by Lesley Kagen
Cooter Smith Not Hung
(Don’t worry. I perceive this needs a little work. Grampa will smooth it out once he gets home.)
The whole of the Land of a Hundred Wonders is sort of an antique, especially the graveyard. Miss Lydia rarely buys anything. Not ’cause she can’t afford to, she does just fine with all her tourist business. But she preaches that it’s best to do with what the Lord’s already seen fit to give us, so I’m quite surprised when I see the shiny brand-newness of the pitchfork Teddy’s holding in his hand. When I cleaned the stalls for her last week, the old one seemed to work plenty fine.
Miss Lydia calls back to him, “Careful of Holly, she’s got a poor ligament in her right hind.”
I just adore sitting on this veranda with her like this. Her flower garden smelling like Eden and the honeybees buzzzy at work. Cats cranking up their little purr motors figure-eighting between her red silky slippers. Since she can’t wear regular shoes ’cause her one foot is damaged so bad that it’s painful to feel anything rough rub against it, she wears these.
Tracing the dragon on the slippers with my finger, I ask her, “Ya know what I perceive?”
“What would that be?” she says, her gaze lingering on Teddy as he enters the barn.
“That settin’ fire to the dump was a bad plan on the coloreds’ part if what they were tryin’ to achieve was that respect.”
“Why’s that?”
That’s one of the things I love most about Miss Lydia. She listens to me like I’m not NQR. “ ’Cause everybody is probably thinkin’ even more disrespectful about the coloreds now for makin’ the whole town stink of burned rubber. Wouldn’t it a been more appropriate for them to’ve just quit pickin’ tobacco? That woulda got everybody talkin’ in a big way. And if he was still alive, well, that woulda got greedy ole Mister Buster’s undivided attention. Ya didn’t happen to kill him, did ya?”
I’ve been praying with all I got that I’ve made another bad assumption. That it wasn’t my Billy that did him in. I’ve thought about it and thought about it and I can’t come up with one single reason why Billy would want Mr. Buster deader than a store nail. Really, it’s Miss Lydia who’s got the best motive for stabbing up her deceased brother, him taking advantage like he did.
“For you,” Miss Lydia says, without pausing at all, “I’ll tell the sheriff I murdered Buster.”
Boy, that’s a relief! Since I believe Billy would never make it for long in a prison. Being closed up gives him the heebie-jeebies something bad, which wouldn’t happen anyway because ’fore it did, I’d break him outta the sheriff’s jail. I did it for Cooter. I can do it for my man. Besides, if Miss Lydia confesses to murdering Buster, both of us know that since just about everybody in the county believes she’s touched in the head, the worst that’d happen to her would be she’d spend a few weeks in the mental institute crafting ashtrays, and Grampa can always use a couple more down at the diner, so this is not that big a deal.
Heavens to Murgatroid! I just perceived something.
“Since Mr. Buster is dead, you’re gonna be the boss now. After they let ya out of Pardyville, ya can go back to live up at the farm.” The second after I say it, I also perceive she’ll never leave Georgie. Or Mama. Or the Wonders.
“I own the farm outright now, yes,” she says, snapping a bean to smithereens.
“But what about what’s his name . . . I forget . . . Mr. Buster’s son? What’s gonna happen to him?”
You don’t see Miss Lydia smile all that often since people of wisdom see more of the bad in life than we simple people do, but she’s giving it a try with the good side of her lip. “Appears that my dear nephew, Bishop, and that Yankee neighbor of yours got carted off this morning. The field boss found what the two of ’em been growin’ and called the state troopers, who then asked my permission to burn those hemp plants down to the ground.”
Well . . . well . . . well.
With Willard and Bishop outta the picture, the golden hemp treasure is fair game. Me and Billy and Cooter could go gather up that crop ’fore the troopers show up. We’ll take it up to New York and introduce ourselves around that village while Clever is recuperating from the baby coming, and when we’re done selling the hemp for lots of cash, I’ll make a stop at the offices of Penguin Books to see if Mr. Howard Redmond is at his desk. I have been dying to ask him about—
“Ya can forget all that,” Miss Lydia says, snippish.
(Told ya she can see my wheels working.)
“Did ya realize you got a birthday comin’ up?” she asks, outta the blue.
“I do.” I was thinking I’d have a party of some sort this year as I have not had one since . . . actually, I don’t remember ever having one. “How old am I gonna be?”
