Matylda, Bright and Tender

by Holly M. McGhee

  “It’s not an easy thing to do,” Mrs. Bueler said, “but you’re taking good care of her. I’m glad you have Guy to help. He doesn’t seem too worried about the crickets.” She squeezed my shoulders.

  “This was very informative,” she said to all of us. “I think we learned a great deal. Thank you, Sussy and Guy, and thanks to you, Mr. Reed, for helping. Matylda certainly made herself known today.”

  It seemed like it was going to be just a regular Saturday field trip to Total Pets for me and Guy. A simple errand to get vitamin D3. Guy said we should dust the crickets with the powder before Matylda ate them. “D3’s a trace element,” he said. “It helps Matylda’s body use the calcium. In the name of science, and our lizard, we’re getting it!”

  “Let’s ride our bikes,” I said. “We can go by the reservation and see more flowers.” I wasn’t that much of a nature person — at least I didn’t pick up fall leaves to breathe in their scent or anything — but in the month of May, in New Jersey, the trees all flower; maybe that’s why it’s called the Garden State. My favorite was the saucer magnolia, with blossoms so big you could drink out of them.

  “Great idea,” Guy said. “I love spring!”

  We knew the rules. Helmets — check. Shorts or capris or pants fastened at the ankle — check. We had the hand signals down, too, even the one for stop.

  I’ve gone through all the things I didn’t know about that regular Saturday field trip so many times. I’ve gone through all the things I can’t say out loud. Like that the Airedale on the corner of Witchett and Elm would find the door open and come after me on my bike as I pedaled the same way I pedaled on any other day. Like that Guy, the bravest boy I knew and my best friend, would stand up to the Airedale to stop the attack, blood running down my leg. Like that the car, coming up over the hill on Witchett, wouldn’t know that there was a ten-year-old boy in the middle of the road, hollering for that dog to go back, charging that dog to save my life . . .

  That I’d hear the brakes squeal not in time. That I would see Guy there on the road, his body laid out, unfamiliar. Flashing lights, car doors opening, slamming, voices, terrible, terrible voices, a stretcher picking me up . . . sinking, sinking, sinking below, below the voices, below the lights — shutting out the sound, shutting out the world.

  That I’d wake up in a hospital bed, narrow, with wheels, and say, “Where’s Guy?” That the nurse wouldn’t answer. That no one would answer, and I’d scream “Where’s Guy?”

  That I’d be wearing hospital pajamas with one leg cut off, with teddy bears in little tan circles against pink cotton, gauze around my leg. That I’d scream, “Bring me my clothes my red capris and my sunflower shirt give me back my clothes I want my clothes!”

  And that my mother, Ivy Reed, would come to my bed and lean over — hollow eyes, small mouth, red lipstick — she’d lean down to me, her chest and arms collapsing into me, no sound. Then I’d know that the boy who was my best friend, the boy I spent all my days with, the boy I loved more than anything, was dead.

  We’d be like that for a while, me and my mom, silent like morning dew, and then she’d start humming — only chords, rocking with me like we were one. It began to hit: Guy was dead because he wanted to save me. It came to me, fast, like this, over and over and over again: Bicycle spokes. A ferocious dog running off a porch. Running to me, and me going down. My friend, jumping his bike, standing like Bigfoot with his arms overhead, with his arms overhead higher, with his arms overhead lunging and roaring at that dog, who ran back to his porch in fear. The car that couldn’t stop, the noise of the crash, the car that killed the one person in the world who meant more to me than anybody else.

  Guy was dead.

  “Stay strong,” my mother whispered to me then. “Stay strong.” She pulled me in, her body swaddling me. I was on a hospital bed with wheels and pink teddy-bear pajamas, gauze wrapped around my leg, and I wasn’t strong. The dog barking over and over again, the forever-long horn blaring, blaring, blaring, it would never stop blaring . . .

  Blackness.

  I don’t remember coming home. And I don’t know how many days went by or who came and went from my bedroom. I know that the gauze came off and went on and came off and went on over and over again. I know that my mother wrapped it tighter than my father — and after one, two, three days, a week, I don’t know — the gauze came off for good and a small square bandage was all that remained.

