Once again, I feel like that child of divorce parents. I want to be loyal to Carmine but if I could talk to Lillye….
“What are you thinking?” Dwayne asks. “You know what I say makes sense, right?”
I was actually reminded of something my sister Portia recently said. About my father coming back into our lives. My parents divorced a few years ago and it wasn’t pleasant, then my father split at the worst time of my life. I told you I was ADHD.
“Tell me more,” I instruct Dwayne and make myself comfortable while he does the same.
“It’s fairly simple. There’s a light that appears when our work is done, when those trapped here become released.”
I nod. I’ve seen Ghost and my experiences haven’t been that different from Patrick Swayze’s.
“It’s a beautiful thing, being one with the light of God.”
We’re back to skirting religion and I shift in my seat, wondering if more of that charismatic talk is coming. Dwayne appears lost in thought, and I wonder if this idea of communing with heaven might have him soon conversing in tongues.
He looks back at me and his countenance shifts, as if he suddenly remembered he had an audience. He clears his throat. “Anyway, when that happens, you need to tap into that energy.”
The ghosts I have helped climb the ladder didn’t waste time moving on. “How do you do that?”
That devilish grin re-emerges. “Next time you get close, let me know. I’ll show you.”
This is a first, someone helping me cross over a wet ghost. Something about it feels impersonal, like he’s invading a space between me and my client, but I nod anyway. If I get to that point on this trip, I’ll think about it.
“We’re here,” Shelby announces and we look out the window to find rows of cotton growing alongside the rural road with a house off to the side. We saunter off the bus, approached by an excited Mona who’s been following us in her car.
“Y’all are in for such a treat,” she gushes.
We follow Mona and Shelby in their high heels down the gravel road and across a rural highway, the two women stumbling as they go.
“Someone needs to tell these PR people that it’s okay to dress like the rest of us,” I tell Winnie.
When she doesn’t respond, I look up from digging through my purse for my notebook. “What?”
“Why were you talking to that man?”
I glance over at Dwayne who’s now at Miss Georgia’s side, no doubt saying something like, “Of course, last night meant something. I only sat next to that New Orleans girl with the crazy hair because I felt sorry for her.”
“I was picking his brain.” Not really a lie.
Winnie leans to whisper in my ear. “Carmine said to stay away from him.”
“Yeah, he’s a fallen angel. Did you remember how drunk Carmine was last night?”
Winnie straightens and doesn’t say a word, so it’s my turn to whisper in her ear. “There’s bad blood between those two. Doesn’t mean I can’t talk to him.”
We’re almost across the street, following the PR heels up a small driveway. The house beyond is hidden by thick woods and a stone wall lines the property along the street in both directions. An elderly man with soft white hair and a gentle demeanor greets us at the entrance.
“This is Tom Hendrix,” Mona says. “He’s going to explain his unique and beautiful home.”
I’m in the rear of the crowd — still trying to find that dang notebook — but as I approach I see Tom has arranged a group of chairs for us to sit on. On the side of the driveway he has items placed on a piece of the wall: a book, a binder, and a straw basket that looks native made. As I pass, I get a better look at this section of wall and find it’s full of gorgeous stones, all of which call out to me.
I have this thing with rocks.
Tom begins talking so I quickly take a seat but my eyes are locked on a brilliant piece of quartz. Smooth and round, it’s perched high on a larger stone like resting on an altar. The fall sunlight hits it from behind and it glows. Around this quartz rests fossils, green aventurine that my Aunt Mimi calls the heart chakra stone, chert, amethyst, and black tourmaline, the latter a protection stone Mimi always carries with her.
I told you I love rocks. I reach into my pocket and wrap my fingers around a piece of Angelite, enjoying the smoothness of the stone and feeling a calmness rise inside me. I purchased this lovely blue rock on my first press trip, when I saw a young girl clear as day hurt and bruised inside a cave. And yes, she was dead. Long dead. The cave owner gave me this stone, one associated with the spirit world, hence the name.
