I reached over and turned the shade to block the afternoon sun. I was worn out and all I wanted to do was go to sleep and never move again. The hospital had sent a counselor to talk to me about grief, but he fell a little short in describing it to me. He should have just hit me with a Taser. I imagined it would feel about the same.
The absence of Mama was everywhere. I could feel her not in the trailer, not in my room, not anywhere. Not.
Mama had been sick for a long time. Those last few days were the worst, but she’d done everything she could to prepare me for her leaving.
I know it’s going to be hard, but you can do it, she’d whispered. I have faith in you. Whenever you get to feeling blue, think about a happy time when we were together having fun.
What good will that do? I asked.
I don’t know. Maybe heaven works likes television shows. Did you know that every time a rerun airs on TV, the actors get a check in the mail? It’s called a royalty payment.
I shook my head. Every single time?
That’s right. Maybe when you think about something we did together, I’ll get my own kind of royalty payment. She leaned her head back against the pillows, smiling. I’ll be in heaven smiling and laughing with you.
It was worth a shot. I closed my eyes and thought about a day when we’d gone to Adventure Cove, a local amusement park. It was one of my happiest memories. Mama had a hat on that hid her baldness and she’d put on a little bit of weight. If you didn’t know any better, she almost looked healthy. She sat on a bench eating popcorn and watched while I rode the Flying Swings over and over.
I tried to concentrate on how Mama had looked that day, but it was no use. The sugary smile of Samantha Rose kept floating through my head. I sniffed. I could smell the smoke all the way back in my room. Mama hadn’t smoked at all and she’d gotten cancer anyway. I inhaled a deep breath and held it, imagining the carcinogens diving down into my lungs and latching on to my blood cells. Dying wasn’t scary anymore. Living was.
The letters M-E-L-A-N-O-M-A floated against my eyelids. MEAN, ALONE and MOAN. Nothing good could ever be made out of that word. My eyes were squeezed as tight as I could make them, but I couldn’t stop a tear from working its way out and running down my face.
I’d taken Mama’s blanket off her bed when she went to the hospital for the last time and I wrapped it around me now, breathing in the scent of her. The thought of never seeing Mama again, of not being able to ask her all the questions that were racing through my head, was too much. I buried my head into the blanket folds and cried myself to sleep.
• • •
A BRIEF KNOCK sounded on the door, then Samantha Rose poked her head through. “Up and at ’em, lazybones. You want something to eat before we get on the road? It’s a good two hours and I don’t plan on stopping.”
I sat up, groggy and confused. “What? It’s morning already?”
“Yep, and somebody just dropped off biscuits.”
“That’d be Mrs. Florence. She makes biscuits whenever something bad happens.” I wiped the sleep from my eyes and glanced at my plastic wristwatch. I’d slept seventeen hours straight and if Samantha Rose would’ve left and closed the door, I could’ve probably slept for seventeen more.
“Huh. You’d think she’d be better at it, then; these are half-burnt.” She opened the door wider and leaned up against the doorjamb.
“You’re wearing Mama’s robe,” I whispered.
“I didn’t figure Ro needed it anymore.” She ran a hand down the pink, fluffy lapel. It was too small and gaped in the middle, exposing her pajamas. “Better me than one of these scavengers watching out their trailer windows for us to leave.”
Scavengers? It took me a second to realize she was talking about the neighbors, the same people that had checked in on me those nights when Mama was too weak to cook supper. Our friends, like Hannah and her granny. I stared at the worn carpet in my bedroom. Anything was better than looking at this stranger in Mama’s housecoat. “I’m not hungry.”
Samantha Rose nodded. “Suit yourself.” She looked around the room. “Ronelda couldn’t wait to see her hometown in her rearview mirror, and look where she ended up. Different trailer park, same old story.”
“Why didn’t she like it there?”
“Thought she was too good for us, I guess.” Samantha Rose shrugged.
I remembered the photographs of the two of them. “Do you still live where you and Mama grew up?”
“Yup.” She felt around the pockets of the robe and fished out a cigarette. “Right where we was reared in Conley Holler—named after our pa, Hap Conley, a man meaner than a skillet full of rattlesnakes.” She said it like she was proud of the fact. “It’s just on the other side of the mountain.”
She gestured toward the desk. “What’s that?”
I’d forgotten about the envelope of cash Hannah had given me. “The trailer park took up a collection.”
Samantha Rose picked up the envelope and began counting. “Twenty-three dollars and fourteen cents?” she said out of the corner of her mouth. “That’s it? That’s the best they could do?”
“Yeah, that’s it,” I repeated in a low voice. “It’s too bad they have to hoard their money for silly stuff, like food and electricity.”
She gave me a dirty look and tucked the envelope into her pocket. “Well, this’ll pay for the gas getting back, anyway. Get your things together. We’re gonna head home.”
Home. Mama’s home, a place she’d left and barely mentioned. I picked up the picture of her and stuffed it into the backpack. A whole life of stories she could have told, but obviously didn’t want to, and now never would.
The not of Mama kept growing.
