Open Mic Night at Westminster Cemetery

by Mary Amato

  Without knowing what it is, Lacy hears the humming and, like a lullaby, it soothes her: the sound of each individual voice joining in an understated mycelium of harmony.

  And then . . . although Lacy cannot see it, the color of the sunset is both ordinary and otherworldly in its rose-blue beauty, the last gasp of the gloaming, already inevitably slipping away.

  When the sun is completely gone and yet the horizon still has a faint glow, young Clarissa Smythe appears—not completely, of course; she wouldn’t take that chance. She looks out first and then when she is sure that no one else is up, she rises halfway, so that only her upper torso is aboveground. There she rests her elbows on the ground, puts her chin in her hands, and takes in the sight of the trees and sky as if she is taking in a huge breath. She has a round, deserving face, wide ready-to-smile eyes, and curly hair, braided and wound into a bun at the nape of her neck. Her dress, which she made herself, has a bold collar with a large bow.

  After a moment, she turns her gaze toward the church wall. Owen Hapliss appears. He, too, stays in his grave, which is twenty feet from hers. Hearts pounding, the two gaze at each other and smile. It is their nightly ritual. They are both breaking the rules, but they have found that by staying half in their graves and by rising only for a few moments at this particular time of evening, the risk is at its lowest. They dare not speak, but they hum and they gaze as the cemetery grows darker.

  One by one the Dead fall back asleep, and the music of their energy grows softer and then stops. Owen mouths “I love you” to Clarissa and she mouths it back. They return to their graves, and Westminster settles into itself.

  [I have witnessed this scene between the unrequited lovers firsthand, dear Reader, and let me say here that you are fortunate to be one step removed by virtue of this narration. To directly feel the longing between them every night, to know that this fleeting exchange is the most they have, will test the absorbent properties of any handkerchief.]

  There are a few hours until midnight, when the bell will toll and those who are able are allowed to rise. Only Raven remains awake, perched on Poe’s monument.

  After an hour or two passes, we make out a figure walking into the cemetery, and those fine hairs on the back of our necks quiver: a Living person . . . a young woman! It is a cold autumn evening, just dark, but the streetlamp at the entrance casts a halo of light, and we get a better glimpse of her as she passes under the light. Older than Lacy by two years, this is Olivia Brink, Lacy’s sister. Her features are sharper than Lacy’s. Her hair is cut in sharp layers, dyed reddish brown. Tonight she is wearing jeans and boots. No hat or gloves. Her hands are jammed into the deep pockets of her jacket, borrowed from her boyfriend. Troubling anger emanates from her. It’s as if the jacket she’s wearing is embedded with a thousand outward-pointing arrowheads.

  From Poe’s monument, Raven watches. Olivia looks up and sees him, which reminds us that the Living as well as the Dead can see Raven. Although she knows it’s ridiculous, she swears the bird is observing her.

  OLIVIA: Take a fucking picture. It lasts longer.

  Drunk, she laughs at herself. I have come to this, she thinks: telling off birds for appearing as if they are watching me.

  Feeling large-hearted, Raven decides to help by making several small, bird-like movements of his head, turning to look this way and that, as if each jab is random and brainless.

  Olivia pulls a bottle of vodka from her coat pocket—the same size and brand as the empty one Lacy found earlier against the side of the church—and sits on the stone bench in front of Lacy’s unmarked grave. She takes a long drink and then she talks to herself, her voice fluctuating between anger and sadness, the occasional bitter laugh betraying the fact that she has already had a lot to drink.

  OLIVIA: So here I am again . . . Zane thinks I’m at home. Mom thinks I’m at Diana’s. And Diana thinks I’m . . . I forgot what I texted her. (She laughs.) I’m doing an excellent job. Here’s to me.

  Olivia lifts the bottle and takes another drink. Her cell phone vibrates in her jeans pocket, and she ignores it, instead looking up at the bare black branches of the tree against the moonlit sky outside the gate.

  OLIVIA (singing):

  Lacy Lacy wore a tutu.

  She fell down and got a boo-boo,

  Cried so hard that she went cuckoo.

  So we put her in the zoo-zoo. (Another laugh.)

  I was, like, seven, and you were five when I made up that song about you. God, you used to get so mad at me whenever I sang it . . . You hated getting teased, which made it so incredibly fun to tease you.

