by SJ Cavaletti
Soft like sand.
Hard bits, like pebbles.
No.
Bone fragments.
Teeth.
Deep breath.
This is your Dad.
In no world, this one or any other, will he cease being that.
I took some ashes in my fist, pulled them out, and let them drop into El’s beautiful trinket box. My skin so dry, very little stuck to my palm, but a small trace of whiteness remained. Staring at my palm, I closed my eyes and squeezed my hand shut, giving him a hug.
I didn’t want to open my hand. I felt him there. I urged him there. I willed magic through my veins to wake up those ashes and give me one last look at my Dad.
But when I opened them, even the dust seemed gone from my palm. I imagined a microscopic amount might have settled into the creases. Maybe I would get my palm read, and he could talk from beyond.
Wiping a tear from my cheek with the back of my hand, I whispered into the box, “Let’s go have some fun, Dad.”
I closed the lid. Wrapped it in Jasmine’s elastics and placed it in a plastic Ziploc bag I got from Isolde.
Then, I took my Dad for a piggyback ride in my satchel, on my bike, thinking about the time he ran next to me on my banana seat when I was seven. He had laughed the entire time, running next to me. And when he had let go, I finally learned to ride on my own.
Rolling my bike up to Drake’s camp, the whole crew was on two wheels, waiting for me. I sided up next to Drake.
“Girl, this crew is never assembled on time like this. Just wanted you to know.”
El shuffled his bike over as well. “Did the box work?”
“El,” I jumped off my bike and threw my arms around him in gratitude, not even remembering that I don’t hug, “I can’t thank you enough.”
He gave me childish laugh. “I’m glad you like it.”
“Come on,” Drake didn’t give us time for pleasantries, “We need to motor. We’ll post up between the cathedral and clock tower.”
He looked at Koa and Jasmine, “We do our thing.”
A nod from the Hawaiians.
“And then the Queens will come. Let’s do it.”
At that, we all piled out after our Commander, as the sky threatened with amber. We needed to hurry.
The clock tower and cathedral at Uyu were two of the most important pieces of art to anyone’s experience.
They burned on Saturday night. They were the only place where one could leave a trace, provided it was burnable. (Yes, Drake and I had broken the rules leaving behind those bracelets, but hopefully the artists who found them would see them as gifts).
The cathedral was different every year. One year it was like a temple, one year something akin to Stonehenge. This year, it was a full on wooden gothic cathedral. With flying buttresses and all. It was as large as a double height four-car garage, maybe like a small barn. Inside, the intricate detail of the heavier wood against the lighter pieces that were delicate enough to curve and arch transported the mind’s eye to Paris. Notre-Dame. A hunchback. And whimsy.
There were many written prayers tied on and knick-knacks strewn about. Creations only discernible to those who’d left them and notes in envelopes, saying who knew what, but containing innermost desires. Maybe hopes and dreams for finding love or money or something as simple as a smile. People drew strings through the notes and tied them wherever they could so they wouldn’t blow away.
Our little tribe went inside, as on the way, Jasmine and El asked to tie their notes. I watched as they grew somber, leaving behind a message that would soon burn and lift into the sky, maybe to be picked up by an angel. Granted by their guardians.
We left the cathedral and walked toward the clock tower, a four story high structure. Finding a spot in the shade, Drake took out his guitar. Koa, a ukulele. Jasmine prepared herself as well, as if they planned all this.
They had planned it. They had orchestrated this ceremony in their spare time. When I wasn’t around. For me. For my Dad.
When they could have been partying and thinking about their own problems, they created instead. They chatted something inaudible amongst themselves, my ears trying to zone in, but my heart pounded so loudly, it was the only thing I could hear.
This was it. The sun dipped down, off to tell the moon to take a turn. The Queens would be here soon.
Drake strummed a few notes. Tuned his guitar. Koa did the same. Jasmine closed her eyes, swayed slightly, rolled her shoulders and looked like a beautiful Polynesian princess and she seemed to take in spirit from around her.
