Chapter Twenty-six: Not the Way I Planned It
Blue Eyes helped me into the living room. I collapsed, gratefully, into an overstuffed chair. The younger members of my extended family were clustered around, drinking Daddy's homemade wine and beer. Dinah was in the kitchen concocting her version of a very alcoholic mulled wine. Mary Dell had ferreted out the photo albums and was, tearfully, sharing them with Melba and Sibyl's daughter, Eleanor. The sounds of male laughter echoed from the den; Greg, Raymond's sons, Junior and Wade, and Sibyl's son, Don, along with Eleanor's husband, Jerome, were congregated around the upright piano, butchering songs while drinking Daddy's homebrew. I elected to stay with the weepy women while sending Blue Eyes out into the testosterone-laden beer-fest. I could hear the change in the quality of playing when he took control of the piano. Drunken strains of the Beatles' "Yellow Submarine" floated through the house.
Dinah brought me a cup of hot, spiced wine and sat in a chair beside me. "What did the doctor say?"
"Cracked tailbone. Drugs and bed rest," I answered.
"You look a little pale. Drink that wine and I'll get you some more."
"Trying to get me drunk, are you?"
She smiled eagerly; Dinah was a cocker spaniel trapped in a pretty lesbian's body. "Whatever it takes to get you to tell me about Dr. Gregory House. Are you two involved?"
"We have a relationship that's not easily defined."
"But you have a baby," she asked, "with him?"
I was wearying of answering this question. "He's listed as the father on her birth certificate."
Fortunately, Dinah then lapsed into her wishful lamenting of childlessness. "I've committed myself to Mary Dell, and I love her, but she refuses to even entertain the idea of our having a baby. I want to have someone to love; I know I'll outlive her. Imogene's death has brought all of this to my mind. I worry about it all the time."
Before I could offer any words of consolation, my father, red-eyed and sniffling, called to me from the door to his bedroom. I joined him. He waved at the bed, so I sat.
"I'm saving Imogene's engagement ring for Greg. I'm sure you're not surprised. However, she wanted you to have her cameo ring, the one her mother gave her." He dropped the heirloom into my right hand. "I know you'll treasure it. Imogene revered her mother. They were devoted to each other. Perhaps you can, one day, hand this on to your daughter."
I was overcome with emotion. I had always felt excluded from the mother-daughter intimacy my mother shared with her mother. Their closeness with each other was so complete and fulfilling they didn't need to expand their circle and embrace me. As a result, I had grown up unmothered; my mother had no room in her life to be anything other than a compelling companion for a man and a dedicated daughter to her needy mother. Her ring was warm in my palm, as if it had just been removed from her living finger. There were many things I wanted to hand down to Zelda: unconditional love, an unlimited future; and an unfailing faith in herself. Admittedly, the things I wanted to give her were the very things I had been denied. However, as that ring warmed my palm and my fingers curled around it, I wanted to give her family connections beyond just a bond with me. I wanted her to inherit a sense of belonging that transcended the current generation. I wanted her to know her grandmother through me. I slipped the cameo onto the ring finger of my right hand and prayed for a link to my mother, and to her mother, and to my infant daughter.
Tears filled my eyes as I looked up at Daddy. I wanted to thank him for acknowledging the granddaughter he felt no interest in. As was the pattern in my family, I nodded to him and put none of my emotions into words. His expression was one of regret and gratitude. I left my father in his bedroom; I knew his life had not lived up to his expectations, but I also knew he was viewing an unexpected future without the familiar chaos and camaraderie Mother provided him. I was accustomed to aloneness and loneliness. I had, in fact, been weaned on solitude. I was better prepared for abandonment than Daddy could ever have been.
The living room was still the province of Mary Dell, Dinah, Melba, and Eleanor, whose grief was dulled by the warmth and intoxication of wine and fellowship as they giggled and laughed over past encounters with Mother. Mary Dell told of Daddy's awkward courtship of the sophisticated-seeming young woman who pretended to know more about society and etiquette than her narrow life in a small town could have presented. Melba and Eleanor remembered the odd dating advice Mother had given them, which, when condensed down to the most significant parts, amounted to little more than a stern admonishment to always carry enough money to make a phone call and to reject, tactfully, all suitors who expected more than the chaste goodnight kiss they earned by the purchase of a nice meal and a ticket to the latest movie. Sex was the result of a barter system. An off-tune rendition of "Muskrat Love" drifted in from the den.
I retreated to the kitchen, where I searched the drawers and cubbyholes until I found Mother's keys to her beloved car, a 1981 Mercedes 380 SL Roadster Convertible, arrest-me-red with a black top. I eased it out of the garage and headed for the back roads through the wildlife refuge until I found the spot where I wanted to park: a bluff overlooking the Tennessee River. No streetlights intruded on the peaceful midnight darkness and calm of the soothing water. When I was a child, before Greg's birth, my parents had owned a modest ski boat, and we spent every weekend on the river, joined by various other families in their boats. As time progressed, Mother's drinking increased so that every outing was marred by some caustic word or action; I, however, never lost my love for the serenity of the river. I let the car idle to keep the heat on, and I laid back in the seat and lost myself in the beauty of the nighttime.
