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If you love you can see them, but only if you love. You can come out to Amaranth Cemetery during a full moon (or fool moon as mom used to say) and see them sitting under an elm, sloe-eyed creatures stargazing in the mist. As I finish these last pages I'm sitting under my favorite oak. Her washed out roots stab my back but I don't mind the pain anymore; it's the only indication left that I'm still alive.
A cheap, cement, heart-shaped headstone tells the basics:
IRMA JEAN YANCY
Our Only Beloved Child -- Forever Pure
November 18, 1954 - September 9, 1971
She used to secretly smile at me but I never told anyone for fear of being branded a chubby-chaser. I doubt anyone but me noticed the fragile fire of defiance in her eyes. It's the same fire that seems to mark people fighting the world and who, despite enormous odds, are somehow winning. I saw it again later only after I flunked out of college and ended up playing soldier in a smelly, damp hell-hole named something I still can't pronounce. Those bare-footed soldiers over there had that fire too and would smirk as though they knew ugly secrets about me. I badly wanted to kill them whenever I encountered that look for fear of the truth in it. Some nights when I'm sober I dream of the ways I accomplished that task. I'm not sober very often anymore.
* * *
The end came one afternoon our senior year as we mellowed out at Frasey Park. Kirk and Dean were splitting their share of a pound of grass I'd just bought when Bunny and Liz joined us. They were the richest girls in school and obligatorily hung out with us local jock heroes.
"What's going on?" I asked as I handed Kirk rolling papers.
"We've got a problem," Bunny said, her glossy red lips shining in the sun. Her stogies always these slick, bloody wounds on their butts. She was the head cheerleader and popped the diet pills her mom gave her like candy. Her mom bragged about her daughter's 18-inch waistline and Bunny was foxy but she always looked surprised.
"You see all kinds of made up stuff," Kirk said. He scooped the excess weed into a paper on the picnic table. His buzz flattop, compliments of his policeman dad, exposed a pink, well-scrubbed scalp.
"We walked by the deli where Cam works and he was eating lunch with the pig," Bunny said, looking more dangerous than Circe at a sailor keg party.
"Irma?" I asked, lighting Kirk's first joint.
"Yes," she said, her eyes now slits. "And he won't even speak to me."
"You can't seriously believe they're dating," Dean said, his thick black eyebrows raised high as usual.
"Well now Weeny," Kirk said grinning, "since he dumped Funny here he's just trying to get some any way he can." He enjoyed pissing off the girls.
"They aren't together, you know that," I said. "And didn't Ron Burton just dump you too? Shouldn't he be the one feeling the love now?" Maybe I could distract them.
"She dumped him, thank you," Liz said. "So are we going to do something about Cam or not?" Her braless chest heaved. I sighed at the faint pink points in front of me.
"What do you want from us?" I asked, trying to get on her good side. I'd never scored with a chick before and sensed an opportunity coming up.
"I have an idea so come over tonight," Bunny said. She stroked Dean's cheek with her long nails and they walked away, knowing we would be staring.
"Better change your drawers before tonight Weany," Kirk said, guffawing. "I heard she likes 'em without the skid marks."
A wisp of icy fear floated around my gut but I didn't know why. "What do you think they have in mind?" I asked.
Shrugging as he took a stoke Dean said, "Probably more of the usual."
"Remember the lake?" Kirk asked. He jumped up and flailed his arms around and screamed, "I can't swim!" Dean busted up and I flinched as I remembered him shoving Irma into the lake last summer.
"Hey," I said. "I can't go tonight. I'm still in Dutch about the Mustang." I'd crashed my new Mustang but all my dad did was pour himself another amaretto and hand me the keys to a new Camaro. I suddenly felt too connected to chaos, though, like riding in a car as it slides on ice, and the lie gave me some space. The pranks just didn't seem to be as funny anymore, and a few of the suckers on the receiving end of them weren't all that bad. I'd been friends with some of them like Jake Callahan and Tom Schearer from the Chess Club. They hadn't spoken to me since Kirk beat them up last semester but they'd called us idiots and we had to do something, I guess.
"You're going son," Dean informed me. "Because I'm not hearing her crap for a month if you don't."
Kirk laughed and handed me the joint, nodding, and said, "Nice try."
I smiled and shrugged, aw shucks, and didn't say another word.
* * *
The town deli sits surrounded by rowdy honky-tonks lined up along Maple Street like forgotten frat houses crowded with gray-haired denizens inside raising hell to Conway Twitty tunes. I entered the place near closing time. Irma stood
"Hi," I managed. I couldn't look into those green eyes and so stared at the crank cash register. Silence floated between us like a fine spider web, linking us in fragile awkwardness. "Uhm, how long have you been working here?"