Everyone else in the group, even Pika and Joey, were completely silent. And waited. Shaking myself into action, I searched in my satchel for the ashes, and prepared myself for the moment to come.
Drake and Koa were ready. Jasmine was ready. And so it began. Not what I expected. Better than I expected.
Sounding out from Drake’s guitar, not a rock tune but an island-like melody. Koa strummed along on the tiny guitar, the ukulele always finding the positivity in every tune. Jasmine bent her knees, her arms out to the side like they were made of silk, undulating on every gentle movement of the subtle breeze.
And Drake sang a song like none I had ever heard before. We belonged now to another world. His voice was deep and delicate, humming out as if his heart could bypass his mouth altogether and the sound came directly from his chest.
He sang:
“The high ledge by the lemon tree,
that is where the impressionist would be.
Salt air and the folding sea, how he tried to capture the scene.”
Jasmine’s fingers attracted his lyrics and made them dance.
“A lady hanging laundry one day in his scenery
hid the grove behind her white sheets.
How she changed everything…”
His eyes, closed til now, stole a look.
“He told her
all the time that I’ve been coming here, I’ve never seen you there.
You must know that you’ve changed the view.
She said, well, you’re welcome to the work that I must do today.
If not you may carry on then.
So he moved to the Olive tree.
Better how it shaded the heat.
Changed it all, how he saw the sea.
Hadn’t known how much better it could be.”
Everything had changed. My landscape would never be the same again. Just like the painter in his song. Koa’s beautiful little strings sang along, too. Lulled into this dream, I disappeared and all I could sense, from my eyes, my ears, my fingertips, my taste. All there was, was this song.
“Then he saw,
he would not believe,
the same lady from the lemon tree.
He swore the linen was dry as can be,
that she strung up in his new scene.
She said bet you thought the Sea was yours and only yours to view,
but some of us have work to do.
That is when he turned the canvas so that she could see… like looking in the mirror…”
This poetry, this, this, what was this? It was about change, and getting in the way, and sharing the view, and…
“So funny how we love. Hard to do directly.”
I gripped the trinket box, tightly.
“Funny how we feel. Protect, protect from injury.”
My hand cramped and stiffened.
“Would that we could love. Armor in the armory.”
My body collapsed as the strings stopped vibrating and Jasmine bowed. The hazy dream caused by this song snapped into reality as my hand nearly dropped the wooden box. I caught myself and Drake caught my eye.
Our eyes touched. They connected with such force and wondering. This song? This beautiful prose, written for me? For my Dad? A million questions flashed between us, attached through invisible tethers across the desert wind.
It all made sense but didn’t. The meaning of his song swam around my tongue, and I wasn’t at all a
ble to capture what it meant with my words, though I knew in my heart…
Just then, Drake’s gaze changed. He smiled, lifted an eyebrow and flicked his eyes to a spot behind me.
I turned. The Drag Queen parade arrived in the near distance. It was time, time to let my Dad dance. Time to change his view. Like Drake sang, time to stop protecting from injury. Time to release him, and everything from its armor.
Because my Dad? He wanted to be free. And it’s all he ever wanted for me, too.
Behind me, I felt Drake’s little Uyu family, huddling around me like I was a quarterback, Drake by my side. He put his arm around me.
We all watched in silence as the Queens approached, dancing, smiling with joy and authenticity. Enjoying the chance to unleash their spirits, be playful and unencumbered by the cloak of a homogenous society. They skipped. Sequins and boas and glitter everywhere. They sang, they cheered, and they lived.
My God, they were so alive.
Watching them now, in all their glory, made me know that dropping my Dad by their feet, to dance one last time in this celebration of total freedom, was the right thing to do. My chest warmed.
I looked up at Drake. He smiled and winked. Not winking like a sexy flirt. Not winking for attention. Winking like you got this.
