One Amazing Elephant

by Linda Oatman High

  “We will see him again,” says Grandma, “in heaven.”

  “But … that’s so far away!” I say. “Too long to wait.”

  “I know, honey,” says Grandma. “But sometimes we just have no say. We just have to wait. It’s not up to us.”

  I nod and blink. I don’t want to cry on Skype. I’ve got to be strong for my grandma.

  “It’s okay to cry, hon,” Grandma says. “That’s what we need to do when someone we love leaves. We need to get it out.”

  And so I do. I let go and I weep. I don’t know what I’m going to do without my grandpa in my life.

  Dad goes to turn off the stove, dumps the boiling water in the sink. Nobody cares about hot chocolate at a time like this. It can’t fix a thing.

  “I love you to the moon,” says Grandma before we sign off.

  “Love you, too,” I say. My voice breaks, shatters like a fallen lightbulb. “Love Grandpa, too.”

  And then I start to sob again, as if this bad news is once again brand-new.

  The Giant Has Died

  The Giant has died and I cry. Elephants do cry.

  I tried, I really tried to keep him alive.

  I pushed the lawn mower away from Bill so that it would not run over him. The smell of gasoline and cut grass; the putt-putt of the mower; those things stick in my mind like taffy.

  I tried to gently lift the Giant with my trunk. He did not move. I nuzzled him. He did not move. I nudged him gently with one hoof. He still did not move. His skin looked white-blue, like milk, like the moon. I trumpeted, loudly. Help! Come! Quickly! Hurry!

  I rumbled. I ran. I stampeded until Violet and Trullia came, and then the winter camp neighbors, and then the ambulance with frantic red flashing lights and screaming siren. I wailed when I heard Violet say that he was gone.

  But the Giant, he lost his life tonight. I lost my owner, my trainer, my keeper, my mahout. I lost everything—everything! That is why I refuse to move from this spot, behind the silver trailer with its blinking happy lights, in the big grassy field with the purple wildflowers and yellow weeds. My grief will keep me here, where I last saw the Giant. I can smell him still, my best friend Bill.

  Bill the Giant. He had a large heart, too, and that heart killed him in the end.

  They took him away in the ambulance, but I can still smell him. The scent of his skin, the salt; it lingers on my trunk.

  Oh, I miss my Bill. I am alone. I am so, so alone.

  A Big Decision

  I sleep in until ten the next morning, on this Christmas Eve Sunday. The sky hangs gray; not much difference between night and morning. For a split second, I forget about last night and the bad news. But then I remember again. That’s the problem with waking up: eventually you remember.

  “Good morning, sleepyhead,” Dad says when I blunder into the kitchen in pink flannel pajamas, my eyes full of sleep and grouchy denial.

  “Morning,” I mumble. “It’s not exactly ‘good.’”

  “Every day, no matter how sad, has something good in it,” Dad says. He cracks eggs into a red bowl.

  I just shrug, shake my head, bite the inside of my cheek hard so that I don’t start to cry. That’s a trick I learned when I was little. Keep the pain on the inside.

  “I have something for you to think about, Lily,” Dad says. “It’s a big decision, but unfortunately you have to make it pretty quick.” He whips the eggs, puts butter in the frying pan, turns on the stove. Sizzle fills the room.

  “What?” I sink down into a kitchen chair, running my hands through the tangles in my hair.

  “Well, here’s the thing, Lily. Grandma called early this morning, and she’s thinking about the funeral. She’d really like for you to be there, and so she found a great deal on holiday airfare on some website. She’d pay half and I can cover the other half, but you’d have to fly today.”

  “Today?”

  Dad nods. He pours the eggs into the hot butter, stirs, scrambles.

  “Grandma’s all ready with her credit card as soon as you give her the word. I can get you to the airport in less than an hour. You’d have to pack your bag pretty quick. We’d stop first and get you a cell phone—”

  “My own phone?”

  “Just one with minutes for a texting plan. Like, to keep in touch with quick stuff. Or for emergencies.”

  What other kind of emergency could possibly happen? My grandpa already died.

