Tin Lily (27 page)

I sit down hard and feel the pain in my head only a little before blue sky starts to slip away and gets replaced by darkness.

This place where I am now is dark, but not silent. I hear something metallic. Soft voices. Rustling. And Mom’s words.

If you
’
re reading this, it is for one of two reasons.

No matter how old you are, it
’
s too soon.

Listen to me now.

Pretend I
’
m with you.

Hear my voice.

I
’
m trying to find the courage.

I
’
m not brave like you are.

You are the best person I
’
ve ever known.

I wish so much I could hold a mirror up and show you what I see.

With all my heart, I love you.

And new words.

Come back to us, Lily.

We miss you.

We love you.

Margie’s voice whispering, saying words for more than just her. Smoky wisps of fog, silky tendrils that make my heart ache, make my mind wake.

The sun is bright in this hospital room. I sit up and look around. Margie’s asleep in a chair next to my bed. Her face is white except for red spots high up on her cheeks. Mom’s letter, back in its envelope, sits on her lap.

And Mom. She’s sitting on the end of my bed, cross-legged and smiling in a beam of sunlight. Dust faeries dance through her while her hair floats like a halo around her head. I want to touch it, to feel the soft cotton balls on my fingertips again. I want to wrap my arms around her. Once more. Tell her I miss her. Tell her she was brave. Tell her it’s okay we didn’t have very long. The time we had was everything. I say these things in my mind, sobbing out loud as Mom fades, a last glimpse of the person I loved most in all the world.

Margie sits up, her eyes huge. “Lily!” she says when she catches her breath. “Are you okay?”

I nod, but the grief has taken my voice. I let it all out. Let it fill the room, the world. She waits with me while it all comes out, patient, knowing this is how it has to be. I think about Hank, about him not calling and me thinking he did, about the blood and Mom’s body on the floor, about ketchup packets and Christmas wreaths and more photos than I can count and dog food factories and parks and meadows. I think about spreading Mom’s ashes and going to the cemetery and Margie saying words to let go of her anger. I think about wheat fields and forests and Grandpa Henry’s SUV, about insanity and choices and Margie and Hank’s growing up time and deciding to let the hollow go, to feel again.

Most of all, I think about the pineapple, about what Mom said. I slice into my armor, get at the fruit. I examine what’s in me. The hollow has stayed gone. I’m filled up, right up to the top of my head.

Dr. Pratchett was right. There’s room for everything.

The grief finishes up its violent business and I lean back against my pillow, exhausted.

After a bit I realize there’s a big bandage covering my arm where Hank’s bullet came after all. “Aunt Margie, is Hank dead?”

She watches me for a long moment. “No, honey. The police officers shot him. He’s in the critical care unit. Upstairs.”

“Will he live?”

She takes a deep breath and squeezes my hand. “They don’t think so, sweetheart.”

“Okay.”

“Are you all right? Should I get the doctor?”

“No, I’m okay.” I look around the room, at a big bunch of Gerber daises on a table next to this bed. “From Nick?”

“He wanted to come,” Margie says. “But his parents didn’t think it was a good idea.”

“I understand.”

We’re quiet for a minute, me looking at the blanket on my lap, Margie holding my hand.

“Aunt Margie, is—” I take a deep breath. “Is Sam okay?”

“He’s fine. According to him, Binka’s the new queen of his house. You’ll be lucky to get her back.”

My whole body breathes and my mouth stretches into a big smile when I think about how fat and spoiled Binka will be when Sam’s done watching her. Margie’s expression is surprised. She looks like she’s seeing me for the first time. “You’re more than okay, aren’t you, Lily?”

I nod. “I’m more than okay. I’m good now. There’s room for everything.”

“What happened out there?”

“Hank went crazy. I mean, more than we thought, you know?”

She nods.

I look around this room again, see big trees outside the window, like we’re sitting in the middle of the forest. This hospital room, a white and blue bramble cave. “Where are we?”

“Oregon” Margie says.

“Hank was taking me to Grandpa Henry’s?”

She looks at her lap.

“It’s okay, Aunt Margie. I’m okay now. Please tell me.”

She glances past me, out the window. “Yes,” she says. “Back to my parents’ old house.”

“Where it all started.”

“Yes,” Margie says. “Officer Archie had already been through there a couple times, but there was no sign of him.”

“Because he was in Seattle with us, painting our pictures.”

“Yes,” Margie says.

“He wanted us to all be together again. Me, Mom, Grandpa Henry, Grandma Josephine. He was going to kill me there.”

Margie closes her eyes for a minute, then opens them again. We don’t say anything more about Hank’s beliefs or his choices or his going crazy. We let silence fill the room, let the clang and clatter of the hallway remind us where we are. We think our separate thoughts, maybe Margie about the next box she wants to make.

Me, I’m thinking about Nick, holding his necklace in my palm, looking at all those tiny fragments, strong because they don’t count on just themselves to stay together.

