Chasing Lilacs (15 page)

“Sis, we’ve got company.”

My stomach rumbled as I went to the front room in slow motion. “Aunt Vadine?” I hung back and eyed her for a second. “I… I
didn’t know you were coming.”

“Of course I came. Now, come, give me a hug.”

My legs moved me across the floor, each step slower than the one before, until I reached the outstretched arms of my mother’s
sister. I braced myself and felt her arms around me, pulling me to her plump bosom. Her breath reeked of Juicy Fruit.

“It’s good you could make it.” The words stuck like a wad of gum in my throat.

I
RENE FLANAGAN PLAYED
the piano as I sat squeezed between Daddy and Aunt Vadine in the second pew. Shivers danced up and down my spine while my
eyes fixed on the paisleys in Mrs. Flanagan’s shirtwaist dress. She swayed ever so slightly, each paisley swinging like a
tiny noose.

In my head Mama swung back and forth in time to “Precious Memories” as I counted each tiny loop on Mrs. Flanagan’s dress.
I shut my eyes to stop the image, but they burned behind my eyelids, and I couldn’t stop counting. When I reached fifty-four,
Irene rose from the piano and took a seat off to the side of the platform. Brother Henry walked slowly to the podium. His
words got lost in the muddle in my head and Aunt Vadine’s sniffling beside me. The air felt thick and heavy; Brother Henry’s
words slurred together. I wanted to run away and hide from all the eyes I felt boring into my back.

Someone sang “In the Garden”—Deacon Greenwood, I think. I kept my head down and looked at the toes of my shoes when Irene
went back at the piano. Brother Henry spoke again, but this time stood right in front of us. I raised my head and saw him
holding his Bible and pointing to a page. I held my breath.

“In Matthew, it tells us to ‘Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.’
We think of Jesus’ words as being the key to heaven, and they are. But
for you, Joe, Sammie, and Mrs. Cox, I encourage you to follow these instructions not for answers to what has happened or
why, but to find peace and everlasting joy in the memory of your wife, your mother, your sister. May the God of all comfort
fill your hearts today.”

The air swirled around me, not heavy as before, but light and breezy. How had he known Mama’s words, the verses she underlined
in her New Testament? Before I had time to think about it, Mr. Johnson stood at our pew to usher us out, and I saw Hilltop
Church filled with people from Graham Camp, my classmates from school, and near the back, Mr. Howard, his face flushed red
as a ripe tomato. Someone whisked me to the car, and we followed the hearse to the Mandeville cemetery.

Tears welled up as we passed newly plowed fields and pastures of parched buffalo grass. As we glided by, a pump jack dipped
its head and bowed.

When we got to the cemetery, Daddy guided me along to a row of folding chairs under a green tent held up with skinny poles.
The rich, earthy smell of the newly dug grave filled my nose, and I breathed it in. Big gulping breaths so I would remember
the tickle the smell made in the back of my throat. I got a whiff of Juicy Fruit. I turned to see Aunt Vadine, one hand dabbing
her eyes with a hankie, the other linked in the crook of Daddy’s arm. My neck prickled like a spider crawling inside the collar
of my dress. The way Aunt Vadine hung onto Daddy twisted something inside me.

As soon as everyone sang “Amazing Grace” and Brother Henry prayed and dismissed us, I ran up to Mama’s grave. I tore off the
white gloves Aunt Vadine had insisted I wear and broke a rose from the pink bouquet spread across the casket. A thorn pierced
my finger, and I sucked the blood off. Then I scooped a handful of Mama’s grave dirt and filled one of the gloves.

When I turned around, Tuwana stood beside me, her eyes red and mascara streaking down her cheeks. “It was a nice service.”
She sniffled.

“Nice? It was my mother’s funeral. I wouldn’t call it nice.” My voice trembled.

“Mother said Brother Henry did a good job under the circumstances. I’m sorry. I really am. Anything I can do?”

“No, Tuwana. I’d rather be left alone.”

She frowned and opened her arms. “I’ll still be your best friend. If you want me to, that is.” She gave me a quick hug.

By now people started closing in on me, putting their hands on my arms and my back, offering hugs and crooked smiles that
looked like their faces might break. Every time someone touched me, it felt like they took a part of Mama with them. I wanted
her to myself. I wanted to see her casket and think about how she looked inside.
Stop touching me! Can’t you see I don’t want any of you here? All I want is Mama.
The words shouted in my head, and my skin felt dirty from all the arms reaching out, grabbing, clawing at me.

