Darnay Road

by Diane Munier

  We have lived in front of the television for three days. President Kennedy had been shot on a Friday so we had the weekend to huddle together with all the other families in all the other houses all over the world and try to believe all that was unfolding.

  I tried to imagine how Lee Harvey Oswald could ever want to kill President John Fitzgerald Kennedy. He went to Russia and turned on the United States. He was a traitor to America. I tried to think of it, but it was not possible. Oswald had a wife and a kid even. He knew people here, what they were like. How could he hate us like this? How could he like Kruschev and hate President Kennedy?

  I couldn’t believe it. What would it ever be like to be his kid? Worse than having Easy’s dad even. The very worst.

  Poor Jackie. And Carolyn and John-John. I couldn’t imagine how they must feel. Neither could my Granma. Then on Sunday we watched Jack Ruby shoot Lee Harvey Oswald. I had just taken a bite of the sandwich Granma handed me on a paper plate and Jack Ruby went up to Lee Harvey Oswald and bang. I screamed and Granma said, “What? What?” Little Bit was shaking all over. Jack Ruby killed Lee Harvey Oswald and now we would never ever know why Oswald shot our president.

  After that Aunt May came over and the two of them talked and talked and talked, “My Lands,” this, and “Have mercy,” that. I tried to ignore it while all three of us eked every bit of news from the television we could possibly get and read and reread the newspaper to ourselves and aloud. But inside I’m thinking there has to be more to being alive than just tsking and fainting over everything after it’s gone and happened already.

  Then sometimes they talked about Abigail May and Ricky, but not as carefully as usual. It’s like we had all seen so much they became children and I became a grown up and we met somewhere new I guess. Aunt May said Mr. Figley was a tight-fisted son of Satan. They didn’t even care if I heard. He didn’t even try to be a father to Ricky, and that one was running wild like a hoodlum. Her Ricky. Then she boo-hooed, Aunt May did, and Granma patted her back like I wasn’t even in the room having to hear all this. Fortunately forgotten.

  I didn’t know what was happening to the world, but I was not going to shrink away. Information is my life even when I’m very sad I make myself look. Abigail May would.

  So I just blurt out, “Get him back then. Get them back.”

  They both look at me. “I’m not their mother,” Aunt May says.

  “Yes you are,” I say. “Why did you let her take them? They didn’t want to go.”

  “Well…when you’re a mother you have the right….”

  “She didn’t have any right,” I say. “Her children didn’t want to go. You didn’t want them to go. What about all of those rights?”

  They are just looking at me.

  I just keep going. “Easy was living alone. He was living all alone and he wanted that money to bring his mom and Cap home.”

  They probably think I am as crazy as Jack Ruby. Aunt May is dabbing under her eyes and she blows her nose, but her and Granma don’t take their eyes off of me.

  “He’d still be here if you would have let him have MY money.” I get louder on ‘my.’

  “Why…why in the world didn’t you tell us that boy was alone?” Granma says tightening her collar around her neck.

  “Because it was a secret so Easy wouldn’t get taken away. Or sent to Tennessee where they are all mean to him. But you could have found out maybe. If you’d tried you could have found out she wasn’t there.”

  My Granma is about struck speechless.

  “Why in the world would she leave her child here while she went off to Tennessee?” Aunt May says all breathy like she’s going to faint which I know she is not. She just doesn’t want to hear me say they could have found out before Easy had to leave. I have never said anything like that before, but I want to now. I want to shout it.

  “All I know is he wanted them back and he was doing all that work to hold the house just hoping and hoping he could pay the rent and electric and keep that place so they could return. He was holding place for them, like in line, holding it so you can let someone up like me and Abigail May always did with each other before stupid Gloria Sue took my best friend away. But Easy couldn’t do all of it so I was going to help him. Because he’s my best, best friend after Abigail May. But she’s gone. And he’s gone. And President Kennedy is gone. And Miss Little. And even stupid Lee Harvey Oswald.”

  Granma tries to get my attention to quiet me down but I just get louder, “And you don’t change,” I yell at Aunt May, “and you don’t either,” I yell at Granma. I don’t know why I yell at them about change. I have no idea.

