Sammie & Budgie

by Scott Semegran

  "Great! Let's go!" Sammie said, tapping his foot incessantly on the curb.

  "Wait! I need the flowers, too!" She gathered up the bouquet from the backseat, clutching the bunch of roses, astrids, and baby's breath flowers tightly in her little arms. I helped her out of the car and closed things up while my two kids shoved each other a bit before sprinting across the great, green, fuzzy lawn of the cemetery that separated the funeral home and parking lot from the cemetery itself. They were really looking forward to visiting their mother's grave. Me--not so much. Things had already been hard enough for me but they really wanted to visit her grave so I agreed. Besides, it was a really nice day to be outside, even if we were spending time at a cemetery, although, spending time in a cemetery was depressing as hell. Any time in a cemetery is depressing as hell. Am I right? Of course, I am.

  I sped up my pace to catch up with my two little heathens, who didn't seem too concerned with the sanctity and solemnity of the cemetery. They treated the tombstones like pylons on an obstacle course, running around and through them, chasing each other with outstretched arms, attempting to grab each other by the necks of their t-shirts. When I caught up to them--both entrenched in the competitive throws of attempting to best the other at their game of 'catch the monkey'--I stopped them in their tracks. Holding them at arms' length, my intervention snapped them out of their craziness.

  "You guys need to show a little more respect," I said, giving them 'the look.' You know? The LOOK. That's the look a parent gives their children to let them know that something serious will happen if they don't calm-the-heck-down. That something serious is never said, just implied by a hard squint of the eyes and a pinched grimace, the jaw clinching so tightly that their punishment is never revealed, leaving their over-active brains to assume the worst--the worst in their minds anyway. "This isn't the schoolyard, you know?"

  "Of course it isn't, Daddy," good ol' Sammie Boy said. "Our teachers wouldn't let us play in a sim-uh-terry. That would be weird!"

  "Then why don't you two chill?"

  "OK," said Jessie, reaching for my hand as a sign of reconciliation, roughly clutching the flowers with her other arm.

  "If you want to play games, then let's read the gravestones as we walk. These people here were once mothers and fathers and sisters and brothers and grandmothers and grandfathers. They were people that were loved when they were alive. We should respect them."

  "How about cousins?" Sammie said, looking up at me, really perplexed. "Were any of these people cousins?"

  "I'm sure some were," I said.

  "How about uncles?" Jessie said, chiming in. "Or aunts?"

  "Yes, we could rattle off all the kinds of relatives they could be. I'm certain they were all of them--once. Here," I said, pointing at the nearest gravestone. "What does this one say?" I gently pushed Sammie Boy toward the gravestone.

  The stone said:

  SACRED

  TO THE MEMORY OF

  JOHN GRIFFIN

  BORN MAY 1, 1827

  DIED AUGUST 13, 1868

  LOVING SON AND BROTHER

  NOW IN THE ARMS OF

  THE LORD

  Good ol' Sammie Boy bent over at his waist, getting a better look at the bold lettering carved into the stone, then said "Say-krid to the mim-ree of John Grift-in, born May one, one eight two seven. Then died August thirteen, one eight six eight. Luv-ing sun and bruh-therr. Now in the arms of the Lord! Is the Lord, Jesus, Daddy?"

  "Yes, son."

  "Why is Jesus a Lord, Daddy?"

  "Good question. That's just what people call him."

  "Can we read some more graves?"

  "Sure."

  Sammie and Jessie held my hands as we continued on. They read the names off each tombstone. The simpler names--like Brown or Smith or Jones--they would pronounce with glee, unperturbed by complex syllabic combinations of foreign origins. But when they came across more bizarre or complex names, they would stop in their tracks and slaughter the pronunciation of the names. What did you expect elementary school kids to do with Polish or Spanish names? I mean, some of these names were even hard for me to pronounce, what, with names like Jodorowsky and Feigenbaum and Tousignant and Mazariegos and they would stand there, dumbfounded or stumped, attempting to pronounce the names, scratching their scalps and spitting all over the place with a slobbery stutter. It was cute and irritating at the same time. And forget the occasional Chinese or Japanese name we came across, the inscription etched in the Asian alphabet of the deceased's ethnicity. They would see those foreign letters and just scream with delight.