  At the sound of Olivia’s voice Lacy stirs, then feels the heavy and encompassing arms of sleep around her, and closes her eyes, believing that she is dreaming.

  OLIVIA: Remember that one time when I sang it outside at Grandma’s house, in front of those other kids? You got so mad. I ran inside and you followed me and you screamed and threw a saltshaker at me. Grandma put you in time-out. That made you even madder. You said it was unfair. I told Grandma that you took every little thing the wrong way, and Grandma sided with me. She told you to sit in the chair and think about how you needed thicker skin and you screamed, “What do I need thicker skin for? I’m not a rhinoceros!” And then you sat there, silent and shaking and pathetic. (Olivia’s voice takes on weight and is on the verge of cracking beneath it.) God, Lace. Why were you so fucking easy to tease?

  Olivia’s intensity pulls at Lacy and shakes her out of her sleep. The ground shifts and Lacy rises halfway out of the earth to take in the unexpected sight of her sister sitting in front of her.

  LACY: Olivia? Liv? I can’t believe it . . .

  Olivia tries to take another sip, but the bottle is empty. She swears, gets up, and tosses the bottle into the bush by the church wall.

  Lacy is spellbound, watching; the familiar solidity of her sister’s body unlocks a tiny window of memory. An image from that last night: the sound of Liv and Zane and Diana in the basement laughing at something as she was in the kitchen secretly getting ready to go to the open mic. She remembers her excitement. She was finally going to perform and nobody knew it. Their mom wasn’t home; she was out on her first date, Lacy suddenly recalls, with some guy she had met online. Olivia and Lacy had helped her put together an outfit to wear. That had been fun.

  With a stab, Lacy realizes how terrible that night must have been for her mother . . . did she get a call about her daughter’s death when she was on her date?

  Even though she knows that Olivia can’t see or hear her, Lacy speaks.

  LACY: God, Liv . . . what happened that night? How is Mom?

  Olivia gets up and makes a slow circle around the bench. She sees the shot glass full of bourbon at the foot of Poe’s grave and laughs. She walks over, picks it up, and smells it.

  OLIVIA: Ha. See, this is a sign. I’d leave it for you, Lace, but I know you’d hate it. (She downs the shot. Her phone buzzes again.) Shut the fuck up. Nobody gets it, Lacy. I don’t know if I can take it.

  LACY: What is that supposed to mean? Liv?

  Moving with sudden speed, Olivia walks to the iron gate. She opens it, walks through, and closes it. Lacy runs to the gate, but it won’t open for her. The door to Sam’s grave opens halfway and he peers out. Anxiously he calls to her in a hushed voice.

  SAM (whispering): Lacy, you’re not allowed to be out all the way! It’s not midnight yet.

  LACY: Sam, it’s my sister!

  Sarah Brown hears and peers out next.

  Lacy is about to call out for Olivia, but Olivia has already disappeared from sight.

  SARAH (whispering): Lacy, you mustn’t be out. Come—

  LACY: But my sister—

  Sam wants to go to her, yet it’s Sarah who takes the tremendous risk. Shy Sarah, who has been quiet and careful for the past 200 years, leaps out of her grave, runs to Lacy, puts her arm around her, and starts leading her back. Sam, still half in his grave, is stunned.

  SARAH: Shh. Come back to bed, Lacy.


  LACY: But my sister was just here. I swear it. I heard her . . . I saw her. (Lacy resists. Silently, Sarah pulls Lacy toward her grave. Lacy pulls away.) Will she be back? She has to know what happened to me. If I could just ask her . . .

  SARAH: Shh . . . please.

  The door to Mrs. Steele’s grave opens and Raven caws a warning. Mrs. Steele rises halfway from her grave. From her vantage point, Lacy is visible, but Sarah is blocked by a crypt.

  MRS. STEELE (a look of triumph on her face): Lacy Brink, fully out of your grave before midnight! That is strike three!

  Sam, remaining half in his grave like his mother, feels an anguished cry rise in his throat, but he holds it in. Sarah steps out from behind the crypt.

  SARAH: No! It was my fault, Mrs. Steele. I was awakened by a cry and I rose, thinking it was already midnight. It was just a cat yowling, and so I immediately realized my error and turned to go back. I must have been half asleep because in my haste and panic, I tried to return here (she points at the spot from which Lacy had emerged). Naturally, I frightened her right out of her grave! I was just apologizing. (She turns to Lacy.) As I was saying, I’m sorry for the intrusion. It won’t happen again.