  “Settle yourself,” Granma says, but it’s not like usual Granma, it’s this new Granma whose president is killed.

  “I’m mad,” I say. I have stood up and Little Bit has jumped off my lap and gone under the ottoman.

  “How do you know one thing that boy said was the truth?” Aunt May says.

  “Because he was never ever a liar. But he didn’t tattle either. When I told him about Father Anthony, he already knew. But he kept his mouth shut tight. Just like me when I saw. And just like Abigail May.”

  Aunt May goes frozen. Then her bottom lip starts to tremble.

  “What about Father Anthony?” Granma says. She looks from me to May. “What…about Father?”

  My other almost favorite movie is The Unforgiven with Burt Lancaster. I wish Burt was my father, but anyway, in that movie there is a crazy guy who appears one day saying Burt’s little sister is an Indian. Right before they hang the crazy guy he points to Burt’s mother and says, “She knows,” in a terrible crazy voice.

  I want to do that to Aunt May right now. I want to scream and rattle some chains and stomp and howl. I want to do something, stop something, change something, yell at somebody.

  “It’s not fair,” I say to Aunt May. “It’s not fair what you,” and to Granma, “and you did to Easy.”

  Granma is making the ‘w’ in why or what. But I don’t care. “Unfair,” I yell. And I have to stop myself from yelling it again and again.

  Granma stands and takes me by my arms. I’m kind of sorry already, but not enough that I couldn’t get going again—yelling like a hoodlum—in a pink room. A hoodlum and a pink room? I doubt it. But that’s how I feel, like Ricky must feel, a hundred sharks on his tail and none of them fast enough to catch him.

  If I was a boy, I’d hop one of those trains. I’d go to Tennessee. Shoehorn. I wouldn’t be afraid of mean uncles and grampas. I’d fight my way in and no one would stop me and I’d get to Easy and I’d put my arms around him and squeeze, squeeze. And I’d never let him go.

  “Georgia Christine,” Granma says, “you apologize to May. And you tell us what you mean about Father Anthony.”

  “I’m sorry,” I say to Aunt May, but I do not feel sorry at all. “I don’t know what I meant about Father. But I don’t take back what I said about Easy. He wouldn’t of had to go if you’d both just listened for once.”

  I go running out then. I can’t watch television anymore and I can’t listen to them talk so helplessly, like two old crows sitting on the washline, caw, caw and squawk. I am not going to take this lying down. I am an American and my president has been killed and my best friend was taken to Tampa and my other best friend hopped a train and disappeared.

  I am not a boy and yet I know a lot of things a boy might do when he gets mad. But I don’t know a thing about what a girl does when she gets angry. Maybe Abigail May knows. She always fought for her way. But the girls I know, big and little, me included, we just bake cookies or something while everything in the world, the very world gets wadded up in God’s hands and tossed like it ain’t worth a dime.

  Mad men kill presidents and kill those who kill presidents. They make wars and fight in wars and some don’t come home and their wives go crazy. They stop being married to wives who want to be models and they forget to love their daughters. They say mean things and steal pom-poms and treat crazy women like the
y don’t have souls. They try to boss and pick fights, they don’t obey and they don’t give money to their step-children or even want them very much.

  They become priests and walk around in the dark. They try to fix everything and when they can’t they run away. I know what angry men do, angry boys.

  But I don’t know what angry girls do but caw caw and squawk.

  So it is Thanksgiving in a couple of days and my dad calls and he has to work so he might come after, or Christmas for sure. I only care a little bit, but not so much I’m going to fall off a cliff of sorrow and drown in a pool of despair.

  Well maybe I’m already there.

  But then something good happens, something so unexpected I can’t even close my mouth for five minutes…when it happens. I’m in the kitchen cutting noodles for my Granma for the Thanksgiving meal and someone knocks on the big door and Granma tells me to stay put and keep cutting.

  I hear my Granma open the door and laugh and the steps, light and fast and there she is. Abigail May. Hair longer, maybe a little taller, those little white teeth and eyes like firecrackers. I get up and I still can’t talk and she runs for me and we grab each other and hug, hug and I trip a little, but I don’t even care.

