Saving Cicadas (32 page)

There is nothing pleasant about how you came to enter your mother's world, but there's no talking around it either. In order to survive, your mother has pushed the thought of you to the far recesses of her mind. Still, you're constantly with her. She thinks of you whenever she sees a child, when she's shopping for groceries, when she's drifting off to sleep. For an instant she wonders what your life might have been like. But only for an instant. She has never named you because giving you a proper name would mean she'd have to face what she did to you. It would mean having to acknowledge you were a real, live person. But deep in your mother's soul, your name is written there. When she finally hears your true name, she will know it. And she will know you.

Protect your God-given name until the moment is right. You will know it when the time has come. Your good name is your strongest weapon. Use it to protect the sweet life growing in your mother now.

I will see you soon, sweet Lilly Gray Macy. Be brave and know how much you are loved. Every child has a purpose under heaven. Every child. Fulfill yours, Lilly. Heaven will wait for you.

Poppy

I closed the paper and looked at Grandma Mona through tears. “Poppy,” I said. “Poppy's waiting for me. He told me my real name.” She bent down and held my face in her hands. She leaned close, kissed my forehead, and whispered, “You have such a beautiful name. But let's not speak of it just now. You'll know when the time is right.”

For feeling so dark and nothing all day, I was surprised to feel so special, the most special I'd ever felt. My name was written in the Book of Life. God himself had given me my name. I wanted to burst with the knowledge. I was no ghost. I was a child of God, an angel sent on a special mission! I ran to find Rainey.

“Be careful of what you tell her, honey,” warned Grandma Mona. “No name talk.”

“Okay,” I said.

I found Rainey brushing her hair in the bathroom upstairs. She smiled at me in the mirror. I wanted to burst. “I have a secret,” I whispered.

Her eyes grew large. “What?”

“I cain't tell you. It's a secret, silly.”

She furrowed her eyebrows and said, “No fair. Tell me.”

I was so happy I thought I might truly explode. I was special, somebody really special! Poppy had said so.

“I'm special,” I said after carefully considering my words.

“Uh-huh,” said Rainey. She grinned. “Me too.”

“Yeah, but I'm a different kind of special.” I leaned up in her ear and said, “I'm an angel.”

Rainey glowed and said, “I gonna be the angel too!”

“No, Rainey. Maybe someday you will, but I'm already an angel.” Dejected, Rainey put her hairbrush down and plopped down on the toilet seat. “Yeah. You got the wings,” she said.

“No, I don't think so, but I'm an angel anyway.”

“Yuh-huh, you do. Look.” Rainey pointed to my back, and I froze. Slowly, I turned to face the wall. I swiveled my head around until I could see in the mirror.

“I don't see any wings, silly.”

“Right there.” Rainey stood up and lifted the back of my shirt. “See?”

There, in between my shoulder blades, were two beautiful golden wings, folded just so. I could not believe my eyes.

“Oh my goodness. You see that? I have wings! I really have wings!”

“Yeah, duh. Everybody know it.”

“But how long have I had them? Did they grow overnight?”

Rainey smiled a sly smile and said, “No, silly. You got wings since you the baby.”

Then she lifted up her own shirt and struggled to see her back. Rainey mumbled, “I never get wings,” and she left the bathroom to go find Mama and tell her it was time for work.

Chapter Fifty-eight
THE LONG ROAD BACK TO CYPRESSWOOD

The sky was dotted with dark clouds shaped like an army of mice as we left Forest Pines. I watched them, counting thirteen as our Police Interceptor exited the grocery store parking lot and turned right. Rainey was safely inside. Instead of bagging, they'd moved her to stacking products, cans, and occasionally produce until her arm had fully healed. Rainey was happy with this change in duties. It proved to her and everybody else she could do even more.

I sat in the front seat beside Mama. I had watched her walk right over the
baby
words on the sidewalk that Rainey had scribbled. She barely gave them a second glance. Nothing and no one would distract her from what she was setting out to do.

The wind was beginning to pick up and shake the car in gusts. Mama held the wheel a little tighter when that happened. She turned on no music. She barely seemed to breathe. She wore no makeup and had pulled her hair into a clean ponytail behind her neck. She was wearing a blue blouse and a loose skirt disguising her figure. She could have been any woman at all.

“I'm right here, Mama.” I put my hand out and touched her arm. It was cold beneath my fingertips. But it was Mama's arm, and I didn't mind. It had always felt the very same way. I was alone in my world, and Mama in hers. It was like those scenes in the movies where the person is being interrogated, and on the other side of the window, people are looking in. I was looking in on Mama's world. She had no idea there were two sides to her mirror.

Just weeks ago, I was so ignorant about my life or lack of it. I remembered driving this same road, but the other way, as a family—Mama, Rainey, Grandma Mona, Poppy, and me. It was the last trip we'd ever take together. I wished I'd known it at the time. I would have appreciated it more, paid attention better. Tears sprang to my eyes when I remembered sitting next to Poppy in the backseat, holding his hand. I thought we were going on an adventure. I was secure in my place in the family, with the people I loved. And now it had all changed. Everything had changed.

Mama breathed in deep and let it out slow. She did this a few more times but never said a word the whole way to Cypresswood.

