by Donna Cooner
“No,” I say, “Raylene drove me.”
I sit down at the table and pour the Rice Krispies into my bowl. “Do you want some?” I ask Mom. “You really should eat.” This is backward. It should be the mom reminding the kid to eat.
“I’m not hungry,” Mom says, but she does turn around and join me at the table. She sits still, fiddling with a spoon in front of her.
She seems so far away. I want to tell her I miss her and that I don’t want to be alone anymore, but I can’t push those words out past the big lump in my throat.
I pour the milk on my cereal and take a big bite. When I speak again, I try to keep my voice casual. “Dad and I were talking about me getting my driver’s license. All my driving hours will transfer from Colorado. I checked. All I have to do is take the test. I think it’s probably a good idea, right?” I say it all really fast and then stuff another spoonful of cereal into my mouth.
Mom’s forehead creases into long lines. She leans forward and her blond curls, so like Miranda’s, fall into her face. “Are you old enough?” she asks.
“I’m sixteen, Mom.”
“That’s right.” She smiles ever so slightly.
I focus all my attention on stirring the cereal into a mushy mess and then watch it spin wildly around in the milk funnel I created. Some milk splashes onto the table and Mom reaches over as if she’s going to wipe it up, or take my hand to stop me from stirring. It’s like her mom instincts kick in for one second. But one second only. She pulls her hand back and drops it listlessly into her lap.
“I’m not so sure about you driving,” she says. “It’s dangerous.”
We both know what she’s talking about. “I’ll be careful,” I say.
“Do you have any homework?” she asks quietly, changing the subject.
I look up from the bowl into her pale blue eyes.
“Just some biology reading,” I answer, even though I can tell she isn’t listening.
The driver’s license subject is obviously not going anywhere. I decide to tackle the next big subject. There is little hope it’s going to go any better, but I have to try.
“I’ve been thinking about the court thing.”
My mom freezes, her back stiffening. This is definitely going to be worse.
“What court thing?” she asks, each word an effort to produce.
“The district attorney said someone from the family will be able to give a statement in court. I want to be the one to do it.”
She sort of cough-chokes. “What brought this up, Torrey?”
I shrug, as if I haven’t been thinking about it since Raylene mentioned it this morning. “I’m good at talking in front of people. It’s my … our … opportunity to tell our side of the story,” I say slowly, determined to keep going.
Mom stands up suddenly with the spoon in her hand. Her back is rigid, unyielding, as she puts the spoon down on the countertop with an abrupt clatter.
“This can wait. We don’t have to talk about it right now,” she says sharply.
“You can’t even say what this is.” My voice rises.
Mom turns toward me, her eyes glittering with raw pain, no longer unfocused and vague. “Miranda is dead and we’re supposed to tell everyone how that makes us feel? What good is it going to do?” she demands bitterly.
I realize I have pierced her stupor of grief. But there is no victory in seeing what lies beneath.
Without a word, Mom stalks out of the kitchen. In a minute, I hear her bedroom door slam. The guilt of my accomplishment hits like a hammer to my stomach. The plain beige walls of the kitchen close in on me.
I leave the rest of the cereal on the table and go to my own room. I throw myself on my bed and stare up at the ceiling. I feel like I am supposed to cry, but I’m not sad. I’m mad. I want my used-to-be life back.
After a minute, I sit up and unzip my backpack. May as well get started on that biology homework. A single piece of folded paper slides out of the backpack and falls to the floor. I pick it up, open it, and read the message scrawled there.
Go home, Beautystarz15.
It takes a minute for the words to sink in. Somebody recognized me today.
My stomach squeezes. Who was it? I think through the day, tightening and loosening the shot on each new remembered face. Ross, the blond boy with the big smile who reminded me of Cody? Probably not. He doesn’t seem like the type who’d know about beauty and fashion videos. Same goes for Ever and Rat, my lunch companions.
What about Princess Blair? She’d said I looked familiar. But the note slipped into a backpack doesn’t seem like her style.