CHAPTER FOUR
I sat in the backseat of the Buick as we drove out of Castle Fields Mobile Home Park and onto the highway. My backpack was at my feet, Mama’s blanket was folded on my lap and the potted peony sat beside me, held in place with its own seat belt.
The trees lining the side of the road blurred into a sea of green as we sped past. Goodbye, Hannah. Goodbye, Mr. Stephens and the Andro sixth-grade class. Goodbye, life with Mama.
You got as much right to a good life as anybody, so find it, Mama had written on the list.
It was the central theme of our final conversations. Ain’t nobody any better than you, Wavie Boncil. The good Lord says everybody has a hope and a future. I rubbed the back of my hand across her blanket. I’d hoped that Mama would get well and that hadn’t turned out. Where was her future?
“Ronelda only came back to the Holler once, back when Mama died,” Samantha Rose said from the front seat. “But now you’re coming back and gonna be right where you belong.”
“Is it just you and Hoyt?” I asked.
“And your uncle.” Samantha Rose adjusted the rearview mirror so she could look at me. “He’s disabled and needs to rest a lot, so try not to make a lot of noise.”
“Okay.”
I watched out the window. We drove deeper into the mountains and the old car sputtered as it climbed the steep hills. Almost every turn was a hairpin. We’d drive straight for a moment, and just when it seemed like we were going to plow into the side of the mountain, the Buick would turn. I was glad I hadn’t eaten, since I was beginning to feel carsick.
There was almost no flat land, so any houses either sat right near the road, or perched on the side of the mountain. They clung there, like dingy moths sitting on velvet drapes, and I half expected them to take flight at any second.
Finally, Samantha Rose pulled onto a dirt road with several driveways leading off it. A green street sign read CONLEY HOLLOW.
“This is us. Our house is just at the top of this hill,” Samantha Rose said.
We passed a row of tilted mailboxes on rusty posts and I caught the name Miller written on the side of one before Samantha Rose gunned it. We drove by
two trailers—a double-wide with a metal swing set, and a tiny one on wheels. An empty lot separated them from a small clapboard house that looked like it hadn’t been painted in a hundred years. She turned the curve and suddenly we were in front of a nightmare.
“Welcome to the Hillbilly Horror Show,” Hoyt muttered.
“Hoyt!” Samantha said. “What’d I say about keeping your piehole shut?”
But Hoyt was right; it was a horror. I stared out the window. The first thing I noticed was the trash. Soda bottles, scraps of paper, and waterlogged books littered the yard. A recliner with the stuffing coming out of it sat in a tangle of weeds next to some old cars and a rusty barrel.
Those were the highlights.
The house itself looked old as the devil and about as inviting. The front porch was crooked and crammed full of junk, too. I couldn’t imagine living in that place. I’d rather sleep outside with one of the mangy dogs that were running around.
“Where are all the flowers?”
Samantha Rose put the car in park and turned to look over the seat. “What?”
“Mama said my grandma was good with plants.”
“Oh.” She shrugged. “There’s a bush or two still around, but most of the beds have been taken over by weeds. Never had much use for gardening myself.”
A thin, curly-haired boy who looked about my age came from inside the house.
“She’s here!” he yelled over his shoulder. Two smaller boys raced outside, sending the screen door banging. They stared slack jawed as Samantha Rose parked the car.
“Who’s that?” I asked.
“Neighborhood no-accounts.” Samantha Rose opened the door and stood beside the car. “What have I told y’all about coming inside my house when I ain’t home?”
“Sorry!” the older boy called. I didn’t think he sounded sorry at all.
Samantha Rose leaned down and looked inside the car at me. “You’re gonna have to get out sooner or later.”
I was too stunned by the state of the house to move. “Suit yourself,” Samantha Rose said. She kicked a spotted mutt out of her path. “Hoyt, take the stuff inside and find a place for it.”
I watched as Hoyt went around the rear of the car and pulled a box out of the trunk. SHRED was written on the side in Mama’s handwriting.
“You getting out?” The sorry-not-sorry boy stood next to my window.
I nodded and opened the door. Castle Fields Mobile Home Park hadn’t been anything to write home about, but at least it was neat. Our landlord, Mr. Randolph, would have had a stroke if he’d seen this place.
My new neighbor was shorter than me, and skinny, and his Dollywood sweatpants pooled around his ankles like clown pants. He smelled like sweat and tar.
“What’s your name?” he asked.
“Wavie.”
“That’s a weird name. I’m Gilbert F. Miller. You coming to live here?”
“Maybe.”
“Hey!” Samantha Rose yelled. For a second I thought she was yelling at me, but she was shouting at the kids still standing on the porch. “FRANK AND BEANS! Git!”
They both stuck out their tongues and jumped over the railing. I watched as they ran toward the old house across the field.
“If those two woke your uncle, I’ll have their hides.” She stormed up the steps and went inside.
“What’s wrong with them?” I asked Gilbert.
“They’re backwards.” He moved closer and leaned against the car. “Their mama likes it that way though because she gets extra money from the government since they can’t read. What about you?”
“What about me?” I asked.
“Can you read?”
“Yes. And write, too!” I blurted. Apparently you couldn’t take those kinds of things for granted in Conley Hollow.