  “I want my clothes,” I told my dad. He had come to feed Matylda. “Where are my clothes bring me my clothes BRING ME MY —”

  He grabbed my hands. “It’s okay,” he said. “I can get your clothes.” He squeezed. “Take a breath,” he said. His voice was calm, but his eyes were afraid. I’d never seen his eyes like that before.

  “Do this,” he said. He took a long breath in, still squeezing my hands. He let it out. “Take the air in slowly, let it out the same,” he said. He took another long breath, and I matched him with my own. The air gently filling my lungs and going back out made it seem as though everything was on pause. . . .

  “It helps,” I said to my dad, and he sat with me then, his hands still holding mine, his wanting-me-to-be-better eyes still there. “Can I have my clothes?”

  A little while later, he brought me my red capris and my sunflower shirt, and he kissed my forehead. “Here they are,” he said, “all clean.” My dad went to the door and said again, “Remember to breathe.” He let me be then.

  I had my clothes. Slowly, I unfolded the shirt — the shirt I’d had on when my best friend died. I felt the soft cotton, smelled the laundry soap, hugged it to my body. The Dying Day shirt. I put it on then, and I picked up the pants, the Witchett Road pants — somebody had stitched them up for me, tiny perfect stitches, fire-engine-red just like the pants. It must have been my mother.

  There alone on my bed, I held the pants close, the ones I’d had on when my world went black. I sat with them, smoothing out the wrinkles, ironing with my hand. Then I slid my legs in, taking care.

  I know that somebody gave me a Bible and somebody made me an oil painting, a vase with daisies in it. These things were on my bedside table. Daisies — still, pale-yellow center, white petals. I didn’t need to count the petals to find out if Guy loved me or not. He did, and he left me here in this bed with a Bible and a painting and a lizard and a house full of whispering and murmuring. All we wanted was to see some flowers that day, to ride our bikes, to get the D3, and now he was gone.

  The days came and floated in and out, and my blinds were open and they were closed, and I lay in my bed and I wanted to go to the boy I loved, I wanted to go to Guy, to follow the path of my friend. I wanted to stay close to him, and I groped my way through my dreams looking for him, to find my way to him, but he wasn’t there. I couldn’t find him.

  Then I’d wake and see my room again and feel the bandage on my leg and know that I couldn’t change my mind. That I couldn’t tell him we didn’t need the D3 and that Matylda was just fine with the crickets and her little bowl of calcium and that we WE NEVER SHOULD HAVE GONE ON THAT BIKE RIDE and I couldn’t change it and I couldn’t change it and I couldn’t change it. If I hadn’t been on my bike that day, Guy wouldn’t have gotten off his. He wouldn’t have left me here on this earth in this room in this bed wishing I was with him or that he was here with me.

  Blinds up blinds down he was there and I was here.

  Then it was time for the service. I was supposed to say good-bye.

  And everything was grey as I walked to the service for Guy, as I walked behind my mother to the car, step by step by step. Everything was grey as I sat down in the back of the Honda. Everything was grey as my feet touched the rubber mat on the floor of the car. I turned, looked out the window.

  And everything was grey as the shapes and houses and trees and road signs of a town I knew so well, a town where I’d lived nearly all of my life, a town where there was a man who couldn’t stop for Guy, who didn’t understand that my very own warrior was there
in the road, impelling an enemy dog to back away with his own hands. Everything blurred on that drive to the service for Guy.

  My parents took my hands, and I shuffled into line behind them. The coffin was small, like Guy, like me. But the person in it didn’t look like him. I swallowed hard. Guy wouldn’t want anyone to see his face patched together like this. Why had they left it open? It wasn’t my friend’s face. And his hands were crossed over his chest. He hadn’t done that in all the years I knew him. He was a saying-hi kind of friend; he should have been waving. Guy had his own clothes on, a Cougars T-shirt and sweats, and his glasses were in his hand. They got that right. But the rest was all messed up.

  I put my hands on either side of the coffin, and I moved in, up on my tiptoes, close.

