Lookin' Back, Texas

by Leanna Ellis

  Josie now stands at the front in a conservative dress that still accents her curves. She’s warming up her voice, practicing “It Is Well” and testing the sound system. Her voice floats up toward the rafters as if on the wings of angels.

  Mrs. Hoover approaches me. “Who’s that sitting next to your mother?”

  In the front row, directly facing the stage and the casket, Mother and her beau, Cal Henry, sit together. But explaining Cal Henry’s presence is a bit difficult. “Oh, he’s … uh … uh …”

  “The funeral director?” she supplies.

  “Sure.” That works. “Yes, I mean.”

  Then the preacher steps through the side door. He’s wearing his usual biker wear with do-rag and leather vest, jeans and black boots. He’s our cue.

  “Oh, Mrs. Hoover, we’re going to open the casket for a few minutes and let my mother say good-bye.”

  The gleam in Mrs. Hoover’s eye says it all. She wants to watch. She probably wants to make sure Archie is tucked inside nice and neat. She hasn’t said a word about the incident where she discovered Flipper in the casket instead of Daddy. Maybe Drew’s threat to arrest her was enough to curb that bit of curiosity. Or maybe she thinks she imagined it. Whatever she believes, I’m sure she would love to be able to report in the paper whether my father looked “natural” or “traumatized” by the car wreck. What she doesn’t know is the reaction from Mother when Mike’s plan swings into gear.

  “In private,” I add, turning her toward the doorway.

  Mrs. Hoover forms an Oh with her mouth. “Well, I’ll wait outside then, guard the doors so no one interferes.”

  “Thank you.” I follow her to the steps. A few early birds waiting for the funeral hover outside the church. I gently close the main door and unlatch the windows. They’re heavier than I realize and make a dull thud as wood thwacks wood.

  Mike enters through the ‘Band Only’ door. The preacher bends down and says something to Ralph. The last notes of his accordion vibrate through the dance hall and fade. Then he and Josie leave.

  Pastor Reese moves over toward the casket and lifts the top half, locking it into place. Even though I know it’s empty, I still crane my neck to see the white satin inlay covering the resting place where, if my mother had her way, my father would be lying peacefully for all eternity.

  I marvel how Mike is so different from my mother. Where Mike forgave me, my mother has wrought revenge. It’s a startling contrast. At least Mother stopped short of actually killing Daddy. I’ve read in the newspaper of others who crossed that line. Not to excuse my mother’s behavior, but I’d much rather be at a pretend funeral than a real one.

  “Everything all right?” Mrs. Hoover’s voice startles me.

  “Mrs. Hoover!”

  Mike turns and looks at us across the dance hall.

  I put a hand on the older woman’s arm, place myself between her and the casket which, thankfully, is at least thirteen rows of seats away. “Let’s go outside.”

  “Is your mother doing okay?”

  “Oh, you know Mother.” I push the door open.

  “She needs to cry.” Mrs. Hoover glances over her shoulder toward the casket.

  “She will,” I say. “Believe me, she will.” I need something to distract her and get her away from the building. “Oh, look over there. Is that who I think it is?”

  “Who?” Mrs. Hoover jerks around.

  “Well, I can’t be sure.”

  “Was it Willie Nelson?” Her beady eyes glitter with excitement. “I heard he might make an appearance.”

  “Well,” I say, “he does know, or knew, Daddy.”

  Mrs. Hoover bustles across the parking lot toward the old shack that used to be the post office and is now a store for tourists. Oliver steps forward. He’s drinking from a can of root beer. “I’ll watch the door, Mom.”

  “Thanks.” With a relieved smile, I go back inside the dance hall and see my father enter through the side door. Suddenly the dance hall is anything but quiet. My parents go at it like hockey players, bodies tilted toward each other, faces red and angry.

  “You’re just lookin’ for an excuse to go back to that man!” Daddy points at Cal Henry.

  “That’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard of. I am not looking for a man. It’s not my fault Cal Henry is here.”

  Actually, it is. But no one points this out. She did, after all, call him to borrow his hearse.

  “Why,” Mother continues, “I can’t stop a man from doing what he’s set on doing. Like I could have ever stopped you from traveling. Or made you do one thing you didn’t want to do.”