“Twenty-one. That’s a milestone birthday.”
“Ya don’t say.”
“A milestone means it’s an important event, chil’,” Miss Lydia says, all of a sudden so supremely solemn. The breeze has stopped stirring. Birds have quit their twittering. Even the cicadas are stock-still.
I really do wish I had my blue spiral notebook with me because it’s one of those times when something of great importance is about to happen. This is an almost daily occurrence at Land of a Hundred Wonders and always comes on fast like this. Miss Lydia is about to make one of her PRONOUNCEMENTS.
“The spirits have spoken,” she says, setting down her bowl and floating up out of her chair. “The time for A FINAL RECKONING has arrived. Follow me.”
What I really need to do is get over to the hospital to check on Clever and Rosie and Billy and Cooter, but since I trust Miss Lydia beyond reason, and would not ever disobey her, I go with her into the parlor that’s dim with black curtains to protect her eyes that are so sensitive they can see into the future. Candles of white burn day or night, for they are soul cleansers. And AR-TIFACTUALS OF PROTECTION are scattered across her tabletops, their chestnut faces and corn-husk bodies working just dandy to keep away evil spirits. I know there are four-leaf clovers lying beneath the cushions of her green cloth sofa, which is where we always sit when we have our VISITATIONS with Mama. And the ever-present vase full of lilies-of-the-valley looms large and reminding.
If Grampa would only come visit and see these pictures of Miss Lydia and Mama that hang on her every parlor wall, he would know how much love there is for his daughter here in Hundred Wonders. Maybe he’d stop being so bitter about everything. Maybe even his hope would spring back when he saw the snapshots of when they were blond enough to ride two to a pony. Little girls picnicking down at the lake with Gramma Kitty. Later when they are more grown, there is a photo of Miss Lydia gazing into my mama’s eyes with such pure love that you can barely stand looking at it.
From underneath the sofa, Miss Lydia removes her tattered photo album with shaky fingers. We have spent day upon day, year upon year, looking at the two best friends glued forever on these pages. And me. I’m in these pictures, too. Baby Gibby . . . first day at school Gibby . . . braids down to my bottom Gibby. She removes a photo from the album. Gibby graduating from high school. My mama’s got her arm around me looking so proud. And I’m smiling at her so Quite Right.
I say, “Did you know that back before the crash Billy and me were going to get married and . . .” Something like soul-shatteringsorrow is sucking the air out of the parlor and taking my breath along with it. When I look over at Miss Lydia, to see if she’s feeling the same, she’s fingerin’ that graduation picture and staring off into the distance. The sound of clattering chimes comes through the parlor window.
“Are you ready for THE FINAL RECKONING?” she asks. “Are you willin’?”
“I am willin’,” I say, even though it has just occurred to me that maybe I’m not. I have no idea what THE FINAL RECKONING is. The room has drawn darker and the wind . . . it’s unearthly sounding.
Miss Lydia’s eyes close and she begins to chant, “Open your heart . . . open your mind . . . open your heart . . . open your mind.”
I do.
“Breathe in my breath three times.”
So honey sweet.
“Allow yourself to drift away to the night of the crash so—” She steels herself. “The spirit of rememberin’ is comin’ upon you.”
I don’t want to disappoint her, but I desperately do not want to go on with this. I am feeling floaty and faraway and frightened. Untethered. Because suddenly, I’m not in her parlor anymore. Not in Hundred Wonders. Not even in Cray Ridge. I’m back in the kind of night anybody in their right mind stays home and is grateful to do so, me and mine heading down here to start my summer stay. The rain is gushing down so bad it’s erasing the highway line and our Buick’s sprouted wings more than a few times. And the sky isn’t the only one spittin’ mad. My mama’s saying in her crossest of voices, “We’re not gonna outrun this storm . . . Lydia . . . get off at the next exit. Ya got talent at findin’ motels, don’tcha, Joe? ’Specially the real cheap kind.” Daddy’s bellowing back, “Goddamn it. I’m warning you, Addy . . . for the last time . . . ,” and Mama starts screaming. The driver of the car is burying her face in her hands when Daddy lurches for the wheel too late. And then there’s an explosion.
We’re never gonna outrun this storm, Lydia.
Lydia?
“It . . . it was . . . you drivin’ that night?” I ask, trembling.
