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“Quit taking this personally,” said my mother. “It’s not about you.”
I took it very personally though, when I was eleven years old, to see the place where the four of them would rest together eternally, with no space for me.
Tonight the graveyard was black. For the first time, it seemed like it might not have been a good idea to come here alone. I found a flashlight in the glove box and made my way through the cemetery, following the skinny beam of light, trying to remember where they were. At the point when I started to feel like I should just give up until it was light out again, when I looked back and the car looked so frighteningly far away, I found them. I crouched down, making sure to keep my butt off the squishy wet ground, and shined the flashlight across the headstones.
Van was first. Evan Roger Loden. He’d never been known as Evan a day in his life. June 15, 1968 – November 26, 1986. A chintzy, faded ribbon on a plastic wreath flapped in the night wind. It said Son. The last time I had visited, the same wreath had been here, but it had been new. Had my parents been here between then and now? I pulled the wreath from its rusty metal stake, and also removed the tattered one leaning up against Valencia’s grave that said Daughter. There were rules against leaving these tacky pieces of garbage here year round. I was surprised some groundskeeper hadn’t taken them down a long time ago.
I looked around me, making sure I was still alone. The cemetery is creepy at night. It is not the ghosts I am afraid of. There are so many places to hide. I shined my light around and then let it fall on my sister’s headstone. There was a chalky pile of bird poop on it. I rubbed at it with the corner of the faded ribbon. The night wind picked up and a prickly sheet of icy rain began to fall.
I crouched back down a bit, and pulled my collar around my face. This was no longer surreal. When had it stopped being surreal? That is when the emptiness takes over for agony. Once you become numb, you never feel anything quite as acutely again. I suppose being numb robbed me of much that other young people enjoy. It is what it is.
Valencia Patricia Loden said the words neatly etched in granite. Who, since she was born ten minutes after Van, had managed to score herself her own birthday, but not her own death day. June 16, 1968 – November 26, 1986. I followed my old superstition of standing in front of Valencia’s grave, since there was not a skeleton beneath me, just dirt.
I waited to feel something. I touched the gravestones, running my fingers over the texture of their names.
“Van?” I whispered. Could he see me? Did he remember me? I wish I believed he was watching me.
The wind was blowing harder and I pulled my sweater sleeves around my fingers, clicking off the flashlight so I could be alone with them in the dark.
“Valencia, who am I?” I whispered. I felt stupid for saying this aloud and caught myself looking around, as if someone had heard me. I wanted to cry. I wanted to connect to them. But I just kept feeling empty. My legs started to burn from squatting to avoid the wet earth, so I let myself sit on the damp grass, let the icy, pellet-like drops of rain dampen my hair and face.
You might as well go, I told myself. What were you expecting?
But I stayed there, shivering, pathetically jealous of my dead brother and sister. They knew things I did not, might never know.
Chapter 19
I was more excited about the weekend that Van and Valencia were moving to La Crosse than possibly even they were. It was going to be a mini-vacation. We were all going to spend the night there. I was not entirely sure what I was expecting it to be, but I had the vague notion it would be cool. In the days leading up to their departure, I was too caught up in my imaginings of dorm life and pizza parties to think beyond that weekend. The reality of a house that would be losing forty percent of its inhabitants, two thirds of its children (and the important children at that), in one swift weekend was too much for my eleven-year-old brain to comprehend.
Three days before we planned to leave, my dad borrowed his brother’s truck and began loading it up with boxes. I had already packed an overnight bag. It looked like a sausage about to burst. It was filled with everything from hand-me-down bikinis of my sister’s to a hot pink Shaker sweater, and plenty of makeup. I had the vague, secret notion that I could trick a college boy into thinking I was sixteen or seventeen. That was as far as my fantasy had evolved. I was sitting on my bed, reading ‘Teen magazine, my mind split between the trip to La Crosse and school starting in less than a week. It might not be too late to reinvent myself as a Stylish Girl. With all of Valencia’s old clothes, I might finally stand a chance.
I heard the sound of knocking on my doorframe and I looked up. No one ever knocked on an open door. You were lucky if they knocked even if it was closed. My mother was standing there with a sheepish look on her face. “Hi. Mind if I sit down by you?” I knew instantly this was no good. She sat on my bed and peered at my magazine. “What are you reading?” I showed her the article about starting the year off right, with fresh new styles. There was a picture of a fuchsia-mouthed girl with a fun ponytail erupting from the side of her head.
“Cute,” said my mom. “I could do that to your hair if you want.”
“It might make the older girls pick on me.”
“Hmmm. Listen, Honey, your dad and I were thinking that you might want to stay at Heather’s house this weekend. I called Heather’s mom already and she said it was fine. Then you’ll be all ready to start school on Monday.”
“What?” I felt my face growing hot. This could not be happening.
“I worked it all out with her. She said you can order take away food on Saturday night.”
“It’s called take out. And I don’t want any. I want to come with you!”
My mother sighed, loud and dramatic like a dog. “Don’t whine. It’s been a long day already and I am not in the mood to listen to you.” She stood up, leaving a big butt print on my bedspread. I wanted to smooth it out but I imagined it was infested with her germs. I looked up at her hard, determined face.
“Why? Why can’t I go? Valencia and Van want me to say good-bye to them. I want to see where they’re going to live. Why are you doing this?”
“It’s settled. I already talked to Heather’s mother. It’s final.”
“But why?”
“The last thing I need right now is a tantrum out of you.” She picked up my overnight bag and set it on the bed. “Pack this with reasonable clothing you can actually use, including something to wear to school on Monday, because you’re going directly from Heather’s to school on the bus with her. Understand?”
“No. What did I do? Why can’t I go with everyone else? I’ll be good.”
“Your dad and I need a break and we’re going to stay there an extra couple of days. And you’re going to stay at Heather’s. You’ll have fun on the farm. Maybe they’ll put you to work and you’ll realize how good you have it here.”