The front Queens of the parade now reached us, and some old Cher dance anthem pounded on an art car that wasn’t far behind these leaders of the pack. There was smiling. There was twerking. There was a Queen with a baton and another with pompoms. My cheeks hurt, smiling at them.
My Dad knew it would be impossible to resist smiling in this moment, as I let him go.
But what he hadn’t known was the strange sensation I was to have in the future. The one where it occurred to me that the universe was eerily balanced.
One man out. One man in.
The most profound example of yin and yang.
Drake pulled me tighter, “You ok? Nice to see you smiling.”
“How could I not?”
Life’s symmetry propped me up. That. And Drake’s big, powerful arm. Holding me close, his musical bones shaking to the dance beat involuntarily.
Soon it would be the end of the leaders, so I opened the lid of the trinket box. I wasn’t really sure the best way to throw ashes in the air; I didn’t want to douse a Queen, or blast my Dad into the throng, though they would have likely assumed it was just bad glitter. Thinking quickly, I got closer to the Queens at the front and one of them grabbed at me, as I was about to tip out the ashes.
“Hey girlfriend!” Her sing song voice shouted out.
“Hey!” I shouted back, so nervous, never more nervous in my life. I didn’t want to do this wrong.
Drake came up beside me. “Ladies!!” He shouted, taking the attention off me the best he could, “Give us your best moves!”
Drake gyrated his hips and circled his sexy chest, getting the girls all lubricated. Acrylic nails shot in the air, arms pumping to the sky. The parade slowed down ever so slightly as the Queens showed Drake how to shake some booty. Finding his attention irresistible. For a moment, I did, too. His smile flashed hotter than the desert sunset.
But my Dad. I opened the trinket box, and underneath the shifting platforms and stilettos, shook him out to join the gypsum dust below. One of the Queens caught me, littering on the desert floor.
“Honey?!”
I was petrified, thinking she might make a scene. Like she might report me. I didn’t want the attention and eyes on me. All I could blurt was, “It’s… my Dad.”
Hand on hip.
A head wobble.
My blurt created a curiosity.
Drake stopped gyrating with the Queens and came to my side. “His ashes. He wanted his last dance to be with you ladies.”
Her puffed up pink lips formed an o-shape, and she placed her long, painted nails on her chest. Falsies blinked at us. “What an honor.”
She raised her hands to the sky and jiggled her body, like it was an offering to the gods. Then, she hugged me, like a nearly seven-foot giant on her heels, “We won’t stop dancing til he reaches those heavens, baby girl.”
And off the Queen went. Like a goddess into the sunset, followed by many others and a chariot booming a disco tune.
It should have been ridiculous. But it wasn’t. In fact, it felt less ridiculous than crying in a church, staring at a large photo of my Dad surrounded by a flower wreath singing a Catholic tune from a hymn that nobody even knew the melody for.
This felt right.
But as I closed the box, I was also glad that I had saved some of my Dad for my Mom. For her shrine. Or whatever she had planned for him. Because he had belonged to us all.
Replacing the beautiful lid, I traced the inlay again, when Drake’s hand came into view. He engulfed mine and the entire box in his huge palm and long, manly fingers.
Looking up, his eyes twinkled, like the sun reflecting on the darkness of the deep sea. Glimmering.
What was this?
Call it luck.
Call it fate.
You could even call it love.
24
“That went well? Was it what you had hoped for?” I asked.
Her lips pursed and twitched from side to side. Maybe it was a stupid question. Do people hope a funeral goes down well? I might as well as asked her if having a tooth pulled was everything she dreamed it would be.
But she knew what I meant. I just wanted to know if she was okay.
“Everything has been such a whirlwind this week, I don’t think I had time to hope for this to go one way or another. But it… it was perfect.”
The last of the Queens were past us now. The sound of the chariot art car changed from heavy treble to all bass in the distance. Like an ambulance passing.
