She lifted her head off my chest and looked up at me.
"What is it? I felt you start like a burden had been lifted."
"It's you. Whether you're spirit or mortal, you've helped me at every turn, whenever I was blocked or ready to give up in despair."
"Such words, Milord. You mock a poor gardener."
"Poor gardener indeed. Your pretend rose let me find the key to the Hall of Heroes, and your drawing on parchment revealed their names. Now, with time running out, you appear again in my hour of need."
She pulled away and slowly shook her head.
"But I have no such power. The crocus pretending to be a rose and the picture on the parchment were nothing but jests, a way to cheer you on."
"Not jests, Rebecca. Magic."
Intent on demonstrating her power, I reached into my tunic and withdrew the crocus. But the instant I exposed it, the flower withered and died. I stared in horror as its petals decayed into dust and were carried away by the wind, leaving only a few surviving grains nestled in the palm of my hand.
"Now even your magic has failed. I fear it's over and the demons have won."
"Oh no, Milord," Rebecca said. "That's not demons, but the gardener's way. It's in the nature of flowers to bloom and die. Then, when the new season comes, they bloom again. And in this way, we go on."
A blanket of gloom settled over us. I would have called it a chill but for the heat. When my silence persisted, she stood and wandered over to the parapet, facing to the east. She spoke with her back to me.
"Perhaps if I knew more about the trials."
"Why? Has your butterfly returned with an incantation more powerful than SMOG?"
She spun around, and I saw the color rise in her cheeks.
"You mock me again, Milord, but don't belittle a gardener's spirit. Pray tell me what I need to know."
She hovered over me, not to be denied. I took in her delicate features, her fierce but fearful eyes. Was it possible she could yet conjure up magic? My words spewed forth like the stream in the watershed, fire and ice, all the good and the bad that had transpired.
"In these last two days, the world will be won or lost in the crypt. I've overcome the early trials, but two remain. The missing boy with the innocent smile. And the final mystery, an empty casket beyond my reach."
Rebecca looked past me, out over the gray hills and to the mountains beyond. Then her eyes narrowed. She lifted her chin, extended her arms out to the sides, and leaned toward me, tilting up on her toes as if about to take flight.
"Though my crocus has died, and my heart is pounding in my chest, I swear by the Goddess to stand by you. Tomorrow at noon, I shall accompany you to the crypt."
I looked up, wanting to believe.
"Have you had a revelation? Some mage who's granted you spells?"
"You misunderstand," she said. "I have no magic. There's only you and I. But perhaps together, we'll be stronger than apart. Perhaps together, we'll find a way."
Chapter Thirty-One
Grim Gray Stones
On Saturday morning, I limped out the front door of the advanced rehabilitation facility and found Becky sitting in her car with the motor idling. The sky was somber and low, and the prior night's mist had glazed the pavement with a film of black ice. A bad day to be a wounded warrior. But once in the car, my mood improved with the scent of the daisies Becky had brought to decorate the graves. That and the touch of her hand on my arm.
We eased out of the hospital parking lot and headed onto the VFW Parkway. Two traffic lights later, we turned at Baker Street, a road my father used to call cemetery row. There we passed a mile of graves, cemetery after cemetery, each of a different denomination. All God's children laid peacefully to rest, as long as they stayed in their realm.
Becky tapped on her brakes, eyeing the slick surface and the many pillared entrances.
"So many cemeteries. How can you remember where your family's buried?"
"Easy," I said. "I've come here often enough."
Five times, though it seemed like more. Three funerals. Then once before I left for active duty and another on a three-day pass before shipping out to Iraq. I came not because the visits meant much, but because all of my buddies spent their last leave with loved ones. These grim gray stones were all I had left.
I found the entrance with no problem and directed Becky down the narrow access road. But before we could reach the Williams' plot, we were forced to roll to a stop. Ahead, a row of parked cars lined one side, leaving barely enough space to pass. And at their front, a hearse. Beyond a waist-high stone wall, a funeral was in progress-a cluster of mourners, a casket draped with an American flag, seven Marines in dress blues standing at attention, feet at 45-degree angles, arms straight, and thumbs aligned with the seams of their pants.
Becky stepped out of the car and I followed, huddling close more for warmth than support.
We waited respectfully as the minister finished the eulogy. While we listened, my attention kept drifting to the back of the cemetery where a row of stately willows bordered the fence. They stood with browned branches hanging low to the ground, like mourners with heads bowed, perpetual witnesses to an endless succession of funerals. But the willow directly in front of us was what caught my eye. Darker than the others, it let no light pass through, and its branches were quivering.
When the eulogy ended and the mournful sound of taps had faded to silence, an order was given. The honor guard raised their carbines and aimed at the sky. Out of habit, I snapped my right hand into a salute.
Seven cracks shattered the cold and I jumped despite myself. Then again and again. Smoke from the three volleys rose and drifted away with the December breeze as if carrying off the soul of the departed. And then I saw what had made the willow so dark. Out of the tree, a flock of starlings took flight as one, circled in a living cloud, and migrated to the next tree in the row. Their new resting place darkened, trembled, and settled to stillness, like the smoke from the honor guard's volley. It was a brief and moving moment, over too soon, like the life of the soldier.