  Well I start crying then, and she just holds me, Abigail May does, and she’s patting my back and I’m holding her, for dear life. And Granma is there saying, “Well.”

  Darnay Road 43

  Aunt May comes to watch. I didn’t hear her come in and when I can remember I’m in Granma’s kitchen and not over the rainbow hugging my very, very best friend other than Easy—Abigail May. I see Aunt May standing there staring at us and wiping under her eyes.

  “I get to stay for two whole weeks,” Abigail May says. “Maybe the rest of the school year.”

  “But how?” I ask from her to May.

  And Aunt May is saying, “Now we don’t know for sure.”

  “Mom is thinking about it. We came on the bus, me and Ricky. Mom says she’ll see about me getting to stay. I don’t like it in Tampa and I missed everybody so much.” Then she remembers to hug my Granma who hugs Abigail May back and I realize how much my Granma misses her too.

  Abigail May has had a very different time of her life in Tampa. She goes on to tell me about the weather getting only slightly colder and how she didn’t really need new school clothes because there is no winter like we’re used to here.

  Granma humphs on that and looks at Aunt May. Why wouldn’t she believe Abigail May doesn’t need new school clothes? Granma rubs her thumb on her pointer and middle fingers where she thinks I don’t see, but of course with eyes trained to notice everything, I do. So it’s money and that means Figley and that goes with Prunley and that stands for tight-fisted fool.

  So we’re about so happy we can’t stand it, and I have to admit this much happiness pushes against all the sadness I’ve been feeling and it makes me feel funny, dizzy even like my insides can’t catch up. So Granma has Abigail and me and Aunt May and herself sit around the table and May finishes cutting the noodles cause I couldn’t think to do it anymore.

  I feel like Abigail was never gone and I feel like she’s been gone a hundred years. There is so, so much to tell. First off Abigail May is so mad about President Kennedy. She tells us how they did it at public, announced it over the loud speaker just like at Bloody Heart and kids cried. Abigail May says she hates to live in Florida cause we’ve talked a million times how Kruschev could come right there or Castro.

  “He’ll send Castro,” is my belief cause Castro is so close. Then I remember Easy said it would never happen, and I feel a stab of sorrow that never goes away, not even when Abigail is here I guess cause one person does not replace another. Abigail May is the only one, and Easy is the only one. That’s all.

  Aunt May says we need to pray about it and God will always keep America safe, and Granma says Castro is another maniac and the earth burps one up straight from the pits of hell every few years. And Aunt May says the bible says rulers are here today and tomorrow gone like dried grass. And she said to think about it cause that’s exactly what happened to Hitler. All the mess he caused and where is he now?

  “Well I’d take a good guess,” Granma says.

  And Abigail May and me look quickly at each other cause we know who probably told Aunt May all that.

  We talk a while but there’s a lot of cooking going on and it isn’t long before we make our escape to my room. Abigail runs for my bed and crashes there and flops on her back. “I missed this room so much.”

  I flop next to her on my stomach. “Easy and Cap are gone.”

  She lifts her head and rolls on her side. “Gone…as in really gone?”

  Oh it’s so good to have her back. Only she would understand what it means to have Easy gone, but even Abigail May can’t know my heart. Granma says only God looks that deep.

  I tell her then, pretty much everything.

  “You’re going to marry him? You’re only ten years old!”

  I lay on my back and my arms are folded. “I already know. It’s Easy. Course I have to finish school and he is going in the army and all.”

  She is staring at me. “What if he forgets? It’s such a long time.”

  “He won’t forget,” I say. Then I look at her. “He won’t forget. I’m pretty sure.”

  “Then why did he go like that? Did he tell you not to ever have a boyfriend when you get big?”

  “No. But I won’t of course. I’ll just wait.”

  “I will follow him,” Abigail May sings the new Peggy March song we love, love.

  She is sitting up and then I remember. I sing Peter, Paul and Mary’s song, “Cruel War.” It’s one of our very favorites. She sings with me because we know all the words. When we’re done I fall to the bed again and so does she.