  “Let me in,” I said to him.

  Nothing.

  “Let me in,” I commanded, right up by his face. It would be better to go with him. “LET ME IN!”

  And Guy answered then, clear and strong.

  “You can’t come in,” he said. “You’ve got to live for Matylda.”

  I knew it was Guy answering. I’d know that voice anywhere — it was the voice of a boy who saved my life and lost his own. It was the voice of a boy who wanted to see the flowers blooming with me, who wanted Matylda to get the proper nutrition. It was the voice of a knight, of someone who would miss the bus to get my jacket.

  And for the tiny little time that I heard it, my world was in color again, and Guy was in his Witchett Road clothes, and it looked like nothing had happened. I saw the denim of his jeans and the white-grey threads of his ripped-out knees, and I saw the orange of his polo shirt and the blue of his Converse. His green socks, too. His favorite green socks. I saw him, and his beautiful face was not messed up.

  He looked at me. “Promise me,” he said. “Promise me you’ll love her like I did, enough for us both.” That was Guy. His demands were to the point. We were supposed to love her together. She was ours.

  I couldn’t give her enough for us both; she wouldn’t even come to my hand. I looked at him there, still not messed up, still Guy, long brown hair, shining eyes, wide face, no freckles, glasses in hand — and I knew that I couldn’t say no, and I couldn’t say good-bye, that I had to hold on to him, had to say yes. I put my mouth right by his ear.

  “I promise. I’ll find a way to love her like you did. I promise.”

  I touched my heels on the floor then, touching down a few times, feeling for the surface. It would hold me.

  My dad’s arm around my shoulders led me away. And I think they were there, but they were like silent actors, on a stage: Mr. and Mrs. Hose, Amanda, Carter, Mrs. Bueler. . . . The only thing I knew for sure was my promise to Guy. I had to love Matylda like he did. Enough for us both. She was all I had left of him. I had to do everything right. If I did everything right, I could hold on to Guy.

  The grey days settled in after that — one after another they came. They floated in and out, and the aloneness of me and Matylda seeped in. We were here by ourselves, and the boy who loved us was gone. How could I love her like he did?

  She was in the tank, just three feet from my bed, but it was hard to get up, as mornings became afternoons became evenings became night, the promise I made a shadow, always with me. I’d said yes to stick with my friend.

  The last week of school passed by as the aloneness crept deeper. My mother went back to work, but before she left in the morning, she checked on me.

  “I’ve got clean sheets,” she said. I stood up while she changed my bed, pulling the corners tight. “Could I wash your clothes?”

  “Not today,” I said, hands snug in the pockets of my red capris.

  She smoothed out my bedspread, then perched on the edge. “You doing okay?” she asked me. “You . . . you’re in here so much. . . .”

  “I like my room,” I said, rocking back on my heels, hands in my pockets still.

  “All right,” she said, reaching out to me, touching my hair. “Okay. I’ll see you tonight.” She touched my hair again and left for work.

  There was so much to say and there was nothing to say. I chose nothing. Guy was gone, and I was supposed to love the lizard he’d left behind enough for us both. Nothing was okay at all.

  My father kept bringing in the crickets. “She’s not eating much,” he said to me one morning. “You know what might help?”

  “What?”

  “If you feed her. I think she wants you to feed her.”

  I looked at Matylda, really looked at her, for the first time in so long. She was thin. She must have lost her appetite when she realized Guy wasn’t coming back. Maybe my dad was right; maybe if I fed her myself it would make a difference. I could help her. I didn’t want to handle the crickets, but I would if it meant she’d eat. Just had to think of them as feeders, like Guy said.

  “I’ll try.”

  “It can’t hurt,” my dad said.

  “Not hungry?” I said to her after he left. Her eyes were dull. “I don’t blame you,” I said. “But you have to eat. Guy would be upset if he knew you weren’t eating.” She was listening.

  “I know what — I’ll make you a deal,” I said. “If I’m brave enough to bring you crickets, then you have to eat them.” She didn’t agree, but she didn’t disagree. Maybe it would work.