"I started last spring," she said. "My folks bought me a farm truck from Mr. Somner and I'm paying them back. It's an old Apache, but I like it." She smiled so sweetly I nearly forgot who she was. I'd never heard of a chick driving a standard shift truck.
"You can shift it and everything?"
"Sure," she said. Nice, white teeth behind pink lips. I felt myself smile back. "But I just drive it to the library and here," she added. "Not to school
because someone kept slashing the tires." She shrugged. "So I just ride the bus now." I remembered one time as I was cutting up one of her tires I saw a beautiful pewter cross pendant dangling from the rear view mirror about four inches long. An urge to steal it had hit me and I unwound the chain. I saw engraved on the back "forever Cam" and felt a surge of something like happiness, so I put it back. My gut wrenched. I nodded and asked her what the best sandwich in the place was. "I like the ham but Cameron says the lamb is the best. I could never eat a little lamb though."
"I'll have the lamb then," I said and grinned. She laughed ruefully. "Just kidding," I said with a genuine smile, somehow pleased that I had made her laugh. "I'll take a ham and cheese." She fixed a nice one for me while we talked about chess and Bread's latest LP the genius of David Gates.
"I'm glad you didn't take the lamb," she said as I paid. "They're just like kids, you know, like us."
"Oh yeah," I said and looked away. Cam was now watching us, grim faced, through the window in the stainless steel swing door that led to the kitchen. I said thanks and quickly walked away, the feeling of obviousness sharper now. Irma might not have understood what she was dealing with but he sure did.
He came up front and they counted down the register and as I sat waiting for the call I realized what he saw in her, or really what he didn't see; stupidity and meanness. Like me, he saw kindness and humor. I got up to leave before the call came. I could just miss it. I would stop any more jokes on her after tonight. I'd make up with Jake and Tom. But then the phone rang and my life ensnared me. Cam answered it with a cheerful hello and listened a moment. He frowned then slammed the phone down and ran outside with Irma waddling behind him. With a sinking feeling, I pulled the pound of bacon from under my jacket and placed it on the counter and quietly left the place staying in the shadows. I joined the gang and got into Dean's silver Nova which was parked across the street. We all sat and watched the show.
Irma's screams rang out of the alley where her truck and Cam's Chevelle were parked. The Chevelle's tires were flat and every inch of glass shattered. Looking dazed, he walked around it as Irma sobbed. Dozens of dents bruised the black body and the roof was deeply slumped. I then saw the purpose of the bacon. In white spray paint on the hood were two pigs mating with "Cam & Irma makin' bacon!" I laughed, which now I like to think was shock and not amusement, as Dean drove slowly towards them with the headlights off. We flipped Cam and Irma off. Cam screamed and they got into her truck with Cam at the wheel and chased us. I looked back as the truck veered around a corner so fast the two figures inside, silhouetted by a street lamp, flung hard to the left.
We raced to the lake and Dean parked at Pear Dock where the abandoned bait shop sat. He cut the headlights and motor. The moonlight cast blue shadows everywhere and the calm lake looked like a sea of oil.
"Ya'll wait on the other side and I'll set it up," he said as he got out. He leaned on the hood as we piled out to the opposite side to lay in wait in the dark. Kirk took two baseball bats from under the front seat and handed me one.
A moment later the truck whipped into the space by Dean's car and Cam shouted through the open window, "You're going to pay for that!"
Looking crazed with anger, Cam jumped out of the truck and ran at Dean, Irma close behind, tears running down her face. Cam grabbed Dean by the collar and shook him. To my amazement Dean smirked.
"Why?" Irma asked.
Locking eyes with Cam, Dean answered, "Because we can. You're nothing. Pigs like you ..."
Cam punched him in the chin. Dean fell hard to the right. Kirk jumped from the shadows on the left and slammed Cam on the left side of his head with the bat. Irma screamed and jumped back. I crept from the shadows on the right, stepping over Dean. Cam flinched and faced Kirk head on, blood pouring out of his mouth. I knew we were no match for him and surprise was our only chance to beat him. I stood frozen for a split second, staring at Irma as Liz and Bunny descended upon her like lions on a gazelle, and for a breath I thought I would save Irma and let Cam pummel them all to hell like they deserved. But then he saw me and connected to my nose. Blood spouted out and across the front of his white work t-shirt. I managed to land a hard swing to his knee as I went down and
saw him collapse. I crawled away as Kirk stomped hard on his stomach. He doubled over and didn't move again.
Bunny was sitting on Irma's chest as Liz held her arms above her head. Bunny had painted Irma's entire face red with lipstick and was now pulling clumps of her hair out as Irma screamed. Dean jumped up and ran to them, pulling Bunny off and throwing her aside. He brutally smacked Irma hard across her painted face and the screaming stopped. He kneeled down and punched her about the head and as she tried to roll away, blood splattering from her nose and landing on the powdery sand beneath her, Bunny kicked her in the ribs and she flopped to the right then lay still.
