“What now?” he asks Officer Grant.
“I’m guessing Gather will make her way into the forest and go deeper and deeper into the heart of Guyana.”
“You’re not going to kill her and put her back in the museum?”
“Oh, no. My job is to find runaways and make sure they end up in a good home.” Officer Grant smiles. “Today, for Gather, my job is done.”
“Your mother is buried right through there,” says Barnby, nodding to a path through the trees.
Jomon looks at Officer Grant.
“Jomon,” she says, “the jail is not going anywhere. Go find your mother.”
32
Jomon walks out of the sunshine and into a shady grove. The trees here hold each other’s branches like they’re holding hands. The branches form an arched ceiling, like in a cathedral. A flock of red macaws look like Christmas ornaments against the deep green leaves.
Jomon steps quietly around the graves, looking at the names carved into the stones.
He finds Taylor, his mother’s last name before she was married.
Then, at the end of the row, he finds his mother.
Corrine Anne Taylor (Fowler)
Mother of Jomon
She let her light shine.
Jomon kneels by the grave. He pulls the weeds away from the headstone and traces the carved letters of her name with the tip of his finger.
“Hi, Mum,” he whispers. “It’s me.”
He runs his fingers through the grass.
“I’m sorry it took so long for me to get here,” he says, “but I’m here now. And I’ll be back again. It might be a while …”
He can’t tell his mum he’s going to jail.
Should he sing or pray or make a speech?
Jomon doesn’t want to do any of those things. He wants to stay on the grass, close by her name, and just sit.
She’s in a nice quiet spot, he thinks.
The grove is cool. Jomon looks around the calm beauty of the place, then blinks and looks again.
He is sitting in Jomonland. There is even a stream gurgling along the edge. All that’s missing is the bench.
Maybe I can build one, he thinks, then says, “I’ll be back with a bench.”
He takes Cora’s tissue-paper flower out of his pocket and places it on his mum’s grave.
“See you soon, Mum,” he says. Then he gets up and leaves the grove.
Officer Grant is waiting.
“I’m ready to go back to the detention center now,” he says.
“And I’m ready to take you. But we have one stop to make first.”
She turns Jomon around so that he is facing her, and looks him in the eye.
“Jomon,” she says, “we found your father. He’s alive.”
33
Jomon is asleep on his bed, in his school uniform and his stocking feet.
It is the middle of the night.
He wakes up thirsty.
He gets out of bed, walks past the tiny bathroom and into the combined sitting room and kitchen. There’s more room for sitting since his father sold the fridge and stove for booze, but there’s no point in sitting there since the television has also been turned into booze. Even if the television was still there, the electric bill hasn’t been paid.
Jomon rinses out a tea mug. He wonders sleepily how long before the landlord finds out his father sold the appliances, and whether that will mean police and eviction or just eviction.
He fills the mug with water, then turns around to lean against the sink while he drinks it.
The mug hits the floor with no water reaching his lips.
Jomon’s father is sprawled on the sofa. His face droops to the side, eyes closed, mouth open. Empty bottles lie scattered on the floor.
The light from the street allows Jomon to see his father’s chest. It is not moving.
His father is not breathing.
Jomon bolts from the house and out into the dark, lonely night.
The door slams behind him.
He just keeps running.
34
“Here’s what we think happened.”
Officer Grant is standing by the open back door of the police car, leaning in and talking to Jomon. Behind her are Hi, Angel, Barnby and Mrs. Simson. They are in the parking lot of the Georgetown Public Hospital.
“We talked with a neighbor who heard the door slam. We think the noise woke your father just long enough for him to get out of the house and run after you. He collapsed again a few blocks away. He had no identification and no one in the area knew him, so we didn’t know who he was until the old woman next door went into the hospital to visit someone else and saw him in a bed on the ward.”
“He’s really alive?” asks Angel.
“He’s in a coma from the combination of pills and alcohol.”
“Will he be all right?” Barnby asks.
“I don’t know,” says Officer Grant. “Jomon, get out of the car. I’ll take you to him.”
“I don’t want to see him.”
“I do,” says Barnby. “We’ll all go.”
All the other doors of the car are closed and locked. There is only one way out for Jomon.
He swings his feet out of the car. Officer Grant leads the way. Mrs. Simson brings up the rear.
“He’s on the third floor,” Officer Grant says.
Each step is a mountain.
Jomon climbs and he thinks.
He thinks about his mum, and about the bench he’s going to build and put beside her grave.