Angels, I think. As I turn to look for Carmine, I realize he’s at my side, an arm stretched behind me on the back of my chair. He gives me a friendly smile and a warmness spreads through me. I need to listen to my friend, I think, but something about this place ignites a powerful yearning and that rises in my blood, too.
Tom relates how his grandmother told him tales as a boy. She had mentioned an ancestor, Mary Hipp, who was a Yuchi Indian, a woman who loved her home. She believed, like many others of the area, that the river sang to her.
Tom looks at me and smiles and I shiver. Carmine brings his arm to my shoulder and gives me a warm squeeze but I’m not cold. I’m thinking about that mythical lady in the water.
As it turned out, Hipp and her teenage sister were relocated to Oklahoma during the Trail of Tears, Tom explains. Both were given silver tags with numbers on them and Hipp’s was fifty-nine.
“But the waters didn’t sing in Oklahoma,” Tom explains. “And Hipp dreamt of her mother calling her home.”
Tom’s ancestor left her sister, who had adjusted to Oklahoma life, and walked back to Alabama. It took her five years, hiding off the road to keep from getting caught. When she returned to Florence, she met a white farmer who married her and, had it not been for Tom’s grandmother still owning that silver button that read fifty-nine, the story might have been lost.
Tom researched what he could, then visited the Yuchi tribe in Oklahoma who welcomed him in. He longed to pay tribute to this remarkable woman, so he built a stone wall on one side of his property in honor of Hipp’s journey to Oklahoma and one stretching to the other side for her long walk home. A tribal elder advised him to lay one stone for every step she took.
Tom offers us his binder of photos and stories written of his feat, a wall now consisting of twenty-three million pounds of stones he laid down over thirty-something years. “Tom’s Wall,” as the locals call it, is the longest un-mortared wall and the largest memorial to a Native American woman in the United States. More than one hundred indigenous tribes and visitors worldwide have come to both admire his handiwork and leave gifts, including the stones I can’t stop watching and that exquisite basket made from a tribe in Louisiana.
“We have a visitor from Louisiana,” Shelby inserts, and looks my way.
Tom gives me a gentle smile and then encourages us to wander the multi-acre property and enjoy his wall. We’re free to act like journalists but his only requirement is that we refrain from shooting photos in the prayer circle, a sacred space off to our right.
I can’t wait to explore this wonderland but as I head off to the left where the woods are thicker, I let my hand brush those crystals beckoning me. There’s a vibration pulsating from the earth and those stones and I let their hum calm my soul.
One might think Tom’s Wall a fascinating undertaking but one that’s quickly enjoyed. But the wall goes on forever, and I’m only walking the first phase of Mary Hipp’s journey as I venture off to one side. Along the way are stone benches to rest upon and indentions in the wall where people have left items: a meteorite, shells from the Gulf Coast, a leather pouch with tokens, beaded necklaces, crystals and little notes I want to read but wouldn’t dream of doing.
The other journalists are chatting away as they explore the wall but talking seems sacrilegious in this sacred space. Joe is busy taking photos while Stephanie gives direction, Winnie and Kelly
talk gardening, and the PR women chat back at the entrance. I wonder where Dwayne has gone and turn to search for him but he’s nowhere to be found.
“Amazing, isn’t it?” Carmine sneaks up from behind.
I don’t know what’s come over me but I’m so glad to see my old friend, especially since he’s talking, that I deliver a bear hug, resting my chin on his shoulder and sighing.
“What’s this all about?” But he doesn’t release me. I sense he needed the hug as much as I did.
It’s then that I spot the photo on a deep indention in the wall. Two to be exact, both sporting images of the same woman dressed in a tight corseted outfit, full skirt with enhancements underneath. I’d say a hoop skirt but I’ve never been good with historic detail. The smaller photo curls at the edges and the photo is faded but the woman holds a child in her arms, smiling like only a new mother would smile. Her happiness pours off the page. The other resembles cardboard, those old photos people had professionally done with the photographer’s name listed at the bottom. There’s a man in this one, a dapper fellow seated with his hat resting on his lap, an arm about the object. The same woman stands at his rear, a hand on the back of his chair. I’ve seen these photos before, and usually the woman has a hand on the man’s shoulder in reverence. Something about this woman’s aloofness is significant, I think. That and the fact that she’s not smiling. Her grief emanates through this picture as well.
