Gramps’ funeral isn’t just someplace, I think. It isn’t at the drop of a hat. But I let it pass. I heard that big-sister tone in her voice: what could you possibly know about my love life? Like I’m nine and she’s a hotshot freshman in high school. In fact, she acts half-mad at me after that. Like she used to act when I said something dumb and embarrassed her in front of her friends. When I ask her if she wants go to the mall and help me look for a funeral dress, she says she’s too tired.
So I go by myself. I find a dress right off: a simple black lightweight wool dress. Long-sleeved, fitted in the bodice, it flares gently and falls to my ankles. It looks good. Grown up. I buy black heels and a small black Coach bag to go with it. Then I wander in and out of stores for a while, ending up where I always do, looking in the window of the pet shop. Two yellow lab puppies play in some straw, rolling and nipping at each other. When I knock on the glass, one of them stops and looks at me, panting.
I think of Harp again, how he looked at me that day and asked me what I wanted. He ditched me, sure. But for a little while, he knew me in a way no one else ever had. I think of the cold winter day we stood on the beach together, remember the feel of his arms around me, and I long for that now. Someone, anyone just to hold me.
The yellow puppy barks, scratches at the window as if to beckon me. I go inside, breathe in the furry, fecal animal odor, and the puppy puts his paws on the retaining wall of the display window and cocks his head. I set my shopping bag on the floor. I lift my hands to his face and feel his soft fur, his rough, wet tongue licking my fingers. “Hey, Harp,” I whisper, surprising myself.
The puppy twists eagerly, as if he recognizes the name.
“May I help you?” a sales clerk asks.
Get a life, put a dog in it, the real Harp said. Suddenly, it occurs to me that it could work the other way, too. Get a dog, get a life to put it in. I ask, “Do you ever put dogs, like, on hold?”
“Hold?” the woman asks.
“Well, yeah. I mean, what if I wanted to buy this puppy, but couldn’t take him today? The thing is, I just moved back to town and I don’t have a place to live right now; but my grandfather died and the funeral’s tomorrow, so I can’t find a place till after that. So if I wanted to buy the puppy, do you think it might be possible for me to pay for him now and then leave him here a couple of days until I find an apartment?”
The woman goes back to the office to consult with the manager, who agrees that I can leave the dog for three days if I’ll sign a statement releasing them from responsibility for any accident that might occur.
I shouldn’t do it, I know. I think of my parents, upset enough already about Gramps, and feel almost nauseous. But the puppy yaps urgently at me. He jumps wildly, as if trying to jump into my arms. And I can’t help it. I lean over the restraining wall, pick him up and draw him close to me. He’s so warm, so needy. He nuzzles my neck, burrows against me, as if to convince me that he belongs here in my arms.
“Okay,” I say, abandoning whatever shred of common sense I ever had, and a few minutes later I leave the shop with the receipt and a copy of The Natural Dog in hand. I’ll just keep it a secret, I think. Until the time is right.
The next morning, the day of Gramps’ funeral, I get up early, put on some old sweats and my running shoes, and go outside. It’s sunny, but cold for March. Still, the bushes in the yard are red-tipped, promising spring. I walk briskly toward the canal, thinking of Gramps, acutely conscious of the visible puffs of vapor my breath makes in the air. I think, too, about the time I took this same walk all by myself when I was barely three. I was going to feed the ducks, I said, when Mom found me nearly two blocks from home. I was carrying my breakfast toast. The ducks might be hungry, I thought, and I had decided to go feed it to them. I knew the way to the canal perfectly; I’d been there dozens of times. I didn’t understand why Mom was so upset about it, why she was crying.
I don’t actually remember that morning myself. But Mom’s told the story so many times that it seems like a memory to me. There are other stories about me, too. How I constantly escaped from the baby pool at the swim club by attaching myself to some family and walking with them past the lifeguard, out the gate. How I cried the first time I skied in powder because it was too slow. I love the image of my small, brave self. I miss that self so much. Where is she? I feel sick at heart to think that the happy, fearless little person I used to be might be gone forever. Like Gramps is.
