Stillwater

by Mary Jo Hazard

  “You’re right; he loved me so much,” Denny said, closing his eyes.

  But then came the day when love wasn’t enough.

  Later that night my father came to me in a dream. He was sitting in his special chair in the living room when I walked in wearing a crown of red roses and my favorite white lace nightgown.

  “My beautiful girl,” my father said, smiling. “Grace, my beautiful girl.”

  “What about me?” Denny chirped. “Am I your best boy?”

  “Yep,” my dad said. “My best boy.”

  “Play with us, Daddy,” we said, tugging on his arms. “Please.”

  “I’ll get you,” Daddy cried, jumping out of his chair. He held his arms straight out in front of him like Frankenstein and wiggled his long fingers back and forth. “You can’t get away from the tickle monster. I’ll catch you, little missy and mister.”

  We screamed and ran around the coffee table and right out the front door into the yard. The sun was high in the sky, and the birds were singing in the trees. Earl the squirrel ran up the lilac tree, chattering all the way to the top branch.

  “Daddy, watch this,” Denny said, performing a perfect backward somersault. My father laughed and blew him kisses.

  I twirled around and around like a ballerina, and my father cheered and clapped his hands.

  “Encore,” he shouted. “More, more.”

  Denny bowed and I curtsied; then we did our tricks all over again.

  But this time when I curtsied, the sky turned pitch black. My father’s eyes filled up with tears, and he turned and walked toward the house.

  “Don’t cry, Daddy,” we yelled. “Daddy, please don’t cry. We love you.”

  My father walked up the porch steps, stopped when he reached the front door, and covered his face with his hands. He moaned like an animal caught in a trap, like Uncle Tony did after O’Malley threatened to arrest him; then he straightened up, opened the door, and disappeared inside.

  “Daddy,” I screamed, desperately trying to open the door. “Come back. Please don’t leave us.”

  “Open,” Denny yelled, pounding his little fists on the door. “Please.”

  “Daddy,” I said, collapsing in a heap on the porch. “What’ll I do if you leave me? Don’t leave me.”

  There was a loud crack, and the door opened wide. A fierce wind sucked Denny and me into the house, but it wasn’t our house—it was the boiler room at Saint Mark’s School. A large furnace hissed and shot yellow darts of fire at us. We tried to run away, but we couldn’t. Our feet were stuck to the floor.

  A scary devil floated above the furnace near the ceiling. He had a giant red balloon head with two horns on the top. Sulfur-smelling smoke swirled out of the horns. Somehow I knew that the devil was Mr. Kutter. He opened his mouth and flicked his long-forked tongue at me and laughed; a long black cape drifted behind him like an ominous thundercloud.

  “Look in there, girlie,” he ordered, pointing to the furnace. “Look deep inside. That’s where your father is.”

  I screamed and closed my eyes. “Open your eyes, Grace,” Mr. Kutter said. “Open your eyes.”

  I opened my eyes. Denny had disappeared, and Uncle Tony was standing in front of me.

  “Help me, Grace. Please help me,” he said, pointing at the furnace. “I don’t want to…”

  “How?” I said shakily. “But how?”

  Uncle Tony’s eyes were dark. He stared at me and didn’t say anything else.

  The next thing I knew, my mother was shaking me and telling me I was okay.

  My heart was pounding, and I couldn’t catch my breath. Denny was kneeling at the bottom of the bed—his eyes wide, watching me.

  “It’s all right, Grace,” my mother said softly. “You had a nightmare, a bad dream. It’s all right, baby.”

  “Mom,” I said, sitting up. “You don’t understand. Daddy was…Uncle Tony…”

  “Shhh, Grace, baby,” Mom said, hugging me tight. “Let it go. It’s just a bad dream.” Kissing my forehead, she repeated, “It’s all right.”

  My mother and Denny fell asleep in my bed, but not me. My heart wouldn’t stop pounding, and my hands were trembling. I clasped them together tightly and turned over on my stomach. Did the dream mean that my father was in hell like Sister John the Baptist had said? Did Uncle Tony really think I could save him? If I couldn’t, would he die too?

  When I woke up, my mother had gone to work, and Denny was sitting at the kitchen table with his ear on the top of his cereal bowl. He loved to listen to Snap, Crackle, and Pop.

