Joshua and Lizzie ran over for hugs, and I squeezed them both.
“We’re moving today,” I told them.
“I know,” Lizzie responded. “We’re moving to Arlington, Joshua,” she explained importantly to her little brother, being sure to speak slowly and clearly to avoid him missing anything.
“Dada, dada, mama!” Joshua babbled excitedly.
“Yes, with Daddy and Mama,” Lizzie agreed.
“How was your sleep?” Maggie asked me.
“I couldn’t sleep,” I admitted. “Too many things to think about, I guess.”
“Yeah, I know, it’s a big step,” she agreed. “It’s exciting, but a little scary.”
I nodded thoughtfully. It was feeling more scary than exciting at the moment.
“Oh, well, we’ve been there before, haven’t we?” she reminded me brightly.
“I guess we have,” I smiled reluctantly.
We ate breakfast and prepared to leave. Most of the few belongings we were taking with us had been packed the night before, so there was little more to do than gather up the few remaining things and do some cleaning.
We settled the children in the car, and I was about to get in, when I stopped.
“I’m going to go make sure we didn’t miss anything,” I told Maggie. “I’ll be right back.” I went back into the house and slowly went room to room, looking for missed items, turning off lights, but mostly, reflecting on each room as I went through it. I wondered why I had wanted to leave it so badly. When I was done, I locked the door behind me and placed the key on a nail above the door as I’d promised Eric Matthews I would.
I fought tears as we drove away. I hadn’t expected it to be that hard. Maggie sat silently beside me, gently stroking my hand with her fingertips.
Before we were on our way there was one more stop I felt I needed to make. Until that morning, I’d had no intention of making it, but now, I felt as though it wouldn’t be right to continue on without it.
Maggie didn’t say anything as we pulled up to the cemetery beside the church. She hadn’t asked what the flowers on the seat were for, either, and so I think she probably knew. I stopped the car and shut it off.
“What are we doing?” Lizzie asked from the back seat.
“Hush!” Maggie told her.
I picked up the flowers and hesitated a moment, wanting to say something, but I couldn’t get the words past the lump in my throat. I cleared my throat, got out alone, and walked through the graveyard, toward the headstone I knew marked Ma’s grave.
“Hello, Ma,” I said quietly as I laid some wildflowers on her grave. I stood back and looked down at the gently sloping grassy mound that covered my ma, and thought about her life.
“I’m sorry I haven’t been around in a while. I—I’ve had a lot of things happen in my life. But I guess you probably know that, don’t you?” It felt strange to be talking to the dead, but it would have felt wrong not to.
“It’s been a long time since I picked you some wildflowers, so I thought I would drop by and leave you some. I know how you like them,” I continued. I shoved my hands into my pockets and studied the gravestone. “Safe in the arms of Jesus” it read.
“I love you, Ma,” I said, wiping my eyes.
“Good-bye.”
I stood for another moment in respectful silence and turned away. My heart pounded and my knees almost shook as I walked toward the part of the cemetery occupied by more recent graves. I had never visited Ellen’s grave, and doing so filled me with sadness, and fear, and the fear of sadness.
There were two graves beside each other with new grass growing on them, and so I walked toward them. I stopped and looked at the first headstone.
Ellen Marie (Moore) Mattox
May 16, 1922 - May 16, 1946
And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes - Rev. 21:4
The inscription blurred as I read it, and I began sobbing uncontrollably. Sorrow depleted my body’s strength, and the wildflowers I held in my hand dropped to the ground. I held my hand over my mouth to muffle sobs I didn’t want my family to hear, and vainly tried to stop my body from shaking.
Until then, I had grieved, but I hadn’t felt what I was feeling then, this overwhelming sense that I’d experienced the loss of something so beautiful and precious. I wasn’t just mourning the death of Ellen, or the way she’d died, but I was mourning the death of our love, grieving for the demise of a life we’d had that had slipped away from us.
When I had cried my wells of sorrow dry, I picked up the wildflowers and knelt beside her grave.
“Until we walk hand in hand again, darling,” I whispered, and gently placed the flowers on her grave. I stood up, intending to leave, but it felt as though something bound me to that spot. Leaving felt so hard. I had thought I could leave everything behind like the bad memory that it was, but now I realized how difficult saying good-bye really was. As I stood there, I felt like I didn’t want to leave Coon Hollow, or the homestead, or even the gravesite before me. In my grief-stricken state, I thought it would have been better if my life had also ended on May 16, 1946. I couldn’t muster the desire to turn around and walk back to the car, and so I stood there, limply, staring down at her grave, feeling so empty inside.
“Robert, the children are getting restless,” I heard Maggie’s quiet voice behind me.
As I stood there like a statue, I felt her arms wrap tightly around me from behind. We stood together in silence. I knew I should go, but I just wasn’t ready.
“Let the dead bury their dead, sweetheart,” Maggie whispered softly behind my ear. “Your life is with the living.”
Her words rang true. I felt like a disgrace as a husband, ashamed that I’d become so overwhelmed with past grief that I’d forgotten the love of the woman who held me. I turned, and we embraced fiercely. Tears filled my eyes as I lay my head on her shoulder.
“I love you so much,” I whispered. She kissed me on the cheek, and turned and looked down at the grave before us. I pulled her against me, clasping my hands over the tight roundness of her belly, and felt the flutter of life inside her. My sadness fled, and I felt a sense of hope and an excitement for the promise of the future.
I looked toward the road that wound its way up and out of the valley, the road that we were about to travel. It wasn’t just the road away from things I wanted to leave behind, anymore. It was the road to a new life and deeper love. It was the road that would take us to new opportunities and possibilities. It was the road to anywhere.
Maggie gently pushed my arms from around her and silently began walking back to the car, as if allowing me to say good-bye alone. I stood there a moment, but my desire to linger by the grave had vanished. There was nothing more to do or say. I leaned over, picked up the wildflowers, and began to follow her.
“Maggie!” I called out. She was nearly to the car, and didn’t hear me.
“Darling!” I shouted as I sprinted toward her. She heard me now, and turned toward me as I ran up to her, holding out the wildflowers.
“These are for you.”
THE END
Thank you for reading my book! I hope it made you feel something.
I have striven to make this book exemplary in every respect. While I think I have created a product that is equal to anything produced by a large multinational publishing house, when it comes to promoting it, I obviously can’t compete with their marketing dollars. But I am convinced I can not only play their game, I can beat them at it. I just need you to help me.
If you enjoyed Love is a Wounded Soldier, please take two minutes and write a review on Amazon.com. If you’re feeling particularly generous, also post your review to sites like Goodreads, Shelfari, and Library Thing. Your review doesn’t need to be eloquent or exhaustive, it just needs to be there. Reviews are how books get noticed online, and without reviews even the most compelling literary masterpiece will likely remain buried in obscurity beneath a heap of a million books of lesser merit.
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I’ve done a lot of things in my life. I’ve worked in a factory that made books, driven truck, worked in the oilfield, a foundry, a warehouse, hog barns, and construction. I’ve even been a Sandwich Artist! Thank you in advance for helping me add “successful author” to that list.
Till we walk ha
Regards,
Blaine
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