“I can’t go in there.” I clutched Jess’ arm.
“Rowan, take your time.” Mrs. Anderson caressed my cheek. “Take your time.”
Jess put her arms around me and her warmth fought to settle me. It didn’t work.
“Oh my God. Oh my God.” I didn’t cry, but I couldn’t stop repeating this phrase over and over to myself until Miss J. leaned down into my face.
“Rowan!” Her voice cracked like a whip and the words stopped in my throat. “It’s okay. You’re going to be okay.” She put her hands on my shoulders and squeezed.
I nodded, feeling so unattached from this moment that I didn’t feel my feet carry me forward.
“Rowan, hello.” The preacher held out his hand, but I didn’t take it. Instead, I stepped around him and walked to the casket.
Dad’s face was angry even in death. No matter how hard the funeral director tried, he couldn’t mask the resentment and anger that shaped Jack Slone.
He almost looked like the man I remembered. Or rather, he looked like a wax copy. His lips were pale, almost white. A fake color was swiped across his cheeks, but it made them too pink, too clownish.
I resisted the urge to reach out and poke him, thinking somewhere deep in my brain that that was a kid thing to do. And I wasn’t a kid anymore, no matter how lost I felt at that moment.
Then arms were around me. I didn’t know whose they were, only that they weren’t Mike’s. He should be the one holding me, shouldn’t he? I looked to my side and realized it was Gran, dressed head-to-toe in black. Even the circles under her eyes were black.
She didn’t say anything. Trina joined us and Gran put an arm around her, too. The three of us stared down at my dead father lying in the dead wood casket. My heart was breaking. What made it worse was that I didn’t fully understand why.
We were not close as father and daughter. In fact, for most of my life, I felt like Dad hated me. We didn’t toss the baseball, or practice the waltz, or go to get ice cream when I brought home a good report card. We didn’t do any of those things. He stalked around the house like a simmering pot of boiling water, and I cowered around the house like a little mouse terrified of drawing too much attention to myself.
But I could feel it—my heart breaking, almost like it was a dried piece of clay that was crumbling in my hands. I was surprised and devastated all at once. Why had it taken his death to realize I loved him?
“Shall we get started?” The preacher’s voice made me want to cover my ears with my hands.
Gran led me and Trina to the front row. I sat on the aisle seat with Gran beside me and Trina beside her. Dad’s casket was only a few feet from me. If I reached out, I wouldn’t be able to touch him, but his face was so close I could see the pasty white makeup.
As the preacher greeted everyone in a low, droning voice, I watched my father’s chest waiting for it to rise and fall. At one point I thought it did, and I shuddered, grabbing Gran’s hand. When she squeezed her bony fingers around mine, I realized I was mistaken and sat back in my seat.
Throughout the service Gran kept my hand in hers, but I couldn’t feel anything. I only knew it was there because I stared down at our hands and saw that the fingers were intertwined. She was also holding Trina’s hand.
I turned in my seat to see who was there. There were eleven people: me, Trina, Gran, Jess, Mike, Mrs. Anderson, Mr. Anderson, Miss J., Janie, Angel, and Dad’s friend, Ron.
The preacher asked if anyone wanted to say anything, but no one spoke up. What was there to say? After an uncomfortable silence, the preacher cleared his throat and asked us to bow our heads. Within the blink of an eye the service was over, and people were passing me between them like I was an infant at a baptism. How ironic that the hugs I had longed for yesterday only made me feel sick today. Even Gran’s arms made my insides cringe.
A statue couldn’t have stood more still than me, though, with stony hands folded across my stomach. People’s words and caresses rolled off me like rain droplets. And far too soon after, I found myself in a car, driving to the cemetery.
I was in the car with Miss J. and Jess. Mike and his parents were in the car behind us, then Gran and Trina. Janie and Angel had hugged me tight at the end of the ceremony and quietly slipped away. The rest of us followed a long black hearse that meandered through our small country town.
This area had one place where most people were buried. I had never been there and as we passed underneath the iron arch that marked the entrance, I knew I never wanted to come back. It was a dismal place filled with fake flowers and wasted lives.