I broke away and ran to the car. In the backseat, tears leaked from my eyes, a few at first, and then a river of them splashing
out. I laid on the seat and let them come. The sobs came in waves like the ocean, and I could hear deep groans snarling my
throat. My fingers cramped from clutching the glove. I sat up, letting the last sniffles drain down my throat, and looked
out the window. Overhead a clear blue sky circled the earth above the green funeral tent. Mama’s copper coffin hovered over
the open spot in the ground, and figures milled around like ants at a picnic. When I twirled the pink rose in my fingers and
sniffed its sweetness, a glimmer of an idea popped into my head. A way I could keep Mama to myself.

I closed my eyes and leaned my head against the seat, waiting for Daddy and Aunt Vadine.

*   *   *

After the dinner the ladies at Hilltop Church laid out, Daddy, Aunt Vadine, and I went home. We sat staring at each other
in our funeral clothes. Aunt Vadine had brought in a wooden sewing basket and pulled out a ball of thread, which she worked
with a silver crochet hook. A toothpick bobbled between Daddy’s lips. Any minute I expected to hear the splash of water and
smell the scent of lilac wafting from the bathroom.

After a while Daddy mumbled something about fixing the squeak in the Chevy, the one that had been there since we went to Red
River. He changed into Levi’s and an old shirt, leaving me alone with Aunt Vadine.

“I thought it quite odd”—Aunt Vadine looked up from her handwork—“taking a handful of dirt from your mother’s grave. What
came over you?”

“It felt like the thing to do at the time. The smell and all…”

“We’ll probably never get the dirt stains out.”

“I’m leaving it in the glove.”

“And ruin a perfectly good pair of dress gloves?”

I didn’t answer.

Later she started in again. “Tell me, Samantha, about your mother, her last days.”

I gritted my teeth. I hated being called Samantha. So prissy.

“Please, call me Sammie. And to answer your question, I don’t care to talk about Mama right now.”
I don’t even know you.

“Confession is good for the soul.” She rested her hands in her lap. “I have needs to know about my own sister too, you know.
Surely you had some inkling, some clues she left….”

“No. Nothing.”

“You don’t have to be so huffy. I hoped we could comfort one another. And your daddy. We’re all he has left, you know.”

My face felt hot, but Mama’s sister or not, I couldn’t tell her anything.

Aunt Vadine went back to her crochet, and when Scarlett, who’d been snuggling beside me, stretched and opened her mouth in
a wide yawn, I stood up. “Scarlett needs to go outside.”

“While you’re up, would you be a sweetie and get me a glass of iced tea? No sugar.”

After getting the tea, I took Scarlett outside. The elm leaves, browning around the edges like pieces of burnt toast, floated
from the trees. The tingly air cooled my face, but not the burning ache inside.

Scarlett chased after a leaf. With my chin resting on my knees, I sat on the porch and watched her. A pukey-green feeling
came over me when I remembered the three suitcases Aunt Vadine had Daddy lug in yesterday.

A glove full of dirt does sound crazy. But it was part of the idea that had come into my head. I wanted to keep a memory box
of Mama—things I could touch and smell and look at that reminded me of her, that would keep her close to me.

After supper Aunt Vadine touched Daddy on the arm. “You know, Joe, I feel like taking a walk. Maybe you could show me around
the neighborhood.”

“Suits me. You want to go, Sis?”

I shook my head. With the house to myself, I went to my room and collected my penny-loafer box, the dirt-filled glove, and
the casket rose, which I pressed between two layers of waxed paper. Next I dug to the bottom of my underwear drawer and got
Mama’s New Testament and slipped the sandwiched flower between the pages. To keep it from bulging, I wound a rubber band around
it three times and did the same to the wrist of the glove to keep the
dirt from spilling out. I closed my eyes and sniffed to get the earthy smell where Mama now rested into my head. My heart
thumped loud and fast as I tried to think about her not as dead, but just off somewhere taking a walk. Maybe a cool stream
trickled nearby where she could take off her shoes and stick her toes in the water.

From the bathroom I took a sliver of lilac soap from the edge of the tub, Mama’s hairbrush, and a box of bobby pins. The last
two things for the shoe box were Mama’s pearls in their leather case and
Gone with the Wind.
I yanked a piece of notebook paper from a spiral in my desk and scribbled a note:
Mama’s things, the day she was buried. September 8, 1958.
I hugged the box to my chest, then stashed it behind my old dolls on the closet floor and went to the kitchen.