The crew came up behind us and Pika said to me, “Bra, that song was epic. Maeve, prayers for your Dad.”
He put his fingers to his lips, kissed them and sent the love to the sky.
“Thanks,” Maeve said.
Pika reached out and gave her one of his Pika hugs. He and Joey always seemed like kids in a candy shop, not serious, total lack of concentration or ability to focus, but they were both total lovers. And very affectionate.
I thought she’d look awkward, not knowing them that well, she had told me how guarded she normally was. It surprised me to see her close her eyes and take in his embrace.
He pulled back and with arms on either side of her. “ʻĀnela i ka lani. Angels in heaven. My pops is up there, too.”
Maeve flashed him a knowing look. One that only two people with the same lived experience can share. Not sympathy. Not even empathy. Allies. They could fight this fight together.
“Well, our fathers can dance together now,” she said.
“Yeah, they can.”
He gave her another quick hug and gave me a look as though he was now entrusting her care to me. He joined the crew behind us again, all mingling about. It was one of those weird times in human communication where people spoke but didn’t listen. Hell, they didn’t even talk about things that meant anything to them.
This time at Uyu was like small talk before a movie starts. Or a chat before the fireworks. Because this was the only time at Uyu when people waited.
At Uyu, people didn’t wait. They lived. Every moment, every second was completely alive here. Sure, there were events that happened at specific times, but if you missed them, there was always something else.
It was the land of opportunity.
But now we waited. Waited for the Firestarters to clear the cathedral and clock tower of people, to back us all behind a circle of Fireguardians. These Gypsies were experienced firefighters and EMTs, people that were there to keep festival goers far enough from the fire. People could be on anything this evening. Alcohol, pot, acid, E… Uyu, despite the state troopers that did mill about, wasn’t a clean place. It could be pretty unsafe.
Many structures to climb, or slide down. Swings and the Rumble Ring where people beat t
he crap out of one another (yeah, never been in it but apparently it was popular enough to be here every year). And of course, the final burns.
The burn was sacred. It was a time to celebrate, let go. Burn away those wishes in the cathedral. Burn away yesterday’s problems. Burn away that heartache. Burn like a pagan giving praise for some gift from the heavens.
Anyone who has ever stared into a campfire can comprehend that mesmerizing quality that flames have. They take you back to the dawn of time when things were simple. It should have been a very sober time at Uyu, but for many it wasn’t. Including me. This was the first time I watched the burn without a beer in my hand. The Fireguardians were the only people at all of Uyu, Rangers included, that would body slam your ass if you made a wrong move.
One of the Fireguardians came up to me and Maeve, dressed in a jumpsuit, presumably of fire retardant material, but he looked more like Egon from Ghostbusters with steampunk goggles and curly white hair.
“Can I just have you, and your group, back up to the circle line please?”
We did. And we stood there, being in a crowd again for the first time in a week. People around us drank, e-cigarettes filled our space with berry and vanilla scents. And although the crowd wanted to party, the entire world slowed down as we watched the pyrotechnics being set up.
This wasn’t any old beach fire. It was two house-sized structures burning to the ground in less than an hour. Fire is destructive, but only an expert could choreograph an element this unpredictable.
Just then, we saw the torches in a circle around the clock tower. And we saw the Firestarters on our side of the cathedral. It was time.
With a dramatic poof, flames licked up the clock tower in a millisecond and the crowd let out a gasp in unison. The cathedral followed. The fire warmed us even from such a distance. It all happened so slowly and yet so quickly at the same time.
I hadn’t realized Maeve and I had hardly said a word to each other since she let her Dad out to dance.
Looking down at her fairy face beside me, golden from light of the flames, my heart swooped. I didn’t take my eyes off her face. I wanted to remember this moment. Lock it in for good. So that even when I was old and gray, I could take out the key and see inside my chest of treasures that I once stood next to this amazing woman.