The Handbook for Lightning Strike Survivors

by Michele Young-Stone

  In her mind she could still see him there behind Moore’s Grocery. She remembered saying, “I was a virgin.” It was August 8, 1958. She remembered writing the date in her diary. She had left the whole page blank to fill in later when he changed his mind, when he said I want us to be a family. That page is still blank, she thought. It would remain forever blank.

  What had she looked like then? She tried to picture herself, the two of them standing with their backs up against the bricks, him hardly looking at her. She kept moving in front of him, trying to make eye contact, to see into his heart. She was so naive.

  “I’ll deny it’s mine.”

  “No, you won’t.” What did I look like then? She let a can of Roger’s Gourmet Pork ’n’ Beans pass at the sixth line. White mold. Some woman is going to be entirely destroyed in another year’s time when she opens this slop to feed her family. How terrible. Mr. Peebles won’t approve.

  I was thin then, she remembered, and I had on that white skirt I bought in Fayetteville, the one patterned with French ladies and parasols. I had washed and pressed it, and it got dirty against the bricks. Stained forever. Pretty means pretty and nothing more. It doesn’t pay.

  “I gotta go” is what he’d said.

  Didn’t he know Jiminy Cricket’s “Always Let Your Conscience Be Your Guide”? If Richard doesn’t want to know Buckley, then Buckley doesn’t want to know him. She let another can pass, this one at the tenth line. Richard got out of here. No doubt about that. He left Mont Blanc for good, but not before he saw Abigail wheeling her baby boy down Main Street. She remembered walking proudly, trying not to seem obvious, but eyeing him. He crossed the street. He hadn’t even tried to sneak a peek at his own son. He’s your baby, she’d thought. She wanted to scream, He’s your son. You need to claim him! But who was she to him? A good time. An easy lay. What did her mother say? “Why pay for the cow when you can get the milk for free.” “Pretty’s just pretty. It doesn’t pay.”

  When Buckley was four or five, she ran into Richard at Bronco Billy’s Drive-in. He was in town for the holidays, visiting his folks. She was fat then, and Richard hadn’t recognized her, but she knew him. He looked the exact same, except his hair was long down his back, which suited him. Had she been thinner then … had her hair been washed … had she been nicely dressed … had she had more confidence, she might’ve approached him then to tell him how amazing his son was. She wanted to say, It’s me! Abigail. She wanted to tell him about Buckley Richard Pitank.

  Instead, she drove away with her cheeseburger and milk shake, her palms sweaty on the steering wheel.

  Linda came up behind Abigail. “What the hell is going on?”

  Abigail said, “I’m doing my job. I’m checking the cans.”

  “Has Mr. Peebles seen this mess?”

  Abigail shook her head that no, he had not, thinking that if Linda and Samantha weren’t always wandering off, this type of thing wouldn’t happen in the first place.

  “Thank God,” Linda said. “And Horace didn’t come by?”

  “No.”

  “When the line started back up, did you check each can?”

  “Not really.” Abigail didn’t lie. She kept secrets, but she didn’t lie.

  “Why not?”

  “My mind wandered.”

  Excerpt from

  THE HANDBOOK FOR LIGHTNING STRIKE SURVIVORS

  A farmer from Waryo, Montana, struck thirteen times in the last ten years, told reporters, “I don’t feel nothing. I’m numb. I won’t run from a storm. I ain’t seeking no shelter. I think it’s God’s way of letting me know he’s here. He’s waiting for me, but it’s not my time. I’ve been to the hospital every time I got hit, and every time I tell them, ‘Listen to my heart. Hook me up to one of them machines you got,’ and every single time, we look at that monitor thing and there’s my heart, still ticking, all crazy fast and slow and fast and slow, and they keep me there until my ticker settles down again, and then I go home. I guess I’ve had a dozen cardiac arrests and somehow she keeps on ticking. I’m like Timex.”

  [9]

  This mortal coil, 1979

  Grandma Edna goes to bed at quarter past nine. She unfastens her watch and drops it on the nightstand. She tucks the heavy knotted quilt under her arms and, anxious to dream, forgets what she should remember: forgets that tomorrow she has to buy tracing paper, red construction paper, snowflake paper, and tubes of silver glitter for the Sunday school Valentines; forgets to take her antacid (her stomach bubbled after supper); forgets the back porch light and the four pills in the white plastic Friday slot of her pill bin; forgets to defrost the chicken.