  Lacy’s body starts to shake. Mrs. Steele won’t believe Sarah’s story, Lacy is sure of it. Raven, perched on Poe’s monument behind Mrs. Steele, turns his head and mimics the sound of a cat, throwing his voice to the far edge of the cemetery. When Mrs. Steele turns around to look, he tucks his head under one wing as if he has been sleeping all along. Sam finally gets the nerve to speak.

  SAM: Yes! The cat woke Sarah and it woke me too, Mother. I saw the whole thing just as Sarah described it. I was clarifying how it works. (To Lacy) Rule 240 says that if you are roused during evening hours, you may be excused for reflexively peering out—

  MRS. STEELE: But you are subject to a strike if you fully exit your grave. Sarah, you know that.

  SARAH: I’m sorry.

  MRS. STEELE: Look at Samuel and me. We did the right thing. Well done, Samuel.

  Sam is mortified. His mother’s praise only highlights his lack of courage.

  SARAH: I understand if you feel that you have to give me a strike. But Lacy should not be given a strike because my arrival pushed her out.

  SAM: That’s right! Rule 242: If one resident tries to occupy the grave of another and the grave’s owner rises to defend his or her rightful place—

  MRS. STEELE (snaps): I know the rule.

  Lacy, Sarah, and Sam are on edge as Mrs. Steele deliberates in silence.

  LACY: I—

  MRS. STEELE: Quiet! (To Sarah) Under the circumstances, I have to give you a strike, Sarah. Make sure it doesn’t happen again. (To Lacy) You may return to your grave. I can’t give you a strike, but I’m quite sure that your stay here will be temporary nonetheless. To bed, everyone.

  Lacy turns to Sarah, her heart bursting with gratitude. She wants to hug her, but Mrs. Steele is watching. She wants to hug Sam, too, but Mrs. Steele clears her throat, and Sarah leads the exhausted Lacy over to her small burial plot and gently encourages her to take a step in. Lacy turns and gives her a look. She can’t possibly sleep. Sarah returns her gaze with a nod and the whispered advice that it is an imperative. As soon as Lacy’s foot is in the grave, the rest of her descends in a quick rush. Sarah nods at Mrs. Steele and returns to her own grave. Mrs. Steele and Sam descend.

  The cemetery is quiet for a moment. Far away, another siren is heard. High, high above, the tiny blinking lights of an airplane pass.

  Below the stillness, the souls hum in turmoil. For decades the cemetery had settled into the dull drone of routine; sleep was so easy that it was hard to tell the difference between sleeping and rising. But now, they are unable to sleep.

  [Here, dear Reader, I must pause and confess what you already know to be true: so far I have skipped rather quickly over my descriptions of the Dead in their graves. In truth, it is an image I personally don’t like to linger over, given my own tendency toward claustrophobia, but I cannot do justice to the next part of this scene without giving an accurate picture. Here it is: there is nothing romantic or surprising about the graves at Westminster; they are narrow and separate and confining. So keep that in mind as you continue reading. These restless souls will be surrounded by nothing but darkness.]

  Sarah, in her plain coffin, is replaying what just happened. She has turned on her side, one hand under her cheek, the other pressed against her chest. Since her grave is not far from Lacy’s and since she tends to be a light sleeper, Olivia’s voice had woken her. As she heard the responding emotion in Lacy’s voice, her heart went out to Lacy and she found herself rising without thinking of the consequences. Inside her chest now is a mix of vibrations. She is still worried about Lacy, but she is at peace with getting her first strike, even pleased with her own boldness.

  Mrs. Steele is also replaying what happened. She lies flat on her back, her hands clasped over her stomach. Sarah caught her off guard, stepping forward like that and for what reason? To save the girl? And Samuel . . . he is clearly smitten with her, too. An image of the cemetery as a quilt comes before her eyes—not a patchwork quilt, but a nicely designed pattern. She pictures the quilt stretched out, parallel to the earth, as if on a frame, and the new girl is standing on it, the weight of her threatening to pull apart the stitching that holds the pieces of fabric together. She has a fantasy that she pushes the girl off the quilt. When the girl is safely gone, she tells Effie and Neffie to reinforce the seams with tight, perfect stitches. The fantasy calms her and she falls asleep.