“Mama, please don't do this,” I said as we were pulling into the driveway of Alisha's house. “You can raise this baby. It's not that hard. You did it with Rainey, and you have a nice house now. And did you know you're having another girl?” I touched her shoulder. “I was thinking, Mama. This could be the last Macy there ever is. The baby in your tummy might be the very last one to carry the Macy family name. You can't get rid of her. You just can't! She's a person, like me. Like you. A person!”

Alisha ran to us with a newspaper over her head. She was wearing shorts, and the tops of her legs dimpled and jiggled as she moved. It had begun to rain, and the sound of water on the car roof pummeled my ears. Sounded like my nervous heart.

“Hey, I've missed you,” said Alisha.

Mama tried to smile but couldn't. “You too,” she said.

“You want me to drive?” Alisha asked.

“No. I'm fine.”

After Alisha had buckled in and enlightened us on all the gossip and trash and complaints about the pancake house, we drove in silence. I had climbed over the seat to the back and was sitting in between, my elbows propped on the console. I didn't like Alisha much. She'd always been no good for Mama, and here she was, helping her make the second biggest mistake of her life. She didn't care about Mama. She didn't care that Mama would regret this decision too, that she'd have to live with it for the rest of her life. She didn't care that Mama suffered deep inside about me and that she was so hardened she couldn't even feel anymore. Alisha didn't care about any of that. A true friend might have suggested these things, but no.

“My cousin James lives in Forest Pines,” said Alisha. “Works at the K & W as a manager. You remember meeting him at that party I had a few years back? I'm sure you met him, but you were living with Harlan still. Anyway, he's single. Just got divorced. He remembered you and thought you were pretty hot. Maybe after you get today out of the way, I can set you two up.”

“I don't—”

“Mama doesn't want to date your cousin, Alisha. She's in love with my daddy!”

“You don't have to say yes today,” said Alisha. “I just thought it might give you something to look forward to. James is a hoot. Not bad looking either.”

“Thanks,” said Mama. I wished I could kick Alisha right out of the car. I leaned over in her ear, and as loud as I could I yelled, “I don't like you!!!
BOOOOO!

”Alisha jerked and looked over her shoulder, then back at the road. She stayed quiet after that. We all did, with jangled nerves. All the way to the clinic in Fervor.

To the naked eye of a regular person, I imagined the building looked like any other, white concrete, windows with bars, a sign with a staff and two snakes coiled around it, sad-looking women entering the door, sometimes alone, other times with a man or woman beside them. Some girls were young, real young. They clutched teddy bears and baby dolls as they ducked in from the rain.

But to my eyes, the place looked very different. For every girl or woman who entered there was another person, a spirit who entered right along with them. Some spirits were yelling, others were crying, and still, others begged and pleaded to no avail. We sat there in the car with the windshield wipers flipping back and forth. There was a leaf stuck under the wiper, so every pass made a grating sound. After a while, an angel spirit would leave the building with a bundle in his or her arms, and walk in the rain along the sidewalk until out of sight. The girls with teddy bears would come out in the arms of a mother or father or boyfriend later, crying or glassy-eyed. Doomed and shocked with what they'd done.

Mama watched. She shuddered. Her lip trembled. She felt her stomach and smoothed her hair back. I observed the steady stream of baby bundles floating down the street and saw the hopelessness of it all. Mama couldn't see them. How would I ever be able to accomplish what no one else seemed able to do?

“What time's your appointment?” asked Alisha.

“Right now. Three,” said Mama.

“It's three after.”

“I know it.”

Swish, swish,
the wipers went back and forth. The rain turned the road gray, the air gray, the building gray.

“It's raining,” said Mama.

“Sure is. We better get out and go on in before it gets any worse.” “Mama. It's raining,” I said. “Isn't that what you've been waiting for? To settle down? It's a sign, Mama. You're supposed to keep this baby. Don't go inside. Don't—”

But Mama was opening the car door and stepping out into the rain.

The door slammed closed and I pressed my hands and face to the window. “No, Mama, no!” But she couldn't hear me. I banged on the glass. Some spirits turned and looked at me, but not Mama, not Alisha. So I did the only thing I could think of. I flipped the switch in our Police Interceptor, and the siren and flashers went off. Mama stopped and cringed. She darted for the car door. Women in the clinic came to the windows to see who was guilty of a crime.

Chapter Fifty-nine
FERVOR

“I don't think I can do this,” said Mama. She sat behind the wheel, breathless after turning the siren off. The tears were beginning to flow. Alisha stood outside her window, thunderstruck. The rain was turning her newspaper soggy.

“What in the world happened?” she asked. “Has it ever done that before?”

“No,” said Mama. “Not on its own.”

“Car's getting old, Priscilla. Real old. Now that you don't have to pay rent, you'll be able to buy a new car. Get rid of this old heap. I got another cousin in Columbia might be willing to take it off your hands.”

“Alisha,” said Mama, “be quiet. Please.”

Mama's eyes were shut. She was gripping the wheel.

“Listen.” Alisha stooped down and put her hand on Mama's leg, like she was helping. Like she cared. “You're pregnant, you're hormonal, I know how it is. In an hour, this'll all be over. You'll get back to Forest Pines, pick up Rainey, get on with your life. I know you're scared. The second time's always harder than the first 'cause you know what's coming, right? Like getting a shot or something? But you're having the anesthesia. It won't be that bad. You do have enough money for anesthesia, right? If not, I can spot you.”

Mama nodded, eyes still closed.

“Good. Well, let's get on in, then. I gotta be at work at quarter to six.”