Purity (18 page)

“I need about… um…” I do some quick math in my head, thinking about the cemetery layout. “Probably about seven hundred.”

Christine pauses. “Is this for that Princess Ball thing?”

“Oh. Yeah. For the ball,” I say, feeling stupid I didn’t think of that.

“Cool,” Christine says, nodding. “I think the idea of it is awesome.”

“The idea of Princess Balls?” I ask. Christine never struck me as the Princess Ball type.

“Yeah,” Christine says, and laughs a little. “I mean, maybe not the dance part—not really my style. But I like that girls and their dads have something to do together. My dad and I are really close, and it doesn’t seem like that’s the case with most girls, that’s all.”

“Right.” What am I supposed to say? I agree? I never thought of that? That I can’t believe Christine Juste is a better candidate for the Princess Ball pamphlet than Mona Banks? I don’t know why I’m so surprised that people aren’t always how they seem—after all, I probably don’t look like someone questing for a hookup. I nod and make a noncommittal noise.

“Anyway—carnations. Let me see what we have,” Christine says, and disappears in a flutter of faded pink hair.

I get lucky and the truck that delivers carnations arrives within a half hour—but that still gets me up to only three hundred. The flower shop employees run around with a sort of giddy gleam in their eyes, collecting daisies and tulips, their second-least-expensive flowers. I make it to seven hundred—but just barely. The total comes to over five hundred dollars. I see Christine’s manager grimace a little when I explain that it’s my dad’s card, but I think that she’s so eager to do big business that they swipe the Visa anyhow.

They load the flowers into cardboard boxes and help me shove them into the back of the van, and I set out toward the cemetery. Something has come over me, like the scent of the flowers is intoxicating me and I can’t think straight—but it’s wonderful. I feel powerful, amazing even, a sort of high I’ve never gotten from marking off a Life List item before. I’ve never crossed off a list item without Jonas; I consider calling him, but there’s this underlying buzzing in my chest that hums,
No. This is for you to do alone.

So I go on, by myself.

The intersection is recognizable from this direction, and while memories of Mom’s funeral flash by in my mind, they’re in the background, afterthoughts of the summer day.

I park the car in the wraparound drive, just beside a giant statue of Jesus. He stands with his arms outstretched, welcoming everyone. Now that I think of it, Ben Simmons doesn’t look so much like Jesus after all. I open the back door
and throw the lid off the first box, then grab as many flowers as I can manage.

I step up to the first row of graves, all topped with a brass or silver plaque instead of a headstone. The sun makes them sparkly, some almost blindingly so.

Henry Waxman, born 1958, died 2001. I drop a carnation over his name.

Joycelyn Elders, born 1918, died 2004. A daisy.

Arthur Caplan, born 1932, died 2008. Another carnation, a white one. I continue along the row, reading each name before dropping a flower on the nameplate. I manage to circle the Jesus statue three times before I run out of flowers and have to go back to the car.

The names begin to run together in my head, but not in a forgettable way; more like they’re joining forces, encouraging me to keep going even though my arm is tired from holding so many flowers. The sun overhead seems to pulse heat down onto my shoulders, and I can feel the deep burn of them starting to turn red. I ignore it and go back to the car again. The spot, the place where my mom lies, is at the other end of the cemetery; I avoid looking at it. I’ve hardly ever been here without Jonas.
Focus, Shelby.

Late afternoon, and the sun begins to hide behind the thick oak trees that dot the cemetery. It casts dappled shadows across the ground and I’m running low on flowers. I glance up and see
the
spot as I head back to the car. Only tulips are left, the most expensive of the flowers. The back corner of the cemetery is quiet, the noise from the road almost
completely silenced. The sounds of cicadas and birds emerge from the woods on the other side of the cemetery’s glossy iron fence. A tulip for Daniel Savage, one for Karola Siegel.

