I guess Mary’s father had heard John crying, because he came stumbling out onto the dock, followed by Mary’s mother and Tom and Shirley and all of our parents, a whole crowd, and the dock groaned under the weight. Mary’s father called out to me, and his voice was so confused I couldn’t tell if he was angry and coming after me or desperately sad and wanting some kind of consolation. I paddled out farther.
A loud splash broke through the night, followed by a few more splashes. Mary’s father had jumped in, completely clothed. I guess Tom had jumped in along with one of the other adults to haul Mary’s father back out again. He was wailing and crying, and by the fading of it I could tell someone was guiding him back around to the front of the house.
It was out there in the dark that I knew for sure. Mary was gone. I held John close and drifted for a long time on that black sheet of water, and eventually I managed to paddle my way back to the dock.
That’s when we packed, and the next day we left Nysa.
And I never came back, not until now.
This time, with you.
The Clouds Bear Down
I don’t even take time to put on shoes. I run barefoot through the woods like some prehistoric human, not caring that the branches are scratching my face, the briars tearing at my clothes. I have to get to the cabin. I’m not telling Tom this time, and I’m not taking the boat. I want to go there the way you do. I want to figure out, somehow, what is drawing you back time and again, what is pulling you from the house.
Within a few minutes, my feet are freezing cold and my breath pants out in a fog, but I don’t stop or go back. And there, among the poplars and the oaks with their changing leaves, the overgrown vines hanging like snakes, I find a trail I didn’t know existed. Is this how you get there and back? Is this how you go to the cabin? And why is this trail here in the first place? Did Tom and Shirley return there more often than Tom has led me to believe?
Rain begins to fall, and I hear the drops stirring the leaves around me, tapping on the hard dirt of the path. Through random clearings in the trees off to my left, I can see the western sky, and what I thought was simply a curtain of gray bringing rain looks more sinister than that—the edges of the sky are nearly green, and the clouds boil back on themselves. I run faster, scanning the lake, the woods, wondering how long it will take me to run to the cabin, or if this is even the right path.
The morning grows darker as the storm approaches. I can’t catch my breath, so I stumble to a slow jog, then a determined walk. I don’t have the energy to be upset at you, not anymore. It’s all been run out of me. All I feel is a deep sadness that this is how it has been, and perhaps this is how it will be until I die.
I don’t know how long it takes me—maybe thirty minutes—but I finally arrive at the clearing surrounding the old cabin, and seeing it again like that, on a stormy morning, takes my breath away. It might be lonely, and Tom might be part of the last generation that keeps it from crumbling into disrepair, but it is still the place where I fell thoroughly in love with your grandmother. The darkening gray light casts every edge into sharp relief, and memories bombard my mind—Tom and me laughing while fixing the roof, and Mary and Shirley rigging up a pulley system to raise a thermos of cold water up to us; that early evening when we played a game of tag around the house, when Mary and I hid in the brush; that feeling of having nowhere to go and nothing to do but sit in the sun and look out over the water.
I stand at the edge of the clearing and put my hands on my knees, try to catch my breath. My heart beats so hard it feels like it might break one of my ribs. I move closer to the cabin. The memories draw me in; I am helpless. But I don’t have time to think any longer about the old days, because as I come around the side of the cabin, I see something bobbing along the edge of the lake. At first I’m sure it’s a pile of clothes one of those trespassing high school kids left behind. As the rain comes down harder, I stare at the spot, and I nearly go into the house looking for you, but something about it makes me stop. And that’s when I realize it.
That floating pile of clothes is you.
You are facedown on the bank, but your body is a rag doll, dipping up and down with the small waves created by the wind of the approaching storm. I race through the clearing and slip through the mud and the wet leaves, fall down, get back up. Fortunately, at that particular spot the bank is shallow, so I reach down and gently scoop you up.
Your face is pale as death.
I start to cry. “No, no, no! No, Pearl, not you. Not you.”
I hold you close, trying to convey all of my warmth into you. I would give it all to you if I could. I carry you back to the path, and the cursed branches pull at your hair and our clothes as we leave the cabin behind.
We don’t go very far before I lay you down on the packed dirt. The rain is falling even heavier now, so I lean over you to try to keep you dry. I can’t tell if you’re breathing. Your skin is the color of white-gray clouds, your lips blue, your black hair somehow darker than black. I put my ear to your mouth.
Are you breathing?
I cradle you in my arms as if you’re an infant, the same way I cradled John when I paddled out into the lake with one arm. I run, and this time I do not stop the whole way, even when my legs burn and my lungs can’t catch up and my head swirls. I keep running, and I’m not thinking about any of these things—all I’m thinking about is the way your arm sways beside me, a pendulum, bumping against my hip, keeping the time.
I will never be able to remember the facts about that journey through the woods—it was endless and took no time at all, through bright light and the strange dim breaking of dawn brought on by the storm. I sense a groan from your tiny frame, and it is like someone has brought down a whip on my back. I find unknown energy and run even faster.
Tom is looking out through your bedroom window, and when I get there, I pass you through the window to him. I follow close behind and think of your stories of sweeping through the forest, riding on the shoulders of Death.
