The Feathered Bone

by Julie Cantrell

  “My daughter committed suicide,” I say softly. “Almost a year ago. She was barely fourteen. I was alone when I found her.”

  She may not hear what I’m saying, but I trust the right words will find their way to her at the right time. That’s all I can do.

  “The night she died, I was home with her. I walked into her room. She was on her bed. Just lying there. She used a gun too.” I continue, detail after detail, letting her know that not only do I care, but I understand. I’ve been there. I’m still there.

  When I say, “She was my only child,” the woman stops rocking and moaning and pulls her hands away from her head. As she looks at me, I say, “You will get through this. I promise. I’m here to help you. Lots of people are here to help you.”

  She reaches for my hand. I repeat this message in various ways, again and again. It finally begins to sink in. Twenty minutes later, she crawls out of the closet and leans against the bedroom wall, her arms curled tight around her belly. Her eyes connect with mine, as if I’m all she has to believe in anymore.

  “Stay with me,” she says. The fact that I’m still here, that I somehow survived my daughter’s suicide, is enough to get her to the next inhale.

  Hello Sparrow,

  Today I was reading to Bridgette. The story about Moses. I was at the part when his sister hides baby Moses in a basket and puts him in the river. That’s when Bridgette got real serious and said, “I don’t get it. All this time, and you’re still believin’ God’s gonna show up. Why’s he lettin’ all this happen to you? Explain that.”

  Monday, October 29, 2007

  Today’s The Day, the third anniversary of Sarah’s disappearance and one year after Ellie’s suicide. This year, instead of helping Beth search for Sarah, I have come to my daughter’s grave. I am here to focus on her life, not her death.

  I still haven’t ordered her marker. Instead, I placed a cement bench near her grave. It’s a quiet spot beneath the oak. A place for me to examine my emotional shoe box, confront the piles of pain.

  I set down a thermos of tea and begin to flip through photographs I’ve brought with me. They show Ellie through the years, from the moment she was born, wrapped in a striped cotton blanket at my breast, to a red-cheeked toddler at dance lessons, wearing a sequined costume and shiny tap shoes, then tutus and ballet slippers. Sarah is beside her in nearly every pose. Photos show them earning Girl Scout badges, pitching a tent at church camp, singing in the choir. With each page, memories surface, and I become more and more convinced that we gave our daughter a good life. A happy life. A life with love.

  Some of the photos show Carl, Ellie, and me together, roasting marshmallows over a campfire, cutting a Christmas tree from a wild stand of pines, bringing Beanie home for the first time. Ellie holds the tiny kitten up to her mouth, kissing her. Beanie lived up to the love. A constant companion, curling atop homework pages and purring Ellie to sleep each night.

  I laugh to myself now, remembering Ellie’s protest. She slept on the porch with Beanie that first night, insisting that if the cat couldn’t come in then she wouldn’t either. That lasted all of two hours before Carl gave in. I admired her stance. She had a fire in her that I believed could never burn out.

  “You survived so much, sweet girl.” I talk to her now. “You were brave. And strong. And you never let your hurts make you mean.”

  I start to cry now as I tell my daughter what I need to say.

  “Ellie, honey. I’m so sorry.

  “I’m sorry I let you down. I’m sorry I lost Sarah. I’m sorry I couldn’t keep our family together, and I’m sorry I couldn’t stay as strong as you needed me to be.

  “When your dad left us, I fell apart. I relied on you. That never should have happened. You were the child; I was the mother. I should have done better. I wish I could go back and make different choices. I’d do anything, Ellie, to save you.”

  I wipe tears and continue.

  “I wish, more than anything, that you had known how much you were loved. How much you were needed here, in this life, with us. I wish you had not done this, Ellie. Every day is hard. I miss you. And . . .”

  I can’t finish my sentence. I lie down on the bench, photo albums in hand, and I curse the sky.

  Nearly an hour later, the sound of my cell phone stirs me awake. It takes me a minute to realize where I am. On the third ring, I take a look. It’s Carl.