Next, the flag was removed from the casket and folded and refolded until nothing was left but a thick triangle of stars. One of the Marines presented it to the widow, holding it out stiffly in his white gloves. I thought of Maria Sanchez at the archangel's funeral. He and the others were gone, while I stood here with a bum leg but alive. I longed to join them, to be embraced by the earth as well-to breathe no more, love no more, hurt no more.
Becky turned to me and took my hand in hers. It felt warm in the cold.
"Are you all right, Freddie? Talk to me. What are you thinking?"
"Do you really want to know?"
"Yes."
"I wish it were me in that coffin."
She squeezed my hand harder and lifted it to her cheek.
"Well, I'm glad it's not."
When the ceremony was over and the mourners shifted from their folded chairs to a mingling crowd, we went back into the car and lumbered along the rutted road to the far end of the cemetery. I found the wrought iron gate that led to our family plot, a plot I'd purchased as a fifteen-year-old after my father died and while my mother was paralyzed with grief.
I recalled the first time I saw it, how I'd memorized the markings on the archway so I'd be able to find my way back. At the time, I thought they were magic runes, something from a fantasy game. Now they looked more like souls writhing in hell.
I paused before passing through. In the distance, I could see the graves of my family, three vaults containing their remains. With my mother's fear of being buried alive, she insisted Dad be placed in an above-ground vault. Even at fifteen, I argued with her-it was more than we could afford. But she used almost half of my father's life insurance for the funeral. When Joey died, we couldn't very well give him less. And after Mom passed, I figured what the hell. I took out a loan on the house and gave her the funeral she wanted. I could always pay for college by joining ROTC.
I tried to coun
t vaults. From this angle, one blocked the other, but I was pretty sure there were no more than three. I was naive to expect a fourth. Even if Richie's remains had found their way to the family plot, no stranger would have borne the cost of a vault.
Becky dragged me back from my memories.
"Shall we go look?"
I nodded, unable to answer. She locked arms with me and led the way.
The wind had died down and the cold seemed to no longer sting. After a couple of dozen cautious steps on the frozen grass, clutching the eagle cane and hanging on to Becky, I reached the plot. Above the three unadorned vaults stood a granite marker bearing the name Williams. I couldn't take my eyes off it, afraid to look down. But Becky looked for me.
"There's nothing, Freddie. No grave. No headstone. No mound that's been recently turned. He's not here."
I held onto her, wobbling a bit but unwilling to leave. My knee had begun to throb as if it had just been stretched, and I felt unsteady. I felt empty too and strangely heavy, like the planet was spinning too fast, amplifying gravity and pulling me toward the earth.
A little ways off, I spotted a marble bench, part of a nearby plot. I motioned to it, and Becky brought me there.
I patted the space next to me, hoping she'd sit, but instead she turned and raced off across the frosted grass.
"The daisies," she said. "Be back in a minute."
She ran through the wrought iron gate with a lightness that made me and my injured leg jealous, then retrieved the bouquet at a more respectful pace. Her little dash had infused color into her cheeks, and puffs of steam came from her lips. She lowered the bouquet to her waist and proceeded more slowly toward the graves of my family, taking small shuffling steps as she came closer. Except for the gloves and the parka, she might have been a bride approaching the altar at a wedding.
At the plot, she separated the flowers into clusters, one for each of the three vaults.
Only three vaults.
I found myself steps away from where my parents and Joey were buried, thinking not of them, but of Richie. Before the Cape, we lived in a small apartment not far from the VA hospital, on the fourth floor, with a claw-foot tub and a trundle bed that Richie and I shared. He was two years older but followed me everywhere. A big brother until the differences began to show, and then a little kid who looked up to me and trusted me as we grew. As Mrs. Miller had said, two peas in a pod. Whatever happened, he thought I'd make everything turn out right. Like the men in my squad.
Then it struck me. I used to be like Becky, always telling others that everything would turn out fine.
I watched as she arranged the daisies, smelling each before placing it on the vault. When she was done, she came back and settled beside me on the bench but stayed quiet, as if observing a moment of silence. When she finally spoke, her voice was muted, the way people talk in cemeteries.
"What was she like, your mother?"
My mother. I tried to conjure her up, but had a hard time. My memory of her had begun to dim even before the war. But now, after all that had happened, she was just another in a line of ghosts, a wraith of a woman who died when I was so much younger and full of hope. I mostly remembered her from the faded black-and-white picture from my dad's wallet, a young woman holding me in her arms. But her face was blurred like a cathedral painting of a saint in the light of a candle. An image that quickly fades.
"She was a slight woman," I said, "probably why I was too short to dunk. Before everything happened, she laughed easily and was a pleasure to be around. Not the woman who wasted away, listening over and over to that damned Christmas carol. She cared most about three things: her family, the ocean, and God, in that order. But gradually, the things she loved were taken from her until nothing was left but me and the round window in the garret where she could see the ocean."
Becky released the long sigh of a patient teacher whose favorite student still didn't get it.
