Phoenix Rising

by Grant, Cynthia D.

  “The hell I do.”

  “It’s true. You and Dad. Everything’s always boohoo. Why can’t you be happy when we talk about Helen?”

  “Too bad I’m not well-adjusted like you. Does your shrink know you won’t leave your room?”

  “What’s the matter, Lucas? Can’t you face the facts? When Helen said she loved you, you couldn’t say it back! You just sat there like a lump and said, ‘Thanks a lot.’”

  “Did she tell you that?” He grabbed my arms. “Did she say I didn’t love her?”

  “No! I read it in her diary!”

  My brother groaned as if I’d stabbed him, sinking onto my bed. He covered his face with his hands and moaned, rocking back and forth.

  “Lucas, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it. Helen knew you loved her. She said you did. Listen to me, Lucas! It’s in her diary! Look, it’s right here! I’ll read it!”

  I’d never told Helen I loved her. And she had never told me. We were children, with all the time in the world for everything that needed to be said and done. We were sisters; we knew we loved each other. We said it in a hundred ways every day, from: “Your slip is showing,” to “The phone’s for you.”

  Helen, I love you as much right now as I ever did, and always will.

  Lucas uncovered his face. He was crying. I hadn’t seen him cry since he was little. His tears dissolved something sharp inside me. My heart cracked open and overflowed, rising in a blinding tide to my eyes.

  A long time later, when I could see again, my brother was still beside me.

  He said, “I love what you’ve done to your eyes. You look divine.”

  “I wouldn’t talk if I were you.” I reached into the nightstand and grabbed a box of Kleenex, handing him a few.

  “Well, shit,” Lucas said. “We’ve missed dinner. They’re probably wondering if we’ve killed each other. I suppose you want to go see your boyfriend.”

  “He’s not my boyfriend.”

  “Why did Mom invite him? He was lousy to Helen.”

  “In a way,” I said, “but they made up before she died.”

  “Did you ever tell her you loved her?” Lucas asked me.

  “Not in words,” I said, “but she knew. Just like she did with you. You saw what she said in her journal.”

  Lucas nodded. “I still wish I’d told her.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “Me, too.”

  He pulled me to my feet. “Let’s go face the music.”

  “In a minute. I have to wash my face.”

  “Oh, sure. Then you lock yourself in the bathroom and drown yourself in the tub. What am I going to do with you, Jess? I can’t let you stay in this house.”

  “And you can’t get me out. It’s my problem, Lucas. But I appreciate your concern.”

  “Then I know you’ll appreciate this special offer. On Saturday I’m calling in sick to work. Then you and I are taking a ride to Foothill Park if I have to drive the Impala into your bedroom.”

  “You will,” I said. “I’m scared.”

  “Scared of what?” He grabbed me. “Scared you’re going to freak out? Scared you’re going to be hurt? Everybody’s scared! And there’s a simple explanation: Life is a hair-raising business! It can kill you! The thing is, you’ve got to keep hanging in there! You gotta lives till you dies!”

  “You’re squishing me, Lucas.” He was out of practice in the hug department.

  He let me go. “Shall I send up Romeo?”

  “No, I’ll be down in a second.”

  “You better be,” he said, “or the car comes through the door.”

  I went into the bathroom and washed my face. My eyes and nose were red. I wondered what my parents and Bloomfield had been doing while Lucas and I were cussing and sobbing. Bloomfield had probably fled.

  I had to force myself down the stairs. They were sitting at the dinner table; my parents, my brother, my sister’s lost love, turned toward me like sunflowers and I was the dawn.

  “I hope I haven’t kept you waiting,” I said from behind my plastic mustache.

  I’m in an elevator. It goes up and up. It stops; the doors slide open with a gasp. I step out onto the shiny white floor. White walls, endless shiny halls, humming with bright fluorescent lights. A familiar smell, an uneasy mix of ammonia and flowers. I realize where I am.

  I’m at the hospital.

  There’s no one. Anywhere. The nurse’s station is empty. But the coffee pot is bubbling and the switchboard is lit with a hundred blinking calls on hold. The windows are black. The clock reads two.