  “Doc went to get the paper,” Denny said, looking worried. “You were really screaming last night, Grace.”

  “I know, Den,” I said, filling a glass with orange juice. I took a blueberry muffin off a plate on the counter and sat down next to him. I looked at his innocent little face—glad I knew how my father really died but so happy Denny didn’t. “It was only a bad dream. I’m sorry if I scared you.”

  “Morning, kids,” Doc said, walking into the room. He set the newspaper down and pulled out a chair. “Nice day. Not too hot yet.”

  I looked out the kitchen window at the river; a flock of mallards were swimming up near the bridge.

  “Won’t be long now until we start to see geese migrating,” Doc said, watching the ducks. “Fall’s not that far away.”

  “Doc, did you hear where the fire was last night?” I said. “Do you know what happened?”

  “Vinnie said it was just a small fire—an accident,” he said, sitting down across from us. “The Hansen place. The fire department put it out right away.”

  “But what happened?” I said, afraid to ask if Uncle Tony was there.

  “Fred took his kerosene lantern out to the barn. Apparently, his flashlight was out of batteries, and he needed to check on a sick cow. He set the lantern down, and the cow knocked it over. Fred’s wife heard him yell and called the fire department. Good thing she was awake.”

  “Was Uncle Tony there?” I asked. “Is the cow okay?”

  “Hansen got all his animals out. Tony was there, but he had nothing to do with this fire.”

  I breathed a sigh of relief and bit into the muffin.

  “According to Vinnie, O’Malley got a bit ahead of himself though,” Doc said, taking off his glasses and rubbing his eyes. “Before the damn fool knew how the fire started, he noticed Tony watching from the field next to Fred’s barn and jumped to the wrong conclusion. He decided enough was enough and went over to arrest Tony. When Lola Hansen saw O’Malley walking Tony to the police car, she ran over and straightened O’Malley out.”

  “Did he believe her? Did he let Uncle Tony go?”

  “Of course; he had to. It was the truth.”

  “I never heard of a cow setting a fire,” Denny said, pouring himself more Rice Krispies. “That’s funny.”

  “Sometimes the truth is stranger than fiction,” Doc said, nodding at him.

  I smiled and rinsed off my dishes; it was going to be a great day.

  The doorbell rang, and Denny jumped up, yelling, “I’ll get it. I’ll get it.”

  “That boy’s a whirlwind,” Doc said, laughing. “I wish I had his energy.”

  “It’s Louanne and Maggie,” Denny shouted from the hall. “They want you, Grace.”

  “Bring them in here,” I said, clearing off the rest of the table.

  “Did you hear that O’Malley tried to arrest my uncle?” Louanne said, storming into the kitchen. “He didn’t know how the fire started, and he—”

  “Doc just told us,” I said, interrupting her. “That’s awful.”

  “How’s your uncle doing?” Doc asked, getting up from the table.

  “He was pretty upset, but Aunt Michelle and Vinnie calmed him down.”

  “O’Malley must be so embarrassed,” Maggie said.

  “Things aren’t always what they seem,” Doc said, shaking his head. “O’Malley shouldn’t have assumed Tony set the fire before he knew the facts. I’m sure he wo
n’t make that mistake again.”

  “He better not,” I said.

  CHAPTER 27

  “Mrs. Ferrell’s a fine woman,” I said, jumping down her porch steps two at a time. We’d picked up the books she was donating to the library, all romances, and she’d made us oatmeal cookies and root beer floats.

  “Mighty fine woman,” echoed Louanne. “That was so good.”

  “Since we’re over here,” Maggie said. “Let’s stop at Two Trees.”

  Two Trees was a small beach on the barge canal where the older kids hung out. They wouldn’t be there now though—they got there in the late afternoons.

  The most exciting thing about Two Trees was the rope swing that went out over the canal. The city took the rope down the summer after Billy Thompson fell off it and drowned. They nailed a “No Swimming” sign to the tree to prevent more accidents, but someone had taken the sign down and put the rope back up.