  Tonight the February wind squalls. It clatters the chairs on the side porch and tears the wind chimes from their metal hooks. They clank on the concrete and thud to the grass. The wind rattles the storm windows. She thinks someone is trying to get in. She thinks, Come on. I don’t care. She has gone to bed to dream and so she does.

  In the dream, her mother is young, washing petticoats in the sunlight. Wisps of hair fall from her bun and she catches them with the back of her wrist, pinning them to her face. She laughs. Edna smells lavender mixed with lye. Beneath the covers, Edna’s right hand opens and her fingers wiggle. She sees her mother’s teeth, including the chipped one, and her mother’s hands, wet and coarse from scrubbing clothes on the washboard. Her mother gathers her top skirt, drying her hands, calling, “Ed,” but Edna’s right there within reach. “Ed,” she calls again. Edna says, “I’m right here, Mom.” Every night her mother smiles or waves and the dream ends, but tonight Edna feels the sunlight on her arms and after reaching for her mother’s skirt, feels the fabric. Both of her old feet kick beneath the tucked sheet. When Edna’s fingers touch the suds on her mother’s skirt, her right hand spasms under the covers. She hasn’t touched her before. She feels her mother’s wet fingertips on her forehead, sees the glowing red blur of sunlit skin. Her mother pushes a strand of hair from Edna’s eyes.

  Edna dies in her sleep at seventy-seven years old. Her mother, Rosemary, died at the same age.

  Five years ago, Edna had prepared for death. She counted crisp twenty-dollar bills into the palm of Morton Spank, Prospect’s sole funeral director, and waited for a receipt. Edna had never been a slouch. She took to heart the TV commercials that reminded her, You shouldn’t burden your loved ones, nor should you suffer their whims. They might cremate her!

  Her affairs were in order. She wasn’t much looking forward to seeing old Clayton. There were things she’d done since his death that he wouldn’t approve of. There was Old Man John, for one—who was colored. If Clayton knew about the kiss—even though it was on the cheek, just near the lips, and even though there’d been gin involved … Oh, never mind. If Clayton knew about the gin, he’d be upset. It was all right for men to drink, Clayton said, but not women. She wouldn’t worry about seeing him. She had missed him, but he had been hard to swallow, like castor oil, and she wouldn’t have known how difficult he was if he hadn’t died so many years before her, opening her eyes to all the kind people close by. Well, there were plenty of other people up there she’d be happy to see, like her mother.

  Rowan drove the Volvo to Prospect while Mary slept in the backseat and Becca told him about her grandmother. “She could see the watch hand go counterclockwise, and she wrote that I was blessed. I can’t believe she died. I can’t believe she’s gone.”

  “Everybody dies.”

  Becca’s neck, splotched red since her mother had told her about her grandmother’s passing, felt hot. “I don’t want to die. I don’t want Grandma Edna to be dead.”

  “She’s in our hearts,” he said, adjusting the side mirror.

  “Can you turn down the heat? I’m burning up.” Becca slid off her shoes and tried looking for stars, but there were none to see. There were the headlights and the black trees. “I just got to know her, and she’s gone.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Do you believe in ghosts?”

  He s
queezed her shoulder. “What do you think about going to Richmond with me next month? I’ve got a couple meetings, but we could sightsee in between.”

  “Sure.” Even with her shoes off, her feet were sweating. She propped them on the leather console between the seats and thought, When I get to the farm I’ll look for Grandma Edna sitting at the kitchen table, standing at the sink, shuffling up the concrete steps. I’ll listen for her laugh and her Marianne Pamplin potato salad stories.

  The next morning, Mary couldn’t decide what to wear to her mother’s funeral. Already quarter to nine, with the service supposed to start at nine-thirty, and Mary, still wearing her slip, tossed the dresses she’d brought from home, one after another, the wooden hangers clacking, onto her dead mother’s bed.

  Wearing a blue velveteen dress, black tights, and Mary Janes, Becca stood in the doorway, watching. She said, “What about that one?”

  “What did you say?” Mary stopped, dress hanger in hand, staring hard at Becca.

  “That one. The green one.”

  “Could you please get out of here? Am I asking too much of you?”

  Becca went to her father and they waited together in the red dust, and he took her hand and squeezed.