  “So I know you’ve never flown, sweetheart, and I’m really sorry that I can’t afford to get myself a ticket, too. But I know you’ll be fine! You’re a smart girl and you’re brave.”

  “I’m so not brave!”

  “You’re smart. And you have a great big heart. And that great big heart is exactly what Grandma Violet needs right now.”

  “But … what about Christmas? It’s Christmas Eve!” I pick at a little rip in the plastic tablecloth, making it bigger.

  “I know,” Dad says. “And I’ll save it for you. Some things can wait. Even your favorite holiday.”

  I look at the tree. I look at the star. I look at the plates of cookies and treats, made by Dad and me. I look at the wrapped gifts under the tree.

  “Promise? You promise to wait?”

  “You can count on me,” my dad says.

  And I know I can. Dad pours me a big glass of orange juice, puts some eggs on a plate for me, and hands me the bottle of ketchup.

  “How long do I have to decide?” I ask.

  “Take a little walk after you eat breakfast and think about it,” Dad says. “And whatever you decide will be fine.”

  Trudging up one of our hiking trails, I’m thinking and thinking and thinking. But what if my mother is mean to me? What if the elephant charges me or smothers me? What if I’m scared, all alone, way up high in the sky? What if I get lost? What if I can’t figure out the airport? What if the plane crashes? What if Dad has a heart attack while I’m gone? What if, what if, what if? My entire mind has turned into one big question mark.

  I’ve never been on an airplane. I’ve never gone anywhere alone. I’m twelve. I know nothing about flying or Florida or funerals. I’ve never even been to a funeral!

  What to do, what to do, what to do? That’s what I’m thinking with each crunch of my boot against frozen ground, with every crackle of dead leaves, with every snap of tree limb that I break with my steps. The air is so cold that the tiny hairs freeze inside my nose, and it feels as though I’m frozen from the inside out.

  What should I do?

  And then I remember how Grandpa Bill saved my life when I was six. I remember how it felt to be cuddled in his arms. I remember how he’d blow bubbles for me, and we’d see each other’s faces through the bubbles as I looked up. I remember how he was always there for me when my mother was not.

  “Yes,” I say out loud, to the hard ground and to the bare-limbed trees and to the quiet gray sky.

  “Yes, I’ll go. I’ll be there, Grandpa Bill. I’ll be there for you. And I’ll try to be brave.”

  And then I jump as a bird startles me, flapping its wings on the branch of a tree. I gasp, then almost laugh.

  The bird flies away, into the West Virginia winter sky, leaving me behind to finally make up my mind.

  “I’m going to fly, too,” I call after the bird. “Just like you.”

  Maybe Queenie Grace Can Die, Too

  It is Sunday morning. Violet lugs bucket after bucket of water from the hose. She dumps them, sloshing the water into my trough. She does not speak. The Giant always had words, sometimes song. It was as if his spirits rose with the sun.

  I am not thirsty. I am not hungry. I do not want the carrot she offers. I do not like the taste of Violet’s hand in my water. I long for Bill. Where is Bill? Where do people go when they leave their bodies?

  Violet looks up at me. She meets my eyes with hers.

  “I miss him, too, you know,” she says. Her voice is a whisper.

  The daughter, Trullia, rambles outside of the trailer. She walks wi
th the man Mike, who smells of secrets and sneakiness. They go to the car, and they drive away.

  The fire-eating man, Charlie, comes out of his trailer. He settles into his rocking chair, staring at me and smoking his smelly cigar. His wife, Mary the Bearded Lady, comes outside, too. She strokes her beard; he smokes.

  “Such a shame,” she says. “I always liked Bill.”

  Charlie takes his cigar from his mouth, points it at me.

  “It was the elephant,” he says. “That darn elephant probably killed him. I always told Bill that elephant would be the death of him yet.”

  “Oh,” says Mary, “Queenie Grace wouldn’t hurt a flea.”

  Charlie just stares at me, his eyes mean and hard under his cowboy hat. Charlie has a beard, bushy and black like his wife’s. Charlie makes my skin quiver.

  “We need to get that critter out of Gibtown,” he says, “before it hurts somebody else.”

  I hang my head. I agree with Mary: I would not harm a flea.