Then I remember. Luis. The funeral home boy. He knows about my sister. He probably Googled me or something and made the connection to my vlog. It has to be him.
I stare at the note in my hand. Is this supposed to be a threat? He thinks he knows all about me, but he obviously doesn’t know who he’s dealing with. Anger pours into my hands, making the slip of paper shake. I’m not about to be bullied by some high school freak.
I pull out my phone and type in the name of the funeral home. There is only one tiny bar of service and it takes forever, but finally it pops up on the screen. Luis Rivera’s house, and his family business, is a quick bike ride away.
The heat is so intense that my T-shirt is plastered to my back by the time I’ve pedaled the few blocks. My energy and my anger have dwindled significantly with the effort.
I spot the big white sign that reads RIVERA FUNERAL HOME: FAMILY OWNED SINCE 1954. Directly next door is a big yellow house with a large front porch. I stop the bike and put one foot down on the sidewalk.
Two older women sit on wooden rocking chairs under a wildly spinning ceiling fan. One is a tall woman with tight gray curls who looks a little like my grandmother back in Colorado. The other is a tiny Hispanic woman wearing a bright pink beret covered in rhinestones.
I call out. “I’m looking for Luis Rivera. Does he live here?”
The gray-haired woman shouts back, “He’s gone running. That boy doesn’t have a lick of sense some days.” She waves me up toward the porch. “Oh, Lord, it’s hot out here today. Can’t believe this September weather. You want some ice tea, honey?”
I wipe my sweaty forehead with the sleeve of my Lucky Brand T-shirt. It’s too tempting to turn down.
“Yes, thank you,” I say. I lay the bike down on the grass and join them.
“Sit right there on the swing. You’re going to burn up in this sun.” The gray-haired woman pours me a glass of tea from an icy pitcher on the plant stand nearby. I sit down on the swing and touch the icy glass to my forehead before taking a long drink.
“My name is Mrs. Annie Florence and this is Maria Rivera. She’s Luis’s abuelita. That means grandmother.”
I know that because I took Spanish in Colorado for my foreign language elective, but I don’t enlighten her. I just say, “Hello. I’m Torrey.”
Mrs. Annie Florence nods and gives me a big grin. In spite of my reservations, I smile back. I can’t seem to help it.
“Me and Maria have been best friends since we were kids. Now we’re both widows and we’re back together again,” Mrs. Annie Florence tells me.
Maria speaks up for the first time, peering at me curiously. “I haven’t seen you before. Do you go to school with Luis?” she asks.
“I’m new,” I say, and take another big swig of the tea. The cool, sweet taste fills my throat and I feel myself relax. There is no sign of judgment here with these women.
“Luis will be back soon,” Maria says. “You just cool off a bit and drink that ice tea.”
“Isn’t it cooler in the house?” I ask, hearing the rattle of the central air compressor behind me.
“You can’t see anything in there,” Maria explains. “We’re waiting to catch sight of who all’s coming to Mr. Paulson’s viewing. I hear he left three different girlfriends and they’ve all been to the funeral parlor to pick out different things for him to wear into eternity.”
Mrs. Annie Florence nods, then says, “Mr. Paulson had a zonkey ranch out on the east side of town.”
“What kind of ranch?” I must have misunderstood her.
“Zonkeys,” she says again. “He bought this zebra at a sale up near Cleveland, brought it back, and bred it with a donkey. Got zonkeys.”
They must be kidding me. “Is that a real thing?” I ask Maria.
“Sí,” she says, picking up the pitcher. “¿Más?”
I hold out my glass and she fills it back up to the top. I wonder what a zonkey looks like, but I’m suddenly distracted from that thought. I catch sight of something on the porch.
The pots of bright red geraniums almost hid them from view, but now I can clearly see the figurines everywhere. Figurines of skeletons.
A skeleton riding a bike. A skeleton playing a guitar. A skeleton in a wedding dress. I blink, startled by the figures on every corner, railing, and windowsill. My stomach tightens and I take a gulp of ice tea to calm the creepiness, but not before Maria notices.
