

Elly remembered other birthdays. Kathy had always teased, “You’ll never catch up with me, little sister.” And Elly had always answered, “Well, you’ll be thirty before me.” Only months before, Kathy’s birthday had come and gone. They’d tiptoed around mentioning it, but the atmosphere had weighed heavily in the house. Now it was Elly’s special day and she’d invited Joy to share it with her.

“I want to open my presents.”

“Presents?” Mr. Rowan teased. “What makes you think you’re getting cake
and
presents?”

“Open mine first,” Joy urged, thrusting a brightly wrapped box at Elly.

She tore the paper off and squealed with delight. “A new CD! Thanks, Joy!”

Elly’s parents had given her a gift certificate for new clothes that morning. She wasn’t expecting anything else. But her dad pulled out a second box from beneath the table.

“Gee, for me?” Elly couldn’t conceal her surprise.

Mr. Rowan shrugged. “Just something I picked out in one of those fancy stores. The saleslady said it was the height of fashion.”

Elly imagined him entering the women’s department of a store, his big, broad shoulders amid all the feminine, dainty things. The image touched her heart. Elly tore open the flat box and discovered several pairs of socks. She blinked at the variety of colors.

A lump rose in Elly’s throat. She smoothed her hand over the socks and gave her father a loving look. His brown eyes twinkled at her. A silly grin tipped the corners of his mouth. Elly saw the dimples deepening in his cheeks. Kathy had inherited his dimples.

“I really like them, Daddy. Thank you very much.”

He playfully tugged on a hank of Elly’s hair. She felt closer to him than she had in months.

“You’re welcome, baby girl.”

When her dad picked up his fork to eat his cake, Elly saw a glimpse of herself in his profile. At that moment she loved him more than she ever had before. She realized that in his way, he’d said he loved her, too. She wanted to throw her arms around him and tell him, but instead she laughed aloud, a deep laugh that bubbled up from inside her heart.

* * * *

“I don’t think it’s fair that girls get to cry and boys aren’t supposed to.” The angry observation came from Al, nineteen, the oldest member of Elly’s support group. “Why is it sissy for boys to cry? It hurts us just as badly when someone we love dies.”

Elly looked at Al’s pained expression. Guiltily, she remembered the night she’d heard her father crying. She’d thought the same thing.

“I’m sorry that our society is that way,” Dr. Nash said. “You’re absolutely right, Al. Crying is a natural reaction to pain. Boys shouldn’t be made to feel that tears are wrong or foolish or sissy.”

“When my father died,” Al continued, “I became the man of the house. I had to drop out of college and move back home. It’s been tough, but my mom and my brother and sisters needed me.”

Elly measured Al with awe. He was only five years older than she, yet he was responsible for his whole family. She glanced from person to person. She felt a warmth from them, almost as if they were family.

“When my best friend died, I didn’t cry at all,” Molly, a twelve-year-old said. “But when my cat died, I couldn’t stop crying. I cried for days. That’s when my parents made me come here.”

“Grief is an odd thing,” Dr. Nash confirmed. “Sometimes we act very strangely. Good students get into trouble at school.” Elly identified with her comment. “Or we do bizarre things.”

“Like smearing makeup all over the girls’ bathroom,” Elly announced.

The kids at the table laughed.

“Or spreading peanut butter all over my mom’s kitchen walls,” another girl said.

“Or throwing all my brother’s toys out the upstairs window after he died,” Jamie added.

“The ability to mourn—grieve—and then go on with your lives is the most important emotional experience you can have,” Dr. Nash told them. “People who don’t mourn may never fully recover from their loss.”

Elly pondered Dr. Nash’s words. She would miss Kathy forever. The sadness, the sense of loss, the feelings of being unloved and isolated had wounded her. But she felt better after every support group meeting. The road to feeling normal again was long, but she was glad she was on it, surrounded by people who really understood and cared.

E
lly picked up the newspaper and read:

A strange feeling crept through her. Her parents were selling Kathy’s bedroom furniture. They’d discussed it for a week. “I can make it into a sewing room,” Mrs. Rowan had said about Kathy’s room. Elly agreed with the decision. Yet, seeing the actual words printed on paper made her feel uncomfortable.

As she entered her sister’s room, Elly somehow still expected to find Kathy there. Kathy’s clothes had been donated to charity. Her personal things had been packed away. Elly had kept Kathy’s photos, her CDs, her diaries, and many of her books. All that remained was the furniture. And after that was gone, all traces of Kathy’s physical presence would be gone, too.

Elly had told the support group about it. Many of the kids had nodded knowingly, telling her what it had been like for them to see the things that belonged to their loved ones disappear.

“At first, I felt like Dad was trying to pretend that Mom had never existed. You know—erase her from our lives. But later it was easier than looking at her stuff day after day,” an older girl had told the group.