Miss Lydia reaches out for me, and when I pull back, her tears come. “Addy thought that it’d do me good to come visit y’all up in Chicago to get away from Cray Ridge for a bit, and then . . . then we’d all drive back down here together. I knew she and your daddy’d been havin’ some marriage problems, but that whole week they fought something awful. The night . . . that night we were headin’ back down here, they were so upset and outta sorts they asked me to drive, and I did . . . but then . . . in all their arguin’ . . . the rain sheetin’, I was wore out with their mad, and still feelin’ so sad about Georgie, I closed my eyes, just for a moment . . . a moment is all . . . and then the bus . . .”
“I . . . I . . . Is this why Grampa doesn’t want me to visit with you?” All this time I thought he was being so unreasonable. And that my daddy was the one driving. “Ya fell asleep at the wheel? Why didn’t you tell me the truth?”
“I couldn’t . . . I couldn’t risk losin’ ya like I lost Georgie and Addy and . . .” Miss Lydia breaks into the kind of banshee wailing she does when we do one of our LAYING UPONS on Mama’s grave. “I’m sorry . . . I’m sorry . . . I’m sorry . . . forgive me . . . I’m sorry . . . I’m sorry . . . I’m sorry . . . forgive me. . . .”
"Y’ all right in there?” Teddy Smith has come up the porch steps and is calling through the screen door. “Lydia?” When he pokes his head in and sees her balled up on the sofa, he rushes to her side, lifts her into his arms, and carries her off toward her bedroom, leaving me behind and alone.
All these years of believing in Miss Lydia with my whole heart and soul. How could she? That means the ACTUATIONS, and even worse, the VISITATIONS were a lie, too. And they were the only way I had to stay close to my mama.
I’m not sure how long I lay there on her parlor sofa letting the torturous sad spew outta me, or how long it took before I realized that my gulping breaths, they smell so strong of lilies-of the-valley. But now I am sure that I can hear Mama’s laugh that pealed like church bells resounding inside me. She drank coffee black. Melancholy was how she felt when she was done with one of her paintings. She adored applesauce cake with a sprinkle of cinnamon hot out of the oven. The warmth of her against the warmth of me, our heads sharing a pillow. The last thing she said to me ’fore I fell asleep every night, no matter how mad or sad or busy she was, “I love you forever, my little Giblet. No matter what happens . . . don’t ever forget that.”
That’s when it comes to my mind that I’ve not been completely right about why my mama hasn’t been resting in peace. It is because I’m NQR, but not the way I’ve been thinking. No. She isn’t pacing heaven, wringing her strong but small hands ’cause I confuse my words and my mind wanders. Or even ’cause of the blue streak that runs through me. It’s because, ’cept for a smattering here and there, I did forget about her love for me. And there’s no way she can rest eternally until what’s been lost is found and returned to its rightful owner.
So I pick up the picture of her and me at my graduation that Miss Lydia left lying on the table, and holding it to my heart, I trumpet loud enough that she’ll hear me all the way up to the pearly gates, “Oh, Mama. Rest assured. Your little Giblet remembers.”
Birthday
Could it be just this morning that I believed the nature sounds were so much louder here in Hundred Won-ders ? Like this is where it all begins and the rest of the world’s gotta put up with hand-me-downs? Now the cemetery looks desolate like any other. And the baptizing creek’s got some scummy weeds floating on top. Even the flowers don’t smell as sweet.
Me and Teddy Smith are sitting side by side out on the wood bench across the road from Miss Lydia’s house. He’s staring off yonder and I am struggling to fit together the pieces that got me to where I am right now. Mama. How right it feels to have her back cozy in my mind. And Miss Lydia, I’m thinking on her, too. I don’t believe I’ll ever be able to forgive her. Even if I wear purple every day for the rest of my life. Not ’cause she was driving the car the night of the crash. That was just an accident. That coulda happened to anybody. But having your trust snatched away from you like that? That’s gotta be about the worst thing there is. Makes me feel like I lost my grip on a trapeze, knowing I’ve got no net below. Maybe many, many, many moons from now, I’ll be able to say to her, “It’s all right, ya made a mistake, Miss Lydia, let’s have a kitty cuddle.” But maybe not neither.
“Ya know, don’tcha,” Teddy says, extending his arms, “that this, all of it, come ’bout ’cause of you and your mama? The signs.
