The Buried Book (32 page)

CHAPTER 61

Given your history, which you were generous enough to share, I’m afraid you do not make a credible witness.

“What?”

“Where did you take my mother?”

Uncle Leo held up a defending hand. “Listen. I only did what I thought was right.”

Jasper’s blood rose in disbelief. “What was right? What did you do?”

“If you could’ve seen her then at the clinic . . .” His uncle shook his head. “She’d come undone. Convinced people were trying to kill her . . . and you. The doctors said there was no way she could come home. Hysterical. Suicidal. Delusional. Paranoid. She was a danger to herself and to everyone around her. Even Wendell saw that eventually. We had to protect her from herself. We had to protect you. She’d become violent. It was like she was trying to claw out of her own skin. She’d tried to claw her way out the hospital. She injured an orderly.”

Jasper drew in a tortured breath, trying not to imagine her tied to a bed. “But she wasn’t crazy. I was there. I remember it now. They were trying to kill her.”

“Another reason to keep her safe. Dammit, we did the best we could for her, Jasper. We did.”

“You should’ve told me. I could’ve helped her.”

“That’s ridiculous. You’re not a doctor. I couldn’t let her drive you mad too. You deserve a chance to grow up without this burden. When you’re a parent, Jasper, you’ll understand. You have to make tough choices.”

“You let me think she was dead!”
Jasper screamed. He was beyond caring if he offended his uncle. He was done listening. He stormed across the barn, grabbed the castration knife from the wall, and brandished it at the man. “You did this. You have to tell them. You have to go and tell them the truth. She’s not crazy . . .”

Leo held up both hands but took a step toward him. “It’s not that simple, Jasper. She’s not well. She’s never been well. Not for years.”

“She’s not a broken cow you can shoot! She’s my mother!” A cold calm settled over him as he realized screaming and carrying on would get him nothing. Jasper turned the knife on himself. “What if I’m just as crazy as she is, huh? Are you going to send me away too? You have to help her!”

“This has gone too far. Put the knife down, Jasper! Before you hurt yourself!” his uncle commanded.

“I am not afraid of death.” They were Motega’s words, but they were true. He wasn’t afraid. A part of him welcomed it. One clean swipe and it would be over. The nightmare would stop. He pushed the blade into his skin and felt a small trickle run down his neck. “Promise me you’ll tell them she’s not crazy.
Promise me!”

In two steps, Uncle Leo ripped the knife out of Jasper’s hand and raised a fist. “That’s enough, dammit!”

“Hit me. I don’t care anymore.” Jasper glared up into his uncle’s eyes. “Just promise you’ll do everything you can to bring her home. You owe it to me. You owe it to
her
.”

Uncle Leo returned the knife to its proper place, then just stood there with his back to his nephew. After a solid minute he wiped his face and said, “Okay, Jasper, if I promise to try, will you stop? Will you stop runnin’ off and tryin’ to get yourself killed? Will you just give yourself a chance to grow up for God’s sake?”

“Yes, sir.” And Jasper did his best to mean it.

CHAPTER 62

All the suspects you’ve named are dead. I’m sorry, but you’ll have to find justice in that. This case is closed.

Jasper’s father pulled up to the barn on a Saturday morning in the late summer of 1954, as he did most Saturdays. Only this day, he stepped out of the truck dressed in a brown suit instead of his work clothes. Jasper puzzled at him through the window as he straightened his tie before walking through the door.

“Good morning, folks!”

“Well, don’t you look nice, Wendell,” Aunt Velma said from the stove. “You want some breakfast?”

“Nope. Can’t stay today. I need to take Jasper back into the city with me.” He turned to Jasper and winked. “Get on your school clothes, Son.”

Jasper could tell by the twinkle in his eye something big was doing. The whole way back to Detroit, they hardly spoke. Aunt Velma insisted they take a breakfast plate, and they both munched on bacon as the cornfields rushed by. All his father would say was that he had a surprise for him. His smile was wide, but his eyes were nervous. Jasper decided to ignore the nagging feeling that something was off and stared out the window.

When his father turned off the highway ten miles sooner than usual, his curiosity got the best of him. “Where are we going?”

“You’ll see.”

Three minutes later, their truck pulled up a narrow driveway next to a small tract house. His father jumped out of the car and pounded on the hood. “We’re here.”

Jasper slowly climbed out and surveyed the street in confusion. It was lined with tiny houses nearly identical to the one in front of the truck. His mouth fell open with a question, but nothing came out. He just followed his father up the three steps to the front door. Wendell swung it open without knocking.

The front room was sparsely furnished, but Jasper recognized the yellow flowered couch and matching lamp. “What is this?” he asked, turning around in the room as more familiar objects appeared on the walls and shelves.

“Got a new place.” His father beamed at him. “Been savin’ up a few years. What do you think?”

“It’s . . . nice.” The smell of cookies baking wafted in from the kitchen. It was followed by the sound of dishes clinking in the sink. His throat tightened. “Dad? Who’s here?”

The man’s hands were shaking more than usual, but he forced a huge smile. “Go see.”