I grab the last bundle of flowers as sunset truly hits the graveyard. The world is dark purple rimmed in gold, and the little light that remains reflects off the headstones in a way that makes them look like ripples on water. Her spot is getting closer—it’s unavoidable. But I’m afraid if I stop to look at it, I won’t have the courage to start again and finish the job. I drop three more tulips.

She’s only four stones away.

Another, and another. I recognize the name of the woman on Mom’s left side, Maggie Sanger. I remember wondering what she was like, since she got to be so close to my mom for all eternity. I look down and realize there’s only one flower left in my hand; a single pink tulip that’s already wilting a bit in the humidity.

I take a step over, to the grave beside Maggie Sanger.

J
ENNIFER
L. C
REWE

M
ARCH 15, 1969
–A
UGUST 1, 2003

A
LWAYS LOVING, ALWAYS LOVED

I always wondered who picked out the line about love but never asked. I stare at the stone, trying not to think about the white coffin beneath it. I bend down and run my fingertips over the image of a lily that rests above the
love
line. I brush the tulip bloom across her name.

I used to have this movie idea of death, before Mom died. All you ever really see is the shiny headstones, the beautiful services, the black horses pulling caissons up the road to the cemetery. Bagpipers, priests, dresses—ceremony. But the truth is, when someone dies, you keep thinking of everything else. Once we all left and the funeral home took the blue tent down, I worried that she was cold.

Surely under all that dirt, it has to be freezing? I remember the first winter after she died, the first truly cold day when the ground frosted, how I wanted, more than anything in the world, to be able to put a blanket around her shoulders. I want to help her; I want to be there for her.

I drop to my knees between Mom and Maggie Sanger’s grave, and put my hand over the spot where I think Mom’s hand might be. My shoulders are sunburned and the grass is sticky. The air is full of the sort of heat that wraps around me, embraces me. It’s not cold today—not here, not under the ground. Not in the heaven that I have to believe my mother is in.

That’s the real problem I have with God. When the world crumbled, I couldn’t grab onto him. But I can’t bring myself to deny him completely, because if I do, where does that leave Mom? In heaven alone? In heaven with him despite me? Alone in the ground?

No. I can’t think that.

There will always be a part of me that can’t abandon the idea of God, because if I do, I have to abandon Mom. No matter how angry I am with him, no matter how much I
doubt he is what the church claims, I have to think he’s there. I have to think he runs a paradise in the clouds. I have to think Mom is with him. Happy.

I reach over and drop the last tulip on Maggie Sanger’s grave, then run my hand across Mom’s headstone. I lean over and kiss the word
loved. Put a flower on every grave in a cemetery—
if I had to be one flower short, Mom would want to be the one to go without.
Always loving.

The warm air holds me close even as I walk away.

It looks like St. Valentine vomited in my living room.

I am surrounded by boxes overflowing with pink, white, and red trinkets. Goodie bag paraphernalia. I sigh and cram another
I’m waiting for my prince
shirt into a pink canvas bag. I’ve been at it for two hours and have finished only four bags—I’m not sure if it’s because it’s an arduous task or because it’s a boring one. My mind wanders. I wonder what would happen if I slipped condoms into a few bags? I could even get the strawberry-flavored ones so they match….

Ugh. I toss a heart-shaped candle in on top of the shirt.

I thought about calling Jonas to help—it’s a thought that keeps popping up in my head like one of those little Whac-a-Mole games. It pops up; I remind myself that he slept with Anna Clemens and smash it back down.

And then it pops up again. I suck at this game.

Truth is, I know I can’t delay calling him much longer. I already had Dad answer my phone and tell him I’m sick, but if I keep this up, Jonas is probably going to show up at my front door. I have to face him sooner or later. I take a deep breath. Just call him.

I grab my phone and dial, fast, before I can change my mind.

“Finally! I was worried,” he says when he answers, exhaling in relief. “Why didn’t you call? I had to find out from Anna about Ben.”

