by Doug Burgess
The crowd of mourners is thinning out. Billy stands dutifully by, but he is scraping his toe in the dirt. “No,” I tell them. “Take Billy home. I’d like to be here myself a little while.”
“Of course.” Irene and Constance go have a word with Billy and I see them depart, arm in arm.
Now it’s just me and Grandma. No, that’s not entirely true. At her left is Grandpa Mike, a small flag marking him as a veteran. Just as well, since that’s the best that could be said of him. I’m standing amongst the long rows of Dyers, Thurbers, Butlers, Tinkhams, Browns and Hazards, all jumbled together by marriage and issue, with names like Frances Tinkham Butler and William Butler Brown. Here is Harold Hazard Dyer, 1929-1961, who had an enormous collection of Dresden figurines and a wife named Luley that nobody could stand. Grandma called her “Physic Face” for the look of intestinal discomfort she habitually wore. The marriage was childless, and Harold took to spending more and more of his summers with his artistic friends on Fire Island. Luley’s discontent deepened. But it was Harold who put a bullet through his mouth, April 14, 1961, the same day the CIA invaded Cuba.
Stories pulled out of the cupboard, dusted off, and presented at the table with the same loving care as Limoges china or Great-Grandma Hattie’s silver set. But it’s not my family—or, at least, only half as much as I supposed.
I’ve been thinking about blood a lot recently. Not the kind that goes drip, drip, drip down the walls in some gothic horror. The other kind, passing its thin blue identity chip from one generation to the next. A couple days ago I sat down with a pad and pencil and wrote it all out. Pretty soon the whole thing started to look like one of those Old Testament catalogues. Emma Godfrey and Teddy Johnson begat Annabelle, who begat Marcus Rhinegold. But Teddy, randy bugger, also begat Walter Hazard (my dad’s name is Walter, can’t think why that never came up before) with Grandma Maggie, which means Marcus and I are actually related—all thanks to our mutual Grandpa Teddy’s wandering pipe.
I’m not a Hazard at all. I don’t know whether to be relieved or sad.
It’s still only early afternoon when I get back, but the fog makes it seem like evening. I was expecting the house to be dark but the porch light is on, lamps lit in the front hall and kitchen. There are two covered dishes on the draining board and a note: “Just something to tide you over till Saturday. Love, I & C.” I pull back the foil and find fresh-baked lasagna in one and blueberry crumble in the other. These were my favorite dishes as a kid. I dip a fork into the still-warm lasagna, and sigh. The comfort comes not from the food itself, but from knowing there is still someone that remembers.
The house is not as depressing as I thought. In fact, without the turmoil of Grandma’s uncertain memories, it seems to have settled into something resembling normality. The ceramic owl still gazes beadily down from the banister. The Rockwell plates line the kitchen. In the front parlor, Grandma’s knitted afghan rests neatly folded on the arm of the old leather sofa, her rocking chair drawn up to its usual spot near the fireplace. Someone—Constance probably—has even drawn up a fire. It throws warm shadows on the room.
My room, I remind myself. My house. Which means things will have to change. It’s not a prospect I relish. Academic life required that the sum total of my possessions fit within the back of a pickup truck. I’ve never had anything larger than a bedroom to decorate; suddenly it feels as if I’ve been given Versailles.
Sure, I could leave the house just as it is. Pack up her old clothes, clean out the closets and attic, but otherwise leave well enough alone. And yet, without even acknowledging it, I’m already moving from room to room, deciding the fate of all things: what to give to the Aunts, donate to charity, consign to the curb. It’s a strange and terrible power, enshrining some memories and discarding others, becoming the final custodian of someone else’s life. Keep all the family heirlooms, of course. The upstairs bathroom, too, will remain untouched as long as I’m alive. And Grandma’s bedroom set is actually quite pretty: late Deco, with lots of little mirrors and inlaid mother-of-pearl. My own, on the other hand, is heavy, blond, and hideous. I slept on that bed for thirty years, but I can’t wait to see it gone, along with all the other frilly horrors. Finally, I promise myself to make a bonfire of all Grandpa Mike’s marine registers, his stacked and sorted copies of The New American and The Federalist, even the wooden models of the Herreschoff yachts on the mantle. The first thing to burn will be that little leather ottoman he used to bend me over to deliver what he called “discipline.”
I pass by the dining room and there, sitting all by itself, is the tape recorder. There’s a cassette inside. I don’t remember leaving it, but in the confusion of the last few days I could have walked around the house with two live lobsters and a pair of fire tongs and not known. The recorder is foursquare on the table, looking up at me, practically begging to be played. I press the button and Grandma’s voice fills the room:
“…a bit of Sylvanus in all the Hazards. Good and evil, rage and comfort, wrecking and salvage. We became wreckers to have the power of gods on Earth: choose what to save, and what to destroy...”
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