  “You underestimate yourself, Betty Lynne.” Daddy glares at Cal Henry. “Why don’t you tell that man to go on home?”

  “Why would I do that? He has every right to be here.” She smiles in a simpering Scarlett O’Hara kind of way, as if she’s dangling two men by a thread. What she doesn’t seem to understand is that she could easily lose them both.

  “See!” Daddy explodes. “See what you’re doing there? Flirtin’! Flirtin’ at my funeral.”

  With a huff, Mother simply turns away, her back rigid.

  “You won’t listen to reason!” Daddy’s arms are stretched out wide. “I’ve apologized. What more do you want?”

  “You said you were leaving town, Archie. You were leaving for good. So why don’t you just go?”

  “Because this is where I’ve lived most of my life. This is where I wanna live and—” He stops himself from going to that inevitable next line as Mother seems all too willing to make that a reality.

  “Now that your girlfriend doesn’t want you any more?” She faces him again.

  The side door to the dance hall opens and Josie walks in. I take a step forward, deciding to head off disaster before it begins. But before I can speak, she holds open the door and waves to someone. “Come on. It’s okay.”

  Then Hazel Perkins takes a hesitant step inside. She’s dressed in typical funeral wear of black dress and limp hat that seems to be weeping. Her umbrella drips on the hardwood floor.

  “Um, Mrs. Perkins,” I reach to lower the lid on the casket, but Mike puts a restraining hand on my arm.

  “Wait,” he says.

  “Hazel,” Mother’s brow puckers in that way of hers that says the other person has broken some unwritten social tenet, “you’re a little early for the funeral.”

  “Actually I’m late. I should have done this days ago. But I was too ashamed. Too embarrassed. But—”

  “Hazel—” Daddy steps toward her.

  “Archie,” Josie stands close behind Hazel, “let her speak.”

  Hazel holds up a hand as if to restrain my father, but her gaze remains fixed on Mother. “Betty Lynne, I am the other woman. I didn’t intend to be. And as soon as I realized what was happening, I sent Archie right back to you. Or tried to.”

  “Why, of all the things! My so-called best friend …”

  “Well, now, you just wait a minute. I’ve been thinking over the last few days what I might have done wrong. I did not chase after your husband. But I did offer him a kind word. I did listen to him and try to be his friend. But obviously, he took my silence and my kindness to mean something else entirely.” She takes three steps toward Mother. “Now, you listen here, Betty Lynne. You have a fine husband there. And he’s done nothing wrong.”

  Mother snorts and looks away.

  “Nothing in deed. He poured out his heart to me, yes, but maybe that was because you weren’t listening. But he loves you. Not me.”

  Mother crosses her arms over her chest.

  “I ain’t gonna try to get you to call off this funeral. I’ve known you long enough to know you’re gonna do what you wanna do. But I will tell you this: If you let that man get away from you, you’ll regret it till the day they put you in one of those caskets. Now, be the woman I know you can be and talk to this man, forgive him, and ask for his forgiveness.”

  Mother turns back to Hazel, her eyes wide with disbel
ief. “What do I have to be sorry for?”

  “Well, it’s the odd person who don’t have nothin’ to be sorry for. If you can’t think of nothin’, then maybe the good Lord will give you a hint.”

  Mother opens her mouth to protest.

  “But,” Hazel lifts a crooked, arthritic finger, “you gotta be quiet enough to listen to what God’s trying to tell you.”

  “Well, I never!”

  “Of course not,” Hazel says. “You’ve manipulated all of us for years. You’ve kept us all afraid to speak the truth around you for fear we’d be ostracized. Well, if you wanna treat me that way, fine. I’m strong. I can take it. But you are the weak one, Betty Lynne. You are too weak to acknowledge that you are as sinful as the rest of us.”

  “What are you afraid of, Betty Lynne?” Daddy asks, his voice quiet as a caress.

  “Afraid?” Mother puffs up. “I’m not afraid of anything.”

  “But I think you are. You’re afraid I’m going to abandon you. Which makes what I did so much worse. And I’m sorry. So sorry. I had no idea.”