  "This one is in Chinese!" Sammie blurted out, not knowing if the letters were really Chinese or Japanese or Korean. They looked Chinese to me but what did I know? I didn't know shit about Chinese. It's true. Jessie then said, "Whoa! A Chinese one!" Then we would move on, losing interest pretty quick.

  Their mother's grave was at the back of the cemetery with the rest of the newer graves. As we walked toward the back, the dates of the deceased moved toward our present time and the surrounding trees became smaller and more twig-like. The trees at the front of the cemetery were massive oak and pecan trees, having grown through the generations to their current, majestic heights. But in the back, closer to where their mother was buried, new trees were planted as new graves were plotted so all the trees were about the height of broomsticks, and not much bigger around than that, too. They were kind of sad in their young state, all held upright by strings to stakes in the ground, the wind whipping their frail trunks around. It seemed they almost were being pulled out of the ground by the gusty, springtime breeze. And none of us--not me, not Sammie, not Jessie--would live to see them grow into tall, majestic trees. Maybe my kids would be lucky enough to live long enough to see these trees grow, if they stayed in Austin. But who knows if that'll happen? I don't, that's for sure. Nor did I care. No one really knows what will happen in the future. Well, except maybe for Sammie.

  "Daddy, are we close yet?" Sammie said.

  "We're getting close," I said.

  "Good, 'cause I'm getting tired," Jessie said. "This stuff is heavy!" She clutched the bouquet of flowers tightly yet awkwardly, being that the bundle of flowers was just slightly too big for her little arms to comfortably hold, and the fact that she didn't want the petals or pollen of the flowers getting in her face. But she was strong and did her best not to drop them on the ground although the tissue and plastic wrap around the stems of the flowers was becoming a little mangled.

  "Want me to hold the flowers?" I said, extending a hand to her.

  "Yes!" she said, unceremoniously tossing them to me. The flowers sagged as I examined them, some of the stems broken at right-angles, which made them more perfect for the occasion. After releasing the flowers, my two kids ran a sprint the last of the way, good ol' Sammie Boy in front with his sister very close behind, clutching for the back of his t-shirt. When they reached their mother's gravestone, good ol' Sammie Boy touched it first. Even in a cemetery, both of my kids were competitive as hell.

  "I win!" Sammie said, proudly. He danced a little jig to celebrate.

  "You pushed me," Jessie said, crossing her arms, pissed off. "You're a cheater!"

  "Am not!"

  "Are to!"

  "Daddy, did you see me cheat?" Sammie said, crossing his arms defiantly.

  "I don't know. Why don't you two have a seat?" They both dropped to the grass; a disappointed harrumph slipped out of Sammie's mouth. Both upset with the outcome of their sprint, they sat--cross-legged and cross-armed / criss-cross, apple sauce--staring at their mother's gravestone. "You should say a prayer for your mother," I said.

  They both tilted their heads forward and pressed their palms together, reciting something under their breath that I imagined was a prayer or something like that, although I couldn't tell for sure. It's hard to say what little kids say to themselves while they are praying or pretending to pray. But, being that they were children, sitting still too long without moving or fidgeting was practically im
possible. I knew at least one of them would stop praying and say something. And good ol' Sammie Boy did. He looked at me and said, "Daddy, do you think Mommy is in heaven?"

  "That's a good question, son. But I don't know, really."

  "But Grandma Moma says all mothers go to heaven."

  "Yes, your Grandma Moma says a lot of things. But, I don't know. Saying ALL mothers go to heaven is quite the blanket statement. Don't you think?"

  "I think Mommy is in heaven," Jessie said, her head still tilted forward and her palms still together. "She was the best mommy in the whole world!"

  "That's great, sweetie," I said, shifting the weight on my feet, crossing my arms, and looking down the row of gravestones. About ten down was an old man--his bald head underneath a poker visor and his thin arms poking out of a brightly colored Hawaiian shirt--sitting in a folding lawn chair and drinking a glass of iced tea. He stared lovingly at the gravestone in front of him.

  "Daddy?" Jessie said, looking up at me, quite perturbed. "Aren't you going to pray for Mommy, too?"