I walk faster, glad to be outside, alone, in the beautiful morning. At home I’d just sit around, getting sadder and sadder. I’ll walk an hour, I decide. Think of something happy. Like how it will be walking this same path in a few days with my puppy. Harp. I smile, remembering the way he twisted, burrowing into me. But then I remember I have one day, tomorrow, to find a place to live. And whether I am or am not lucky enough to achieve that, I’m still—and soon—going to have to tell my parents what I’ve done.
Suddenly, another memory surfaces—a real one this time, my own—and I’m a little girl again, waiting for Mom and Dad on the pier at Mackinac Island. Jules and I had been allowed to explore the shopping street alone and Dad’s last words to me were, “Don’t waste your money!” It was legendary already, how I spent money on the weirdest things. So I was determined to impress my parents that day by being practical, finding something sturdy and useful to buy.
What I bought was an umbrella hat. Red, white, and blue striped, it sheltered my face from both sun and rain. And it was collapsible, like a real umbrella! It fit neatly into my backpack. I put the hat right on my head, mortifying Jules, who walked ten steps behind me the rest of the afternoon and was now sitting on a bench far away from me reading one of her Nancy Drew mysteries. Sweating, I noticed. While I was shaded by my wonderful new hat. I couldn’t wait to show my parents how sensible I’d been. The second I caught sight of them walking up the pier, I jumped up and ran toward them.
“Oh, Emma,” was all Mom said, but I knew from the tone of her voice and the expression on Dad’s face that the hat had been a mistake. They weren’t mad, it was worse than that. They were amused, in that wry throw-your-hands-up way that made me feel like a big fat baby.
But Gramps loved my umbrella hat, I remember. He was the one person in the whole world who always believed that every single thing I did was just fine. And now he’s gone.
I hurry along the bumpy dirt path with my head down so that the joggers and bikers who pass me can’t see my face. I pass the old, hollowed-out tree where the geese nest, and a few stride after me, squawking and hissing.
I whirl around, hiss back, and the geese stop short. “Freud?” I say. “Okay, which one are you? Don’t fuck with me, man! I saved your life.”
The geese regard me with their beady little eyes, then turn and wobble down the steep bank toward the water. I hiss again and they flap their wings and speed up. “Assholes,” I mutter. “Chickenshit bullies.” Geese are disgusting creatures, I think. Everyone in my psych class thought it was hilarious when I insisted on rescuing Freud; my parents were annoyed. And who could blame them? I see now that rescuing the goose was just one more dumb thing in a long line of dumb things I’ve done. It’s not even like I’m a vegetarian, a person with a moral imperative. I just got it in my head to save the goose and nothing anyone said could deter me.
And now Gramps is dead.
Which has nothing to do with the goose, I remind myself. But I can’t shake the feeling that if I hadn’t insisted on saving Freud, if we hadn’t gotten rich because of him, Gramps would still be here. I was so happy the day I found out Dad won LOTTO CASH, intoxicated, thinking of everything the money could buy; but now the money seems like a physical presence in my life, a disapproving voice reminding me to think twice about every little thing I do. Reminding me that I’m just a dumb kid who’s never been responsible or properly appreciative and who doesn’t have a clue about anything, let alone wha
t to do with a million dollars. Before it’s all over, I’ll probably end up buying something even more stupid than the umbrella hat—but at a hundred-thousand times the cost. I think of the car I bought for Josh sitting reproachfully in our driveway, where I guess he left it—a pretty good start. That’s the problem, after all: the way the money allows me to make even bigger, stupider mistakes.
Suddenly I don’t feel like walking anymore. I cross the bridge at Meridian Street and head back home. In the little park across the street from our house, energetic Yuppies in power suits stand around drinking coffee from Starbucks mugs and chatting with one another while their dogs romp in the grass: a chocolate lab, a couple of Dalmatians, a Weimaraner. Some mutts. The Dog Club, Mom calls them. They gather every morning, rain or shine; greet one other with easy familiarity, part half an hour later with cheerful regret, clapping their hands to call their dogs back to them so they can move on through the day. I imagine them in their Pottery Barn interiors, checking their Blackberries then tucking them back into their worn-just-right Coach briefcases, climbing into their BMWs or Jeep Cherokees, and heading downtown.