  I start to run. My footsteps ring. The doors that line the corridors are shut. I want to open a door but I’m afraid. My heart is heaving.

  A door opens; someone steps into the hall.

  It’s Helen.

  It’s Helen! I’m so glad to see her! Happy tears warm my cheeks. She looks wonderful in a loose white gown. Her hair is a dark shawl across her back.

  She smiles at me. We rush into each other’s arms.

  “Jessie,” she says, “what are you doing here?” She sounds more like Mom than like Helen, as if she’s grown up since the last time I’d seen her, and I’m still a child. I feel safe.

  “Helen, you have to come home right away.”

  “It’s late,” she says gently. “You should be in bed.”

  “I can’t sleep. I get so scared, Helen.”

  “Scared of what?” She searches my face.

  “I’m afraid I can’t find you.” I feel silly saying it, with Helen right here beside me.

  “You always find me.” She laughs softly, then stares at my bare feet. “Where are your shoes?”

  I can’t remember. “I guess I left them at home.”

  “You really should have your shoes on, Jessie. Mom would have a fit.”

  I tug Helen’s hand. “I hate this place. We have to leave before they all come back.”

  “I can’t come with you, Jess.” She puts her hand on my arm. Her fingernails are like opals.

  I start to cry. I can’t help it. Helen holds me close.

  “Don’t be sad,” she says. “This is only a dream.”

  My cheek is on her chest. I can feel her heart beating.

  “Are you sure?” I say. “It seems so real.”

  “Of course it’s a dream. We’re not really in a hospital.”

  “Then where are we? Helen?” My arms are empty. My eyes are blind. “Please don’t leave me!”

  “I’m right here, Jessie.”

  I hear the words in my mind. My heart opens like a rose. I feel at peace.

  I walk down the empty hall and step into the elevator.

  The hospital is only a dream. Helen and I are free to leave.

  19

  May 31

  I have found the dress I’m going to wear to grad night. It was in the window of a little shop at Town & Country Village.

  It’s blue, lit with light like the morning sky; simple yet elegant, too. I put it on layaway and will bail it out before the 15th.

  I’m afraid to bring it home ’cause then Jessie will know I’m going with Bloomfield and she’ll have a fit. She’ll tell me he’s a jerk, I’m too good for him, etc., that I have no business going out with him After Everything He Did.

  It’s my life, not hers. I don’t care what she says!

  Which is why I haven’t brought home the dress.

  Bloomfield was so cute when he asked me. I started smiling before he even said a thing, ’cause I could tell. We were standing in front of the house after school, Jessie glaring daggers out the bedroom window at his back, so I made a point of acting extra entranced.

  Bloomfield said, “Uh, Helen, there’s something I have to ask you.”

  I started cracking up.

  “What’s so funny?” he said.

  “Your face. I mean—”

  “What about my face?” He was laughing, too.

  “When you’re serious you get this little tuck around your mouth.”

  “Like this?”
>
  “Exactly.” I couldn’t quit laughing.

  “Well, what about you? Here’s my impression of Helen: Me: ‘There’s something I have to ask you.’ Helen: ‘Your face is so funny! Ha ha ha!’”

  He reeled around the front lawn, clutching his sides. I was gasping for air.

  “This is serious!” he shouted.

  “I’m listening, Bloomfield! Seriously, seriously!”

  “I want to go to the grad night party with you!”

  “I know you do! I thought you’d never ask!”

  “How can I, when you’re acting like a lunatic?”

  I haven’t even told Mom, ’cause she’ll get so excited and of course she’ll tell Jessie, who’ll have a cow. You’re Making a Terrible Mistake, etc. I can hear it now.

  On the fifteenth day of June I will graduate from high school. My life is changing. And so am I.

  And so is Bloomfield.

  I just hope I don’t feel lousy then. I’m fighting another cold. My resistance is so low I’m mugged by any nasty bug passing through.

  And I wish that all my hair would suddenly grow back, luxuriant as bunny fur. The wig is not so bad (not so good, either). I wear it with a bandanna, which accomplishes two purposes: 1) it keeps my hair from blowing off when a truck roars by, and 2) it hides the fakiest part of the wig—the part. What hangs down my back looks like my old hair used to, if you don’t look too hard.

