Doodle was dead. That was all I knew in the hour I spent just watching his body while the rain continued to pour down around me.
'I ought to get back,' I thought to myself, 'Mama and Daddy must be out of their minds with worry by now wondering where we are.' At this thought, I gave one last glance back at Doodle's inanimate body and walked back towards the house.
As I was walking, I was contemplating how I would go about telling of Doodle's death, but out of all of the shimmering ideas that were whirling around in my mind, I couldn't concentrate on a single one from start to finish without it ending atrociously for both my parents and me. The thoughts varied from the crazy to the bizarre, with my last plan to burst into Broadway music. Once that idea fell through, I thought for a split moment of running away, but quickly banished that thought from my mind. My parents had already lost one child and didn't need to lose another. I finally decided that I would have to tell the stark truth of what actually happened, but this was easier said than done as I steadily approached the house.
I could see through the open kitchen window that Mama was preparing dinner, and Daddy was flipping through cotton reports, tallying x's and ✓'s. I slowed my pace as I drew nearer, mentally preparing myself for the emotions that were going to follow my now well-though-out speech I had memorized in my head.
The rain ceased to hammer against me as I stepped under the awning, pulled the door open and stepped in. There was a cold burst of air as my skin was introduced to the new atmosphere, followed by the heat emanating from the fireplace in the living room. Their heads snapped up, looking directly in my direction. I made haste of pulling my shoes and socks off, being careful not to look up, but I could still feel their eyes follow me as I deposited my shoes to the right of the door in the shoe corner. Finally, I sat down at my place at the table and waited.
At first I didn't know what Mama was doing when she peeked out of the window, but when she turned around and asked, "Where's Doodle? Is he coming around back?", I knew this was my cue.
I searched every inner content of my brain for my prepared speech, but to my dismay, I came up with absolutely nothing- my mind was completely blank.
"I, I, he," I stuttered. It was miserable seeing the distraught look on Mama's face. There really is nothing more disconcerting than knowing that you're about to break your mother's heart. After what seemed like an eternity of stammers, I finally came up with, "He's back by the Bleeding tree. He got hurt real bad."
"What?" cried Mama and Daddy instantaneously. Their reaction was so sudden and terse that it made jump back from my seat. My father stumbled over my overturned chair to grip my shoulders and look me in the eye as to question my statement. "What happened?" he yelled as he shook my shoulders. I looked back, fearing to look anywhere else or say anything.
Mama, rubbing her eyes, came up behind him, placing a hand on his shoulder. At her touch, he released my shoulders and took a deep breath, saying that he was going to go look for him and pushed passed me to reach the door.
I turned and watched him violently sprint through the pounding rain over Horse-head Landing. I didn't turn around until I heard sniffling and turned to see Mama slumped in her chair, silent tears slewing down her face. She saw me look at her and whispered, "Was there a lot of blood?" I nodded my head, and she gave a shriek and her head fell forward onto the table, cries and weeps seeping from her fortress of misery every now and then as we waited for Daddy to return.
A full twenty minutes later, Daddy came back into view carrying the body of a limp Doodle. I couldn't breathe. I could easily see his flaccid head bobbing up and down with each step Daddy took up the hill.
Mama, still sniffling, stood up as she saw them approach. Daddy had laid Doodle down beside Mama's garden. Mama started bawling again as she saw him up close; Daddy went to go put his arms around her.
The bright colors of the florescent blooms seemed to contrast Doodle's now pale, sickly skin, mocking his existence. I felt the urge to rip the flowers up into pieces of multi-colored confetti but knew it wouldn't do us any kind of good, except maybe release a little pent-up energy, but there would be time for that later, once Doodle was buried . . .
His burial was set for a Sunday, the most religious day of the week, as designated by Aunt Nicey. Of course she was in tears when she found out that Doodle had died, but she had thought he was a second Jesus.
Daddy had ordered a new coffin for the funeral. The old one was too small for him since he had exceeded his supposed short life span. The new coffin was a shiny new mahogany with a creme-colored lining on the inside. It was possibly one of the nicest pieces of furniture, if you could call it that, that I'd ever seen. All of the rest of our furniture was either handmade by Daddy or handed down from family, so seeing this new casket just made me want to look at it, further increasing my guilt at the loss of Doodle. He wouldn't of needed it if it wasn't for me.
Sunday came before I was ready. That morning, I had to help prepare for the incoming guests that would be attending the funeral. All of our aunts, uncles, and cousins were coming in from all over- northern Louisiana, Arizona, Mississippi, and Florida. Even though they hadn't met Doodle, after hearing his fight for life, they felt obliged to come anyway.
First, I did all of my morning chores as I did everyday. I helped Daddy pick the cotton, swept the front porch with Mama, and collected fire wood for the fireplace. The morning seemed to go by normally, but I could feel a hollowness throughout the tasks, like something was missing, the sound of lilliputian feet trailing behind me as I worked.