  “Hello?” Please let him say he’s sorry. Please let him show he cares.

  “Amanda?” When I don’t reply, he continues. “I just wanted . . . I know it’s been a year today. And . . . well . . . I guess I just wanted you to know. That’s all.”

  “How are you?” I ask.

  “Fine.” He doesn’t ask me in return.

  “Have you been to the grave?” I ask him. “Did you see the bench?” We haven’t talked in months.

  “No.” After a length of silence he adds, “I’m sure it’s nice.”

  I don’t bother asking him to help me pay for it. Every month, as I pay my credit card bill, I swallow the bitterness I feel toward Carl. It would do me no good to hate him.

  “I haven’t heard from you in a while. You still at the plant?”

  “Yeah. But I’m going back offshore soon. I never liked working dogs.”

  “That night shift must be rough. I’m glad you’ll be happy.” I say this with kindness, but apparently that’s not how Carl receives it.

  “There you go again. Why do you think I never call, Amanda? All you ever do is attack me.”

  I set the phone on the ground and lie back down on the bench. Carl’s muffled voice continues to launch the same old accusations, but I no longer listen. Eventually he must realize I’m not there. He hangs up the phone.

  I’m nearly asleep again when the sound of a truck draws me to a seated position. It’s Jay, pulling up near Ellie’s grave. He parks and heads my way, flowers in hand.

  I rise and offer him a hug. He holds me, for the longest time, and then we sit together on the bench. “Wildflowers,” I finally notice. “Her favorite.”

  Jay gets up and lays the fresh batch of blooms across her unmarked grave. Then he spends the rest of the afternoon with me, sharing memories and stories of the good times.

  “I almost forgot,” I tell him. “I brought a balloon.”

  The sun is beginning to sink beneath the tree line as we walk to my car. He helps me carry the photo albums, and I trade my thermos for the turquoise balloon. “Her favorite color,” I say. He nods and eyes the note on the seat. I grab it and explain. “I wrote her a letter. Last night.”

  I loop the letter with string, attaching it beneath the helium balloon. Standing at my car, out from under the oak tree, I look skyward, hoping the heavens will get my message to Ellie and that she’ll feel my love. Jay puts his arm around my shoulders and we release the string. Together we watch the message wave in the wind, and then we light a candle for Ellie’s grave, leaving her not in darkness, but in light.

  The narrow route home from the cemetery is flanked by deep ditches. Thick woods creep right up to the edge of the water-filled trenches. For years, these dense stands of timber were broken only by an occasional home, with plenty of privacy for those who opted to live in Walker. But since Katrina, clear-cut neighborhoods have been dropped in between the miles of rural acreage, cluttering the landscape and pressing neighbors together on small lots for maximum profit. Now, as we near Election Day, political signs have been tacked onto wooden stakes and stuck in the ground, creating a special kind of chaos, especially combined with the decorations people have set out for the upcoming night of trick-or-treat.

  I’ve neglected to leave a light on. Without streetlamps, darkness slips in, surrounding me. I feel my way to the back door, but I don’t enter quite yet. Carl and I constructed this small brick ranch-style home as our starter place, perched on an acre of scrub land. The parcel was originally a cattle farm, then a pine flat, before the owner sold the timber and divvied out one- to three-acre sec
tions for new construction. We had never planned on staying here long. Instead, we had commissioned an architect to design a four-bedroom Acadian. “My dream home,” I had bragged to Raelynn. It was to be built on a ten-acre spread north of her place, overlooking a fish pond and a horse pasture and a large backyard with shade trees and plenty of room for Ellie to roam. The house, the horses, the hopes . . . distant memories now.

  Tonight I stand at my back door, letting my eyes adjust to the dome of darkness around me. The swoop of bats merges with the roaring rumble of insects. “Hush,” Carl used to say, holding baby Ellie in his lap as he rocked her on the porch swing. “Listen. It’s the call of the wild.”

  I listen now, standing here alone. “Where are you, Ellie? Where are you, Sarah? Do you know you are loved?”