  My father used to take Denny and me to Two Trees to fish for stripers, but he never let us swim because the canal was so deep. He’d cast our lines into the weeds growing out of the shallows, and we usually caught one or two fish before we had to go home. He caught more fish than we did, but when he didn’t think I was watching him, he’d take the fish off of his line and put it on Denny’s or mine. Then he’d say, “Look you’ve got a bite—looks like a big one.”

  Louanne and I pulled off our sneaks and bobby socks and waded into the water. Maggie sat on a flat rock and watched.

  “I’ll play lifeguard,” she said, folding her arms. “I’ll save you if you start to drown.”

  “Just don’t tell Aunt Michelle. She’ll kill me if she finds out I went into the canal.”

  “No sweat,” Maggie said. “But you’re not swimming—only cooling your feet.”

  Louanne and I waded for a few minutes and then sat down beside Maggie.

  “Scoot over,” Lou said. “You’re taking up all the room on the rock with your big butt.”

  “Am not,” Maggie said, moving over.

  I stretched my arms up over my head and yawned.

  “Tired?” Louanne asked. “You look kind of sleepy.”

  “I didn’t sleep much last night,” I said, yawning again. “I had a nightmare.”

  “I hate nightmares,” Maggie said, looking at me. “What was yours about?”

  “It was strange—scary,” I said, searching for the right words. Even thinking about it made me shiver. I wrapped my arms around myself. “My father was burning up in a furnace. He started out playing with Denny and me inside the house and ended up in the furnace at Saint Mark’s.”

  “Saint Mark’s,” Louanne said. “That is weird.”

  “Uncle Tony was there too,” I said, taking a deep breath.

  “Uncle Tony?” Louanne said, raising her eyebrows.

  “Right. He asked me to help him.”

  “Did you…”

  “No, my mother woke me up,” I said. “The thing that bothers me is my father.” I chewed my fingernail. “Do you believe that if you commit a mortal sin you go straight to hell?”

  “My religion doesn’t have a hell; what is a mortal sin?” Louanne said, puzzled.

  “Eating meat on Friday, missing Mass on purpose on Sunday,” Maggie said, rattling off a couple of biggies. “Catholics have lots of things that are mortal sins. If you commit one and die without confessing it, you go straight to hell.”

  “Suicide is another one,” I said, lowering my voice. “Sister said when you break God’s laws, he punishes you. He doesn’t forgive, and when you go to hell, you’re there forever.”

  “What are you saying?” Louanne asked. “Are you talking about your father? That’s nuts.”

  “I used to think the worst thing was losing my dad in an accident,” I said, my voice cracked. “Then I thought his suicide was the worst thing, but what if he’s suffering forever in hell…”

  “Your dad was sick,” Maggie said, in a reassuring tone. “He didn’t know what he was doing.”

  I know he was sick, but…

  “Maggie’s right. Sick people don’t go to hell,” Louanne said.

  “Remember, Maggie,” I asked, “when Sister John the Baptist said I was going to burn in hell just like him?”

  “She should burn forever for saying that to a kid,” Louanne said.

  “My feet are cold,” I said, getting up. “I’ll wait for you by the bikes.”

  “Okay,” Maggie said. “We’ll be there soon.”

  I purposely scraped my bare feet all the way up the gravel path to the top of the bank. The stones were sharp, and by the time I got to the top, the bottoms of my feet were bloody. The pain from the thousand little cuts on my feet stopped me from thinking about my father burning in hell and Sister John the Baptist. I found a grassy spot under the tree, sat down, and wiped the blood off my feet with my socks. When they were clean and dry, I put on my sneakers and settled back against the hard tree trunk. Maggie’s and Louanne’s voices drifted from the beach, but I couldn’t tell what they were saying.

  The rope moved a bit in the breeze, and I grabbed it and pulled on it. It seemed strong—about an inch thick and rough. I gave the rope a good swing and watched as it moved out over the water, thinking how good it would be to swing out and never come back.

  Shading my eyes with both hands, I watched a motorboat towing a water skier about a half a mile away. The skier was having a tough time standing up even though he stayed inside the wake. Sometimes I felt like that—even when I was on dry land. I watched until he disappeared around the river bend; no other boats were in sight.

  Maggie and Louanne walked up the path carrying their shoes.

  “You okay?” Louanne asked.

