I pull the door to behind myself and step out into the night air. Any more pacing on those hollow, hard-wood floors would have deafened me. Another few moments in the empty closeness of my room, and I would have slipped into insanity. The house is as it was before. No big changes have taken place despite the fact that one of its occupants is missing. I have been walking all night in and out of the house. If Mom and Dad were awake for it all, I would have driven them crazy.
I descend the AstroTurf covered steps and head off in the same direction I walked earlier this evening. I do my best to concentrate on my surroundings and not my destination.
The moon, ochred by the clouds of tomorrow’s rainstorm, hangs low in the sky. Thunderless heat-lightning flashes sporadically in the east. Occasionally purple headlights brighten the road between the pools of peach glow from buzzing, corner street lamps, but mostly I am left in with just the moonlight. On either side of me, dark-windowed houses face off as I walk between them. Dickens was right; each house seems a mystery. But inside those houses live the bigger mysteries, the people I supposedly know…the people who think they know me. A short distance down the street a figure passes from the curb to a house. It is greeted by lights and the friendly yapping of a dog. How many people go home willingly to dark, empty houses? Noticing I've stopped walking, I begin, once again, to step off the oblong blocks that make up the curb.
In the light on the next corner, I stop and sit. Listening to the hum of the streetlight's carbon-arc harmonizing with the night insects, I flick the moth carcasses scattered at the base of the lamppost into the street. Memories of surprising clarity surface. I remember catching spiders and drowning them in the bathroom sink with the blatant disregard for life evinced by some children. I remember cloudless-blue, hazy summer days in the back yard with my sister, Sue. Using Tupperware bowls, we would catch bees off of Mom's honeysuckle. We'd listen to the sweet humming coming from within the bowl until the bee dropped and its humming stopped. When all the bees in their bowls had ceased their buzzing, Sue and I would empty the bowls and race to capture more unsuspecting bumblers.
Headlights flash bright in my eyes. A convertible full of kids runs the stop sign on the opposite corner. The radio is blaring, and half the occupants are hanging out of the car. The other half are ignoring each other to talk into their phones. Someone honks the horn as the car goes by. I turn to watch the tail lights recede. They slowly wink out one at a time. I couldn’t even say if knew anyone in the car. One year at college and all this seems as remote as those memories of summer afternoons.
Resuming my walk, I follow the convertible's stingingly dry fumes and head out of town. A phone rings in one of the dark houses. Bad news. Mom would always worry through three rings before answering the phone late at night. She was rewarded with the anticipated tragedy three times.
I remember being awakened by the phone at midnight fourteen years or so ago. There was a pause and some susurrate argument from the next room. A few moments later Mom came into my room. Blinking her blue eyes more often than usual, she told me Grandad had passed away. She said she and Dad were going to see him off. I was to stay at the neighbors', but Sue, two years my senior, would go with them. They left that night and were back in three days. Nothing much in our day-to-day changed.
As I walk through the almost visible moisture in the air, my shirt clings to me as if it were soaking wet. I dry my forehead with my sleeve. My memories of Grandad are misty-edged. They swirl up in quick succession: days in the park, water fights with hissing hoses in the back garden, exploring the old house he lived in. I know I spent time with Grandad and enjoyed it, but I don't remember tears ever falling when he was gone. I guess I was too young when it happened and too used to the idea of his absence when I was old enough to understand what had happened.
The repetitive, melodious chirping of the katydids and crickets reminds me once more of the bees. I remember the feeling of the Tupperware against each ear and the feeling of power I had over those tiny insects. I remember how angry, how sad and angry, I was when Sue wouldn't trap bees with me anymore.
She said she wouldn't play because bee-trapping was a baby’s game. She was too old for such little kid stuff. I knew her better than that. Even though I was only nine, I remember thinking that the truth was that she didn’t want to hurt the bees.
I stop. End of the road. The street turns to gravel and a low fence bars my way. I step over the fence and into the field. The taller grasses poke their stalks above the ground fog that has come in off the pond. Walking as I did a few hours ago through the field, I listen to the flowers and heavy-headed grasses knocking hollowly against my shoes. A breeze whiffs in from the east. Cooling the air, it carries with it a cold humidity, that promise-of-rain scent.
The breeze makes the ground fog writhe for a few moments before dispersing it. There is the gunmetal-taste of ionization in my mouth. For once the weatherman is right, we’ll have a storm.
The fog is gone; I can make out the dead, brown squares of grass this year's carnival left behind. I smile; carnival nights were always the social event of the summer. Sue made it a point to take me to the carnival each year. We, of course, rode all the rides and saw all the shows, but the highlights of the evening were the atmosphere and the food. Each year I noticed something new about the carnival. There were strange people with strange mannerisms. Smells of food, excitement, fear, and sweat swirled around us in the heavy air of summer's-end. Sue and I would stuff ourselves on batter-dipped mushrooms and shrimp. There would always be numerous candy apples and chocolate-covered bananas, and we never left the carnival without getting a huge bag of cotton candy. When I was fifteen, we each took our first dates with us. That night we got home a little too late for Mom's liking, but before she could get up speed in her scolding, the phone rang. It was after midnight. She worried through three rings before snatching the phone from its cradle. Her breath caught in her throat, and we knew it was bad news. Grandpap, her father, had had a heart attack. That time I went to the funeral.
I loved Grandpap, at least I think I did. While he was alive, I thought I wouldn't be able to live without him. He took me fishing and camping. He taught me to watch animals, especially the birds. I sat in the church during his memorial service thinking over and over that I couldn't believe he was gone. All around me women were crying, and the men looked as if they were doing everything they could not to. I didn't think it was seemly for me to cry, so I didn't. At the grave side, I watched squirrels chase each other among the headstones. Leaves rattled and fell in yellow showers as the wind blew. Winter was on its way. A huge dark wedge of birds split the sky over head. They were still migrating. I realized the world would get along fine even though Grandpap was dead.
Sue was full of sympathy for me. She knew Grandpap and I were close. She told me, in private, that it was okay for me to cry. She said she knew I was all broken up inside. I told her I was fine and life, before too long, would go back to normal. She seemed horrified and didn't talk to me for the rest of the day.
I stand before the gates. The insects are silent. I was here not more than two hours ago, but I walked on by and went home. Now, I feel I have to go in. The black, wrought-iron spikes of the gates and fence jab into the sky. Why do they lock cemetery gates? Those that want to get in get in, and those already in can’t get out. I guess the caretaker has to do more than just mow the grass.
I'm careful not to catch my clothing as I climb over with the aid of a gnarled oak tree. A rumble of thunder sounds as I land with a jolt on the other side. My feet know the way; I have walked it many times over the past year. "Susanna Teal," the stone reads. Beneath that are birth and death dates. A year ago Mom got a third late-night call. Sue had had an accident driving home from some party. She hadn't made it to the hospital.
I want desperately to say something, but I have the feeling the wind, which has been growing in strength, would whip away any words I might say. Who would I be saying them for anyway? I know I loved Sue. At least I felt for her what has passed for love in my life. Mom used to say I worshipped the ground Sue walked on, but I didn't cry at her funeral. And my life has gone on since.
Suddenly I feel sick. What little I ate before I began walking threatens to come up. I stare at the stone and the oblong mound of grassy dirt.
I am getting along.
My stomach heaves, and I run bent double for the gate as the rain begins to fall. There is a quiet roar as my shirt, caught on one of the spike points, rips. I am blinded by wind and rain as I run from that stone, from those dark gates, toward a watery blur of light across the field.