  “You would go to war with him wouldn’t you?” she says like it’s the gospel truth.

  “Yes,” I say feeling very noble and grown up. I have a new story blooming in my head, Easy in an army uniform and me, also in a uniform though it’s slightly too big. We are both wearing helmets and carrying rifles.

  “I can’t believe I went away and you fell in love!” Abigail says.

  But I loved him before she left. I loved him from the very first.

  We eat and play the Barbie Game with Granma and Aunt May. I win. Ricky comes in then and Aunt May is upset that he wasn’t there for the meal when she told him not to be gone long.

  “I’m not hungry,” he says, but he’s looking at me.

  He looks bigger, but it hasn’t been but a few months since I saw him last. Thing is his hair is longer, like one of the Beach Boys, and it’s gone blonder. He smiles at me and I don’t know why.

  “Hi Georgia,” he says.

  “Hello Ricky,” I say like I’m reading the cereal box because he’s just Ricky no matter what.

  And after that Abigail wants to visit the cellar. She about loves that place. I haven’t been down there since I showed Easy and we hugged. I have told her about it, but she wants me to again. Snow is on the doors so we have to get the broom and sweep them. I don’t know why, but I don’t want to go down there. It doesn’t feel like before. I don’t feel like before. One thing is sure, if Kruschev comes I’m going to stay up top and fight. I’m not going into a hole in the ground until they bury me for real. It makes me so mad that he thinks he can come to America like that, or worse, get some lunatic like Oswald to shoot our good president.

  But I don’t say all this to Abigail May. I can’t explain how I feel.

  So we lift the doors like we used to and I try not to think of Easy so strongly I can’t be happy to just be with Abigail May. We get the doors up and go down to the cellar door and I push it through.

  Well it always felt so mysterious here. I turn on the light and it’s just a cellar. Just like Easy said.

  But it’s pretty warm since the furnace is here, but why would anyone want to be down here really.

  “Still got the notebook?” she says
. We do have a lot of mysteries to mull over, but I don’t know as I’m in the mood. So I drop down on my blanket and she shakes out hers because of possible bugs or spiders, which we don’t have because Granma has the bugman come regularly.

  But something crinkles under me and I reach and it’s a square of thick white. An envelope. ‘Georgia,’ it says.

  “What’s that?” she asks and she tries to grab it and I turn and hold it away from her and I can’t stop staring at it. ‘Georgia.’

  I have no idea. But I have an idea.

  She sits back and I hold the letter in front of me and stare at it. “Easy,” I whisper.

  “Gee-manently,” Abigail May whispers. “You just finding it now?”

  My throat is crinkly and I turn it over and slip my finger under the flap. There is no writing there like Abigail puts on the flap when she writes—‘D-liver, D-letter, D-sooner, D-better.’

  There’s nothing like that, just white.

  I pull out the pages. They are lined loose-leaf like we use in school, heavily folded.

  ‘Deer Georgia,’ I read, Abigail May’s head bent at my shoulder as she reads soundlessly while moving her lips only.

  ‘When you read this I will be gone. I didn’t give it to you for real becuz you know, your granma. So I knew you cood read it down here and she would not no maybe. Well I am going for good. I cood not do it in keeping the house and all. I colled Mom and she wood not come back. I thought she wanted to but then she changed on it. So I can’t keep things goin so I’m sorry. I meen we talked aboot it all and you are the best gril I no and my frend. If I was in the army and you were bigger then we would marry like you said. When I am older and I can pay for a girl then I will want you only but by then you will forget me. I no you said you would not forget but I can’t hold you to it when I will have to go ware Uncle Sam says, even to Afrika I guess. You can write me. I don’t write good but I will always want to here what is goin on. I think you are very pritty. I have said that. Do you remember? I saw you that day by Moe’s and I wisled. I scared you an I always been sorry. Very sorry about it. You are the furst gril I ever wisled at and I made you fall in the street. I thought you would die and it wood be my falt. But if you wood have died then I mite have to. All the time I new you Georgia you were the best happiest thing I had. Not had, but new. Your Granma and Ant May are good to. They just don’t know about things but it is okay. They helped me and I won’t forget.