  I stand sad and scared in this place, in the spot where I last saw my friend. The ground flattened hopelessly where he fell. I will not move. I refuse food. I will not drink.

  I sway, shift my weight, weave, rock. Tears fall, and the salt of them drops into my water.

  Maybe I can die, too.

  I’m Not in West Virginia Anymore

  The airplane rises into the sky and I swear, I’m afraid that I might just die. How can all this weight—all these people—fly? It’s a five o’clock flight; outside (and inside), it looks like night.

  I’m sitting beside a nice yellow-haired lady with sparkly earrings and a refreshing smell of mint. She wears these cat’s-eye glasses with green sequins, and a lot of blush, which makes her look excited. She squeezes my hand when she sees how nervous I am, and the skin of her hand is soft like flowers at the end of summer.

  I’m in the window seat, and she’s squished between me and a frowning serious businessman who’s obsessed with his work. So Donna and I are stuck with each other. She lives in Florida … was visiting somebody in West Virginia, she says.

  “That winter weather, brrrrrrr,” she says, hugging herself and making a fake shiver.

  “I know. We’re always waiting for summer to come once again.”

  “So where are you going, honey?” the lady asks. She’s holding a magazine, and it’s open, but she’s paying attention to me. I’m sketching in my notebook, which is what I do when I’m nervous.

  “Florida, a place called Gibtown. My grandfather died, so I have to go to the funeral.”

  “Oh, I’m so sorry, sweetheart.” The old lady pats my arm, which just about does it for me. I have to bite the inside of my cheek and repeat inside my mind: I will not cry, I will not cry, I will not cry… .

  “Grief won’t last forever, honey,” Donna says. “It’ll go through stages, like a roller-coaster ride, and you just have to hold on and go with it. I promise, though, that you’ll heal one day. It’ll never go away, but it will be different.”

  I try to change the subject, because talking about death isn’t my favorite thing.

  “This airplane is bumpy,” I say. I close my notebook and put my pencil in my pocket.

  The lady is still holding my hand and she’s still on the subject of death.

  “So is this is your mother’s father or your father’s father who passed?” she asks.

  “Um, my mother’s dad.”

  “Your mother isn’t coming with you to the funeral?”

  “Well, um, she’s already there. She’s been traveling with a circus since I was three.”

  I get all choked up at the last part of the sentence, and Donna leans over and presses her cheek to mine.

  “Oh, sometimes in life those things happen,” she says. “We just have to learn to forgive and keep on living. Let go of fear, trust that everything will be peachy. And if not peachy, at least good enough. Good enough for us!”

  I nod. I glance down at the open pages of Donna’s glossy magazine. There’s a big headline that says YOU CAN DO IT! MOVE FORWARD WITH LOVE! SPREAD YOUR WINGS AND FLY!!!!

  That’s way too many exclamation points for me at this time of my life.

  The airplane is landing. It’s quivery, and I’m holding my breath, squeezing the seat arms with each hand. Donna circles my wrist, stroking my skin with her fingers, and once again I have to bite the inside of my cheek. Keep it inside. That’s my motto.

  Coming back to earth is scary. It’s noisy and it feels like the airplane isn’t going to stop and my stomach drops and my heart skitters. Donna hands me a little snack pack of peanuts, and I take them but don’t open the bag, just shove them into the pocket of my jacket.

  Finally, the plane screeches to a stop. We all unclick our seat belts, stand, yawn, and stretch. I reach up and grab my small black suitcase from the overhead compartment. My suitcase does not have wheels, because apparently my dad is old-fashioned like that. All I see through the airplane window is darkness, and airport workers, and blinking red lights.

  “Bye, sweetheart,” says Donna. “I’ll be thinking of you.”

  She hands me a card, a flowery one with her name and phone number and the words Spiritual Adviser & Animal Communicator.

  I read the card out loud.

  “That’s an … unusual job,” I say.

  “Well, people have unusual lives!” replies Donna. “Like, for example, you. Your mother works in a circus, and you have a different living situation. Sometimes people just need some spiritual advice! And animals … well, they need communication, too.”

  I nod.

  “Okay,” I say.

  “Call me if you need anything,” she says. “Here, write down your number, too.”

