Church of the Dog (17 page)

“Hey, this is the one!” she calls to me. “You going in?”

I shrug and listen to the sweet sound of horses slurping.

The next time I look over, she’s already in; there’s a pile of clothes on the ground next to her. I tie the horses and walk over. “How’s the water?” I ask.

“Heavenly. You’re missing out.”

I’m missing out. Yes, I’m definitely missing out. I’m missing out in so many ways. She doesn’t even have a clue how right she is. Neither of us says anything for the longest time.

“Hey, you doin’ okay?” She opens her eyes to watch my answer.

I don’t know what to say, so I give her a look to ask why she asked that.

“I don’t know. Sometimes you just seem very far away. Sometimes you even seem invisible.”

I don’t know what to say to that, either, but I look down and nod a little to let her know I know what she’s talking about. I look at the water and wonder what my problem is. I take off my clothes and get in.

What we don’t notice while down in the heavenly gulch is that the winds shift and pick up, bringing with them heavy clouds from the southwest. By the time we see them, they are overhead.

We dry off and dress as quickly as we can. She puts on a raincoat. I look at her, surprised she brought rain gear. We mount up and take off at a fast trot, scanning the ground in front of us for any coyote dens or other holes. The clouds above thicken up and begin to drop rain. By the time we arrive home, we’re cold and drenched.

“Sauna?” she proposes through blue lips.

“Sounds good,” I say.

A cloud of steam rises up from where she threw water on the stove. “Smart to always carry rain gear,” I say.

“You know, you’d think after all the times I’ve been caught in rain or hail out of nowhere, I would, but I usually don’t. I had a dream last night where my Gram and I were riding camels across the Sahara, and she told me to bring it today. When I looked at the sky this morning, I figured maybe her wires were crossed. But then I figured she didn’t specify I’d need it for rain, so I brought it anyway.”

I can’t tell if she’s making this up or if she’s serious.

“Do your parents ever come to you in dreams?” she asks.

I shake my head and wonder where she’s going with this, but she doesn’t say anything more. “I had a dream about you once, before I met you—right before I came back,” I confess.

“Well, yeah. I tried calling you on the telephone, but you never answered,” she says.

“Wait, so you’re telling me you chose to be in my dream, and then you just did it?” I ask, disturbed.

“If I’m worried about something, I tend to go there when I’m sleeping, you know, to try to fix it,” she explains.

“What do you mean ‘go there’?”

“I guess it’s sort of like being a ghost. Your spirit leaves your body, and you go wherever you want without paying plane fare.”

“So you, what? Jumped into my head?” I ask, a little angry.

“No way,” she assures me. “I would never jump in someone’s body. Ew. That’s worse than borrowing their underwear.”

“So how did you get in
my
dream?”

“That dimension doesn’t just belong to you, Daniel. It belongs to everybody. Okay, so I did let myself into your house, but I knew something was wrong with your grandfather and that he had unfinished business with you.”

“How’d you know that?” I ask.

“Know what?”

“That something was wrong with him,” I say.

“Clouds,” she says. “He had clouds around his neck.”

“Clouds?”

“Yeah, clouds. Or smoke. Cloudy like that.”

“Do I have clouds around me?” I ask nervously.

“No, you have almost nothing around you,” she answers.

“Is that good?”

“Not really. It’s like you’re stuck or stagnant. No movement. Shut down.”

What do you say to that? “Oh,” I say.

“Try dancing around your house,” she advises.

For a long time we just breathe in the hot air and let it warm our bones, but then I get to thinking about Grandpa’s spirit and wondering where he was exactly.

“Do you believe in Heaven?” I ask Mara.

“Yes,” she says. “I’ve been there.”

“You died?” I ask.

“No, just visited, like I visited you,” she says.

“You dreamt you were in Heaven,” I clarify.

“I didn’t stay long enough to find out if there were dogs there. I really want to know where the dogs were. I can’t imagine Heaven without dogs.”

Then neither of us says anything else. We just breathe in the steam, shut our eyes, and lose ourselves in our own thoughts.

Mara and I sit back, naked in the hot springs a week after our first attempt to find them. I go inside myself, as one would go inside a house that had been struck by a tornado, to survey the damage, see what is left, and try to straighten up what remains.