  I nodded and shook the rope at them. “Let’s try this thing just once before we go. It can’t be that hard.”

  “We’ll get in trouble,” Maggie said. “What if someone finds out?”

  “It looks like a storm’s coming,” Louanne said, pointing to the clouds that were moving toward us. “We should start home. I don’t want to get my hair wet.”

  “I think it’s going to blow over,” I said, tightening my fingers on the rope. “You don’t have to try the rope, but I’m going to.” I raced off of the bank, and seconds later, I was right back on the grass where I started. It was a great feeling, flying out over the canal; I wanted to do it again and again.

  “It’s fun,” I said, handing Maggie the rope. “Come on, just try it.”

  “I’ll probably kill myself,” she said, gripping the rope for dear life. “What if it breaks?” She walked the rope over to the edge of the bank and looked down at the water. “That’s a long way to fall.”

  “Come on, the rope won’t break, but if it does, you’ll fall in the water, and then you swim to shore,” Louanne said patiently. “Easy peasy—as long as a barge isn’t coming.”

  “Run fast and don’t let go,” I added, more than willing to give her advice now that I was the expert. “Hold on tight.”

  “Are you chickening out?” Louanne asked, flapping her arms and clucking like a chicken.

  Maggie crossed her arms over her chest. “I am not a chicken. Maybe you don’t remember, but I do have a major fear of heights.”

  “Okay, then don’t do it,” Louanne said, taking the rope. “I will.” She raced off the bank and tucked her legs up behind her knees. Her pink pedal pushers slipped down below her hips, revealing white cotton panties for the entire world to see. “Oh no, my pants!”

  Maggie and I laughed so hard that I almost wet my pants.

  “NOT FUNNY,” Louanne shouted, landing beside us.

  “We see London. We see France,” Maggie and I chanted.

  “Good thing you were wearing underpants,” Maggie added.

  “Shut up! Thank God I’m not the nervous type,” Louanne said, pulling her pedal pushers up. “You made so much noise; you almost gave me a heart attack.”

  “I’m going one more time,” I said, flinging myself off the b
ank at the same exact time a Standard Oil barge sounded the horn three times and turned into the mouth of the canal. A knot of fear shot down my spine, and my stomach flip-flopped. The rope slipped through my fingers, and I plunged into the deep water, going deeper than I’d ever gone before. I shot down, down, down, like an anchor heading to the bottom, and just when I thought I was never going to stop, I did. Instinctively, I stretched my arms way up, my fingers grabbing at the water like I was climbing a wall—desperately trying to get to the surface. The barge’s motor pounded through the water; my head felt like it was on fire. When I finally reached the surface, the barge was coming right at me. My heart thumped against my chest like it was trying to burst out; there was a weird whooshing sound in my ears, my stomach, and even my eyes. I had to will myself to take a deep breath. I choked on the air, and water gushed out of my nose and mouth. My eyes were blurry, but I made out two crew members on the deck of the barge yelling and waving to get my attention.

  “Swim, goddamn it, swim!” one of them yelled, waving his cap at the shore. The other man’s mouth moved, but the boat’s engine was so loud I couldn’t hear him. He grabbed a life preserver and threw it at me, but it landed way out of my reach.

  Everything seemed unreal, and time slowed way, way down. It was as if I were watching myself tread water while the boat moved closer. My hands instinctively did the doggie paddle, keeping me upright, but it was only a matter of time before the boat mowed me down. I honestly did not know what to do.

  “Grace!” Louanne screamed from the shore.

  “Swim, Grace, swim!” Maggie yelled. “Hurry.”

  “Grace, what is wrong with you?” Lou screamed. “Swim! Swim!”

  The boat’s engines changed gears, but it kept chugging toward me.

  “I’m going to die,” I whimpered, closing my eyes. Whimpering wasn’t my style; usually I’m a strong person, but I’d never faced a barge head-on before. “I’m going to die, and it’s not going to be pretty.”

  I smelled Old Spice and felt dizzy and warm all over. This was what it felt like to die; it actually wasn’t that bad.

  “Grace.” My father’s voice filled my ears, drowning out the whooshing noise and the sound of the boat’s engines. “Calm down, baby. Relax.”