After chores, I had to go wash up before our relatives arrived. As I was walking back from the woods, I walked passed the open barn door. I'm not sure why, but I felt compelled to go inside, so, following my instincts, I pushed the door open completely and walked in. Upon walking inside, I saw what had drawn in my senses. Directly across from the door sat an object with a sheet covering it. It had the distinct form of a diminutive coffin.
I walked cautiously, watching every footstep, until I reached the object. I knew very well what was under that sheet but pulled the sheet off without another thought anyway. I could see the dust swirl in the sunlight from the barn window. I focused my eyes at the sight before me against the harsh glare of the sunlight. Just as I had thought, Doodle's old coffin was still residing in the barn where it had been untouched for months until now. Grime covered the corners of the casket and lint coated the lining on the inside from what I could see.
At the sight of Doodle's old casket, my emotions went haywire. Old memories of the times Doodle and I spent together flooded through my head. The time-worn thoughts of me teaching him to walk and swim and row came coarsing back and sent me into a frenzy. I picked up the felling axe and with all my might, I chopped into the coffin. My feeble body strength hardly made a dent in the wood. At this observation, I struck it again and again, releasing my pent up energy. As I swung I felt tears slide down my face with a picture of Doodle, broken and bloody seeped back into my thoughts. I chopped as if to chop away the memory; that's not the way I wanted to remember him.
Once I was done and couldn't muster the strength to even lift the axe anymore, I surveyed my work. The axe dropped from my hand, landing with a sharp and metallic thud as I stood there panting from my efforts. I took a deep breath and flung the sheet back over the debris and turned to leave. As I was leaving, I noticed his go-kart. I thought about wrecking that, too, but I had neither the will nor the strength. That go-kart was a symbol for Doodle once was, but it also showed how far our progress had gone. Doodle would've preferred that it stayed in tact.
I finally left the barn and continued on my way back to the house. Once inside, I made for the bathroom to wash up and comb my hair back respectfully. I brushed my teeth and sprayed some of Daddy's best cologne on; I smelled a bit like wood and sweat.
After I was done cleaning up, I went to my room to dress. Mama had already laid out my clothes on my bed. My cousin had loaned me a suit just for the occasion. Mama said that we could've boughten a new suit for me, but we all agreed that the money would've been better spent on the casket, so I threw on the suit and adjusted the cravat comfortably.
I walked into the kitchen to see if I could be of any further assistance. Daddy had closed himself off from the world, had become numb, ever since he had gotten back from carrying Doodle from beyond the hill. That left Mama and me to plan the funeral ourselves. Mama seemed to be holding it together quite well for a mother who'd just lost her child except that she wouldn't use the words 'death' or 'funeral'. She would just call it his 'accident' and his 'special ceremony'.
As I walked in, I saw that some of the guests, bedecked in solid black, had already arrived. I saw Mama talking to her sister from Arizona, Aunt Matilda, and Aunt Nicey in deep conversation with the priest from the local church four miles away.
'Of course," I thought to myself. Aunt Nicey had been nervous lately, thinking that Doodle's death was a wicked omen of the devil, but by the look that Brother Mathew was giving her, she had convinced no one so far.
I shuffled my feet over to stand by Mama just as Aunt Matilda walked away. She looked down at me with sad eyes and looked me over. She ran her fingers through my hair but stopped mid-comb and pulled a wood chip out of my hair that I must've missed.
She cocked an eyebrow at me but said nothing, instead taking up the action of straightening my cravat and brushing the lint off of my shoulders.
After another hour all of the guests had arrived and were sitting in the fold-out chairs on the lawn. The chairs were set up in front of Doodle's open coffin. Daddy, Mama, Aunt Nicey, and I had the front seats with the rest of our relatives piling in chairs behind us.
The priest began to speak of Doodle as convivial and vivacious for his condition. I listened aptly while trying to fight the tears that were already encircling my eyes. There were sniffles and cries as he described Doodle's 'tragic end'. The truth was that no one really knew how Doodle had exactly died, we could only guess. The best guess among the many was the one made by the doctor who had first checked Doodle's health as an infant. He thought that Doodle had been stressing and pushing his body, making his heart pump faster and faster until it imploded. It wasn't exactly a very simple death. It wasn't until the end of his speech when he asked family members to come visit the body when I started to get apprehensive. I wasn't sure if I could face Doodle's unmoving body. I was still contemplating my thoughts when he called my name to go see the body.
I pulled out a dog-tongue from my pocket and walked forward, my legs shaking as I walked. The same thoughts were whizzing around in my head, bouncing back and forward. What if he was a sick shade of purple with blood-shot eyes? What if his lips were snow white and he emitted the same feeling as a graveyard, of decay and misery. My throat contracted and I couldn't breathe again. The oxygen had stopped roaming through my esophagus as I stepped up to see Doodle.
When I looked into the casket, I was shocked to see that he looked the same as he did when he was up on the hill, just without all of the blood and gore effect. He looked peaceful and in harmony. His serenity gave me a sense of calm as I dropped my dog-tongue onto his diminutive chest and stepped back. I turned around and there it was- I could breathe again.