Is this the kind of life they always wanted, what they planned?
Once long ago, when asked what I wanted to be when I grew up, I said I wanted to be one of those ladies on a parade float, waving. It’s just one more amusing thing about me, one more story my family likes to tell about what a goofy little kid I was. Mom and Dad would probably bring it up right now if I asked them what they think I ought to do with my life, and I stomp up the porch steps as annoyed with them as if they actually said it. As if they’re already making up an amusing story about the time I went into a pet shop and put a dog on hold.
In fact, they’re in the kitchen, half-discussing, half-arguing about Gramps’ funeral.
“I told you,” I hear Dad say. “Dutch was a great father, now he’s gone. What kind of funeral we have doesn’t mean a thing to me. People like my parents always have church funerals. It’s just what you do.”
“I know. It’s just—it won’t be about him. Can’t we at least read the poem?”
I know which poem she means: that Dylan Thomas one about not going gentle into the good night. She read it to Dad yesterday. “Isn’t this Dutch?” she said. “Isn’t this the way he was? He never gave up. He was so alive.” But Dad’s face looked blank, like it always did when she tried to read him a poem.
“It’s so beautiful,” she says now.
“I don’t want anything beautiful,” Dad says. “I mean it, Abby. The goddamn funeral doesn’t have a thing to do with Dutch, as far as I’m concerned. Or how I feel about Dutch. I only want it to be over.”
They both get quiet after that. I tiptoe backwards, open the front door, close it loudly, and head for the kitchen with a cheerful expression on my face.
“Hi, Emma,” Dad says glumly.
He’s dressed in suit pants and a white shirt, his tie untied and draped around his shoulders like a scarf. It’s the way he looked every morning when I was growing up. He’d drink his coffee, then tie his tie, button the collar buttons over it, and say to Mom, “Turn my collar down, will you?”
Now that once-ordinary scene replays itself. I watch Dad tie his tie, watch Mom stand behind him and turn down the collar of his shirt just right. I can smell the starch in it, almost feel cool, stiff cotton as her fingertips slide beneath it. And I have to leave the room because I can’t bear to remember the way things used to be.
Twenty–four
We get to the church about an hour before the funeral service is to begin. Mom and Dad and Jules go on down the aisle toward the open casket, but I just stand at the back, breathing in that sickly-sweet smell of funeral flowers, wondering why they smell so different from the flowers in a vase on your dining room table. And do they smell different—or is it one of those weird psychological things? I’m trying to avoid remembering the other funerals I’ve been to. Grandma Hammond’s, right here in this church. Grandma and Grandpa Deere’s. That first awful moment of looking down into the casket, the person you love there and not there.
I don’t want to go to the front of the church where Gramps lies, but Margaret arrives and throws her arms around me, then holds my hand so that I have no choice but to follow her down the aisle. Teary-eyed, she hugs Mom, then Jules.
“Oh, your wonderful grandfather,” she says. “He was so, so good. Just look at him there. I swear, he looks so peaceful. Like he’s fast asleep.”
“Can you believe she said that?” I whisper to Jules when Margaret has liberated her and gone on to fuss over Dad. “Gramps looks dead.”
“Emma,” Jules says. “Shh.”
“Well,” I say, “he’d have said the same thing himself.”
Which is true. And he’d be right, too. The skin on his hands is blue-white, like marble. They’ve put that awful dead-people’s makeup on his face. Even his lips look wrong. Too red. Not smiling. And he’s so still. Alive, he was never still; he never went two minutes without laughing. His hair never looked neat either. Usually parts of it were sticking out because of the way he was constantly running his hands through it. Now it’s combed so nicely. The only thing that seems right is his black Harley T-shirt: the tackiest one he owned, with a huge bald eagle on the front and gold lettering that says “Ride Free.” It was Dad’s idea for him to be buried in it. He said, “I’ll be goddamned if I’m going to send him into eternity dressed for church.”