The hearse drove pass row after row of stone tombstones standing stoic like small soldiers. A light, freezing rain blanketed the surrounding trees with tiny crystals. When the car stopped near the burial site, I got out and felt the rain cascade over me like a caress from death itself.
Ahead, there was a canopy. Under that canopy there was a hole. And in that hole was where my dad would rest.
My heels sunk into the earth as I walked arm-in-arm with Jess to the burial site. Since Dad had few friends, Mrs. Anderson asked men from church to carry the casket. These men spilled out of the hearse and then proceeded to pull my father’s casket out of the back.
Their feet squished into the sodden earth, and I could tell they struggled to keep the heavy wood on their shoulders. But they made it and rested the casket on the top of some sort of metal frame.
After the men were free of the weight, they moved to the back of our miniscule group. I wished I could stand back there with them, aloof and untouched by what was happening. But I couldn’t. I was here, seated once again in front of my dad, my heart hurting so bad I feared it would burst. Then they could bury me with him when I died.
The preacher started to speak. I would hear his somber cadence in my nightmares if I let myself listen. His voice quivered in the cold. I could see his breath escape his mouth, like little ghosts, each time he spoke. But I didn’t hear the words. I heard nothing.
Then everyone was standing. Hands were back on my shoulders. Somehow Trina’s hand had made it into mine. Jess stood on my other side and my ears reopened.
The preacher was still talking. “The Andersons have been nice enough to invite everyone back to their house for a light lunch. You are all welcome.”
Mike stood behind me and put an arm around my shoulders. “I’m so sorry, Rowan. I know you two didn’t always get along, but I’m sure it still hurts.”
I nodded. His arm felt heavy, weighing me down when all I really wanted to do was fly away—fly far, far away. I let him comfort me because I knew that was the right thing to do.
When Gran came up, he squeezed my shoulder and moved away. Gran was crying, tears pooling in her deep-set wrinkles. “I’ve known him since he was in high school. I just can’t believe it. Despite everything he did, he was like a son to me.” She covered her mouth with a tissue and sobbed into it. She shook her head and walked over to the casket where she pulled a rose from the arrangement and tucked it into her purse.
“You okay?” Trina asked. Her hand slid into mine.
I nodded. “You?”
“Yeah, I guess. I mean, it doesn’t feel real. It doesn’t feel like he’s really in there. Ya know?”
I did know.
“I’m going to go see Mom later. Gran’s coming, too. Do you want to come?”
I shook my head.
For once, Trina didn’t make a nasty comment. Instead she said, “I’m going to walk Gran back to the car. See you at the Anderson’s.”
I nodded again and watched her walk toward Gran, her heels sinking into the earth. That was the most normal conversation Trina and I had had in years.
Miss J. and Jess flanked either side of me like two stoic body guards. I didn’t try to smile—they wouldn’t expect it anyway. “I need a minute, okay?” I said. “I’ll be right there.”
“Okay,” Miss J. said. She and Jess took several steps away, opened an umbrella, and stood under it with the preacher. They w
ere just out of ear shot, which was good, because I had something to say.
I fell to my knees by his casket, my weight pushing into the soft earth.
“You’re a bastard,” I whispered. I laid my hands on the smooth wood watching my fingers shake from the cold, from his death. “You were a bully and a bad father.” Tears started in my eyes. “But you were my father, and I can’t believe you’re actually in there.”
The moisture blinded me. “You don’t belong in there.” I shook my head, my hair swinging around my face. It was as if the more I believed he shouldn’t be in there, the more everything would change and he would suddenly come walking up the road.
“I didn’t kill Aiden. You know that now. After all of these years, you know that. I didn’t kill him. He was a light. I loved him so much. I. Didn’t. Kill. Him.”
Sobs wracked through my body, leaving my shoulders heaving.
“But I did love you.” I took several deep, shuddering breaths. “Somewhere inside my heart, I still love you. And I’m sorry that you’re gone. And you know what, Dad?” I laid my forehead against the wood. “I know you loved me, too.”