He thinks about little Cora, who gave him a flower.
He thinks about Gather, a creature impossible that he saw with his own eyes.
He thinks about everything that has happened since the geography competition, and he thinks about the time he is going to have to do in youth jail.
When he gets to the door of the third-floor ward, all he has are thoughts. No answers.
“He’s down this way,” says Officer Grant quietly.
They move through the ward, past patients in casts, patients with tubes, patients with visitors and patients alone.
Jomon’s father is alone.
Jomon stops when he sees him.
“You can do this,” whispers Hi.
His father looks like he’s sleeping. He is clean, in a clean bed, and the smells are of antiseptic and good cooking coming up from the kitchen.
There is a chair by the bed. Jomon sits down, and he takes his father’s hand.
This is the hand that held a bottle and formed a fist.
This is also the hand that held young Jomon’s tiny one and got him safely across the street to the park.
The grandfathers stand together at the end of his bed.
I can end this, Jomon thinks. I can be the first one to be … happy.
In that moment, Jomon decides to try.
“I’m going to live,” he says out loud.
The grandfathers smile and nod.
Then, in front of Jomon’s eyes, they age. They transform into the old, old men they would have grown into if they hadn’t killed themselves. They all have wrinkles and gray hair. They all have smiles that reach all the way to their eyes.
They begin to fade, and then they are gone.
Jomon squeezes his father’s hand.
He, Jomon will live. That is his decision. He may need to make this decision again and again. Life is hard and it is not going to get easier. But he feels ready for it.
After all, he has a lot of people backing him up.
Jomon looks into his father’s face.
Then he does what the men in his family have always done, down through the generations, when someone they love is hurting.
He sings the Soothing Song.
* * *
<
br /> The End
AUTHOR’S NOTE
Dear Reader,
Many people around the world and throughout history have struggled as Jomon does in this story. Life can be hard. We can feel alone. We can feel that our present pain will be forever pain.
It can be difficult to remember that things change and that we change in our ability to deal with them. We need to find a way to hang on through the tough times and trust in our ability to create a better life for ourselves.
Thank you for sharing Jomon’s journey with me. May your own journey be full of good work, enduring wonder and broad horizons.
All the best,
Deborah Ellis
If you or someone you know is in crisis, please contact one of these organizations:
National Suicide Prevention Lifeline (a network of local crisis centers that provide free and confidential emotional support to people in suicidal crisis or emotional distress, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week)
suicidepreventionlifeline.org
1-800-273-TALK (8255)
The LifeLine Canada Foundation (TLC promotes positive mental health and suicide prevention/awareness)
thelifelinecanada.ca
1-833-456-4566
Kids Help Phone (Canada’s only 24/7 national service offering professional counseling, referrals and volunteer-led, text-based support for young people in English and French)
kidshelpphone.ca
1-800-668-6868
The Trevor Project — Saving Young LGBTQ Lives (a national 24-hour, toll-free confidential suicide hotline for LGBTQ youth)
thetrevorproject.org
1-866-488-7386
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I would like to express my deep appreciation to the people of Guyana I met on my visit there with Mental Health Without Borders. And a big thank you to Shelley Tanaka who, as always, helped me find the story through the fog.
— Deborah Ellis
The author and publisher are grateful for the input of Dr. Rachel Ptashny and other mental-health professionals who read and commented on the manuscript. We have also taken into account the guidelines recommended by the National Action Alliance for Suicide Prevention. theactionalliance.org
DEBORAH ELLIS is a Member of the Order of Canada. She has won the Governor General’s Award, the University of California’s Middle East Book Award, Sweden’s Peter Pan Prize and the Jane Addams Children’s Book Award. She is best known for her Breadwinner series, which has been published in twenty-five languages, with $2 million in royalties donated to Canadian Women for Women in Afghanistan and Street Kids International. Deborah lives in Simcoe, Ontario. deborahellis.com
Groundwood Books is an independent Canadian children’s publisher based in Toronto. Our authors and illustrators are highly acclaimed both in Canada and internationally, and our books are loved by children around the world. We look for books that are unusual; we are not afraid of books that are difficult or potentially controversial; and we are particularly committed to publishing books for and about children whose experiences of the world are under-represented elsewhere.
Groundwood Books respectfully acknowledges that the land on which we operate is the traditional territory of many nations, including the Mississaugas of the Credit, the Anishnabeg, the Chippewa, the Haudenosaunee and the Wendat peoples.
Groundwood Books is proud to be a part of House of Anansi Press.
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