Lights of the Heart

by Nat Burns

  “I came to get you,” I said, trying to be cheerful. “I got off early, and Tia Florida told me you were here. I came to walk you home.”

  “Cool!” she signed and then gave me a thumbs-up gesture.

  I looked at her coffee cup. “You need a refill? Thought I’d get one too.”

  She nodded, and I took her cup to the front counter. The woman was behind the counter. She was very attractive, and my heart ached. I was so very close to sobbing, but I swallowed the tears.

  She smiled at me, and I extended my hand. “Hi. I’m Ella, Maddie’s friend.”

  “Oh. Hello! Good to meet you. I’m Stevie Phelps, owner of this here java joint.”

  Her upbeat personality was contagious, and I couldn’t help feeling some semblance of relief that if I had to lose Maddie’s love, it would be to someone good and positive.

  Chapter Forty-Five

  Maddie

  “I think they’re cannibals,” I typed when Ella came back from the bathroom.

  “Really? Why do you think that?”

  “Kids,” I signed.

  “What about the kids?” She looked at the television and squinted as if she could glean something from the paused movie.

  “Weird,” I signed. “Around father.”

  “Ahh, so you think he was forcing them to eat people?”

  I nodded. “Family ritual,” I typed.

  She curled up next to me on the sofa. We had both gotten into our snuggly pajamas, and we had a blanket over our legs as we watched horror movies on the big TV in the den. It was fun, and I loved being so close to her. She had this really wonderful smell, kind of earthy and woody. I really liked the way she smelled.

  “Okay, go,” she urged.

  I pressed the pause button and the action resumed. Sure enough, within half an hour, the family was serving up human stew, with an ear floating on top. The mother was serving it to her two daughters hesitantly, like it was against her will.

  “Ewwww,” Ella said. “That is so gross.” She looked at the slice of pizza on the plate she held in her hand. She placed the plate on the coffee table.

  I nodded in agreement and made a face. “Like Texas Chainsaw,” I typed.

  “No, Chainsaw would have to be worse,” she argued. “I mean, they did skin lampshades and stuff in those movies in addition to eating the people.”

  “True,” I typed.

  We watched until the end, when the children cooked dear old dad. I muted the music playing over the ending credits then looked at Ella. “Cool,” I typed.

  “Sick,” she said, nudging me with one hand. She rose. “I’m gonna get another beer. Are you sure it’s okay if you have another?”

  “Didn’t say anything about drink,” I typed. “Just no fall.”

  She nodded and slid into the kitchen on stocking feet. I found myself hoping she wouldn’t fall. I never walked in stocking feet anymore. It was bare feet or wide-based clogs for me these days as I still had balance issues. I pulled the blanket close, my mind wandering aimlessly. I was thinking about Tia driving into south Mississippi. I wondered what her children looked like these days. Last time I’d seen them, they’d still been in high school. I realized that although I expected to bring their visages to light in my mind, it wasn’t happening. Damned memory blocks.

  Ella handed me a cold beer and crawled back into the pocket of warmth we’d created in the blankets. I read the label on the beer bottle. It was a light beer, lower in calories. A good thing, I supposed. I took a sip and held the bubbly goodness in my mouth for a long while. I enjoyed the popping sensations. I swallowed when most of the fizz had left.

  “Glad I can still read,” I typed.

  “Hmm? Oh yeah, me too. You’re really making some remarkable strides these days. Maybe by the time you get your words back, your memory will be all filled in.” She studied me closely, and I saw that speculative look in her eyes, an expression that she often wore when studying me.

  I nodded and smiled, miming my agreement for the possibility. An idea occurred to me. “Will you still hang out when well?” I typed.

  “Hang out with you? Of course, you’re my bestest bud.” She grinned at me but turned her gaze away. I didn’t know what that meant. I still sucked at what Tia called nuance.

  “Okay, my turn to pick.” She took the remote and started scrolling through movies. “Let’s see. I’ll check the new ones. Maybe there’s some new scary ones we haven’t seen…Oh my God. Look what’s just been added.”