Jasper’s feet stayed rooted to the spot as a panic swelled inside him. His father had finally moved on. He’d given up on his mother and replaced her with someone else.

“Wipe that look off your face, boy. There’s someone in there that would really like to see you.” His father grabbed him by the shoulder and pushed him through the narrow dining room to the kitchen door. With an unsteady hand, Wendell swung it open. “Look who’s here, honey.”

A woman with dark hair tied up in a bun stood at the sink with her back to them both. Her thick frame was covered in a plain blue dress. She stiffened and squeezed the counter before turning around.

At first he didn’t recognize her, this strange woman who had come to take his mother’s place. Her eyes were an empty blue that seemed to look right through him to the far wall. She held on to the edge of the counter with both hands as if to keep from falling.

Then he saw her. A spark of recognition lit up her face for an instant when their eyes finally met. In that hanging second, her chin trembled ever so slightly before her face fell slack again.

“Mom? Is that . . . you?” Jasper backed into the wall behind him. It was her. But it also wasn’t. Her body had grown thick and soft. She was shorter, much shorter than she had ever looked before. Her hair was graying at the edges and seemed dead, like a wig. Her shoulders hung from her neck as though they’d given up.

“Jasper,” she whispered. “My. You’ve gotten so big.” Her voice was much slower than he remembered. Her mouth smiled but her eyes were drowning in tears.

“I told ya. Didn’t I?” Wendell wrapped an arm around Jasper’s shoulders and pulled him toward her. “They’ve been feedin’ him real good up at the farm. Haven’t they, Son?”

“Y—yes, sir.” Jasper could feel the tremble in his father’s hand.

His mother nodded and whispered, “Praise Jesus. Just look at you.” But she couldn’t seem to look at him at all. She turned back to the sink where the dishes were soaking.

“How ’bout them cookies, Althea? Think they might be done?” Wendell said in a voice reserved for small children.

The mother Jasper remembered would have snapped back that she didn’t need a dullard like him telling her how to cook a damned batch of cookies. Instead, she said, “I think you might be right.”

It was as though she were in some sort of trance as she grabbed the oven mitts and pulled a cookie sheet out of the oven.

“Smells great, honey,” his father said with an overly enthusiastic smile. He nudged Jasper and motioned toward her expectantly.

“Sure does,” Jasper chimed in a hair too loud.

Wendell hobbled over to the narrow Formica table in the corner and took a seat. “Jasper, go get us some plates and some milk.”

“Yes, sir.” He took quick stock of the cupboards and found three plates and glasses to set on the table.

His mother was standing at the electric oven, taking cookies off the sheet one at a time. Slow and steady. He opened the refrigerator and pulled out the milk, watching her. Once the cookies were off the sheet, she just stood there as though she were anchored to the stove. Jasper bit his lip hard enough to draw blood to keep his tears from spilling over. It wasn’t her at all.

He pulled in a breath and walked over. She kept on staring at the stove. She still had the spatula in her hand. He took it from her gently and set it down on the counter. Her eyes stayed fixed on something far away that he couldn’t see. From a locked room inside his head, he could hear the boy he used to be kicking and screaming at the horror of seeing her like this. Steeling himself, he wrapped his arm around her waist and rested his head against her shoulder.

“It’s good to see you,” he said softly. “It’s good to have you home.”

CHAPTER 63

The federal government thanks you for your time, Mrs. Leary.

A week later, Jasper moved into the house on Clausen Street. He opened the door to his own private bedroom and placed his suitcase on the bed. It was the same bag his mother had packed for him two years earlier, only now it was filled with Wayne’s hand-me-down overalls and work shirts and one good pair of pants. As he pulled each item out, the smells of the farm came with them. He pressed a shirt to his face, breathing in the hay and fresh-cut barley laced over the deeper aroma of sweat and August sunshine. It smelled like home.

He scanned the store-bought mattress, bureau, and empty bookcase and sank down onto the bed. He’d be able to go back and visit Wayne, Aunt Velma, and Uncle Leo whenever he wanted. His father promised.

Jasper glanced down at the suitcase next to him. He’d unpacked everything but a few books Miss Babcock had given him.
The First Book of Indians
sat on top, with its silly images of wild warriors screaming across the cover. He picked it up along with the others and placed them all on his empty shelf. He’d write Miss Babcock a letter after supper. He’d promised.

All that was left in the suitcase was his mother’s necklace.

Your debt is paid, Ogichidaa. You have grown up well,
Dr. Whitebird had said after they’d finished rebuilding the clinic. Jasper had spent every spare minute there, volunteering until the job was done. That day, Motega had put the beads in his hand.
Take this back for her. Tell her . . .
Then he just shook his head. The man didn’t know what to tell her.

Jasper lifted the heavy beaded medallion off the bottom of his bag and held it in his palm. It had been his mother’s favorite. Silent tears fell as he ran a finger over the beads.
Nimaamaa.
He missed her. He missed the woman who had not come back. The woman who wore red shoes and laughed too loud when she drank and cursed when she thought no one could hear.