A loud rumbling began to grow closer. It sounded like the mountain was going to come down on us. “What’s that?”
“Coal train. C’mon out back.” He pulled my arm and dragged me around the house, past the piles of trash, to the end of the yard.
Gilbert pointed into the woods. “See the tracks?” he yelled.
The rumbling became a full roar and a train broke through the trees. The ground shook as the hopper cars, piled high with coal, passed. Gilbert picked up a small rock at his feet and hurled it through the air.
I heard a faint bang as it connected. “Won’t you get in trouble?”
“Nah,” he said. “I do it all the time.”
After the final coal car was gone, it grew quiet again. I kept my back to the house and looked at the view, imagining Mama living here as a girl. The mountains sprang straight up beyond the train tracks, so tall I had to lean my head all the way back to see where they met the sky. The bright green leaves of the trees rubbed against each other in the wind, and the occasional bird flew from one tree to another, but otherwise it was quiet. I got the feeling that if I walked through the underbrush I’d be the first person since time began to touch the bark of those trees. Without the trash and the run-down house in view, it was so pretty it almost hurt.
The wind shifted and I smelled the faint odor of smoke. “Do you smell something burning?”
He lifted his arm and sniffed. “That’s probably me. Gran needed help.” He handed me a rock. “See how far you get.”
I threw it toward the tracks and it disappeared in the brush. “Help with what?”
“Burning tires. You get the rubber off, there’s metal underneath.” He cocked his head sideways. “You moving here ’cause your mama died?”
I felt the same familiar kick in the gut. “Yes. How’d you hear?”
He hitched up his sweatpants. “People talk.”
I couldn’t argue with that. They talked at Castle Fields, too.
“You ever been here before?” Gilbert asked.
“Nope.”
He pointed to the run-down clapboard house I’d seen earlier. “Well, over there’s where Frank and Beans live. Their real names are Frank and Baily, but nobody calls them that. They live with their mama. Don’t ask about their daddy. That’s a sensitive subject.”
We walked back to the front yard and Gilbert continued. “The fancy double-wide at the bottom of the hill belongs to the Rodriguezes. They’re pretty new around here. They opened a restaurant in downtown Farley that’s packed every Saturday night. They got a daughter about our age named Camille. Can’t stand her.”
“Why’s that?”
Gilbert made a face. “’Cause she’s a big know-it-all.”
“How far away is Farley?” I asked.
He pointed. “A couple of miles that way, but there’s not much to it. Want to know where I live?”
I shrugged.
“Right there in that trailer next to Camille’s.”
Since Samantha Rose’s house was at the top of the hill, I could see the entire neighborhood. “What’s across the river?”
“Woods, miles and miles of woods. I go exploring, if you ever want to tag along. I won’t get you lost.”
“Maybe.” A thin path veered off from the driveway and headed into the woods. “Where’s that go?”
“Angel Davis’s house. It’s back a ways, but when it’s cold you can see the smoke from his chimney. He’s old and crazy.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, you’ll see him walking around the Holler talking to himself plain as day. Gran says he used to be a bigwig lawyer, till he got in trouble and lost his wife, his house, everything. Now he lives in an old shack and eats lost pets.”
“Yeah, right.”
“It’s true,” he said. “That’s why all those stray dogs hang around. They’re looking for their mates. Howwooooo!” He howled.
Hoyt came outside and jumped off the porch. “Mama wants you inside,” he yelled at me.
He slapped Gilbert on t
he back of the head as he walked past us. “Quit messing with our water hose or you’re gonna get it. I’m serious, Smelbert.”
We watched as Hoyt walked down the dirt road.
“You figure out why she did it?” Gilbert asked.
I was confused. “What?”
“Why Samantha Rose took you in.”
“Because we’re related?”
Gilbert shook his head. “Nah. Samantha Rose ain’t in the habit of doing anything ’less it helps her.”
My heart sank. “She’s that bad?”
He nodded. “As mean as they come. I’d sooner hug a prickly pear cactus.”
“Great. And I’m stranded here.”
“Don’t let it bother you none. We look out for each other in the Holler. You’re one of us now, even if your aunt ain’t.”
CHAPTER FIVE
Back in Andro, a woman at the Baptist church named Mrs. Parsons had two little foster children in her home. They’d come in and sit shoulder to shoulder on the pew and look real happy. Mrs. Parsons gave them coloring books so they wouldn’t be bored. I was always jealous about those coloring books because Pastor Green’s sermons were bottom-numbing boring with a capital OMG.
Once Mama offered Mrs. Parsons some of the clothes I’d outgrown, and we drove over to her home to deliver them. We stood in the living room of her tidy cottage while the kids went through the bags and thanked us. Mrs. Parsons moved away before I became an official ward of the state, but when things fell through with Hannah, and Mrs. Chipman mentioned foster care, I figured I’d land somewhere similar.
I was way off.
You entered Samantha Rose’s house through the kitchen where dirty pots and pans spilled off the countertop onto the floor. A table made from plywood rested on sawhorses, and the remains of some meal—eggs or macaroni and cheese maybe—had hardened onto it. The bottom half of the window over the sink was broken and someone had covered it in cardboard.
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