Then I collapsed and stayed there until Miss J. and Jess picked me up and carried me away.
WHEN I left Dad’s side something in me felt different, like I was floating through the air, suspended in time and space. The freezing rain had changed to snow and soon the air in front of me was alight with white, miniscule angels.
“It’s beautiful.” I stopped. The burial site was to my back, the car parked ahead. But right here in front of me now was a parade of hundreds of fluffy little bursts of beauty.
The sky was a grayish blue, cloud-covered but still bright somehow. Even the clouds couldn’t stop the sun shining. But it was the snowflakes that were mesmerizing. As they landed on my face, cooling my skin, I raised my palms. Then I closed my eyes and relished the feel of the flakes against my lids. It was almost like little angels were planting light kisses on my skin.
When I finally opened my eyes again, I saw that Miss J. and Jess were doing the same thing. And on that day of all days, when death had entered my life for the second time in my eighteen years, I felt okay.
“I’m ready.”
WHEN THE three of us got to the Anderson’s, Mrs. Anderson and Gran were in the kitchen laying out food. Mike and Trina sat in the living room. Mike was on the couch surrounded by Delilah and Levi, Trina on the opposite chair. She was flung back in the seat, arms hanging over the armrests, like she was as bored as life could make her. But when she saw us, she popped up, dashed across the room, and flung herself into me. I stumbled backward and Miss J. helped keep me from falling. Though Trina clung to me like a lifeline, my arms stayed by my sides.
“Oh, Rowan! Thank God you’re here. I need my sister!” Suddenly she was weeping into my shoulder. “I can’t believe he’s gone,” she sniffed. “I just can’t believe it.”
Trina’s wailing brought in Gran and Mrs. Anderson from the kitchen and Mr. Anderson from the study.
“Is everything okay?” Mike’s dad asked, his voice gruff.
Mrs. Anderson, though, always ready to lend a warm embrace, hurried over. “Dear sweet girls. It’s okay. It’ll be okay.”
I bristled at Mrs. Anderson calling Trina a dear sweet girl. But I didn’t want to lose that feeling of contentment I’d gained at the cemetery. If ignoring Trina’s neurotic rants accomplished that, then I would leave her be.
Mike’s eyes locked on mine and after Mrs. Anderson peeled a heaving Trina off my body, I went to sit beside him on the couch. Several inches separated us.
“How are you holding up?” he asked, stroking Delilah’s head. The dog opened one eye and snorted. Levi, all eighty pounds of him, tried to sit on my lap again. Most of him fit, pushing me deep into the couch’s soft cushions. I leaned back so I could look at Mike.
“I’m good, all things considered.”
“It was a nice service.”
I nodded. “Yes. It was nice.”
Several minutes passed, each of us petting our own dog, neither of us speaking. Finally, he said, “I have to leave in an hour. Can we go somewhere and talk?”
Leaving in an hour. It was almost like he hadn’t even been here. But he had been. And he’d seen the scars to prove it.
“Do you want to go upstairs?”
He shook his head. “Dad’s in the kitchen so we can go into the study.”
I nodded and gave Levi a gentle push until he moved off my lap. When Mike slid out from under Delilah, she tilted her head up then turned her butt toward him.
“Where are you two going?” Gran asked, though her words were curious, not invasive.
“We’re going to go talk a minute before he goes.”
“Okay.” She smiled—not the wide kind, but the soft, sweet grandma kind. I didn’t return the smile. Something told me that what was coming didn’t call for cheery expressions.
MR. ANDERSON’S study was small and square, an addition to the original house with red brick walls and drafty windows. There was a fireplace across from the wooden desk and several diplomas and artwork leaned against one wall, waiting to be hung. A brown leather recliner sat in one corner and that was the only furniture other than the desk and chair.
I liked this room, but I rarely came in here even though Mr. Anderson told me I could use the computer anytime. I didn’t belong in the middle of Mr. Anderson’s bills, letters, and magazines. Besides, I had my own computer, an ancient laptop that ran slower than a turtle racing against a hare. But it was mine and worked well enough.
Mike shut the door and turned. “Are you okay?”