  I move into the house and go through boxes of Ellie’s school mementos. One of her best school projects, a science presentation on feathers, earned her an A++. On the front of the report she drew a beautiful feather, edged in iridescent green. We searched three different craft stores trying to match the hues of the wild Quaker parrots that had first caught her eye during the field trip. She had bent low to collect the feather from the ground after Sarah went missing, and carried it with her the entire week, clinging to it as we spent full days pacing the grid, searching for her friend.

  Nearly two years later, Ellie pulled that feather from her bulletin board and began researching the natural habitat of Quaker parrots, discovering they are not from Louisiana at all.

  I am taken back now, as Ellie’s voice comes through to me. “Mom, did you know they didn’t migrate to New Orleans? They were living in South America. Wild and free. People would capture them and sell them as pets. That’s how they ended up here. In cages.”

  The very idea makes me clutch the feather to my heart. She’s here with me. In this room. “Some of the birds got loose. They were free, but they couldn’t go all the way back to South America. They don’t migrate. You’d think they’d die, right? If their owner wasn’t feeding them? But they didn’t die. They found a way to make a new home, right there in the middle of New Orleans, building big nests in the palm trees and on the power poles. After Katrina, some of them ended up on the west bank. People call them Katrina parrots now. Like the hurricane chickens we had in our yard for a while. Remember those?”

  I give in to the magical thinking, as if Ellie were really right here with me. In this space. Alive and teaching me about the parrots. “Did you know, Mom? They have some green feathers and some that are kind of turquoise too. See?”

  I look at the drawings she’s made, capturing the bird’s unique hues.

  “That’s why you chose this project?” I ask her. “Because of the turquoise? Your favorite color?”

  “Of course!” She laughs. My daughter laughs! I reach out, as if I can still touch her, longing to feel her hair in my hands.

  “But, Mom, here’s the coolest part. Some of the feathers aren’t actually blue or green at all. They only look that way because the light moves through them. Like a prism. It’s an illusion. That’s what the scientists say. They found out peacock feathers are like that too. They aren’t blue or green or turquoise like we think. They’re really just brown. Kind of grayish. So how can I say this?” She twirls her pen through her ponytail. “They don’t have pigment in them. It’s actually their structure . . . how they’re made . . . and the color only really comes through when it finds light. Birds, butterflies—they were made for the light.”

  Hello Sparrow,

  It’s been three years. Three YEARS! I will not give up hope. I will not give up hope. I will not give up hope. I will not give up hope. I will not give up hope. I. Will. Not. Give. Up. Hope!

  Chapter 25

  January 2008

  “HAPPY NEW YEAR!” I PLACE A SLICE OF POUND CAKE ON VIV’S desk and head for my office.

  “I’m glad you’re back,” she says, following me to my desk. “It’s been way too lonely without you.”

  “It was time,” I say, unpacking my bag. I add a fresh batch of ink pens to my favorite container. It’s a piece of terra cotta pottery Ellie made for Mother’s Day way back in first grade. Her fingerprints are stamped around the circumference, painted to look like flower blooms. I will not cry today. “What’d you do for New Year’s?” I ask Viv.

  She holds out her left hand for me to inspect a bright, shiny diamond ring.

  “No way!” I cheer. “Is this for real?”

  She’s blushing and giggling like a schoolgirl. “Took me forty years, but I finally found The One.”

  “Viv!” I hug her. “I’m so happy for you. Tell me everything. How’d he propose?”

  “Had the whole unit involved,” she explains. “We had gone out to eat at Don’s down in Denham. Nothing fancy, you know, just good food. Good people. And anyway, we were at the table with his family. They’d all met us out, so I should have known something was up, but I really was clueless. And then this lady started choking back in the corner booth. All of a sudden the restaurant was swarming with first responders. All his firemen. He made chief, you know.”

  I nod, smiling. My friend is radiant; a light surrounds her. So much joy.

  “I’m thinking, gosh, this is a big deal. I mean, they were all rushing in to help her. And then . . . music begins to play, and the whole restaurant, everybody, they all get up and start singing my favorite song.”