Eventually, she breaks the silence. I open one eye when she begins to talk.

“You know, Edith, I accept that I’ll never find a man who can handle all this woman.” She gestures at her whole body in an upward motion with her hands and kind of laughs. “But I do struggle with the decision to have kids.”

“Hm,” I reply, shutting my eyes. My soul feels too tired to struggle with something I already struggled with decades ago. Of course, in my day it wasn’t really a choice. It was just something you did. But there are struggles associated with fulfilling expectations, too.

“I went through a time a year ago when I was feeling intense grief, mostly on a biological level, about not having a child. I was even asking a couple of my platonic male friends with really nice genetics if they would donate sperm to my worthy cause. Lately, though, I look at all it takes, and it scares me. I like my life, Edith. I like bathing when I want, sleeping in, having stained-glass shards all over my house, and riding spirited horses.”

“Hm,” I reply again.

“Would you do it again, Edith?”

I take a deep breath. Would I do it again? “You know, Mara, when Sam died, I thought I would die, too. It felt like the life just drained out of me, out of my core. Losing a child is the worst thing that can happen to anyone. For a while, I confess, I did think motherhood was a cruel form of torture. You pour your heart, your soul, your life into this child, and eventually this child, who has no idea what a huge piece of you they are, goes recklessly out into this world, and all you can do is watch, hope, pray, and have faith. In an instant the most important accomplishment of your life can be destroyed. ” I open my eyes. “I looked at all this. And yet when it came down to it, by being a mother I learned a whole new level of love. I’m not sorry to have experienced that. I’m not sorry to have experienced rocking my baby to sleep in my arms.” I pause to squint the hot tears out of the corners of my eyes. “In fact, I can’t imagine my life without having had that.” And I shut my eyes again.

For a long time neither of us says anything. Finally, Mara says, “I think being a mother is the bravest thing any woman can do.”

We sit back together, arms floating, eyes closed, and I look forward to seeing my baby in Heaven. I wonder if he and Earl are watching me now. Hm. I wonder if I should be wearing a swimsuit. I smile to myself.

Have you ever woken up in the middle of the night to see a hologram of a face floating above, looking down at you? I’ve personally not had this experience before, but I figure, hey, if a face shows up, it’s probably best to be polite. So I ask, “May I help you?”

She speaks to me with her thoughts. I just sort of hear her in my head. She tells me that Wade, a student in my fifth-period class, is questioning whether he has the strength to live another day.

“What can I do?” I ask.

She tells me to speak to the whole class about what depression is and to tell them to take care of each other. When I ask if he will be okay, she tells me that his serotonin level will come back up on its own without antidepressants and just to reassure him.

I say, “Okay,” and with that she floats up, up, and out of the corner of my room.

Now the task is figuring out how to do my true work. I mean, I can’t really walk into class and tell them I have a message from Wade’s Guardian, now, can I?

I had almost forgotten about Three Hills and Saint Patrick’s Day. Being that pretty much everyone in town is Irish, it’s big—so big, in fact, that the Saint Pat’s decorations begin to displace Valentine’s Day stuff in Murray’s Drug Store sometime around February 5. I duck into Murray’s to pick up three plaid hats with furry fake red hair attached to them to send to the housemates. I watch the parade from the curb with Grandma and Mara. The kids parade by and shout at her.

The Girl Scouts hold a long Girl Scout banner as they walk side by side. "Hi, Ms. O’Shaunnessey!” they call to her, and she yells hello back. A truckload of Cub Scouts in their uniforms drive by and wave enthusiastically at her. She smiles and waves back, just as happy to see them. Then comes a truckload of fifth- and sixth-grade football players who are trying not to look as excited as they are but attempting to look cool instead, but anyone can tell they’re about to burst with pride. She waves at them, too. The junior high band notices her applauding out of the corner of their eyes.

This is my home, but you’d never know it. No one looks at me to see if I’m watching them play the flute.

“Aren’t they all so precious?” she asks us, not really expecting an answer. “Those are my babies!” she proudly declares.