Dean and Kirk were panting and leaning over as though they'd just run a lap around the red gravel track at school.
"This is bad man," Kirk said, his voice panicky.
Suddenly calm, Dean straightened up and said quietly, "Not if we can get them into trouble first." He looked at me. "Get the booze from my trunk." Dizzy and tasting blood, I staggered to the Nova and got the fifth we were saving for later. He took it to the truck and smashed it on the steering wheel filling the
still air with the smell of bourbon. "See? They were drunk. We were defending ourselves."
Nodding his bloodied head, Kirk said, "Let's put them back in that pile of junk and I'll call daddy."
"No one's going to believe piggy was drunk!" Bunny shouted.
Kirk grabbed her by the arms and shook her. "They don't have to! They just have to believe big boy was drunk." She stared at him blankly and Bunny laughed.
Dean and Kirk put a limp and bloody Cam back behind the steering wheel while me and Liz put Irma on the passenger side, struggling with her exhausting weight. We shared a joint as we cleaned up at the shore of the muddy lake and soon life felt normal again. But just as we were leaving, Irma groaned and sat upright. We froze as she pointed at us.
"CAM!" she screamed. Then she pointed at us, her face contorted with rage. "I'm telling everyone!"
Shocked and suddenly terrified, I yelled, "We have to do something man!" with a real panic setting in. Why did she have to act angry now?
Dean ran to the truck. He punched her face and she flew across the bench seat and onto Cam.
"Get back there!" Kirk shouted, indicating the back of the truck. He ran to the driver side and opened the door. He shoved Cam's arms through the bottom loops of the steering wheel and popped the gear stick into neutral. "Push!" he said as he slammed the door shut and joined us. Bunny stood back, screaming and jumping around while Liz tried to grab her. We pushed the truck down the wide dock. I fell hard on the rough boards as we got to the end. A few feet away Dean and Kirk let go of the tailgate and we watched as the heavy truck veered to the left and fell into the dark water with a strangely muted splash. Without a word we all ran to Dean's car.
Cam's body was found the next afternoon. The evening edition of the paper said that he was found floating halfway out of the truck which sat in nine feet of water near the old bait shop. Apparently ragged edges of glass from the window frame had cut his neck and he'd bled to death. Kirk's dad told the paper that the accident had been alcohol related. Through an anonymous tip, Kirk's dad said the police learned that the boy had apparently torn up his vehicle and covered it in white paint in a drunken rage before the accident. This same tipster also said that the boy's girlfriend, Irma Yancy, a co-worker at the deli, had quarreled with him and had been with him at the time of the accident. The girl, however, hadn't been found despite hours of dredging the lake.
After that day we steamrolled over anyone we wanted and got away with it, but a smothering emptiness possessed me that nothing could ease, for our Pyrrhic victories over the world's outcasts no longer helped me feel better; they didn't help me feel anything at all. I realize now that hate is the junk food of emotions; you can live on it for years and not feel yourself starving to death.
* * *
That fall we went to the town's annual Halloween Snap Apple Festival. I dressed as a ghoul and Liz was a cat, Dean a Musketeer and Kirk as a fat housewife. Bunny went as a ballerina and had dozens of these flowing skirts on her costume that kept snagging on everything. The night wore on and we crashed at my house since my dad was out of town again.
I got a fire going to ward off the chilly fall air and Kirk started telling ghost stories. We smoked dope and took turns telling our own gory versions of the local folklore. The mood got silly and manic: There's nothing better than a weird tale on Halloween night.
"Okay, listen to this," Bunny said, her speech slurred. "This guy at school told me he saw a ghost at the cemetery last week. He says you always see it when there's a full moon."
"Who doesn't see ghosts at the bone yard?" Dean said derisively.
"He swore," Bunny said, leaning forward. "it's Cam and Irma!!" We reacted with gasps and laughter.
"Hey, I don't want to talk about this," I said, picturing Irma with sunken eyes and a runny, wet face because she'd been in the lake three weeks before some hapless fisherman snagged her on his line.
"Maybe Patrick should be wearing the dress," Bunny said, her voice taking on that familiar combative edge.
"I'm not chicken," I said as dismissively as I could.
"Then prove it," Bunny said, her face beautifully evil. I honestly could have killed her then. "Go to the graveyard and get some dirt off of Irma's grave and bring it back."
"Oh how gruesome!" Liz said and laughed.
"That's lame," Dean said. "He could just get some dirt out of the yard here and say he did it and you're so stupid you'd believe him."
Bunny glared at him. "I'll be back." She stumbled to the kitchen I heard drawers opening and banging closed.
"Maybe it's true," Kirk said. He crossed his eyes and stuck his lower lip out and said, Boris Karloff style, and sang, "Welcome to my grave!"