“Why grief?”
Carmine pulls back and follows my line of sight. “What are you looking at?”
I step closer and now I’m sure this woman was miserable at the time of that photograph. The child isn’t there so I’m assuming….
I close my eyes, blocking out the debilitating pain that arrives without warning. It’s been years since Lillye’s death but the knife cuts as sharp as the day she passed. I feel Carmine’s arms about me and know I don’t have to explain.
When the pain finally relinquishes the fist at my heart, I look up at Carmine. “He said I could evolve. After ten or twelve crossovers. Please tell me you at least have an open mind about that.”
Carmine’s eyes tell me differently. He smiles sadly and shakes his head. “He’s lying, Vi. You can’t trust that man.”
“I have to see her,” I whisper because the tears are so close. “I need to talk to her.”
He’s about to place his hand over his heart but I don’t want to be told she’s always with me there. I want to touch my baby, smell her hair, hear her laugh. I pull away but Carmine grabs my hand.
“We have to talk. But not now. Not here.”
I give him that and nod.
Carmine leans over and kisses me on the forehead. “And I’m always here for you. Always.”
I smile. “I know.”
Carmine nods toward the two photos on the wall. “I think she wants to go home with you.” And with those final words, he heads off down the wall.
I move closer to get a better look at my sad woman in black. Her eyes entreat me, call to me. She reminds me of Mary Hipp, someone far from home who needs to return.
And that’s when the humming begins. It always happens when a ghost is about to appear, murmuring like a creek gently rolling through the woods. I look around but no one’s there. I’m only surrounded by nature’s bounty, endless trees in all direction, and Tom’s lovely stone wall.
I shouldn’t do it, considering that someone left these photos as some sort of token gift; I would never consider such a thing otherwise. But this woman needs me. I can feel it. I take the two pictures and slip them in my sweater pocket. In return, because I feel it’s appropriate, I place my Angelite in its place.
After more exploration, I head back to the entrance and those pretty crystals. They sit on top of the piece of wall outside the prayer circle, and even though that humming has returned when I hover my hand over the stones, the circle beckons me. The center stone bench lies empty, the ground around it covered in fall leaves. There’s serenity about this place I don’t think I’ll ever find in church, maybe because my cathedral has always been the rocks and trees.
I glance around and no one’s here, which is preferable since I’d rather do this in solitude. I sit on the bench and close my eyes, beg God or the universe or Mother Nature to let me have a glimpse of my child. To send me a sign. Let me know she’s okay wherever she is.
I hear nothing but the breeze at the top of the woods, something soft and meditative. I squeeze my eyes shut and think again, but all I get is the sound of a far-away lawn mower.
I feel my heart rate rising and I squirm. I run a hand through my hair, even though I know movement works against prayer and meditation, something I have never been good at, whether because of my ADHD or my lack of faith, I’m not sure.
I take a deep breath and try to relax. I feel like crying. It’s not going to happen, I think, feeling like my chest will break from the pain. A rebel tear slips free and I try to breathe, try to release the pain gripping my heart.
And that’s when I feel them. Two hands. One on each shoulder.
I open my eyes and of course no one’s there. But I know it’s Grandma Willow and Mamaw, my parents’ mothers, their touch telling me Lillye’s with them and all is well. Suddenly, I do know through no effort of my mind that everyone lost to me does exist close to my heart, that those who have perished live in a blessed existence. At least those who are not bound to this earthly plane.
The wind ruffles my hair and I pull my sweater closer. My grandparents have gone. They were here for only a moment and this time the tears are ones of thankfulness. It wasn’t what I was looking for, but somehow it’s what I needed.