  "Well..." I said, looking back at her. I didn't have the heart to tell her the truth, the truth being that I would have loved to have been anywhere else at that moment than standing in front of their cheating mother's grave, a woman who broke my heart so severely that I didn't want to pray for her. I wanted to piss on her grave, to tell you the truth. But you don't tell grieving children something like that. That would be a pretty selfish thing for me to do. Who would do that? A stone-cold bastard, that's who. But I wasn't a stone-cold bastard. I was a good daddy--at least I tried my best to be a good daddy--and a good enough one to know to keep my mouth shut about their cheating, nut-bag mother. It's true. "I already said my prayer for your mother."

  "Then sit with us and say another," she said, patting the fuzzy grass next to her. How could I refuse that? I couldn't refuse that, I tell you.

  "OK." I sat in the grass between my children in front of their cheating, lying, crazy mother's gravestone. I glanced over at the old man who was still smiling and sipping iced tea. He looked like he was happy to be sitting in a cemetery, staring at a grave of a loved one. I wished I was sitting in a cemetery, staring at the grave of a loved one. But I wasn't.

  "Let's hold hands," she said and we all did. "Sammie, you want to say the prayer this time?"

  "OK," he said, tilting his head forward, closing his eyes. I watched him recite his little prayer. "Dear God, please watch out for my Mommy's soul. She was a great mommy and I miss her every day. Let her know we love her and miss her, too. Amen."

  "Amen!" little Jessie said. But noticing I didn't say amen, she turned to me and said in a stern tone, "Say amen too, Daddy!"

  What my kids didn't know was that I didn't want to say amen. I didn't want to remember her in the way that they remembered her. She wasn't a great mommy--to me. She wasn't a great wife, either. She was a cheating, lying, no-good person to me and I regretted every moment with her. Well, I didn't regret that I had children with her because I loved my children. But children are just little miracles so I guess I was grateful to their mother for giving birth to them. That, really, was about it.

  "Daddy?" she said, looking at me, concerned. I didn't know what to say at that moment. My head was filled with the circumstances surrounding her mother's death, how she had started dating a car salesman while we were still married, and continued to see him when we separated. I thought of the difficult divorce we went through and the hard feelings I experienced because of the betrayal I felt. But mostly, I thought about the circumstances surrounding her death and how the police called to tell me--a few months after our divorce was finalized--that Sammie and Jessie's mother died in a fiery car crash after a night of heavy drinking with her car salesman boyfriend. They had gone downtown and bar-hopped from one bar to the next, drinking shots of tequila and glasses of wine, downing them with reckless abandon. Supposedly, her boyfriend became enraged when another man hit on my ex-wife, behavior she didn't discourage from the unsuspecting suitor. The two men brawled--punching and kicking and elbowing each other--until the bouncers at the bar threw them all out in the street. The two men quickly truced when a crowd grew around them and my ex-wife and the car salesman reluctantly walked back to his car together, arguing the entire way. The last thing anyone knew was that they drove home but on the way, her boyfriend lost control of the car and it plunged off an overpass and crashed into an embankment, the car exploding and the two dying in the fire, both still buckled in their seats. The police said that their investigation led them to believe that they were so intoxicated that they probably weren't conscious; they probably blacked out and weren't even aware that they were in a crash. What a sad way to die, I tell you. It was a very sad, pathetic way to die. It's true. "Daddy, aren't you going to say amen?"

  "Do you really want me to say amen?" I said.

  "Yes," she said.

  "OK, then. Amen." I hugged my two children, the two I loved most in the entire world and they put their little arms around my back. They squeezed me tight and I returned their embrace, pulling their shoulders under my arms into my sides. They were the sweetest children in the whole world. They deserved much better than the truth about their mother. They deserved peace. So I didn't say anything about what I was thinking. I just hugged them and loved them. "Who wants ice cream?"

  "Me!" they both said, jumping to their feet.