  In her dead mother’s bedroom, Mary adjusted the wide-brimmed hat. She bobby-pinned it to her curls, checking the mirror to make sure the bobby pins weren’t showing. She looked good and thought that if she were thinner, if she had dark hair, and if she weren’t going to her mother’s funeral, she could pass for Audrey Hepburn in Breakfast at Tiffany’s.

  Who will be there? she wondered, pulling on her black coat, adorned with the purple butterfly brooch—her mother’s, and her grandmother’s before that, and one day she’d pass it on to Becca. When Becca’s older and more responsible. Will I know anyone at the service? she wondered. What will they think of me? The daughter who never came to visit. Will Old Man John be there? He’s a nice man. Is it an open casket? She hadn’t thought to ask. I can’t handle seeing her dead. She shouldn’t be dead.

  Mary sat in the front pew, head bowed, concentrating on her black pumps. She didn’t want anyone to see her face. She didn’t want to see Claire, who sat on her left. The sisters had hardly spoken. Claire, with her ex-boyfriend Tom’s help, made the arrangements. There wasn’t much to arrange. Edna had taken care of everything. “Tom has been a big help,” Claire whispered as the eulogist walked to the pulpit.

  “What happened with his girlfriend Betsy?”

  “It’s over between them.”

  Mary thought, That’s convenient, since our mother is dead and there’s inheritance and a farm house.

  Mary shifted in her seat, crossed her right leg over her left. There was a small snag in her stocking. She fingered it. Claire cried. Becca cried. She should be crying, but she had taken a Valium and sipped from Rowan’s flask in the car. She hoped the snag didn’t spread. This must be Hank at the pulpit, one of the men from church that Mother was talking about last summer. He’s also been crying. What is he saying? As Hank said, “I never met a nicer, more generous woman, and I don’t think I ever will. Make you laugh. Lord, she made me laugh,” Mary thought, I hate you! Full of rage, she squirmed again. Hank told one story after another about a woman Mary didn’t know. “I can’t tell you how many times …” He wiped his nose with a handkerchief. “I can’t say she’ll be missed. That doesn’t do her justice.” On and on. Shut up! She shouldn’t think that. She decided that she shouldn’t have worn black. It’s too depressing. She should’ve bought a new dress, but there wasn’t time.

  Her right foot was asleep. She shifted again and looked to Becca, whose face was swollen with tears, her green eyes flooded, almost transparent. Mary squeezed Becca’s thigh to express to her daughter that it’d be all right. Becca gasped for breath and cupped her face in her hands. Mary tried to take Becca’s hand as Rowan, seated beside Mary with his legs crossed, leaned in. He put his hand on Mary’s shoulder and whispered, “It’s all right.”

  Mary was relieved at his concern. Maybe we’ll make love tonight. It’s been so long.

  Rowan thought about his meeting next month with Atkins and Thames. The additive he’d created. The money he might make.

  After the service, the mourners drove to the farm house. They parked their boxy American cars in a row at the side of the house and down the dirt drive. The bare trees and brown grasses framed the crisp blue sky. It was a cold February day. Inside, Tom, who’d already removed the boxes from the living room and the upstairs kitchen, played host. He pulled back the curtains and distributed plates of food. Forks clanked on plates. Conversation hummed. Mary overheard Tom tell Old Man John, “We’re staying here.” Mary thought, Who is “we”? He’s a fool, and she poured a glass of scotch. People she hardly knew patted her shoulder and embraced her, paying their condolences.

  Marianne Pamplin said to the reverend, “I brought the potato salad and the cherry pie.”

  Becca scanned the buffet, crowded with the standard meatballs, platter of fried chicken, tray of ham biscuits, and casseroles with thick cheesy tops. Spotting Marianne Pamplin’s famous potato salad, she heaped the mayonnaise-rich potatoes onto her plate. Becca took a large bite and laughed at how awful it was, spraying the potato salad onto the rug. Grandma Edna was right. It was by far the worst potato salad Becca had ever tasted. The mayonnaise was warm. She announced, “This is delicious,” spilling her food on the rug. She laughed, and the mourners averted their eyes. Someone ought to do something about that child was the general consensus, she knew. Her father, who loathed a scene, took her by the elbow and reached for her plate. Becca, wriggling loose, saw Grandma Edna rocking heel to toe by the newly hung curtains. Grandma Edna’s blue eyes were moist, the way they’d been the day the two of them had snapped beans. Becca heard her grandma laugh. “Grandma,” Becca said, and the conversational hum stopped. “Grandma.”