  “I’m not—”

  “Are you afraid I’ll abandon you the way your father abandoned you when you were just a girl?”

  “My father did not abandon me. He died.”

  “Death is just another form of abandonment, sweetheart. You’d rather leave or bury me before that could happen.”

  Mother starts to say something, then stops. She turns, grabs her purse off the bench seat. With her shoulders squared, she addresses all of us. “Well, if we’re finished with this session of What’s Wrong with Betty Lynne, I’d like to get on with the funeral.” She pats her purse. “I’ll just go freshen up a bit before everyone arrives.”

  36

  Forty minutes later, accordion music once again swells and throbs through the dance hall. I haven’t heard some of these hymns in years. Our church in San Diego sings mostly contemporary praise songs. But “Peace Like a River” doesn’t soothe my corkscrewed nerves. Peace would be nice in any form or fashion, but at the moment it seems improbable.

  While Mother touched up her lipstick backstage, Daddy, Mike, and Flipper formed their own huddle, discussing options. Then the deputy left to get the squad car ready to lead the empty casket in the crazy black dented hearse to the cemetery to my father’s not-so-final resting place. Mike tried to talk one last time to my mother, using legalese that she apparently didn’t understand or didn’t want to understand.

  In the end Mother told us to open the doors and let the mourners enter. Let the festivities commence.

  Friends and neighbors fill row upon row of benches. Mother then makes her big entrance, walking past the closed casket, pausing momentarily as if saying good-bye to her not-so-late husband. She even dabs her eyes with her handkerchief. I’m not sure if she’s sad that her marriage is really, truly ending or merely play-acting. Finally she takes her seat in the front row, her shoulders squared, her hands clutching a handkerchief in her lap. Cal Henry follows a pace or two behind, then sits next to her.

  I feel the gazes of friends settle on me as Mike and I walk past the casket. Oliver was supposed to follow us, but he must already be seated somewhere in the crowded hall. Guilt wraps around me, twisting my insides. Have I been wrong to play along with Mother’s mad scheme? Where is the fine line between honoring one’s parents and being culpable for their same sins? I haven’t actually lied to anyone; I didn’t tell anyone Daddy was dead. But I didn’t speak the truth either. Just as I didn’t tell Mike the truth.

  Daddy’s words come back to me now about the wrongness of hiding sins. For that, I am guilty. I have aided and abetted Mother in her sham. I even tried to make it easier for her, enabled her to go on with her charade. We all did, trying to help her save face or seeking secretive and creative solutions so the truth wouldn’t come out. And inside, deep in my spirit, I knew it was wrong. Wrong with a capital W that does not rhyme with S, which clearly stands for sin. And I know what I have to do.

  Mother leans against me now and whispers, “There’s a nice turnout, don’t you think?”

  I start to turn around to look at all those who have gathered, but she puts a restraining hand on my arm. Mother always told me it was rude to turn around in church to look at the people behind us. I’m not exactly sure why.

  “Everyone from three towns around is here.” She nods as if pleased. But how long will it last?

  Josie steps forward then. Accompanied by a guitar, she sings “It Is Well.”

  Yet I know deep down, it isn’t. Not until I fix this.

  “The flowers look nice, don’t they?” Mother acts like the director of a Broadway play. Maybe she is. She’s the star about to make her dramatic debut and final curtain call all at once. I’m not sure how the audience, her neighbors and friends, will react. And the star? What will happen when she discovers the script has been changed? “Is something wrong with the flowers?”

  Realizing I didn’t answer promptly, I shake my head. “No, they’re fine. Beautiful.” “I’m glad I insisted on color coordinating the arrangements.”

  I take a deep breath as Josie closes with the final notes of the hymn. Slowly, the preacher rises up from his seat. I touch his arm as he passes and whisper a message to him.

  “Are you sure?”

  I nod.

  He walks to the podium and clears his throat. “Thank you for coming here today to celebrate the life of a man we have all known and respected—Archie Davidson. Let’s not focus on death,” he intones in a somber voice, “but on the life he led … and, well, leads even today.”

  Mother makes a small squeaking sound, then reaches toward me and squeezes my hand. “What is he doing?”

  Here we go.