  "Last one to the car is a rotten egg!" said good ol' Sammie Boy and, before I knew it, they were off in a full-sprint, down the row of gravestones and passed the old man sitting in the lawn chair, sipping iced tea. He waved at them when they ran by but they didn't notice being too busy trying not to be rotten eggs. I began to follow them but noticed I was still holding the mangled bouquet of flowers for their mother. I looked at the flowers then looked at the gravestone. I quickly tossed them on the ground. There wasn't any point in putting them in a plastic vase like the rest of the flowers in front of the other gravestones. Someone was just going to pick them up and toss them in the trash soon, so tossing them on the ground was the quickest way to deal with them. I didn't want to spend any more time there anyway. I was ready to go. Really.

  I walked towards the old man and as I got closer, he looked up at me and smiled. In addition to the snazzy poker visor he was wearing on his bald head, he had on a brightly colored Hawaiian shirt, tan slacks, and Birkenstock sandals that were so worn out and old that they looked like they were actually from the 1960s. His build--thin and wiry and bony--propped up the gaudy shirt like a wire hanger suspended in mid-air. He had a pleasant smile, one that was refreshing to see in such a dismal place, and even more refreshing since he still had all of his teeth--yellow and grimy and dingy as could be. He looked like he was having a grand old time, sitting in a crappy lawn chair and sipping iced tea in the back of the cemetery. No one was going to bother him back there, that's for sure. No one in their right mind anyway. It's true.

  "Good day to you," he said, nodding at me, lifting his glass of iced tea as if to toast.

  "And good day to you," I said, trying to get by him quickly before he could say another word but I wasn't walking fast enough. He was about to trap me with his Southern charm.

  "Are those your children there?" he said, lifting his other hand, indicating the direction in which they ran. And like a tractor beam engulfing an orbiting space ship, his charm roped me in; I couldn't escape. I looked off in the distance and watched them run as fast as they could toward the car. They were hauling ass.

  "Yes, those are my kids."

  "Brought them to see a loved one, I see? Their mother, no doubt," he said, then sipping his iced tea with a loud slurp, punctuating his sentence forcefully. He was an interesting looking character with his thin, bony, hairy arms and big, honking, hook nose and the hazy, brown irises of his eyes swimming in the yellowy area of his sclera, that in most people would be white.

  "Yes, that's their mother over there..."

  "You must miss her dearly," he said, slurping some more iced
tea. "I miss my wife. I miss her so much that I come to visit her every day. It's not so bad sitting here in the cemetery. It's pretty nice most days. Nice and quiet."

  "Yes," I said, looking anxiously toward where my kids were. They had disappeared while the old man was talking to me. I didn't see them anywhere. "It does seem rather quiet, now that you mention it. I have to get..."

  "You know, when a loved one leaves your life, they can leave a large crater after their passing, like a huge meteor has crashed into your world. Doesn't that seem so?" he said, looking at me with his hazy, yellowy eyes. He seemed like a kind old man, one that I might normally talk to if I wasn't so distracted. I was starting to worry about my kids and where they ran off to. I was hoping they would be waiting for me at the car. That's what most normal kids would do, right? I knew they didn't have the keys to the car so they couldn't cause much trouble. "I really do miss my wife. She was my best friend. Was your wife your best friend too?"

  "Their mother was my ex-wife."

  "I see. Well, then you two must have worked things out in the best interest of your children, I would hope. That's the right thing to do."

  "Of course," I said. I lied. That really wasn't what happened. Nothing was worked out between me and their mother, in the best interest of our kids or otherwise. It was all a big pile of shit. The only thing I could say was that I was going to be the best dad I could be. The rest of it went down the toilet. I really hate when people say that, that divorced people should work things out and do things in the best interest of their children. I mean, if people were grown-ups and acted like grown-ups then it would seem that that would be something that they could do. But most grown-ups don't act like grown-ups and most people that get divorced act like assholes to each other. They get divorced for a reason and it's not because they want to be friends and be nice to each other and do things in the best interest of their kids. It's because one of them took a big shit on the other one in the form of adultery or lying or mishandling of money or they killed someone or they punched their spouse or they punched their kids or they did any number of diabolical things while being unhappily married to their unsuspecting wife or husband. People don't get divorced because they're friends; people get divorced because they are not good for each other. And the truth is, even if I wanted to be friends with Sammie and Jessie's mother, I couldn't be. She was dead. And that was the end of that. It's true. "We did our best, I guess."