I rubbed my arms. “I’m hanging in there.”
“You’re not going to, you know.” He looked at my arm and waved his hand at me. “Cut yourself.”
My mouth fell open. When I searched his face, I found concern there, but I also found judgment. “No, Mike. I’m not. I haven’t done that in months, and I don’t plan to start doing it now.”
“Don’t plan to? You’re sick, Rowan. Sick. I mean, you need help.”
Fury erupted in me like a volcano. “Listen.” I stepped forward. “I don’t need your judgment or your accusations or your false worry. I’m fine. I can take care of myself.”
“It doesn’t seem like it to me.”
My hand itched to swing out and slap his handsome face. But that face wasn’t as handsome as it used to be. It was harder, more angular, more severe. He’d shaved this morning, but dark stubble still peeped through. Something had changed in my boyfriend since he left this summer; something that I did not like.
Maybe, though, just maybe, I had changed, too.
“I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again—I am not your charity case. Back off, Mike. This is in the past.”
“But how? How is it in the past?” He stared at me a hard moment then blurted, “That’s why you always wear long sleeves. My God, Rowan, you can’t even wear normal clothes.”
If someone threw me into the middle of a tornado, I wouldn’t have felt more frazzled, confused, stirred up. “This is me, Mike. Take it or leave it.” The shakiness in my voice disproved my strong words.
He was silent, eyes focused on my arm. It started to burn under his gaze, and I had to clench my fist to keep from scratching the dozen lines, from tracing the ugly A.
Sometimes I still wanted to cut but I didn’t.
I. Didn’t. Cut.
My legs were covered in silky light hairs because I refused to hold a razor between my fingers. I’d bent over backward, writing in my journal, studying late into the night, putting more hours in at the shelter, just to occupy my mind.
I didn’t cut anymore.
I didn’t cut anymore.
I don’t cut anymore.
I don’t cut anymore.
“I DON’T CUT anymore!” A soft knock on the door was the only thing that interrupted my screams.
“Rowan, are you okay?” Miss J.’s soft voice carried through the heavy wood
.
My body erupted in shivers and shakes, and soon I had to sit in that large leather chair, the first time my butt had ever been on its surface.
I locked eyes with Mike, willing him to expose my secret, willing him to expose his judgment of it. But he looked away, unable to hold my gaze.
“We’ll be right out,” I said.
“Okay. Let me know if you need anything.”
We were quiet as the ticking of Mr. Anderson’s clock drummed on.
“I need to go,” Mike said. “I have practice tomorrow morning.”
I nodded, a welcome numbness washing over me.
He didn’t move, though. I stared into the fireplace, unable to look at this stranger standing before me.
“Rowan, I love you.”
I couldn’t tame the flash of anger in my eyes. “You have a funny way of showing it,” I spat.
“No, I don’t,” he spat back. “If I didn’t love you, I wouldn’t care what you did to yourself.”
My teeth clenched so hard, I thought I heard them crack. “If you love me, then you have to understand that that part of my life is over. I don’t…do that anymore.”
“I wish I could believe you.”
“Then why don’t you? I’ve never lied to you.”
“No, but you sure have kept a lot from me. I thought we were closer than that.”
His words were like jabs from a sharp knife, piercing straight to my soul.
“No one knew. No one knows. Mike, this has nothing to do with you.”
“It has everything to do with me. I’m your boyfriend. We’re supposed to be close, or had you forgotten that little detail?”
I wanted to pick up the silver cup that Mr. Anderson won at a golf tournament and hurl it at his head. Never had I felt like being so violent toward him, but there was no reasoning here. Some of what he said made sense, but fury clouded over everything that came out of my mouth. He knew my secret and he was using it against me; using it to judge me.
Several words danced across my tongue and every single one was shaped with a fanged bite, shaped to hurt him as much as the accusation behind his eyes was hurting me. But something stopped me. Instead, I swallowed those shredding words and said, “It’s time for you to go, isn’t it? You don’t want to be late.”
My Name Is Rowan: The Complete Rowan Slone Trilogy Page 30