  I’m wondering what to wear with my grad night dress. A bandanna would be tacky. A cowboy hat? I saw some sequined berets at Macy’s. Pretty snazzy. And expensive, but why the heck not? I don’t graduate from high school every day. Thank God.

  I’m glad Bloomfield and I are friends again.

  It’s better this time. It’s more relaxed. We know for a fact that we’re both human. I ain’t a princess and he sure ain’t the prince.

  We talk a lot more than we used to.

  It’s funny how things come back sometimes, when you think they’re gone forever. This winter the yard looked completely dead. Now everything’s in bloom. The other day Mom and I planted iris bulbs. Hard to believe they’re full of flowers.

  Lucas says the band that will play at grad night is terrible; a bunch of Top Forty punks. Their name is Shout but he calls them the Sell-Outs. Fortunately, the music at school dances is too loud to really hear.

  Sara Rose wanted me to come out and play today but I didn’t have the juice. I hate to disappoint her but I had to take a nap. I felt better when I woke up. Then Bambi came by to shock me with her new hair style: Her head looks and feels like a peach. We got out the Ouija board for a while, but all it would say was EAT MY SHORTS, so we gave up on the future. Then I listened to her and Jess have this really stupid (and hilarious) argument. I secretly taped it and played it back, which made them both so mad!

  B: Well, you said you liked him.

  J: No, I didn’t.

  B: Yes, you did. You told Susie and she told me.

  J: I never told Susie.

  B: Well, she said you did.

  J: Are you calling me a liar?

  B: Susie’s not a liar.

  J: She is if she says I said I liked him. I think he’s the biggest jerk in the world. Well, the second biggest jerk.

  B: Are you talking about me?

  J: I never said that.

  B: If I’m such a jerk, then how come I’m the one with all the boyfriends, not you?

  J: Cuz they’re jerks, too!

  B: Oh, listen who’s talking!

  J: Yeah, you!

  B: No, you!

  J: No, you’re the one who’s talking.

  B: Then who just said, ‘No, you’re the one who’s talking’?

  J: You!

  They sounded like a comedy act. Sometimes they don’t like each other at all; they’re just a habit.

  My stomach is urpy. I should eat something but it might come right back up. In a while Mom and Dad are taking me to see Dr. Yee. Just a checkup, then we’ll do some shopping.

  I would like to tell them about Bloomfield (and my beautiful dress!) but only if they’ll promise not to tell Jessie. I’d prefer to tell her myself. Perhaps via skywriting during the graduation ceremony.…

  20

  I went to the hospital the last time with Helen.

  That’s what really happened. I did not stay home.

  I almost didn’t go. I had a science test the next day but I didn’t feel like studying. Besides, Helen needed cheering up. She’d been feeling pretty low.

  We thought it was a cold. Or the flu or something.

  We weren’t blind. Our eyes were closed.

  It was no big deal, just another hospital run. The transfusions made Helen feel better. Everybody noticed, and nobody mentioned, that she was going days earlier than scheduled.

  Dad carried Helen out to the car. Usually she put up a fuss when he babied her. This time she didn’t say a word, just wrapped her arms around his neck.

  When we got to the hospital, nurses took her to her room. I wandered off and bought a Cosmopolitan. It was full of sappy articles that would make Helen laugh, like: “Kiss Your Flabby Fanny Good-bye!”

  When I got back, Helen wasn’t in her room. Mom and Dad were gone. I couldn’t find a nurse. Dr. Yee was being paged. I started running down the hall. Dad found me. He said, “Hurry, Jessie.”

  Everything speeded up. Dad pushed me through a door. It was Helen’s new room. There were no other patients. The room was so quiet. I’d expected confusion. There was only one nurse, and Dr. Yee, and Mom. Helen was in the bed, unconscious.

  Dr. Yee touched her arm. Helen murmured something. It sounded like, “Oh, shit.”

  Dr. Yee said: “Helen, we’re ordering blood.”

  Helen opened her eyes and said, “Save it for someone who needs it.”