  She has me write my cell number on another of her cards, and then she tucks it in her wallet like something precious.

  We give each other an awkward quick hug, and I take the phone from my pocket. I text Dad.

  Here.

  His text comes right back, as if he was just waiting for mine.

  Great. Be safe. Love you.

  Love you, too.

  Lugging the suitcase, I follow the other people through a tunnel-like ramp, and, when I trudge from the other end, into the too-bright and busy airport filled with important people coming and going, and walk all the way to the baggage claim, there she is: Trullia Lee Pruitt, in the flesh, standing with some bald-headed neck-tattoo guy. Her hair is dyed blond, but with roots the color of mine, and her eyes are lined with so much makeup that she looks fake. Her lips are pink and plumped up.

  “Lily!” she calls, waving like Miss America, teetering on high heels. (Trullia’s always a bit more show-offy and fake-cheery when she has a new boyfriend.) They come running like we’re long-lost friends, and the bald man takes my suitcase. His hand feels rough when it brushes against mine.

  “Hey,” he says. “I’m Mike.”

  He smells like cigarette smoke and he’s missing some teeth, plus he’s wearing a dirty white undershirt, but it’s pretty nice that he relieved me of the suitcase weight. Even if it does mean he has to lift his arm, which results in the disgusting smell of sweat coming from that gross hairy underarm.

  My mother gives me a halfhearted, one-armed hug. She smells like smoke, too, plus onions. The mothers in my dream world smell like sugar cookies and roses, and they dress snazzy yet classy, like the moms in the Old Navy Christmas commercials. This is real life, though, not my made-up one, and Trullia Pruitt is wearing a short blue sundress that’s like two sizes too small.

  “I can’t even believe it about Grandpa,” I say.

  “I know,” Trullia says. “It doesn’t feel real to me, either.”

  There’s a minute of awkward silence.

  “And I can’t believe you’re thirteen!” Trullia finally says, stepping back to study me head to toe. She hasn’t seen me since summer, so I guess I’ve changed.

  “I’m twelve. I’ll be thirteen in the summer. July twenty-third.”

  Trullia just
brushes it off, as if she forgot my age on purpose.

  “Wow,” she says. “You sure are getting tall. Taller than me!”

  Yeah, I think. That’s what happens when you’re not looking.

  Stepping out through the airport doors feels like walking into the rainforest part of the little zoo back home: all steamy and heavy and warm. It’s as if a damp wool blanket has been thrown all over the whole world, and I break out in a sweat. Cars honk, people hurry, suitcases roll and clatter. I can’t even see any stars. The sky is dark. It must be after eight o’clock, I know, but otherwise I’ve lost all track of time.

  “There’s our car.” Trullia points to a little beaten-up car that’s parked all crooked.

  “How far is the trailer park?” I ask.

  “Not far,” says Mike. “Be there before you know it.”

  The entire time in the car, Trullia blah-blah-blahs in that scratchy cigarette-torn voice of hers, mostly about how Grandpa Bill was just mowing the yard and everything was normal and fine and then he just went. Boom. Just like that.

  I gaze through the window, into the darkness. I am like the wheels of this car, missing my hubcap: Dad.

  “Queenie Grace is amazing,” Trullia says. “She tried to save Dad. It’s so sad.” Her voice quivers.

  “The elephant was just following her wild instinct,” Mike says. “Trying to move the body.”

  “No,” Trullia says, her voice firm. “She was trying to save my dad.”

  Mike takes a pack of cigarettes from the pocket of his shirt. He shakes one out, taps it against his wrist, driving with one hand. Then he casually sticks that cigarette in his mouth.

  “Um, I’m allergic to cigarette smoke,” I say, and Trullia turns to look at me as if she blames me for that.

  I cough, just to show them that even the sight of a cigarette can get me going.

  “I’ll save it for later,” Mike says, a wisp of annoyance tickling his voice, tucking the cigarette behind his ear.

  “Thanks.”

  “Don’t mention it.”

  Trullia turns around to look at me, grinning as if this new boyfriend of hers is all that.

  “You can take off that jacket, Lily,” she says. “You’re not in West Virginia anymore.”