  I looked at the screen, but it was just a lot of colors.

  “This is my all-time favorite. You, my dear, are gonna loooove it. It’s called The Incredibles.”

  I nodded and sat back as the movie started. I covered my eyes as the strobing purple and blue lights filled the huge screen, so Ella fast-forwarded with the remote. Lights flashing always made my head feel weird. One time a stoplight changing had given me a sick migraine. When I finally looked at the screen again, there was a car chase. A superhero rescued a cat and stopped a bank robbery. There was a big fight. An annoying kid. A female superhero. Then the superhero in regular clothes—a strangely shaped cartoon man—was having trouble fitting in his car. It was interesting, and the animation was amazingly real.

  I sat up suddenly. I knew these people. Where had I seen them before? That bright shock of orange hair. I should know that, should remember that.

  “I think I’ve seen this,” I typed.

  “Really?” She seemed surprised. “I thought…well, before, you said you hadn’t seen it.”

  I continued to be mesmerized by the screen, so I couldn’t answer her right away. Instead, I pulled the blanket higher so that only my eyes were out, raptly following the action on the screen. It was a good story, and I was enjoying the bright colors and well-formed action. I found myself laughing along with Ella during comical scenes. I liked Edna the best.

  I looked over at her once and realized how good this felt. I was having the best time I’d had since the accident. Ella was someone who I could relax with. I knew that she wouldn’t ask too much of me, thereby making me feel inadequate, nor would she brush me and my slow, sometimes incomprehensible thoughts aside. She really was a good friend. She returned my glance and winked at me. She extended her beer bottle and clinked it against mine in a toast celebrating life and our time together.

  Chapter Forty-Six

  Ella

  “Will you take me to cemetery?” Maddie typed the next morning as we were finishing breakfast. We’d both had a lot of beer and pizza the night before, so we were waking up very slowly. It was close to midday already.

  I frowned at her, raising one eyebrow. “Yes? What cemetery do you want to go to?”

  She shrugged in answer.

  “I guess you mean the one here in town?” I studied her, trying to understand why the cemetery was important.

  “Horten,” she spelled out the name in sign, using her fingers with some difficulty.

  “Good signing, Maddie!” I fell silent for a brief moment. “Yes, Maddie, I will certainly take you to the cemetery. Shall we pick up some flowers on the way?”

  She nodded and rose to clear the table.

  Saturday in Maypearl was always my favorite day there. The farmer’s market was set up in the grassy center of town, although this was the short slower season before the vegetables got their renewed winter growth, so the pickings were slim. We parked and then walked in, taking our time. We stopped at Stacy Evan’s flower booth and bought a sizeable bouquet.

  Today the square was full of loitering townsfolk, catching some rays and enjoying this beautiful day. We slowed as we passed them, so Maddie could return the many waves sent her way. I actually had to sit and wait once so a group of her former patients could come over and visit with her for a long chat. I finally realized they were exhausting her, so I soon shooed them away, citing an appointment as an excuse.

  “Want to go by and see Julio after?” I asked Maddie as we pulled out of the parking space and set off
onto a stretch of open road. “I need to feed him his wet food or he won’t speak to me for a week.”

  She laughed as she typed. “Yes, really want see him.”

  I saw the steeple of the God’s Gold Methodist Church just ahead. I slowed and pulled off and into the first turn into the labyrinthine cemetery. I jostled my memory, trying to remember exactly where the Horten family had been buried. I drove slowly, making turns that would lead me closer to the back of the church. I recognized a tree finally and pulled over and parked on the side of the road.

  “I think this is it, Maddie. Are you ready?” I studied her face, trying to determine her emotional state. As happened so often since her injury, her face was a blank slate.

  She nodded and lifted her cane. It was a short walk to the fresh graves that were just now being covered by lush, creeping grass. The headstone had been placed already, and we stood at the foot of the graves, reading it.

  “They named him?” she typed into her phone.

  “Lizzie’s sister did. She said Lizzie had chosen Carter Darwin for him.”