  Barefoot on the grass, I walked toward the rhubarb patch, where we’d caught the comrades, where he’d told me they were only feeders. . . .

  I was all . . . by . . . myself.

  We bought Matylda together, we gave her a story, we fed her and cleaned her tank and cared for her. She was ours, and it wasn’t supposed to end like this; we were supposed to be in it together. Guy, my friend who said, “Enter If You Dare Make Yourself Known Eat and Flourish.”

  He wasn’t here.

  Just a door left open and an Airedale . . . and it had changed forever.

  Guy knew how I felt about the crickets. If he were here, he would help me, just like he did with her identity when I was afraid I couldn’t find the words. But no one was there.

  I was on my own, and I couldn’t bring him back.

  In the nested soda bottles, there were two cricket comrades, medium size, who’d fallen for the lure. They would fit out the neck of the bottle. I didn’t want them to get a good look at me, didn’t want them to blame me for their fate, so I held the trap behind me as I carried it upstairs. I could feel the crickets jumping around inside, even from behind — and then I thought of Guy again, telling me not to look down when I was on my bike. Don’t think about it, I told myself. That was the trick.

  “Two feeders for you,” I told her. “For you from me. I did it myself.” I pulled back the screen top, held the bottle, and unscrewed the cap. Don’t think about it. I shook it quickly and the crickets shot out and I closed the screen as fast as I could. The cap had fallen in, but I could get that later.

  “Now stalk,” I said to her.

  But she didn’t try to hunt them. She just sat there.

  “You don’t want my crickets?”

  She sat.

  “We made a deal,” I said. “Why won’t you eat?”

  She watched me.

  “I wanted to see the flowers,” I told her. “Is that so bad? I wanted to see them with Guy.” And I was back on Witchett Road and the car was coming and coming and coming and I couldn’t stop it. I couldn’t go back and make it not happen. I couldn’t walk instead of ride, and the spokes started spinning spinning spinning spinning inside my head, screaming, spinning spokes spinning faster FASTER FASTER —

  Breathe.

  I could hear my dad. Remember to breathe. And I took a breath, long and slow and deep, and the world paused. . . .

  Slow down, spokes.

  And the spokes slowed down.

  “Do you think you can love me?” I asked as she sat there not hunting. She didn’t look up.

  “How do I do this?” I said. “How do I get you to eat?”

  Matylda came over, still not eating the feeders
but looking at me, questioning me.

  “I need your help,” I said. Her eyes stayed on me. “Please,” I said, meeting her gaze. “Tell me what to do. I need to know what to do.”

  At the table with my parents, I pushed my fork around my plate, because it was my first summer in five years, half of my life, without Guy, and I didn’t want food — I was like Matylda that way. There was nothing to do that would change anything, but a silent meal was worse than talking.

  Fortunately, we had the cricket traps.

  “The evidence is mounting,” my dad said. “Baby carrots may be sweeter than apples. I catch more crickets with them.”

  “I don’t believe it,” I said.

  “The crickets like them better,” said my dad.

  “You mean,” my mom added, “that baby carrots attract more crickets. That doesn’t necessarily mean they’re sweeter.”

  “They probably like the color better,” I said, joining in again, saying something. But it was hard to keep up, because the color of carrots was orange, and orange was the color of Guy’s polo shirt, the one he had on. . . .

  I looked down at my plate and didn’t look up, ’cause they might see my head full of spokes spinning spinning spinning . . .

  Spokes, go away. Go on. GO GO GO GO GO GO GO GO GO GO GO GO so loud in my head —

  BREATHE! I commanded myself.

  I didn’t want my parents to know how loud it was —

  I breathed, long and slow.

  Stay down, spokes STAY DOWN!

  Now talk.

  “Maybe we should try figs,” I said. We had a fig tree on the deck. They turned deep purple when they were ripe.

  “They’ll love figs,” my dad said. “What a good idea. Who couldn’t love the fruit that makes Fig Newtons?”

  “Then the cricket might taste like figs,” my mom said.

  “A fig-flavored feeder!” I said.

  “And we can try pears,” my dad added. “Let’s do pears, too.”