  Doctors floated in and out. So did Helen. She was having trouble breathing. They gave her a shot and turned her on her side. Mom and Dad stroked her hair. Helen whispered something. It was “Jessie” or “Help me.”

  Then my sister hemorrhaged internally and died.

  The nurse was crying. Mom and Dad were crying. Helen was lying there. I ran out of the hospital and got in the car, and when my parents found me, I said, “Don’t talk.” All the way home I thought: HelenHelenHelen, as if her name could protect me.

  We got to the house—I burst past Lucas. He’s shouting, “What’s wrong? What’s the matter?”

  I ran up to our bedroom and locked the door. Then I cried and cried and cried and cried, until my head throbbed and my jaw ached and my eyes were bloody and raw. Then I stopped and I thought, My heart has died. God can’t hurt me anymore.

  But the heart is as tough as an iris bulb. The flowers are blooming and Sara Rose is like a bird, calling outside my bedroom window, “Jess-sie-ee! Jess-sie-ee! Can you come out and play?”

  Not today, I say. Maybe sometime soon.

  21

  June 9

  I don’t feel good. I am sick of this feeling. I am missing the last days of school.

  Yesterday I went for a while, but I had to come home. I felt crummy.

  I get so mad at myself. Why can’t I transcend my body? Millions of people all over the world are suffering more than me, yet they keep on plugging away every day.

  Helen Castle, Queen of the Complainers, says: Woe is me!

  Bloomfield called awhile ago. His voice is like ginger ale. The minute I hear him, I start to feel better. Probably ’cause I’m laughing so much.

  Mom just brought me some toast and tea so I’ll have something to throw up. Usually I love this kind of tea, but today it smells like socks and closets.

  Outside, an orange dragonfly embroiders the summer day. If I ever have a daughter I will name her Summer. Or Autumn or Spring.

  I will not name her Winter. Or Gidget or Bambi or Bernice.

  I want to go get my blue dress today.

  Oh shit, I am going to throw up.

  22

  It’s Friday afternoon. I should be in
school. I wish I was. That’s the weird part. I kind of miss seeing everybody.

  Even Dr. Shubert. She called today to see how I’m doing.

  “What’re you up to these days, Jessie?”

  “About five foot eight,” I said.

  I told her that I still can’t leave the house.

  Dad’s at work, Mom’s gone to the store. My school work is done. I’m bored with TV. There’s nothing on but soap operas and they can’t hold a bubble to real life.

  Bloomfield is coming by tonight. He says we’ll either play Yahtzee or bicker, whichever I’d prefer. I told him not to bother, but I’m glad he’s coming over. Bambi never comes by anymore. (If I’d known this would work, I would’ve flipped out sooner.)

  Lucas says he’s taking me to Foothill Park tomorrow if he has to lock me in the trunk of his car.

  Great, I say, then I won’t have to watch you drive.

  I’m not going to worry about tomorrow right now.

  It’s almost three o’clock. Way down the block, I see Mrs. Jensen heading for the bus stop. Sara Rose will be by soon, as she is every day, inviting me to come out and play. She doesn’t know the meaning of the word discouragement. Or of lots of other words, for that matter.

  Although it’s only March, the air is warm. The windows are open and the curtains are stirring. Lucas is playing his acoustic guitar. It’s a song I’ve never heard before.

  He stops and restarts it, and after awhile I realize it’s something being born. It’s not like the tunes Lucas usually writes, with their fast, brash riffs and their bluesy chords. This melody draws me out of my bedroom and down the hall to his door.

  He’s sitting on the bed, bent over his guitar, his face tilted up as if he’s listening to the sky. Suddenly I know what has drawn me to the song.

  “It’s Helen,” I say.

  Lucas looks at me and nods. Then he is lost inside the music.

  I listen to his gift describe our sister: dark and light and sweet and warm; funny and loving and bright and wise; a daughter, a sister, a child, a woman; a sorceress in a medieval forest teeming with the creatures who inhabited her poems; sprites and phoenixes and jewel-eyed mermaids and unicorns nursing their young.

  I see Helen, at Foothill Park, running across the bright green hills that ripen into golden waves as she passes across them like summer.