Her name in his voice bites at me. Did she tell Jonas that I know about them? Surely not—I’d be able to tell, wouldn’t I? Or does he think it wasn’t that big a deal, either?

I hope that’s not it.

“Sorry,” I say. “I was upset.” A half truth, but a truth. “Can you come over? I need help with some ball stuff. I’ve got to put a bunch of goodie bags together.”

“Of course,” Jonas says, and I hear him grab his keys. “Be there in ten minutes.”

Jonas actually arrives
eleven
minutes later—I know, because I counted them down nervously.

“Hi,” I say when I open the door. Jonas smiles, steps in, and hugs me, his arms wrapped tightly around my shoulders. My face involuntarily breaks into a smile, and I return the embrace. It’s different, though, not the way he and I normally hug. Is it him, or me? The weight of knowing he slept with Anna is amazingly not as heavy as the question of how I actually feel about him, if I actually love him. I hold on a moment longer than normal, hoping something in his arms will answer my uncertainties.

“Thanks for coming to help,” I say when he releases me.

“Glad to help and watch your cable,” Jonas says. “I also
had to hear from Ruby that you crossed off a list item without me. Flowers on every grave?”

I blush. “Almost. I was one short, so I didn’t put one on my mom’s.”

He shrugs but looks strangely proud of me. “We’ll drop one off sometime, so you can cross it off officially.”

I lead him into the living room, where the television is barely visible among the piles of boxes.

Jonas gasps.

“We had to get everything rush-shipped,” I explain as Jonas stares at the dozens of boxes with a look of horror on his face.

“Christ, Shelby, since when are goodie bags more than some candy and pencils?”

“Since they became Princess Ball–themed, I’d wager. So, just put one of each item into the bags…. Which box is the bags?” I murmur to myself as I kick the boxes over to read the shipping labels. “Ah, this one. Anyway, just one of each item into the bag.”

“Right,” Jonas says. He flips on the television to
Animal Cops
and rips the tape off a box of “fresh n’ clean”–scented perfume. I think it smells more like pipe cleaner than the lilies and clouds on the box, but whatever.

“There’s something really sick about candy in the shape of a cross,” Jonas says, holding up one of the white chocolate crosses—they were made special, with the church’s name molded onto them. His eyes are dark brown—I mean,
they’ve always been dark brown, but suddenly all I can think about is how different they are from Daniel’s or Ben’s. And maybe Jeffery’s. Can’t forget about Jeffery—I wonder what color his eyes are. I look down.

“I know,” I say, my voice a little stilted.
Jeffery, think about Jeffery.
I inhale and force words from my lips. “So… since Ben didn’t work out, I’m on to guy number three, I guess.” I smash a few silk flowers into a bag.

Jonas frowns. “Any idea who?”

“There’s a guy who works with Ruby. His name is Jeffery. She said he was interested in me.”

“Are you
sure
you want to sleep with a total stranger, Shel?” he asks, raising his eyes to mine.

“I have to. You know that,” I say calmly. Jonas’s eyes waver. It gives me some sort of sick satisfaction to know the LOVIN plan still bothers him.

“Yeah…” Jonas drifts off and fills the silence that follows by crinkling the cellophane bag of princess-themed rubber bracelets.

I sigh. This isn’t what I want—isn’t what I need, to irritate, even hurt, my best friend. I need to do what my dad said. I need to talk to him. There’s a tiny part of me that, stupid as it sounds, feels like if I never hear
Jonas
admit to sleeping with Anna, it won’t be true. But I can’t just stay silent.

“I…” I don’t know what to say. Jonas looks at me, waiting for me to go on.

“You…?” he says when I can’t find the words.

“Anna,” I finally spit out. “Anna said something to me at the party.”

“About?” he asks.

“You.”

They slept together. I mean, I already knew, but the look on Jonas’s face confirms it. His eyebrows sink, lips part, breath shortens, like he’s afraid to speak. He finally looks back down at his goodie bag and licks his lips.