“Do you like my calacas?” she asks.
“The skeletons? Yeah, sure. Happy Halloween.” I raise my glass as a toast.
“It’s not for Halloween,” Mrs. Annie Florence says. “It’s for el Día de los Muertos.”
I translate the phrase in my head. Day of the Dead. The breeze from the rattling ceiling fan shakes the skeleton on the bike just enough to make it seem as if he’s waving at me.
Oh yeah, that’s better.
“It is not like Halloween at all,” Maria says. “The whole point of el Día de los Muertos is to learn to live with death … make fun of it a little … and it won’t hold so much power. That’s why the skeletons look a little silly.”
I glance around at the skeleton figures once more, but the grins on their little bony faces don’t make me feel any better.
Maria sighs and clasps her hands to her chest. The glittery hat perched on her head wiggles with the motion. “El Día de los Muertos has been my favorite holiday ever since I was a child in Janitzio, Mexico,” she says, then leans forward in her rocking chair and continues in a hushed voice. “Thousands of people came to our tiny town every year to celebrate. People spent all night beside the graves of their relatives, leaving ofrendas and building altars. The bell at the entrance to the cemetery chimed all night and, at midnight, the living and dead were thought to come back together again for that one special night.”
Goose bumps go down my arms and I try to rub them away.
“Amazing,” Mrs. Annie Florence breathes. “Someday I’m going to see that.”
“Yeah, sounds great,” I say, but I still avoid looking at the skeletons.
Maybe Mrs. Annie Florence sees something in my face, because she switches the subject. “Did you go to the Cortez viewing last week?” she asks Maria.
“Yes.” Maria nods and rocks.
“How did she look?”
I’m thinking she must have looked dead.
I’m glad to be off the subject of the grinning skeletons and spending the night in graveyards, but quickly realize this isn’t much better. I feel a trickle of sweat on my forehead begin to roll down the side of my cheek.
“Not natural,” Maria says. “That new girl just doesn’t have the gift.”
“That’s exactly what I told John!” Mrs. Annie Florence slaps the arm of her wooden rocking chair for emphasis.
“The corpses just haven’t looked the same since Mrs. Annie Florence retired from the restorative arts business last February,” Maria says to me.
“I always like to think of it as their last big makeover for eternity.” Mrs. Annie smiles gently at me.
Who talks about these things? I nod as though this conversation is the most normal thing in the world, but start trying to come up with a good excuse to leave. Coming here was a mistake. I can talk to Luis at school.
“What are you doing here?”
It’s too late. A shirtless Luis is standing in front of us on the sidewalk.
He swipes a crumpled red T-shirt across the smooth, caramel-colored skin of his chest, scowling in my direction. I was so distracted by the crazy talk on the porch, I didn’t even hear him come up.
“Don’t be rude, nieto,” Maria says. “Your friend here rode her bike all the way over in this heat to see you.”
“My friend?” Luis echoes, looking over at me with raised eyebrows.
“I, um, I wanted to talk to you,” I say, trying to sound resolved.
“Lo siento, Abuelita.” Luis walks up the steps and greets both women with a quick kiss to the cheek. “I didn’t mean to be impolite.” Then he turns to me, his expression closing off. “I need to finish my workout,” he tells me.
I’m not surprised. Nobody gets those kinds of abs from the gene pool. Luis turns and starts toward the building next door, glancing back over his shoulder. “You coming?” he asks.
I scramble off the porch, quickly saying my good-byes to the ladies and the grinning skeletons.
“If you want to talk to me, then you’re going to have to do it while I’m working out. I don’t have a lot of time. I’m on the night shift,” Luis says.
“Doing what?” I’m almost scared to ask.
“Mr. Paulson’s viewing. Evidently there’s going to be some excitement.”
“I heard,” I say.