The clouds bear down on us, and lightning flashes. Soon it is raining so hard we can barely see out the window.
“Pearl,” I whisper into your ear. I climb into the bed and hold you on my lap, my face pressed against yours.
“I’m calling a friend who might be able to help,” Tom says, walking quickly out of the room.
I hear a sound that blends in with the gentle swishing of the rain. I hold still. The room is quiet. The sound fades, returns.
It’s you. You are whispering. Each sentence comes out like a sigh, slow and light. You tell the story, but you never open your eyes.
The Far Green Country
I had to do it, Grampy. She came back, and I had to do it for you.
She took me back to the cabin, and I walked down the endless stairs all the way to the bottom, all alone. I went through the door, walked into the water, and put my flashlight on the same ledge. I held my breath and went under, but this time I swam as hard as I could, not wasting any time. Tom’s underwater swimming lessons are what did it, and the lights were shooting past me again, like tiny comets. I reached out and tried to touch them, and they went right through my hands.
I could feel my breath running out, so I swam harder. I pulled on the rock walls, pulled myself through, and there it was far above me, the surface. I kicked and swam and started to black out like I had before, but this time I kicked the way Tom taught me, and I pretended you were waiting for me there above the water.
I made it.
I burst up out of the water, and I didn’t know if I would ever stop gasping for air—I didn’t even care where I was, I was so thirsty for air. But soon I realized I was on my knees in a shallow ocean of warm water, stretching like glass all the way out into an endless sea, all the way to the horizon with no far bank. How had I gotten there? How had I come up through the water into this new place? I thought maybe the passage had led me to the lake and I had swum all the way to the surface, but the cabin was nowhere to be seen.
In front of me was a beach with white sand so fine it was like a powder, and when I stood up the sand stuck to my knees and hands. The sky above me was gray and low with rain clouds ready to burst, but they filled me with comfort. No sadness at all, not like storms often do. I only felt a kind of lightness, like I might float away.
The powdery sand was the softest thing I’d ever walked on. I drifted up out of the water onto the beach, and a warm breeze dried me. I still felt a little hazy from holding my breath for so long.
I kept walking. There was something about that sand—the warmth of it radiated up into my feet and made me feel alive! The beach led up to grass that felt like strands of silk, so soft I had to lie down on it. I stared up at that beautiful, low, gray sky, and Grampy, I wasn’t sure if I wanted to come back to you. I’m so sorry I felt that way. That place filled me with such peace. I stayed there for a long time, stretched out on the grass, soaking in the gentle warmth, watching the clouds drift overhead.
I remembered the silver-haired woman and I remembered you, and it was mostly because I had promised her that I would bring back what she needed, and her promise to help you, that I was able to get up. I walked inland for a long time—it felt like days—until I came up over one hill, and there in front of me was a short stone wall. Beyond that, a bending path led down into a valley between two mountain ranges, and tucked away in the far corner of that green valley, alongside the path, was a white farmhouse with a small barn.
Here the grass was up to my knees and made whispering sounds as I walked through it. Everything smelled like spring, like life, like the first day of a vacation in the mountains. I approached the house down the path, and the closer I got, the quieter the house seemed. From a distance the house had looked completely white, but as I got closer I could see that the trim around the eaves was painted the lightest of blues, the same as the door and the shutters. There was a chimney, and smoke eased its way out and mixed with the low clouds that hid the tops of the mountains. Off in the distance, what I thought were boulders on the hillside were actually white sheep grazing. Everything about the scene was comforting—the green of the grass and the hills, the low clouds, the mountains disappearing into the sky, and the slow sheep.
When I got to the house, I peeked through one of the windows. Who lived here? Through that window I could see the kitchen, not fancy at all but clean and tidy and welcoming. And on the table, in the middle of the room, lay a small, leather-bound journal with a leather tie that wrapped around it and kept it closed.
That was it. Somehow I knew. That’s what she wanted me to bring back.
Grampy, that’s the first time I felt fear over there—the thought of going into the house and taking the book scared me. But I knew I had to do it if I wanted to save you. So I walked around the house until I found the door and opened it as quietly as I could. It still made a slight clicking noise, and I stopped and held my breath. But the house stayed quiet. I stepped through the door and left it open behind me.
That’s when I panicked. I was overwhelmed with this feeling that I had to get that book and get out of there as quickly as possible. So I shoved my way through the house in the direction of the kitchen, and there the book was, still on the table. I darted in, but as I put my hand on it, I heard someone else walk into the room behind me.
“Hello, Pearl.”
I gasped, held my breath. My hand was still on the soft leather. I didn’t want to turn around. I froze.
“Dear Pearl.” The voice was so, so kind, and I had to turn and look just to see who it was.
Standing there was a beautiful woman. I could tell she used to have jet-black hair, but now there were glorious white and gray streaks through it, the kind that made me want to reach out and touch them. Those silver highlights reminded me of the lights in the underwater cave and of the silver-haired woman.
“Hi,” I said, my voice barely working. “How do you know my name?”
I could see in her eyes that she was nearly crying but also happy.