"You're not like that," she said. "That isn't you. You can replace the things that were taken away with something new. I believe that. Do you?"
When I hesitated, she placed a hand on my cheek and forced me to face her.
"Say it, Freddie. I need to hear it from you."
I wanted to be positive like she was, to please her, but the ghosts in the cemetery weighed me down.
"How would you know?" I said. "Miss Sunshine and Light. What's ever been taken from you?"
She withdrew her hand and turned away, looking back to the funeral that had just concluded, to the mourners returning to their cars, eager to get out of the cold. I thought for a second she might go back to her car too and leave me on that bench surrounded by graves and frosted grass. I probably deserved it. But instead she turned back, the sunshine gone. Her voice took on an edge.
"What is it, Freddie? You need to break scar tissue too? Well, I have some of my own, but I'm not going to share it with you. You have enough problems. My job is to pump you up, not bring you down."
"Fuck your job."
"What?" Her expression wavered between anger and laughter. "My job's the reason you can walk again. You don't care about my job?"
"I do," I said. "But I care more about you."
In the distance, the engine of the hearse started up, the last of the funeral procession to leave. We both turned to watch as it sped away, the need to drive with dignity gone. As it faded down the road, the starlings took flight again, a wave billowing toward us, flowing from tree to tree until they settled on the last of the willows, the one nearest us.
When the flock came to rest, I looked at Becky, and she looked back at me. She nodded just once. No words were needed. Then she made the slightest motion in my direction, or perhaps it was just my imagination. But I moved too, and in an instant we were locked in an embrace. I held on as if by coming together, we might thwart our demons, mine and hers, whatever they may be.
When we separated, our eyes stayed fixed on each other and our fingers intertwined.
"How is it," I finally managed to say, "that I'm not allowed to keep secrets from you but you can keep them from me?"
Her smile was back, but weaker now.
"It's because you're not ready to hear them."
"Tell me," I said as sternly as I could.
"And have you say I sound like a fortune cookie?"
"I promise I won't make fun of you."
She shook her head. "Not here. Not now. But you can promise me something else."
Her gray-green eyes grabbed me and held. I took a complete breath, in and out, and let the steam bursting from my lips fill the space between us.
"What's that?"
"Never again wish it was you in the coffin."
Just then, the starlings rose into the air once more, a majestic black cloud that spiraled and swirled, forsaking the cemetery and flying away to their roost, leaving Becky and me alone in the silence.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Dragons and Unicorns
The following Monday, I made up my mind. No more cemeteries, no more ghosts. I marched into my caseworker's office and filled out the necessary paperwork. All that was left was to tell Becky.
I went from the caseworker's office directly to the fourth floor, to the physical therapy room, even though it wasn't my scheduled time. Becky was with another patient, an amputee who'd just been fitted with an artificial limb. She was her usual self, cajoling and comforting. Giving hope.
I leaned against the wall in the hallway, out of sight but close enough to listen, trying to hear what she was saying. Physical therapist talk. Nothing more.
As they were about to finish, Ralph arrived to bring the patient back to his room. He eyed me curiously.
"Now I know you're not supposed to be here yet," he said in his rumbling voice, "because I'm bringing Becky's next victim down in five minutes."
I waved my free hand to hush him.
Thankfully, he managed to lower his voice. "Everything okay, Freddie?"
I nodded and whispered. "I came to see Be
cky."
"Uh-huh." He winked at me. "I knew it was only a matter of time."
I glared at him, as angry as I could be at a gentle soul who stood a foot taller than me. I was tempted to ask if he'd ever dunked, but then Becky came bustling through the door, pushing the young amputee in a wheelchair. When Ralph saw her, he laughed and whisked the young man away.
"What was that all about?" Becky said.
"Just Ralph being Ralph."
She looked at her watch. "You're not due till this afternoon."
"I know."
"Then what are you doing here?"
"I needed to talk to you."
"Oh, Freddie. I can't. My next appointment's in five minutes and I need to prep."
She turned to go, but I reached out and grabbed her wrist. She seemed surprised I could move that fast.
"I wanted to tell you myself, before the paperwork came down and you heard it through channels."
"Heard what?"
I took a breath so deep, my shoulders heaved and sagged. "I've requested a change. A different therapist."
She flicked away a strand of hair in that way she had, and blew out a stream of air.
"Did I do something wrong, Freddie?"
"Nothing wrong. It's that regulation. The one that says no fraternizing. I don't want you to be just my therapist. I want something more."
I watched her closely, studying the way her hands moved with a nervous energy, searching for a hint of what she was thinking. But before she could respond, a bell sounded and the elevator door slid open. Ralph emerged with a new patient, a kid who looked hardly eighteen. The pall of war still shrouded his face, and he was missing a leg.
Becky shifted at once into therapist mode, went over, and touched the young soldier on the arm. He glanced up at her, and she showed him the kind of look that melts bad moods away, even for those who have all the right in the world to indulge them. She assured him things would get better, more a healing angel than the angels my mother had heard on high. I backed away, swallowing hard, and left her to her work.
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