The Sky is Everywhere(58)
Author: Jandy Nelson

“Maybe I’ll wear pants for a change.” The earth has just slid off its axis. Gram has a floral frock for every occasion – I’ve never seen her out of one. “And I might straighten my hair.” Okay, the earth has slid off its axis and is now hurtling toward a different galaxy. Imagine snake-haired Medusa with a blow-dryer. Straight hair is an impossibility for Gram or any Walker, even with thirty hours to go until party time.

“What gives?” I ask.

“I just want to look nice, no crime in that, is there? You know, sweet pea, it’s not like I’ve lost my sex appeal.” I can’t believe Gram just said sex appeal. “Just a bit of a dry spell is all,” she mutters under her breath. I turn to look at her. She’s sugaring the raspberries and strawberries and flushing as crimson as they are.

“Oh my God, Gram! You have a crush.”

“God no!”

“You’re lying. I can see it.”

Then she giggles in a wild cackley way. “I am lying! Well, what do you expect? With you so loopy all the time about Joe, and now Big and Dorothy … maybe I caught a little of it. Love is contagious, everyone knows that, Lennie.”

She grins.

“So, who is it? Did you meet him at The Saloon that night?” That’s the only time she’s been out socializing in months. Gram is not the Internet dating type. At least I don’t think she is.

I put my hands on my hips. “If you don’t tell me, I’m just going to ask Maria tomorrow. There’s nothing in Clover she doesn’t know.”

Gram squeals, “Mum’s me, sweet pea.”

No matter how I prod through hours more of pies, cakes and even a few batches of berry pudding, her smiling lips remain sealed.

After we’re done, I get my backpack, which I loaded up earlier, and take off for the cemetery. When I hit the trailhead, I start running. The sun is breaking through the canopy in isolated blocks, so I fly through light and dark and dark and light, through the blazing unapologetic sunlight, into the ghostliest loneliest shade, and back again, back and forth, from one to the next, and through the places where it all blends together into a leafy-lit emerald dream. I run and run and as I do the fabric of death that has clung to me for months begins to loosen and slip away. I run fast and free, suspended in a moment of private raucous happiness, my feet barely touching the ground as I fly forward to the next second, minute, hour, day, week, year of my life.

I break out of the woods on the road to the cemetery. The hot afternoon sunlight is lazing over everything, meandering through the trees, casting long shadows. It’s warm and the scent of eucalyptus and pine is thick, overpowering. I walk the footpath that winds through the graves listening to the rush of the falls, remembering how important it was for me, despite all reason, that Bailey’s grave be where she could see and hear and even smell the river.

I’m the only person in the small hilltop cemetery and I’m glad. I drop my backpack and sit down beside the gravestone, rest my head against it, wrap my hands and arms around it like I’m playing a cello. The stone is so warm against my body. We chose this one because it had a little cabinet in it, a kind of reliquary, with a metal door that has an engraving of a bird on it. It sits under the chiseled words. I run my fingers across my sister’s name, her nineteen years, then across the words I wrote on a piece of paper months ago and handed to Gram in the funeral parlor: The Color of Extraordinary.

I reach for my pack, pull a small notebook out of it. I transcribed all the letters Gram wrote to our mom over the last sixteen years. I want Bailey to have those words. I want her to know that there will never be a story that she won’t be a part of, that she’s everywhere like sky. I open the door and slide the book in the little cabinet, and as I do, I hear something scrape. I reach in and pull out a ring. My stomach drops. It’s gorgeous, an orange topaz, big as an acorn. Perfect for Bailey. Toby must have had it made especially for her. I hold it in my palm and the certainty that she never got to see it pierces me. I bet the ring is what they were waiting for to finally tell us about their marriage, the baby. How Bails would’ve showed it off when they made the grand announcements. I rest it on the edge of the stone where it catches a glint of sun and throws amber prismatic light over all the engraved words.

I try to fend off the oceanic sadness, but I can’t. It’s such a colossal effort not to be haunted by what’s lost, but to be enchanted by what was.

I miss you, I tell her, I can’t stand that you’re going to miss so much.

I don’t know how the heart withstands it.

I kiss the ring, put it back into the cabinet next to the notebook, and close the door with the bird on it. Then I reach into my pack and take out the houseplant. It’s so decrepit, just a few blackened leaves left. I walk over to the edge of the cliff, so I’m right over the falls. I take the plant out of its pot, shake the dirt off the roots, get a good grip, reach my arm back, take one deep breath before I pitch my arm forward, and let go.

Epilogue

(Found on the bed, in the forest bedroom)

(Found again in the bombroom, in the trash can, ripped into pieces by Lennie)

(Found again on Joe’s desk, taped together, with the word dildonic written over it)

(Found framed under glass in Joe’s dresser drawer where it still is)

Acknowledgements

In loving memory of Barbie Stein, who is everywhere like sky

I’d like to thank:

First and foremost, my parents, all four of them, for their boundless love and support: my awesome father and Carol, my huge-hearted mother and Ken. My whole family for their rollicking humor and steadfastness: my brothers Bruce, Bobby, and Andy, my sisters-in-law Patricia and Monica, my niece and nephews Adam, Lena, and Jake, my grandparents, particularly the inimitable Cele.

Mark Routhier for so much joy, belief, love.

My amazing friends, my other family, for every day, in every way: Ami Hooker, Anne Rosenthal, Becky MacDonald, Emily Rubin, Jeremy Quittner, Larry Dwyer, Maggie Jones, Sarah Michelson, Julie Regan, Stacy Doris, Maritza Perez, David Booth, Alexander Stadler, Rick Heredia, Patricia Irvine, James Faerron, Lisa Steindler, and James Assatly, who is so missed, also my extended families: the Routhier, Green, and Block clans … and many others, too many to name.

Patricia Nelson for around the clock laughs and legal expertise, Paul Feuerwerker for glorious eccentricity, revelry, and invaluable insights into the band room, Mark H for sublime musicality, first love.

The faculty, staff and student body of Vermont College of Fine Arts, particularly my miracle-working mentors: Deborah Wiles, Brent Hartinger, Julie Larios, Tim Wynne-Jones, Margaret Bechard, and visiting faculty Jane Yolen. And my classmates: the Cliff-hangers, especially Jill Santopolo, Carol Lynch Williams, Erik Talkin, and Mari Jorgensen. Also, the San Francisco VCFA crew. And Marianna Baer – angel at the end of my keyboard.