He walks so fast I can barely keep up, and unfortunately heads straight toward the funeral home, passing a black hearse parked in the back circle drive. Is his workout partner the corpse of a zonkey dealer? What, or who, else is inside? More skeletons? I really don’t want to find out.
Luis glances back to notice I’ve slowed down. One side of his mouth crooks into a smile. “Don’t worry. We’re going downstairs.”
Like that’s supposed to make me feel better?
“Beauty is deeper than makeup. It’s an art form.” —Torrey Grey, Beautystarz15
I slowly follow Luis to an unmarked door. He bends down and pulls up the corner of a mat on the step, revealing a key. He unlocks the door and holds it open for me. I freeze on the step, but the grin on his face is a test I’m not about to fail.
“We’re going down the stairs,” he says again, and flips on the light switch.
“What’s upstairs?” I ask.
“A formaldehyde prep room, three embalming tables, six dressing tables, a cooler processing station.” He pauses for a beat. “And Mr. Paulson.”
“Well, then I’m definitely going downstairs.” I slide past him and down the steps. I hear him following behind.
The large unfinished basement is like a mini gym. A long metal bar and a set of rings hang from the ceiling. The floor is covered with mats, and a set of free weights lines the wall next to a punching bag. No caskets. No bodies. I start to breathe a little easier.
“You must spend a lot of time down here,” I say.
“I’ve seen lots of dead bodies. But this …” He holds out one arm and slowly clinches his hand into a fist. I see the movement of the muscle under his skin. “This makes me feel alive,” he says. “The body is an amazing machine. I don’t want to ever take it for granted.”
He jumps for the bar above his head and does a slow pull-up. “So are you going to tell me what this is about?” he asks.
Every vein in his forearms shows with the effort. But there is no sign of effort in his expression. He does three more pull-ups while I watch. I realize my mouth is hanging open and I shut it with a snap. What’s wrong with me? The note, I remind myself. That’s why I’m here. I pull the note out of my jeans pocket and unfold it.
“Why did you write this?” I hold it out toward him.
“What is it?” He drops down from the bar in one fluid motion and walks over to me, picking up a couple of free weights from the rack on the way. He puts the weights on the floor beside my feet and then straightens, glancing down at the outstretched paper in my hand.
“Sorry. Wasn’t me.” He says it in such a matter-of-fact way, and his face is so serious, I sud
denly have doubts. Maybe I jumped to conclusions.
I stand awkwardly in front of him, shifting from foot to foot. “You didn’t write it?”
“Nope.” He runs a hand through his dark hair and looks down at me. His eyes are so brown they are almost black. “Who is Beautystarz15?”
“Never mind,” I say, and all my bravado rushes out in one deep breath. I feel really stupid. And suddenly stuck. It’s not like I can just leave now. I rode over here on a bike and sat out on that porch with his grandmother and Mrs. Annie Florence, waiting for him. After all that trouble, how would it look if I left after only two minutes? I fumble for a reason for my visit and only come up with stupid small talk.
“Your grandmother is quite the collector. Skeletons? Kind of strange, don’t you think?”
All that ad-libbing on camera comes in handy sometimes. I’m good at coming up with stuff on the fly, and it helps to include a little bit of the truth when you can. Makes everything more believable.
“It’s not just the skeletons,” Luis replies with a small smile. “She loves everything about el Día de los Muertos. The food, the ofrendas, the flowers. Everything.” He drops the weight, picks up the other one with his left hand, and repeats the exercise. “It’s her favorite holiday — even bigger than Christmas.”
“I guess it makes sense with the family business and all.” I grimace, then catch myself and flash him one of my winning smiles. He’s not fooled.
“You didn’t have to come here. We could have talked at school.” He looks at me with raised eyebrows. “Especially if it makes you so uncomfortable.”
But Blair thinks you’re a freak and I don’t want to be seen with you.
“Tell me about the whole ofrenda thing.” I’m grasping at straws, buying time until I can come up with something better.
“First, pick up one of the weights,” he says, his eyes still locked on mine.