  “It’s a nice name,” she typed. “Solid.”

  I turned to her to agree and saw that tears were streaming along her lean cheeks.

  “Ah Maddie. Don’t cry, sweetie.”

  “Should have died,” she typed. “They should live. Baby should live.”

  I didn’t know how to respond to that. What could I say? Slowly, I began talking, just sharing what was in my heart.

  “You know, Maddie. The bad things in life are not our choices to make. They just happen. I personally believe everything happens for a reason. I remember how angry I was after your injury. I even blamed Lizzie for being pregnant.”

  She gasped and lifted wide eyes to me. I waved her indignation away.

  “Believe me, I now realize how wrong and…stupid that was. I have learned during the past thirty-odd years that life is not so much about what happens to us but that it’s how we react to it that matters. It’s like there’s a tally, some kind of heavenly chart that marks how we react to whatever is thrown our way.” I shook my head. “It’s not that I’m religious or even that I believe in God. He may just be a social construct made by man to meet some deep-seated need. The point is we can’t know for sure about God, so we act on faith. With that in mind, and the golden rule of do unto others firmly ensconced in our psyche, why not act as though the tally, the score, is being kept? What harm can it do? The result is still reacting in a good, wise and honorable way. There’s no downside to that.”

  “Why?” she signed.

  “Why am I telling you this? Well, it hurts me to hear you say you should have died. No, you shouldn’t have, and I do believe there’s a reason for that. Think about how we, all of us here in Maypearl, would be devastated by your death. The townsfolk see how hard you are working to recover, and maybe it gives them a little faith in themselves and in a universe that rewards persistence and survival. Maybe you inspire other wounded people to strive to come back as far as they can. We can’t always know specifics, but by living our lives in such a way, we can hope that what and who we are radiates out a little bit beyond ourselves.”

  Silence settled around us until a black grackle rasped in a nearby tree. A cricket sang in a pile of brush, and I could hear the distant traffic on the highway. I looked at all the headstones surrounding us. Being here was somewhat surrealistic. Had we joined the dead?

  “The funeral was beautiful,” I said. “Sandy and I went to both funerals since we knew you couldn’t be there.”

  “Thank you,” she signed.

  Maddie took the bouquet of flowers from my hands and stepped forward to lay them in the center of the wide, three-person headstone. She bowed her head a brief moment before stepping back to stand beside me. Her hand found mine and grasped it. I entwined my fingers with hers, and we stayed there a long time, the sun slanting hot and heavy on our backs.

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  Maddie

  “Yes. Weird dreams too,” I typed into my tablet.

  We were in Dave’s Diner having spaghetti and crusty Italian bread.

  After leaving the cemetery, we’d gone to Ella’s cute little apartment where I got to play with Julio. I loved that cat. I sort of remembered him from before. Ella said the Julio and I had only met a few times, though.

  “What were they about?” Ella asked. She was watching me with curiosity.

  I wiped my hands and responded with my tablet. “I dreamed I was skating. I guess roller-skating.”

  She tilted her head to one side as she chewed reflectively. “When was the last time you skated?”

  I shrugged. “Never,” I signed.

  She looked at her plate. “So, where do you think this is coming from?” she asked quietly.

  I sipped through my straw as I wondered that myself. The dream had seemed so real, like a memory. I knew, from what Tia had told me that I hadn’t been to Mobile any time lately, and I knew that Maypearl had no skating rink. I’d definitely been inside, for sure, for cartoons…

  “The Incredibles,” I typed.

  Ella jumped as though she’d been stung. “What?”

  “The skating. The Incredibles on the wall,” I typed, my fingers tripping over themselves in my haste. “Where I saw them.”

  She was smiling at me and, as I watched, tears welled in both her eyes. She blinked them back, but I was mesmerized. “You sad?” I signed.

  She shook her head and took a deep sip of her soda before she responded. “I’m just happy, Maddie. Happy that you are remembering things, things that may be important to you.”

  “I loved someone,” I typed.