“You can take it,” she said, motioning toward the book with a nod. She sounded a little nervous, like she didn’t want to scare me off. “If you need it, you can take it.”
“I don’t understand.”
“I came here, like you, a long time ago, and I found this book. It’s what she wanted. I refused to come and get the book for her, but I died anyway, and I couldn’t go back.” She paused. “No matter how much I loved Paul, I couldn’t go back. I thought the woman would come for it someday. I thought she could take me back if she did, but it’s been so long. I know I can’t go back, not now. Not anymore.”
“She can’t come here. She’s tried to send others, but they all died and couldn’t go back.”
“I know. I’ve seen them come and pass by. I’ve told them which way to go.” She shrugged and gave me a sad smile. “Are you going to go back?”
I nodded. “I have to. I have to save my Grampy.”
“Will you tell him I said hello? That I still love him?”
She was talking about you, Grampy. I nodded again, not knowing what to say.
Tears rose in her eyes. “You won’t be the same, you know. You can’t come this far in and stay this long and go back unchanged.”
“I understand, but I have to go back. I can’t leave Grampy there on his own.”
I started to cry, and I didn’t even know why, Grampy. I sobbed as I held that leather book to my chest. Before I knew it, she was there, putting her arms around me. The reason the valley and the hills and the sky, even though it was gray, felt so kind and warm was because of her. It was all her. It was all some beautiful extension of who she was.
My grandma. Mary.
“Do you want to know what’s in the book?” she asked me.
I shook my head.
“It’s a journal of the most beautiful moments you’ve ever read about. The woman with silver hair has a difficult job, and she kept this journal through the years, writing down all the beauty she’s seen. Maybe as a reminder that even in death, beauty abounds.”
“That’s hard to believe,” I said.
“It is.” She sighed. “It is very hard to believe. Maybe that’s why she needs this journal so badly. So that she can remember.”
“How was there beauty in your death?” I asked her without even thinking. “You died so young, with a child. Where’s the beauty in my dad losing his mom?”
I wept again.
“Pearl, look over here.” She took my hand, and I followed her around a corner. “What do you see?” she asked, and I realized I was looking into a mirror.
“I see me.”
“There is beauty even in death,” she said again.
I think she was saying that if she hadn’t died, you wouldn’t have left, my parents wouldn’t have met, and I would never have been.
“You should go,” she said. “Any longer and you won’t be able to go back at all.”
I wiped my eyes on my clothes and sniffed. “Yeah. Of course.”
I turned and walked to the door, and she came with me outside, even to where the path left the house and went back toward the stone wall. I didn’t look back because I was scared I wouldn’t be able to leave her—she felt so kind and wonderful, like everything that’s good about being home. Everything inside of me wanted to stay there with her. I walked the path, and she was still coming along with me.
I shouted to her over my shoulder, “You’ll still be here someday when I come back?”
“Always,” she called back to me.
I crawled over the low stone wall and began walking to the beach, clutching the book. Then I heard someone else, another kind voice, this one light like the air.
“Mary, I was walking up in the mountains, and did you know there are two new lambs?” Her voice stopped, and I knew she had reached the one she called Mary, and I knew without even turning around that they were both standing at the low stone wall, watching me walk away.
“Is that . . .” the new voice asked wi
th astonishment.
“Tell him I’ll be waiting here,” Mary called to me. “Don’t forget. Tell him I’ll be waiting in the white house, beyond the shore.”
I raised my arm to let her know I had heard, because I knew for sure if I turned and saw those two kind women standing there, I’d never be able to leave.
The walk from the beach that had seemed to take days took only moments going back. That could be the way of things. Maybe going in is always a long journey, but it’s not as far away from us here as we think. And then there was the shore and the long stretch of glassy water.
I stopped and felt the life of the sand pulsing through me. How was me bringing back this journal going to help you?
Then I was back in, swimming out as far as I could, clutching the book. I went under, and it was so much harder to swim like that, with a book in my hand. Going down was so much harder.
I couldn’t do it. I felt my lungs begin to let go, preparing for that deep breath in, but when I thought I was drowning, the silver-haired woman was there, pulling me back through the water.
This time, though, we came up in the lake. The water was icy cold, and she pulled me to the shore.
“Thank you, Pearl,” she said, gasping, weary. I felt the book in my hands, and then it was gone. She took it, and she was gone.
I realized something, Grampy, but too late—the only way I could have helped you. It was the sand. I should have brought back some sand for you.
Gone
There are three days of doctor visits, expensive house calls that I know I can’t afford, and we can’t get rid of your fever. You are in and out of sleep or unconsciousness or something other than reality. You whisper things I can’t quite hear, your eyelids alive and fluttering with visions or dreams. Tom is in and out of the room, bringing cold compresses and Tylenol and coffee. I do not leave your side.
On the third day, you are worse, which hardly seems possible. Your skin goes clammy and white, and your breathing is raspy and holds long pauses that leave me counting the seconds. Tom and I decide you need to go to the hospital, so we load up his car and head out the driveway on a cool autumn morning. I sit in the back with you resting against me, and I open the window a few inches so that the cool air rustles around us, promising better days.
The Weight of Memory Page 23