  Lacy, unlike the others, has no coffin to define her position, and so, unlike the others, she is not lying horizontally. She is sitting, knees hugged to chest, the earth around her displaced by her soul so that she is in a kind of dark womb. Agitated beyond measure, her mind is spinning so fast she cannot feel anything but a kind of hot numbness. This is the last place she wants to be—underground, alone. But she has no choice. The cemetery feels dangerous to her, as if it has been wired with little invisible bombs that she has to, somehow, avoid detonating.

  Sam is face down, hands covering his eyes, although there is nothing to see. He lies for several long minutes, flailing his mind with insults: You’re being a pigeon-livered idiot. You are the king of cowards. No one with a right mind would want to spend a clock’s tick of time with you. Look at Sarah! She stepped up, didn’t she? She proved herself to be brave and altruistic while you shook in your boots like jelly in a jar. You might as well stay in this coffin for the rest of forever, you worthless, insubstantial sack of bones.

  Sam goes on . . . he has plenty where that comes from.

  Raven sits atop the monument, listening to the rat-a-tat-tat of Sam’s negative vibrations, rolling his eyes.

  After giving himself a thorough thrashing, Sam is spent. He turns on his side and waits for any sounds or movement from his mother’s grave next to his. When she seems to be asleep, he opens his coffin and sits up, half out of his grave. He looks at Lacy’s grave, not moving.

  Raven flies over on silent wings and settles next to him.

  Sam still does not move. With one claw, Raven withdraws the pencil from Sam’s satchel and sets it in Sam’s lap. Sam looks down. After a moment, he picks it up, takes out his journal, and begins to write.

  Dear Lacy,

  I am unable to sleep. I imagine that you are in a similar predicament, and I long to be able to offer my assistance.

  Given my lack of courage earlier, you might be loath to believe me. It is our actions by which we are judged, and my actions are not worthy of admiration. I am ashamed of myself and grateful to Sarah. If you had received that third strike, it would be as if I had died again. I know we have only just met, but the initial fascination I felt for you has already grown into . . . I shall say it . . . love. I love you, Lacy Brink. Ridiculous, perhaps, but true.

  Eternally yours,

  Sam

  Carefully Sam tears the page from his journal and rolls it. Ra
ven reaches over with one claw and gently grasps it, making a signal with his head to show that he could play courier. But just as Raven is about to lift into the air, Sam cringes and grabs it.

  SAM: I can’t.

  Sam stuffs the missive in his pocket. Raven tilts his head, waits to see if Sam has a change of heart.

  SAM: I know. I’m a coward.

  There is a long pause as an image of Sam’s first love comes to him. Abigail. The oldest daughter of the lamplighter who lived down the street. She always had a book in her hands and was in charge of taking care of her younger siblings, walking them to school and back every day. How badly he had wanted to go to that same school, but his mother told him the school wasn’t good enough. The truth, which he knew, was that his mother, being a widow, had fallen on hard times, and so Sam had to work at the sewing machine by her side in their row house, where they did piecework for a boot company. In the evening, though, Sam would often find an excuse to walk down the street where he could see the girl reading by the light of an oil lamp in her front window. Sam can almost picture it. He thinks about how he never acted on his interest in Abigail and then he looks at Lacy’s unmarked grave.

  SAM: She’s wonderful, isn’t she? Miss Lacy Brink. There’s just something about her . . . (Raven nods. Sam sighs, leans out on both elbows.) After the last burial back in 1913, I thought my job was over and done with. I had a long stretch. Just waking up every night, writing in my journal, trying to keep from going insane. And then . . . Lacy Brink! What a surprise.

  In a comic gesture, Raven wraps his wings around himself and makes the sound of kissing, but instead of laughing, Sam’s face grows serious.

  SAM: Please don’t make fun of me tonight.

  Raven bows a genuine apology, and, sensing Sam’s need for privacy, turns away and settles to sleep. Sam is quiet for a long moment. Then he opens his journal. While he writes, he sings, softly at first, to Lacy’s grave.

  [Please, dear Reader, do not be the insensitive and hurried type who skips over poetry in favor of devouring juicy dialogue. Sam’s song reveals important details. Although Lacy will not hear him, Sam is pouring out his heart to her, and you are his witness. Listen carefully.]