Hank starts to go to his own nothing place in the early morning. He’s in a windowless hospital room, no pictures on the wall, handcuffed to the bed rail. Hank tethered to metal, just like he has been his whole life.

Margie and me, we’re with him, together on one side of his bed. I’m holding Margie’s hand tight.

Hank’s face is slack, all the crazy gone, his eyes closed. Right there in his smooth skin, in his relaxed expression, I see the dad I loved, how Hank could have made different choices, different decisions. It’s not just that he had a bad start. Margie did too. It’s what he chose—the whiskey, the meanness, the decision to not fight what he knew was wrong. Hank believed Grandpa Henry. He lived down to his expectations.

In the smoothness of Hank’s face, I see something I didn’t know before. When our last breath goes, we aren’t rich or poor or mean or nice. We’re just people who’ve lived for a little while, some of us in dog food houses with loving moms, some of us in mansions with cruel dads. Maybe when we die we’re back to that starting place where the only thing that matters is what we leave behind.

Margie squeezes my hand. “They found something in his car I thought you might want to keep.” She reaches into a bag she’s got slung over her shoulder, brings out a camera and hands it to me.

I flip it over, touching where Mom touched, running my thumb over where she painted her name in fingernail polish. Rachel. I bring the camera up, look through the viewfinder, find my view. A little window to capture moments, to capture the how’s and the what’s and maybe even the why’s. Mom with her knowing that explanations wouldn’t come, sorries wouldn’t be spoken. Mom with her knowing the little moments are all we have. Years of little moments captured with this camera. Years of everything that was, of everything she left behind. They’ll stay with me more than Hank’s meanness. I know because I will always remember.

Margie and me, we let our questions go with Hank’s last breath. He doesn’t wake. He doesn’t explain. He doesn’t say he’s sorry. He just goes to his own quiet place.

I’m sitting cross-legged on my blue and white bed at home, Dr. Pratchett’s workbook open in front of me. My fingers brush the silky paper and I remember how they drummed my open history book all those weeks ago, remember that story about the guy who stood up against a bunch of tanks because he didn’t think what his country did was right. A brave man.

I trace the title of the chapter I’m on—
Checking in with Yourself
. Dr. Pratchett says I’ve come a long way, but I’ve got a long way to go and this workbook will help me get there. I think with the bees gone, Hank and the not-Hanks gone too, Dr. Pratchett’s right. There’s peace now, but it’s not from the quiet place. It’s from finding out why I needed it in the first place.

When my eyes start to droop from reading about how to check in with myself, I get up off my bed and grab the box Margie made special for me. It’s a big one and was supposed to be for my birthday next month. She decided I should have it early because she couldn’t wait to give it to me. It’s her prettiest one yet. The metal doesn’t look like metal at all. It’s a chocolate brown—my favorite—and it’s smooth with these little green beads Margie says are made of sea glass running all the way around the bottom. Margie’s used Chinese lettering again to etch a message into the lid.
Bravery
is what she says the beautiful characters mean. I run my fingers over the straight lines and the curly tails and think about the tank guy again.

When I open Margie’s beautiful creation, there are treasures inside—Mom’s camera, Nick’s necklace when I’m not wearing it, Hank’s picture of me and Margie in the meadow and some of Binka’s kibble from when I forgot to put the lid back on.

Nick’s necklace is on top of Hank’s picture. I take it out now and hold it in my palm. This box Margie made me, Nick’s necklace, Mom’s camera, the new people in my life, these things tell me something I didn’t know before.

I’m all wrapped up in love.

The light outside is turning orange. I hurry and slip Nick’s necklace over my head, grab my phone and dial him up on my way to the patio.

“Hey,” he says. “Thought you might miss it.”

“I wouldn’t miss it for anything,” I say softly. “Here we go.” The sun’s orange glow descends over the tall buildings first, down their sides, right across the earth like someone’s turned on a big lamp. Not an explosion of light, nothing so dramatic. A peaceful blanketing where everything’s lit, glowing, silent.

Photo by
Jamie Hudson Photography

Joann Swanson was born and raised in Ogden, Utah, where she attended old Catholic schools with spooky boiler rooms and even spookier nuns. These things have understandably influenced her dark novels.

She now lives in Boise, ID with her husband and three spoiled feline divas. She works full time as an instructional designer, teaches two classes for a university and writes every chance she gets.

Besides writing, teaching and designing, Joann is an avid reader of just about every genre (plenty of YA, a smidge of Sci-Fi, buckets of horror, a dash of literary, even some graphic novels).

Occasionally Joann and her husband try to remember that work isn’t everything and do a big vacation—so far, Victoria and Vancouver BC, Vegas, the Oregon coast and Maui. Someday they hope to go to Sunnydale, CA. Why? Because Hellmouth.

Tin Lily
is Joann’s first novel.

Website:
www.crankyowlbooks.com