  Everyone looked at Becca.

  “Come on, Bec.” Her father and Claire’s boyfriend, Tom, lifted Becca from the rug. Tom wiped at the spilled potato salad with a frayed napkin. Becca hung limply, both knees on the rug. Her father’s hands were under her elbows. “Mary,” he called for help. “Come on, Becca. Don’t make a scene.”

  Becca couldn’t resist. “Your potato salad’s delicious.” She smiled at Grandma Edna, who still rocked heel to toe by the curtains. Becca knew her grandma would be here. Of course, no one else could see her. That’s the way it is with these things—or is it? Marianne Pamplin, not long for the world, looked to the curtains. Becca watched as she put one hand on her hip and shook her head, as if to say, Get out of here, you. You’re dead. Then Grandma Edna was gone.

  Marianne Pamplin said, “I’ll send the recipe to your mother.” Holding her pearls against her bottom lip, she dropped them to her blouse, smiling at the odd little girl on the floor, who she presumed would grow up to have mental problems like the youngest Wickle girl, Claire. Then, finding the two sisters in separate rooms, she whispered to one and then the other the standard “I’m so sorry for your loss.”

  Claire said, “Thank you for coming, Marianne,” but Mary was drunk and responded, “Why?” Mary tottered onto the front porch in front of the reverend and Marianne Pamplin with her glass of scotch, the ice cubes tinkling. The reverend was driving Marianne Pamplin home. He tried to shake Mary’s hand on the porch, but Mary had a cigarette in the one hand and her scotch in the other. Maybe another time, preacher man.

  Excerpt from

  THE HANDBOOK FOR LIGHTNING STRIKE SURVIVORS

  “It felt like I died. I told my son, ‘I’m dead,’ and he said, ‘No, Mama, you got struck by lightning, but you’re not dead.’

  “I said, ‘Nobody gets struck by lightning.’ We were on the beach, and there was only one black cloud. Even with my son right there and the lifeguard running toward us, I thought I was dead. I don’t remember the next few days. Still, today, ten years later, I think I died that day. My husband and son are always reminding me how lucky I am to be alive.�
�

  Account by Margaret M.

  [10]

  Galveston, 1972

  In 1972, with the money she’d earned at Roger’s Gourmet Pork ’n’ Beans, Abigail bought a yellow Vega hatchback. She and Buckley packed it with their scant belongings, mostly clothes, but Abigail also took the electric griddle because she’d bought that too with her money from Roger’s. She packed her diaries—five total—and her photo album.

  It was mid-August, and so hot in Mont Blanc that the red clay roads, dusty and cracked in the sun, were bleached pink and seemed to want to give way, to split open and swallow the pair. Buckley feared it could happen. How could it be possible to leave this place? He’d packed nothing but his clothes, and if it weren’t for necessity, he would’ve left them behind too. He didn’t want anything reminding him of Mont Blanc.

  It was a Tuesday. The reverend was at the Holy Redeemer Church, and Winter was in town at her friend Violet’s house. Violet had recently lost her cat, Twinkle, and as a result she refused to eat. Winter had baked Violet a pie. Winter didn’t like cats, and it seemed ridiculous that anyone should carry on so, refusing to eat over a missing cat, but Winter believed in charity. She could count this visit as a good deed. Since the reverend had married her only daughter and moved into her home, she thought more on good deeds and heaven, and what it might take to enter heaven if heaven was a real option. What did she have to lose? An hour baking a pie. A morning listening to Violet’s woeful kitty-cat tale. It was worth it.

  Winter was already an hour at Violet’s when Abigail and Buckley left Mont Blanc. The Vega had no seat belts, but it did have a radio, and as Abigail and Buckley drove west on I-40, Abigail turned up the song “A Horse with No Name.” She smiled. “We’re going to see the ocean!”

  When Buckley was older, he would remember the brown vinyl interior of the little car, the yellow foam bunching out of his mother’s seat where the vinyl was torn, the cigarette burn on the dashboard, the song lyrics “I’ve been through the desert on a horse with no name,” and the skin hanging from his mother’s right arm. It was too much to hope that things would turn out right for them. But now he was hopeful, imagining a blue ocean. Counting cars and splintered mailboxes. Wondering about his new school. Would he keep his name Buckley or change it to something cool like Keith or Cliff?