Now he stands beside the casket, his hand on Gramps’ shoulder. Occasionally, he reaches up and smooths Gramps’ hair or runs the back of his hand along his cheekbone. I go over and put my arm around him and he pulls me close, never taking his other hand away from Gramps. We stand there, Mom and Jules just behind us, until it’s nearly time for the service to begin. They closed the doors to the sanctuary so that we could have some time alone with Gramps, and I can hear people milling around in the vestibule, waiting for the doors to be reopened. The man from the funeral home appears and puts his hand on Dad’s shoulder. Dad nods.
He steps away from me then, bends over the coffin and kisses Gramps’ forehead. “Okay, this is it, Pal,” he says, patting Gramps’ shoulder as if he’s a little kid on his way to camp. “I love you, Dad. I love the hell out of you and don’t you forget it.” Then he steps back and kind of shakes his head. “Okay,” he says again, to no one.
By this time I’m sobbing. I brought a smooth rock from Lake Michigan, one I’ve had a long time, and I tuck it under Gramps’ cold hands so he can take something of Michigan with him. Mom and Jules take a last look. Then the funeral guy closes the lid and arranges a wreath of red roses on top of it.
Gramps is in there, I think. Forever. But I can’t make it seem real.
The church service doesn’t seem real, either. Mom’s right. It doesn’t have much to do with Gramps at all, just hymns and prayers and a lot of talking about how thrilled he must be today, reunited with his beloved Evelyn in heaven. All eternity ahead of them, living with Jesus.
It’s gotten chilly while we were inside the church and, at the cemetery, gusts of wind blow my thin dress coat open and make my ears ache. It creeps me out the way the tips of my high heels sink into the muddy ground as I walk toward the grave, like the earth itself is trying to pull me into it. I’m grateful when Jules grabs my hand and squeezes it—like she used to do when I was little.
It makes me remember what good care she took of me then, how she always knew just what I needed. She was in charge of me a lot, probably too much, after Mom got so obsessed with painting and spent hours in her studio, working, while Jules fixed our lunch, got our things together to go swimming, or made us a tent out of chairs and blankets in the yard. And I was such a pain in the butt most of the time. I spent my bus money on video games, so we both had to walk home from the mall. I lost my jackets, and we’d both end up half-freezing because Jules had to give me something o
f hers to wear. I was constantly making messes. God. No wonder she ditched me when she got to high school.
Now she sits down beside me on the rickety folding chair, and I lean over and put my arm around her shoulder. “Hey, Jules.” I whisper. “I love you, you know?”
“Yeah,” she whispers back. And her face does that quivery thing. She has to press her lips together, blink her eyes about ten times to keep from crying.
When the burial is finally over, we go back to the church for the dinner the ladies of the hospitality committee prepared. Mountains of mashed potatoes, mushy green beans, slabs of ham. People chit-chatting, even laughing. People cornering us to speak tragically of our loss.
I absolutely cannot deal with it. When nobody’s watching, I slip out into the empty Sunday school room across the hall. Illustrations of Bible stories hang on the walls; there’s a felt board with “Jesus Loves the Little Children” spelled out in blocky red letters on it, and I have to resist the urge to move them around to see what really offensive words I can spell. I sit down on one of the kid-size chairs—maybe the very one I sat on when Grandma Hammond brought me here years ago and I drew the picture of Jesus with blue hair that got the Sunday school teacher so upset at me. Thinking of it still makes me mad. Nobody knows what Jesus looked like! He might have had blue hair, for all that stupid lady knew. It’s about as likely as his having been a blond white guy. Though I have to admit that, right this second, I wish for the easy answers that come with believing in Him.
On the way home in the car, Mom and Dad commiserate about all the stupid things people said to them. “It’s getting tiresome the way nobody seems to be able to look at us anymore without seeing dollar signs,” Mom says. “At a funeral, for God’s sake! I quit counting how many times people shook their heads and said, ‘All that money you and Mac won—’”
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