With the necklace in his hand, he crept down the hall toward her room. She was sleeping. Every day she took a long nap in the afternoon while his father was out doing the shopping or at work. He could hear her snoring softly through the door and pushed it open.

She looked peaceful there on the bed, a pale-blue shadow of her old self. There were several pill bottles on the nightstand. He squinted at them for a moment, trying to read the labels. She still had to see her doctors twice a week, and Jasper wondered, cataloging the pills, if she would ever stop needing them.

He tiptoed past her to the jewelry box on her dresser. It was the same one he’d found spilled out all over the floor in the old apartment. Looking at it, he could see the way his parent’s bedroom had been that day—ransacked and strewn with broken lamps and torn clothing. There had been blood on the wall—a policeman’s blood. He glanced over at the blank plaster next to him, half expecting to see the stain, then back at her snoring on the bed. There was so much he’d never know or dare to ask.

Jasper pulled open the jewelry chest drawer where the beaded necklace had always lived, next to the flowering broaches and rhinestones she never wore. He placed it gently inside and gave it one last look before sliding the drawer closed. It squeaked.

“Jasper?” a muddled voice asked from the bed. “Jasper, is that you?”

“Sorry, Mom. I was just leaving,” he whispered back and hurried to the door. The mother he knew would have killed him for trespassing.

“Don’t go.” She forced her eyes open for a second, but they rolled about in her head before falling shut again. “There’s something . . . something I need to tell you.”

He tentatively stepped back toward the bed where she lay. “What is it, Mom?”

“I’m just so . . . so sorry. If anything had happened to you . . .” Tears were leaking from her closed lids. Jumbled words fell from her mouth. “I can’t let anything happen to you . . . Not you too. He almost killed you. You should never . . . Stay away from me, Jasper. I’m bad . . . I’m a bad moon . . . You should stay away.”

“It’s alright,” Jasper whispered. “I’m fine. Everything is going to be fine now.”

She shook her head and curled up into a ball. “Don’t tell . . . don’t tell Daddy about him, Jasper. He . . . can’t know I did it. I did it . . . He’d never forgive me.”

He frowned and scanned her contorted face. “Did what, Mom? What did you do?”

“It was me . . . the gun. It was me . . . I did it.” She started to laugh through her tears. “You should have seen the look on his face. He couldn’t believe it. When I pulled the trigger. He just couldn’t believe it . . . that son of a bitch.” She buried her head in the pillow and started sobbing.

Jasper sank down onto the bed. “It’s okay. It’s over. You did what you had to do. He was hurting you.”

“How can you . . . stand me? Stay away . . . far away. I’m bad . . . so bad . . . They didn’t believe me . . . No one will ever believe me,” she wailed.

“Shh . . . I believe you. He was a bad man.”

Her tears wouldn’t slow down. “He’ll never forgive me. Never, never, never . . .”

Jasper frowned unsure if she was talking about her husband or Grandpa Williams or—

The front door closed three rooms away. His father was home. There’d be hell to pay if he caught him riling her up like this. Jasper rubbed her back, trying to soothe her. “Shh . . . it’s okay, Mom. I promise.”

She kept crying in her pillow, shaking her head back and forth.

“Jasper?” his father called from the living room. “You home?”

“It’s okay, Mom,” he whispered in her ear. “He’ll forgive you. He will.”

She stopped shaking and fell silent.

“What the hell are you doin’ in here?” his father hissed from the doorway.

Jasper jumped up from the bed. “She, uh—she was crying in her sleep. I just came to check on her.”

His father shoved past him and put a hand on his mother’s forehead. She let out a small whimper and started snoring again. After a full minute, he seemed satisfied and yanked Jasper by the arm out of her room. “You aren’t supposed to be in there. The doctors said this is a very critical time right now for her recovery. Do you understand? She needs peace and quiet now.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Now, dammit, this is serious.” He pointed a shaking finger at Jasper’s nose. “She’s been having trouble with these nightmares. She’s been sayin’ some real horrible things. Things you’re not supposed to hear.”

Jasper nodded.

“She say anything to you?”

“No, sir.” Jasper looked him dead in the eye as he lied. “She didn’t say a thing.”

“Good.” The old man nodded and then shuffled back to the front room to unload the groceries. Jasper watched him go and reminded himself that there had been a time when the man didn’t even know how to find the grocery store. He was a gruff nurse, but he was doing all he could.

Jasper turned back to the closed bedroom door. He leaned his forehead against it and could hear her crying again. His mind rifled through all the things he’d wanted to tell her all the months she was gone, through all the things that she had missed. He picked the one that hurt the most to say, “I forgive you, Mom.”

She went quiet on the other side of the door.

He kissed his hand and pressed it to the wood, praying his words would heal her. Praying she’d finally come home. His eyes filled up as he repeated it. “I forgive you. I’m okay. You’re going to be okay too. Everything is going to be just fine. We’re gonna be a family now. I promise. They can’t hurt us anymore.”

He didn’t know if any of it was true, but it didn’t matter. She deserved better than the truth. They both did.