  “Archie is loved by everyone in this community, as you can see from all the folks gathered here today. He has mentored young people in high school and coached his daughter’s basketball team. He has taught a Sunday school class at this cowboy-and-biker church. Why every farmer and rancher in the area knows him through his feed sales. He traveled much of the time, but his presence has always been very visible. Even now.”

  “Stop him,” Mother whispers. Her eyes are wild. “Mike!” Mother’s whisper is on the verge of hysteria. “What is he doing?”

  Mike reaches over my shoulder and pats Mother on the back. “It’s going to be just fine. He’s simply giving his own version of the eulogy.”

  I hear sniffles beginning behind me.

  “Archie’s beloved wife, Betty Lynne, has written a little statement about their married life, and I’d like to read it now. I believe it reveals her love for her husband.” Again, he clears his throat and pulls a folded paper out of his hip pocket. Slowly, he unfolds it, flattens it out with the palm of his hand.

  Mother starts to relax. “Maybe,” she takes a slow breath, “he was confused.”

  “‘Archie,’” the preacher intones, reading Mother’s written words, “‘was always my one and only love. From the first moment I met him, I loved him. I knew we would get …’” he pauses as if trying to make out her handwriting, “‘married.’”

  I glance sideways at Mother who has calmed down. She sits straight and prim, staring up at the preacher.

  “‘I knew we would have a grave life.’” The pastor stops, frowns, and squints at the paper. “That’s not right. Oh! ‘Grand life.’ They’d have a grand life. Yeah, that makes better sense.” He gives the paper a shake and starts again. “‘Maybe it wasn’t always what we imagined. But I enjoyed making a home for Archie, cooking his meals, cleaning, decorating. I tried to make our life as grand as it could be. And I did a pretty good joke.’” He shakes his head. “‘Job. I always tried to take care of Archie, keeping the house, fixing the best meals I knew how. I’m not sure it was enough. But it was all I knew to do. It was my way of telling him every day of our married life that I loved him.’”

  Hearing these feminine words coming from the biker-turned-preacher makes me want to laugh out loud. But Mother’s sentime
nt is sweet and caring.

  “‘Archie traveled so much that I had to raise Suzanne almost like a single mother. But I didn’t complain. I worked hard. But we had a good lie.’” Pastor Reese coughs. “I mean, ‘life.’” He looks up apologetically. “‘We had a good life.’”

  “If he couldn’t read,” Mother whispers, “I wish he’d told me. I’d have bought him some glasses. Or read it myself.”

  “‘Archie was always appreciative of my efforts. He was always quick with a compliment. He made a good, decent living. He was always thoughtful and sweet. He always remembered my birthdays with a rose on my pillow. If he was traveling, he always made it home for my birthday so he could wake me with a kill.’” Pastor Reese’s face looks likes he’s suddenly suffered a flash sunburn. “It says ‘kiss,’ not kill. Sorry.” He shrugs awkwardly and clears his throat. “Where was I? Oh, yeah, um, ‘wake me with a kiss. Archie wasn’t always able to say what he felt or what he was thinking, but he did little things that showed his feelings. He swept the porch and kept the yard always looking nice. These were little things, but for a man who was always traveling I know it took effort. Maybe it was his way of telling me he loved me too.’”

  Pastor Reese refolds the paper. He leans toward the microphone at the podium. “Now, Suzanne Mullins, Archie and Betty Lynne’s daughter, would like to say a word about her father.”

  I swallow hard. Mike squeezes my hand. Slowly I rise and make my way onto the stage. With heart pounding I face my family’s friends and neighbors. Most of these people I’ve known my whole life. They’re here because they love us. I’m here because it’s the right thing to do.

  “Thank—” The sound system screeches, and faces cringe before me. Many cover their ears. “Sorry. I’m sorry. Okay, well, thank you all for coming today.” Mother is glaring at me, frowning as I have diverted from her script. “I just wanted to say a word about my father. It’s been a long time since I’ve been home. A long time. I was remembering this week how my father used to like to play games. He wasn’t a card man. He wasn’t a gambling man. But he did like a good game of dominoes. He’d sit outside at one of those tables and play with anyone who wanted to play.