Dirty dishes filled the sink. I put the rubber plug in the bottom of the sink, squirted in the Palmolive, and turned the water
on hot. I scrubbed the dishes, rinsed them in a dishpan, and put them in the drainer to dry. Doing something ordinary that
I’d done a hundred times before calmed the banging of my heart against my chest. Wash. Rinse. Drain. The hot water stung my
hands and turned them red, but I kept on until every last dish was clean. I was running the dishrag around the countertop
when Daddy and Aunt Vadine trooped in.

“Your father showed me around the neighborhood.” Aunt Vadine took a clean glass I’d just put in the drainer. “Can I get you
a glass of tea, Joe?”

“Mmmm.” Daddy’s answer could have been a yes or a no. He hung up his hat and went to the front room. Low voices hummed from
the television.

“Nice setup here at Graham Camp; makes me wish I’d paid a visit sooner.” She poured the tea and handed the empty pitcher to
me. “Here, might as well get this too while you’re at it. Funny how death draws people together, isn’t it?”

“You think Mama’s dying was funny?” I washed the tea pitcher and felt the pounding start up in my chest again.

“Not funny… that’s not what I meant at all. Simply that death brings people together in mysterious ways sometimes, doesn’t
it?” She smacked her gum and carried the two glasses from the kitchen.

The only mystery to me was how Aunt Vadine could have ever been Mama’s sister.

I dried my hands and went to the front room. Aunt Vadine had situated herself on the couch with her crochet, the fine yarn
streaming from the box at her feet. Scarlett had nosed into the box, and when she heard me, she lifted her head, a tangled
ball of crochet thread in her mouth.

Aunt Vadine grabbed a magazine from the end table and swatted at her.

“No, naughty dog. No!” She swung at Scarlett, who tried to run away, but the matted yarn ball caught in her teeth, hanging
like a stringy Santa Claus beard from her chin. I reached down to pick her up. She jumped sideways and yanked the crochet
from Aunt Vadine’s lap, looping it somehow around my aunt’s foot.

“Come back here!” Aunt Vadine screeched and fanned the magazine in the air. When she tried to stand up, her feet tangled up
in the yarn. Petrified, Scarlett jumped onto Daddy’s lap, dragging the unfinished, now unraveled creation with her.

“Here, girl, calm down,” Daddy said, and chuckled under his breath. Looking at the mess Scarlett had made, I couldn’t help
it. I burst out laughing. Scarlett’s scraggly yarn beard and Aunt Vadine’s face, the color of pickled beets, sent me into
a giggling fit. The more I tried to stop, the deeper the howls came. Tears ran down my face, and my sides ached. When I looked
at Daddy, he smothered a grin on his face, which tickled me even more. Daddy’s
calm, steady fingers loosened the yarn from Scarlett’s pearly white teeth, and when he finished, he held a slimy ruined mess.

Tears splashed on my face. Crying, aching tears, not those of laughter.
How did that happen?
My face grew hot. I ran into my bedroom and threw myself across the covers, sobbing until I thought my head would burst.
My arms and legs ached, deep burning pain as if I’d just rounded the bases from hitting a home run. Weak and trembly, I wished
I were dead for the hundredth time that day. Dead with Mama and baby Sylvia.

T
HE NEXT MORNING
Aunt Vadine shook me awake with her square hand. “Time for school.”

“No, I can’t…. Not yet.” I turned over on the couch, my bed now since Aunt Vadine slept in mine under my chenille spread.
How could I face anyone? Let them give me those creepy stares like I had a brand on my forehead announcing my mother died.
No. I wouldn’t go, and no one could make me. Not Aunt Vadine. Not Daddy. No one. I shut my eyes and drifted off.

Soft licking on my face woke me up a second time, and I rolled over, pulling Scarlett into my arms.

“You need to take that mutt outside. Why your daddy ever agreed to let you keep a dog in the house is beyond me.” Aunt Vadine
had on one of Mama’s aprons over her shirtwaist dress. The smell of linseed oil hovered in the air. “Best get going. If you’re
staying home, you can help me.” She smeared a rag along the baseboard. “Lord, I wonder how long it’s been since this woodwork
had a good oiling. One thing about your mother, she didn’t put any stock in keeping house.”