  “What?” She seemed alarmed.

  “In my dream,” I typed. “I knew what love was, though I don’t suppose I can feel that now. But in my dream, loving someone was everything to me. Have I loved anyone that you know of, Ella? Was it maybe when I was really young?”

  Ella looked uncomfortable, so I guessed talking about these kinds of personal things was a little bit too much for her. She shrugged. “Can we ever really know what someone else is feeling?” she said.

  “Guess not,” I typed and then resumed eating, my mind whirling. I had a sudden vision of wide black eyes in a dark face, terrified, looking at me. Looking to me for help. I choked and felt myself falling.

  The smell of gasoline inundated me, making me feel nauseous. I was worried, and I could feel my face frowning, even scowling with impatience. I was obsessively checking medical supplies, my hand hovering above a syringe that I knew was needed quickly. Not yet, not yet. Needs to be now. Right now.

  “Maddie! Maddie? Look at me, honey. Look at me!”

  The barked order pulled me from the fugue I’d descended into. People were standing around me, and I was lying on a cold tile floor. Ella was above me.

  “Ella?” I signed.

  “Yes, Maddie, I’m here.” She was holding me, and I relaxed. As long as she was here, I knew for sure I’d be okay.

  “Are you sure she’s all right?” a woman asked quietly. I think it was our server. “We can call an ambulance.”

  I shook my head, and Ella answered for me. “No, she just has these spells sometimes. Her mind is still healing from the accident. She’ll be okay. Thank you, though.”

  Ella helped me back into my chair, and the circle of concerned faces moved away, back to their seats. Ella busied herself with righting my plate and my overturned to-go cup.

  “Do we need to go back home?” she asked me, studying my face closely. She reached and straightened a strand of my hair. “Any headache?”

  I shook my head and signed that I was okay.

  “Good,” she said, smiling and sighing as she reseated herself. “Give me a scare, why dontcha?”

  “Lizzie,” I typed.

  “What about Lizzie?”

  “In the car, needing me. Hurts can’t help her.”

  “Ahh, did you remember that just now?”

  I nodded and took a sip of soda.
Unbidden, unwanted tears fell down my face. I ignored them and tried to finish my lukewarm spaghetti.

  Ella watched me but didn’t try to say or do anything, and we finished our meal in silence. I was remembering, and yes, it was very painful, but we both acknowledged the reality that it was an integral part of the healing process.

  “I thought I saw your car parked out front,” Sandy said as she approached our table. She was all smiles until she saw my face, and then she grabbed up a napkin from a setup at the next table and started mopping me up as though I were two years old.

  “Oh, Ella Lewis, what is going on here? Surely you’re not being mean to this poor child…”

  I grabbed her hand, stilling it, and I smiled up at her so she would know everything was all right. I pulled her down into our third chair and pressed her hand to my cheek.

  Ella laughed. “I think she’s just having some bad memories that are resurfacing,” she said, eyeing me with affection. “She’s handling them.”

  “Hmph!” Sandy said before waving for the server. She approached and greeted Sandy with a warm hug.

  “You’ll be wanting your regular coffee and sweet bun, I suppose,” she said, scribbling on her notepad.

  “That’d be lovely, Annamarie. You girls don’t mind if I join you, do you?”

  “Of course not,” Ella said. “Can we have sweet rolls and coffee all around?” she asked Annamarie.

  “Sure thing,” she said, scurrying off.

  Sandy took my hand and patted it. “How are you doing, sweetie? I couldn’t come by last week because Michael had the flu and he and his mama were staying with Bob and me so Bob could look after him during the day. I didn’t want to bring it to you and your house.”

  “Tia told me you called,” I typed.

  “Well, of course. I wanted to check on you and let y’all know why I wasn’t coming around.”

  “Is Michael better?” Ella asked. “He got that antivirus from Dr McLean, didn’t he?”

  Sandy nodded her thanks as Annamarie placed a steaming cup of coffee in front of her. “Yes, and it knocked it out in about three days. Amazing stuff they can do with medicines these days.”