The healings. The baptisms. All of it goes back to that night of the crash.”
I figured some of that out while we’ve been sitting here staring at the Wonder signs. Like plucking off artichoke leaves to get to the heart of the matter, all of a sudden I understood what they really meant. Especially:
WONDER # 100
SAVING THE INNOCENT IS THE JOB OF THE ONE WHO’S
GOT HOLD OF THE WHEEL
“That’s how she got herself burned,” he goes on. “Lydia’s the one pulled you away from the fiery car. If she hadn’t stumbled into a creek after the exertion of it all, she’d be ’side your mama right over there.”
I lift my head to look where he’s pointing. The graveyard. “Just like all the other lies she told me, it wasn’t a miracle that I survived the crash,” I say, bitter.
“Well, I believe, like beauty, that miracles are in the eyes of the beholder.” I could tell from the way he cradled Miss Lydia that it wasn’t the first time he had. And what she nicknamed him—the Caretaker—that name has a whole new meaning for me now. Teddy here, even if he is slow on the uptake, it’s clear to me he’s lightning quick to keep Miss Lydia safe. Would do just about anything to snatch her out of harm’s way.
“Nice visitin’ with ya, but I gotta get over to the hospital,” I say, starting to stand.
He clamps his hand down upon my shoulder. “She don’ want me to say nuthin’ to ya, but I figure long as ya know the rest . . . Too many secrets been held too long.” Once my bottom meets bench, Teddy gives my shoulder a squeeze like a reminder to stay put. “Ya was over here visitin’ with Lydia that night. Heppin’ her jar up preserves. Blueberry.”
What’s he talking about? Does he mean the night of the crash? No. That’s not right. We were coming from Chicago to Cray Ridge that night. “What do ya mean by that night?” I ask, hardly caring.
“The night . . . a bad storm was comin’,” he says, tellin’ the story like I’m not even here. “When ya got done with the jarrin’, Lydia sent you out to the barn to fetch me so I could walk ya back to the cottage ’fore the rain came. But I was busy, pitchin’ the la
te hay, so I told ya to go back up on the porch and that I’d be there right off. And ya said, ‘I sure ’nuf will, Teddy. I’ll wait right there for ya,’ and off ya went. After I finished off the feedin’, I hurried back to the house, but when I got there you were gone. I thought ya left without me, so I ran toward the path to catch up, callin’ out your name. I was in such a state, I didn’t even notice I still had my pitchfork in my hand.” He swallows hard. “When the thunder stopped rumblin’, jus’ for a lick, that’s when I heard your dog barkin’ and yowlin’ over in the graveyard. That’s where he was waitin’.”
“Well, a course he was waitin’. Keeper always does that,” I say, wondering why this would upset Teddy enough to make his eyes shine.
“Weren’t Keeper. It were . . . ’member?”
Closing my eyes, I wait for the memory of that night to appear. Surprisingly, it doesn’t disappoint. Coming to me is the aroma of just-picked-that-afternoon blueberries on the stovetop simmering away in sugar. And the feel of the smooth rubber rings from the canning jars. And there’s Miss Lydia, swaying to her opera music, the wind of the approaching storm shoving around her white kitchen curtains. But that’s where the memory fades. “I . . . nuthin’ . . . who was waitin’ in the cemetery?”
Teddy’s breathing out all right, he just can’t seem to breathe in.
“It’s all right,” I say, patting his hand. “Ya can tell me.”
“It were . . . Buster.”
“Mr. Buster Malloy?” I ask, stunned.
“I shoulda walked ya straight home,” he says so hollow-hearted. “None of this woulda happened if I hadda.”
“None of what woulda happened?”
Teddy shifts his eyes over to the cemetery. “By the time I got to ya, he already . . . he was drunk. He was . . . Buster was tryin’ to do to you what he did to Miss Lydia all those years ago.”
Oh my goodness.
That night . . . that night . . . yes. Me and Miss Lydia were working together in her daisy-papered kitchen. When the jam jarring was just about done, she said, “Time to get ya home,” while she bustled around the kitchen putting the preserving supplies back into the cupboard. “Bad storm’s comin’. Go out to the barn and ask Teddy to walk you home, chil’. And take a scarf, it’s already startin’ to sprinkle. I send ya back with a wet head, your grampa will be fit to be tied, won’t he.”