I had left the house without notifying anyone; it never occurred to me I would be absent long enough to be missed, much less long enough to cause concern.
The sky was still dark as I pulled up to the house. Every light was on, and police cars littered the street. As I slipped the old Mercedes into the garage, I was bombarded with the frantic faces of my family. Greg rolled into the lawn to speak with the police, obviously telling them the alarm was over, while Blue Eyes limped up to my car door with a murderous expression.
He jerked my door open. "Where the he!! have you been?" he yelled. "I've been worried out of my mind. I was afraid you'd been kidnapped."
Tired and with a sore butt, I eased out of the car. I placed my palm against his chest; I could feel the rapidity of his heartbeat. "I'm so sorry, Blue Eyes. I just needed to be by myself. I didn't realize you all would be worried."
His blue eyes, usually so clear and light, were as dark as the night sky and filled with an emotion I couldn't read. "After the altercation with your ex, how could you possibly disappear and not think we'd be worried? Have you lost your f#cking mind?" he continued yelling.
"Please," I begged him. "I am truly sorry. But I'm very tired and very sore. Will you just let me lie down and sleep a bit?"
He used his left hand to pull me against his chest. "Yeah. We'll all lie down and get some sleep. But if you ever do anything so idiotic again, I'll . . ."
"Gee, Blue Eyes," I muttered against his shoulder, "I didn't know you cared so much."
"I don't," he whispered into my ear. "I just hated seeing your family of misfits and miscreants losing their sh!t. I've felt the force of your fist before. I know you're better able to take care of yourself than most. You certainly frighten me."
"You're a liar, and I know you're a liar," I whispered back as his hand gently rubbed my shoulder blade.
He steered me into the house. As we passed Greg on the way upstairs, he stopped Blue Eyes.
"She all right?" Greg asked.
"Yeah. I've got her," B.E. answered.
"Let's don't let her escape again," Greg said with an underlying, threatening tone.
"I don't intend to," he responded, using his hand around my shoulders to nudge me on up the stairs.
Once inside my bedroom with the door locked and the lights out, we both stripped and climbed into bed. He pulled me onto his chest and held me, his lips tender against my scalp. I cried there, on his chest, my whole body shaking with the release of sorrow. Blue Eyes tightened his arms around me, stroking my hair with one hand, and he didn't once whine about the sleep he had lost because of my thoughtlessness. He held me and stayed awake with me until my sobs subsided and he could feel my body relax in slumber. Only then did he give in to his need to rest.
I felt him stirring next to me, his teeth nibbling on my earlobe. I rolled toward him, still largely asleep, my mouth seeking his. He found me, or his mouth found my mouth, and we kissed languorously, sensually, affectionately. I arched my back so I could feel more of my skin touching his skin when the shooting pain from my cracked coccyx shocked my brain into an alert status. I lifted my head to check the bedside clock: it was eight. The graveside service started at one. Blue Eyes, of course, was trying to lure my mouth back to his.
"Here, Tiger, take a couple of these," he suggested, punching two of his pain pills into my mouth while he swallowed two himself.
I choked down the pills and laid back in the bed, gingerly positioning my butt-bone.
"I take it the moment has passed?" he pouted.
"Morning of Mother's funeral. Yeah, I think we'll wait on the mindless sex stuff. For now, at least."
He leaned over me, holding my face in both his hands. "But we will return to it. And it's not always mindless sex. We're capable of mindful sex."
"You're confusing me," I teased. "Just kiss me once more before I have to morph into mourning mode."
He kissed me lingeringly, pulling on my bottom lip with his teeth, flicking his tongue over my lips, and, essentially, doing anything he could to prolong the contact I craved. Finally, he kissed me openly, our tongues entwining and caressing while we pressed into each other with the passion we were forced to contain. Knowing we could go no further intensified my longing and my eagerness to be joined with him again.
The faint sounds of Greg bellowing for us from the foot of the stairs intruded. "Cissy, biped, breakfast is served. Get down here, pronto."
"We need to go downstairs," I mentioned.
He grumbled, but he released me as I reluctantly left the bed. He groaned, then pulled on his jeans and a t-shirt to go eat. I followed him.
Dinah, in a t-shirt that read, "American by Birth / Southerner by the Grace of God," bounded around the kitchen flipping pancakes while Greg, as normal, tried to get in her way with his wheelchair.
"There they are," Greg greeted us.
"Where's Daddy?" I asked as I poured coffee for Blue Eyes and myself.
"Mary Dell took him home with her. They're going to meet us at the cemetery," Greg answered.
Dinah set a plate of homemade blueberry pancakes before Blue Eyes; a happy smile spread over his face. Greg passed him a plate of bacon. Dinah poured more pancake batter onto the griddle.
"Can I help you?" I asked her.
She shook her head. "Sit down. I've got it covered."
Greg gestured towards Dinah with his fork. "Dinah slept over to give us a hand getting ready for this afternoon. By the way, Audra, Dad wants you to go meet the director at the funeral home before noon to make sure they'll have everything ready for the graveside."