Every time the phone rang, Elly jumped. But her mother took all of the calls. Early that evening, a couple pulled up in a car towing a trailer. The two of them came inside and looked at the bedroom set.

“We’ll take it,” said Mrs. Baer, her eyes shining. “Our daughter, Melissa, has wanted a canopy bed ever since she was four. She’ll be ten tomorrow.”

“These pieces are in great condition,” Mr. Baer commented. “They hardly seem used.”

Kathy had gotten the set for her twelfth birthday. It had been her proudest possession. Elly leaned against the doorframe and watched the Baers circle the room. She fought against resenting them.

“Are you tired of the furniture, dear?” Mrs. Baer asked Elly.

Elly’s eyes darted from her mother to her father. “Uh—this isn’t my room. It was my sister’s.” She watched Mr. Baer as he wrote a check and handed it to her dad.

“Oh, you have another daughter? Has she moved away?”

“Yes,” Mrs. Rowan said, smiling kindly. “She’s moved away.”

Elly was relieved that her mother hadn’t blurted out the truth. For some reason, Elly didn’t want these strangers to know her family’s private business.

“You must miss her,” Mrs. Baer commented.

“Very much. But we’re adjusting.”

“Here, I’ll give you a hand,” Mr. Rowan said, stooping to pick up the nightstand. He lifted it effortlessly and went down the stairs. The lifting and hauling continued until every piece of furniture was in the trailer.

At the curb, Mr. Baer held out his hand. “Thanks for your help, Mr. Rowan. I know how much Melissa will appreciate this.”

Mr. Rowan shook his hand, and Elly stepped next to him. His arm slid around her shoulders and held her tightly against his side.

The Baers got into their car and started the engine. “Tell your daughter how much having her furniture means to us when you see her. We’ll take very good care of it.”

“I’ll tell her.” Mr. Rowan waved as the car pulled away. Elly stood close to him, looking down the stretch of road long after the card had vanished. Dusk was settling over the neighborhood, and fireflies blinked in the gathering night.

* * * *

The morning sunlight splashed across the pink carpet of the empty room. Elly slipped inside and settled against the wall nearest the door. Her gaze looked to the corners of Kathy’s former bedroom. She hadn’t planned on coming into the room until after her mom had fixed it up. But she’d come anyway, in spite of herself.

The carpet needed vacuuming. Little balls of lint lay where the bed had stood. Dust fluttered in the rays of the flooding sunshine. Elly saw the stain in the far corner where she’d accidentally spilled Kathy’s fingernail polish.

“Oh, no! I ruined your rug!” Elly’s eyes brimmed with tears. “Mom will kill me.”

Kathy sopped up the mess with a tissue. “Stop crying about it and help me clean it up. Get the polish remover.”

Elly obeyed, but when she sponged it into the carpet, the pretty pink color came out, too. “What else can go wrong?”

“It’s all right, Elly.” Kathy patted her hand. “I never liked that shade of pink anyway.”

Elly saw the place where the mirror had hung. A faint outline was etched into the wallpaper, faded by strong sunlight through the years.

Kathy studied her face intently in the mirror. Elly pondered what could be so fascinating about sizing up one’s reflection hour after hour.

“Don’t you ever stop staring at yourself in the mirror?” she asked her older sister.

“Someday when you’re thirteen and not a kid anymore, you’ll stare at yourself, too.”

Miffed, Elly asked, “What’s the big deal? You better wipe off that eye shadow before Daddy sees it.”

“I like it.” Kathy tipped her chin to stare at the bright slash of blue across her eyelids. “David Johnson kissed me at Beth’s party last night.”

Elly’s mouth dropped open. “He did?”

“We were playing a kissing game.”

“Daddy would ground you forever if he knew.”

“But no one’s going to tell him, is she?” Kathy’s look was threatening.

Elly puckered. “Did he kiss like a fish?”

“Like a puppy with a wet tongue.”

Elly laughed, flopping onto Kathy’s bed and turning a somersault. “I’m going to tell him what you said.”

“Grow up, Elly. Someday you’ll kiss a boy and tell me all about it. And I won’t tease you.”

Elly circled the room slowly, the walls whispering to her. She thought the memories would make her sad. Instead, they made her feel closer to Kathy.

“Elly, don’t be silly. There’s no such thing as a Tooth Fairy.” Seven-year-old Kathy put her hands on her hips and gave her sister an exasperated sigh.

“There is, too! Look at this.” Elly opened her fat fingers and showed Kathy a shiny quarter. “And see.” She opened her mouth to show her sister the hole in front where to tooth had fallen out.

“You’re only six, Elly Rowan. Don’t you think I know more about these things than you?”

Elly completed the tour of the empty room. She paused at the door for one last, lingering glance. Finally she stepped quietly into the hall and closed the door behind her.