As the parade ends, Tim walks by, stops, and shouts, “Hey!”

“Hey!” I shout back.

“Hello, Mrs. McRae, Mara,” he says politely.

“Hello, Timothy,” Grandma replies. I think she called him Timothy just to bug him.

“How’s the hog?” he asks Mara.

“Great,” she answers.

“On your way to the Elks, Tim?” I ask.

“Of course,” he answers with a shit-eatin’ grin but then turns to Grandma and solemnly says, “It’s all about helping children, ma’am.”

Knowingly, Grandma says, “Uh-huh.”

“Yeah, we’re putting on a mutton stew dinner. Five bucks a bowl. Comes with corn bread. Proceeds go to children’s charities. Hope you can make it. I’d love to stay, but I said I’d help cook.”

I point to a nearby fire truck. “I see the Elks have already made preparations for your cooking debut.”

“Yeah, you know, an ounce of prevention . . . ,” he says, playing along. Grandma forces a smile and gives a courtesy laugh.

“Ladies, it’s been a pleasure.” Tim tips his hat at them and rushes off.

Grandma turns to Mara and says, “Stay away from that one.”

A short redheaded teenager starts to pass us. She has a black eye, and I think she might be pregnant. She looks up at Mara.

“Hey, Kelli, how’s it going? Enjoy the parade?” Mara asks her.

The girl shrugs, smiles, and keeps walking.

“Excuse me,” Mara says to us and jogs down the sidewalk after the girl. She catches up and talks to her quietly for a minute. Mara gestures to her own eye. The girl shakes her head and shrugs. Mara looks concerned and touches the girl on her arm for a second before returning to us.

“Everything okay?” Grandma asks.

“I doubt it, but my hands are tied,” Mara answers. “Sometimes all you can do is love them the best you can and hope it’s enough.”

“Hm,” Grandma says, nodding in agreement.

“Sometimes I think I make a difference, and other times I feel so very small compared to all the suffering in the world. There are moments I don’t think I make any difference at all. When it’s all said and done, though, of course I have. Of course we all make a difference. How could the world not be a different place in the places we have walked, right?” She seems like she’s trying to convince herself.

“Of course,” Grandma says.

The street appears to be in anarchy with the fallout from the parade—clowns, Shriners on minibikes, little kids looking for their parents, and a couple of giant leprechauns.

“How about we go watch the sheepdog trials?” Grandma proposes.

“You guys go ahead,” Mara says. “I’m thinkin’ I’m going to harvest some good vegetarian karma at the ewe doo bingo. Since I’ve never eaten lamb, I’m thinkin’ that little lamb can surely dookie in my square and make me a hundred dollars richer as a way of saying thanks.”

She gives us a look soliciting agreement, but we just chuckle at her a little. “How ’bout I hook up with you guys at the O’Team roping later?”

“Sure,” Grandma and I say, and get in the car to go out to the Doherty ranch to watch the sheepdogs. On our way out, Grandma gestures at a cow, her head over the fence, watching the cars go by.

“You ever feel like that?” she asks.

“Like a cow?” I ask back.

“Like that cow,” she answers, “just sitting there, watching the world go by?”

I don’t know what to say. “Owen and Bertha entering a dog this year?” I say, changing the subject.

“No,” she says with resignation, the sadness at her failed effort to reach out to me coming through in the tone of her voice.

“What about Hank? He going to enter that little Fifi dog of his?” Surely that will make her laugh.

“Don’t reckon so,” she answers with the same sadness. I can’t stand it. I can’t stand making Grandma sadder.

I wait a couple minutes and then, finally, I just blurt out: “Look, Grandma. What is it that you want from me?”

“I want you to wake up, Daniel.” And when I don’t respond to that, she adds, “It’s like you’re just sleepwalking all the time. Sometimes I just want to give you a good shake. For God’s sake, wake up.”

“I’m trying, Grandma,” I whisper.

She nods, and I turn off the highway to the sheepdog trials.

School is going well, I guess. I gave my depression speeches— and tackled child abuse and drug abuse while I was at it. Wade is making friends and seems to be happier. The school counselor told me he moved here with his dad because his parents are getting a divorce. That’s a lot of changes.