"Of course," I muttered. I gazed out the kitchen windows; a steady stream of cold rain rolled down the glass. A dark, dreary January Sabbath – a horrible day for a funeral.
Greg pushed a set of keys across the table to me. "Dad wants you to have Mother's car. He said you could drive it back or leave it here until a better time to get it. But he wants you to keep it."
I held the keys in my hand, measuring their weight. I loved the convertible. I wondered if my sore tailbone could stand a three day drive back to New Jersey. The temptation to head back by road was exhilarating. "What do you think, Blue Eyes? A road trip back?"
Blue Eyes looked up from the pancakes he was devouring. "Huh? You want to ride in a car for days on a cracked ass? I never noticed your masochistic tendencies before, but I guess I can quit hiding my bullwhip and break out the handcuffs."
"Yeah, baby, let me get my hands on your whip," I leered at him.
Dinah laughed as she handed me a plate of pancakes. "Ya'll crack me up."
"You think everyone's entertaining, Dinah. I bet you have long, involved conversations with all the geeks who thumb through your comics, especially the ones who never spend a dime," Greg teased.
"I'm fond of most of my regulars. Remember, most of my business comes from repeat customers."
"But the question is," B.E. interjected, "do you make a profit?"
Greg answered, "She's not in it for the money, b.p. She has Mary Dell for that. She's performing a service for the public, providing valuable reading material for the young and near-illiterate."
"And how much money did you leave with me on your last visit, including a healthy discount?" Dinah responded.
Greg grinned happily. "Dinah, come sit in my lap. I bet I can convince you male cripples are way more fun than female scientists."
"Yeah, Greg, hold your breath for that one."
Blue Eyes laughed along with Greg.
"I'm going upstairs to get ready since I have to go by the funeral home first." I pointed at B.E. "Make sure he stays downstairs," I ordered.
Blue Eyes snorted, but rather than get up, he just pulled my half-full plate to him and started eating off it.
I showered slowly, trying to prepare myself mentally for the trip to the funeral home. I had already been as close to Mother's casket as I cared to be. I shouldn't have been surprised Daddy would leave me with the dirty work.
Blue Eyes came in as I was putting on my serious black suit. He sat on the bed and watched me as I applied makeup, corralled my hair, and added pearl earrings and black pumps. When I was all finished, he walked over to me and hugged me in one of those comforting, encouraging hugs.
"Can you handle this, Tiger?" he asked.
"No choice, Blue Eyes."
"Let me get a quick shower, and I'll go to the funeral home with you."
I wrapped my arms around his waist and held on tightly. "I need to go on. I can take Mother's car and meet the rest of you at the graveside."
I felt his hands on my shoulders tense. "I don't like the idea of you going out alone."
"If he was going to lie in wait for me, he wouldn't expect me to be at the funeral home," I insisted.
"Keep your cell phone in your hand," he ordered.
I nodded obediently.
As I drove up to the funeral home, the rain increased in ferocity. I struggled with my orange and blue Auburn umbrella as I made my way into the office. Henry Mason, the owner, was waiting for me in his black, undertaker suit. He shook my hand solemnly and led me to a room at the back of the building. He was telling me, in a quiet voice, of the blanket of lilies they had ready to cover her coffin before they loaded it for the trip to the small cemetery. He also told me several of his employees would deliver the plants and flowers to Daddy's house the following day. I nodded my head unceasingly.
I was so absorbed in all Mr. Mason was telling me, I didn't realize we were in the room with Mother's casket until I looked in front of me and saw her, reclining as if asleep, amongst the gray, silk cushions. I stopped. I didn't want to see her. Mr. Mason continued walking and talking as if I were still right beside him. When he realized I was frozen a few feet behind him, he came back to me and said, consolingly, in his hushed, undertaker voice, "I thought perhaps you'd want to see her before we sealed it. She looks beautiful and so peaceful. But she always was a lovely woman."
"She's dead," I said tonelessly.
"Yes, bless her heart. But her expression is one of contentment. She is reaping her rewards in heaven."
I looked at him as if he were speaking Swahili. "She's dead," I said with more energy and more volume.
"Yes," he continued in his quiet, comforting monotone, "she is with our Lord now."
I opened my mouth to point out the many unchristian acts she had committed, but her reposed body encouraged me to stop. I asked, "When will you be ready to move her to the grave?"
"The boys in the back will seal her casket and move it into the hearse when you have finished your farewell. I'll wait for you back in my office." He then made an abbreviated bow at the waist and soundlessly disappeared.
Alone, I stepped closer to the body, noticing the heavy makeup that colored her face. I felt no sorrow looking at her; her body was unreal and unattached to my memories of her. I rested my hand on the edge of the coffin, feeling the slick fabric she was nestled in.
The masculine arm curled around my neck and jerked back violently, pulling me off my feet. I felt my windpipe being crushed, and I struggled to free myself so I could breathe.
"Didn't you get my note, Audra? I was hoping you'd call me," his familiar voice hissed in my ear.
I lifted my right foot and was about to bring it down forcefully onto his instep when he jerked me sideways. I realized he intended to kill me this time as he slammed my head on Mother's casket and darkness enveloped me.