  “Don’t tell me.”

  She’s laughing. And we sing in sync, “Holding Out for a Hero.”

  “Perfect! He’s perfect for you!”

  “I know, right! I mean, what kind of man is going to coordinate a flash mob to ‘Hero’ in the middle of Don’s Seafood?”

  “Your one true love, that’s who!”

  She laughs, and I give her a hug. “Pictures. I need pictures.”

  “Don’t worry. They got it on video. You’ll see. He got down on one knee and everything. I was bawling like a baby. A total mess. I wish you could have been there. You’ll love him.”

  “I already do.” I hug her again and give the ring a second look. “It’s beautiful, Viv. You have a date set yet?”

  “Well . . .” She hesitates, grinning guiltily. “I’ve been waiting forty years. I don’t want to wait anymore. We’re too old for a big wedding anyway. We’re going to the justice of the peace this week. And then we’re leaving next Monday. Flying out to the Greek islands and calling it good.”

  “Monday?” I’m shocked.

  “Monday.” She can’t stop smiling.

  “I’m so happy, Viv. I’ve never seen you this excited. Look at you. You’re glowing.”

  “I know. It’s crazy. I mean, all these years I’ve sat here listening to horrible, hurtful things people do to one another, and I still want to believe in happy-ever-after. It’s kind of ridiculous.”

  “Not at all,” I tell her. “I still believe in it too.”

  “So I do have this little fantasy.” She grins. “Have I ever told you about it?”

  I perk my head, intrigued.

  “It goes like this. Someday Jay will come swooping in here, wearing those jeans and cowboy boots that make him look killer. And he’s going to put a big diamond ring on top of an Elmer’s glue bottle. Just stick it right there around that orange twisty cap. Then he’ll bend over your desk and give you a huge kiss and he’ll say, ‘Stick with me for life, Gloopy?’ ”

  I roll my eyes. “That’s your fantasy?”

  “Yep. And then you’ll say yes and y’all will live happily ever after.” She gives me a more serious look and adds, “You deserve it, you know. The happy-ever-after part.”

  “I can’t get engaged without a flash mob and a theme song. What fun would that be?”

  She smiles. “I already thought of that. ‘Brown-Eyed Girl.’ Because one day Carl came to pick you up. Your car was in the shop or something, I don’t remember, but anyway . . . you probably never knew this.” She waves her arm and says, “Maybe I shouldn’t tell you.”


  “I’m sure it’s nothing I haven’t heard from him before. I can handle it.” I smile for extra assurance. She finally tells me the story.

  “He was looking at a magazine, waiting for you. He made some kind of comment about Cameron Diaz and her sexy blue eyes. And then he said, ‘Nothing worse than looking at a woman’s eyes and thinking about a pile of poop.’ Only he didn’t say it with that much tact.”

  I laugh. “I’ll bet.”

  “Then he pointed to your office.” She imitates him, mocking his harsh tone. “ ‘Look at my wife in there. Dirt-floor hair and eyes like poop. And she can’t even be ready when I come to pick her up. See what I have to deal with?’ ”

  I smile, but what I really want to do is close my eyes and bleach my hair.

  “So one day,” Viv continues, back in her own voice now, “I want a man to look at your beautiful brown eyes and your long, dark hair and I want him to see your worth, Amanda. Something Carl could never see.” Then she raises her mug and says, “Here’s to happy-ever-after.”

  I tap my cup to hers and add a second toast. “True love.”

  “He’s left me.” My client spins her gold wedding ring around her left finger, tugging it up to her knuckle and back down again as she works the words through her brain. “Thirty-seven years, and he up and leaves. Just like that. How can I tell the kids? We’ve got grandbabies now. Where will they stay when they visit? How will we handle Christmas? And birthdays? This isn’t how it’s supposed to work.”

  I listen, wishing as I always do that I could ease my client’s pain. Viv’s right. We sit here day after day, witnessing the hurts people cause one another. Serving as a catch basin for all the grief and loss and heartache life can deal. “Thirty-seven years,” I say.