I slip my hand inside the sweater pocket and touch the photo that lies inside. I pull out the small photo, the one weather would have destroyed almost instantly, I say to myself to justify what I’ve done. The woman in black stares back at me with such happiness, a feeling that resonates to my soul. It’s what I experienced years ago at Lillye’s birth.
I run a finger over the lovely woman’s face and that humming returns. In an instant, I’m standing in the parlor of someone’s home.
“Cora,” a woman dressed in a calico skirt and white blouse calls out, “please change your mind. I worry for you.”
On the other side of the room a woman wearing a similar costume but with a riding shawl — my thoughts seem to reflect the language of the day, weird! — smiles at her friend and places a hat on her head. “Mary, I’ll be fine.”
“We’re talking Mississippi.”
Cora laughs and takes her friend’s hand. “You make it sound like the ends of the earth.”
“It is as far as I’m concerned. I wish you would stay in Kentucky.”
Cora’s smile fades. “I know, sweet Mary, but I’m weary of being a burden on you and your family.”
Mary starts to retort but Cora squeezes her hand. “You’ll be married soon. I can’t stay forever.”
“But Mississippi, Cora? You don’t know a soul there. And you have to travel that horrid Natchez Trace.”
Cora glances out of the front parlor window at the man waiting beside a horse and wagon filled with Cora’s things and a tarp stretched above.
“I have Reynald. My uncle trusted him when he traveled to and from the South so I know he will see me there safe.”
Mary also turns to look at Reynald, who’s cleaning mud from his boots. Their gazes cause him to look up and there’s nothing friendly about his demeanor. He tips his hat in their direction but it fails to relieve Mary’s nervousness.
“You can stay here,” Mary says. “I’ll talk to Phillip. He’ll understand, let you have the back bedroom, I’m sure.”
Cora tightens her hat straps at her neck. “I inherited property, Mary. It’ll give me independence I’ve never had, insurance for my old age.” She leans forward and takes both of Mary’s hands. “It’s my chance at life.”
Mary pulls Cora into an embrace and Cora grabs her hat to keep it from falling off and the awkwardness o
f it all makes them both laugh. When they pull away, however, both have tears in their eyes.
“Write often,” Mary pleads.
“Of course.”
“Don’t do anything rash.”
“When do I ever?”
Apparently, quite a bit for they laugh once more.
Mary turns solemn. “Sell the place and come home if you need to.”
I can tell by Cora’s reaction that she hopes this scenario never happens. Whatever lies on the other end of the Natchez Trace is her chance at adventure and freedom. She nods, but her mind’s too busy thinking of the happy possibilities.
Cora picks up her satchel and joins Reynald on the wagon seat. Mary stands at the door, a handkerchief to her mouth to hold back tears while Cora waves and smiles.
“Watch out for highwaymen,” Mary says as Reynald rolls his eyes and kicks the horse into action.
“Write to me in Natchez,” Cora calls out as the wagon turns the street corner and slowly moves out of view.
“Miss Valentine?”
At first I think it’s Mary calling my name but that would be absurd. When my name is called again, I open my eyes to see Shelby peering into the prayer circle.
“I didn’t want to disturb you.”
I look around and see none of the other journalists. Surely, I can’t be the only one left behind.
“Where is everyone?”
“On the bus. Waiting for you.”
There’s a slight tone in that last remark and it makes me feel guilty. How long have I been sitting here? I jump up and hurry toward the van, now parked right in front of Tom’s driveway. Tom’s there, too, seeing us off.
“Thank you for everything,” I say to Tom, but it seems so insignificant for what I’ve experienced here, so I give him a big hug. We Southerners tend to do that so he’s not surprised and hugs me back.
I smile at this kind man who built an homage to his ancestor the size of several football fields and jump on the van. Within seconds, we’re heading toward Mississippi to travel the Natchez Trace.
“Where’d you go?” Winnie asks as I sit in the aisle behind her. Carmine’s off to the right working on his laptop.
Trace of a Ghost Page 5