"You're such a waste," Dean said and laughed. Bunny came back holding something in her hand.
"This is your proof," she said. "And it's so perfect! Get it? For Irma the pig!" She laughed and handed me a fork.
Feeling trapped, I shouted, "What the hell is that for? Am I supposed to eat her too?!" Kirk brayed and fell over backwards on the floor.
"You're such a dickweed," Bunny said, looking hurt.
"Okay, now what?" I asked, feeling a pang of guilt and taking the fork from her.
"Go to the graveyard and stab it into her grave," she said, "and if you're not too scared come back and we'll all drive there and see if you did it."
"That's great," Kirk said, and looking at me, "So how 'bout it Patty?" They all stared at me and I knew I had to do it or they'd get me next.
"When I get back you're next douche bag," I said to him as I left.
It took me half an hour to stumble to the place. A thin mist had settled along the ground in the lower spots and the place looked like every horror movie I'd ever seen. For a paranoid instant I thought the wide tree trunks that lined the gravel entrance road were the pants legs of giant adults watching me ready to beat me for the slightest infraction of graveyard etiquette; curtsy when you pass an old tomb you spoiled brat! Bow your head when you see an open grave you stupid turd! Take that! And that! And that!
I screamed and fell onto the damp ground. Frogs bellowed and crickets chirped softly, an owl hooted occasionally into the cool country air. It all started getting on my nerves really. When I opened my eyes the trunks were inanimate again and I continued on to the west end near the big fountain. My heart pounded so hard my breath jerked with every beat.
When I found Irma's grave, I steadied up and pushed away the awful thoughts that flooded my mind and stared at the fertile earth that housed her now. When I kneeled to put the fork in I noticed it smelled like the potting soil my mom had used for her petunias at home before she died. What the cancer hadn't gobbled up of her was out here by the pond a few yards over. God I had to get away. I plunged the fork deep into the soil and winced when my wrist sank in. I imagined a hand popping up and wrapping fleshless fingers around my forearm; a hand with long, filthy claws because not even a rotting body can rob you of your tip-scratchers. I snatched my hand back and fell hard on my ass. I scooted back and heard leaves crunching in the forever darkness behind me and what sounded like lurching footsteps. My heart leapt to my throat and before I could run away a voice floated out in the stillness.
"I want my head!" it said. I heard muffled laughter.
"You a-whacks," I said, trying not to sound relieved.
"We almost had you," Kirk said as they stepped out from behind the trees.
Bunny pointed to the fork. "He did it," she said in awe.
"Yeah, he's goddamn hero," Dean said and kicked the grave.
"Right on," Liz said and put her arms around my neck. A noise came from our left and everyone jumped.
"Oh my God, what was that?" Bunny whispered, her voice shaky.
"It's fat Irma about to get us! HELP!!" Kirk yelled and ran in circles, throwing his dress up over his head revealing white, lacy bloomers.
"We need to leave," Liz said. She took my hand and we ran along the gravel road with Kirk and Dean chasing us and yelling obscenities. Flying high, no one noticed Bunny wasn't with us when we jumped into Dean's car. When we got back to my house we all did some needle work on each other and everyone tripped out.
The next morning near noon I awoke in the front yard with Liz by my side. Head throbbing and a mouth full of gossamer spit, I managed to finally wake her. We got dressed and went inside. Kirk groaned as he pulled himself up from behind the couch. His mouth was stained pink from sleeping with lipstick on.
"Where are we?" he asked and flopped back down on the floor.
"My house," I said.
"Where's Bunny?" Liz asked. We looked upstairs and in the yard.
"I think she slept at the bone yard," Dean said coming out of the kitchen with a cup of coffee. "You'd better go get her." But before we could leave a police cruiser pulled into the long driveway and twenty minutes later we were at the police station.
When no one would talk, Chief Wilder began telling revolting juvie hall stories but soon started shouting what useless crap we all were. After a half hour I couldn't take anymore and told him about the graveyard dare.
"So it was all friendly fun?" he asked skeptically when I finished. He leaned forward and asked, "Do you know where Bunny Taylor is now?"
"As you know," Dean said, trying to sound in control, "my father is an attorney. I suggest you tell us what this is all about and why we're here. Otherwise this constitutes harassment."
The chief leaned back in his swivel chair and looked at Dean as though he were an incredibly stupid insect from outer space. Dean blushed and lowered his head and played with the table edge.
"Officer Reed," the Chief said calmly, his eyes boring into Dean, "please tell these fine young people what they're here for and uh, use small words."
The officer told us what they had found earlier that day as she shoved the evidence in our faces and shouted, "What is this?!" In the confused silence everything seemed far away and I dry-heaved under the table, praying she wouldn't force me to tell them what this thing was because I knew what it was but no one else seemed to.
We were finally released to our parents with the chief promising he would be speaking to us again soon. A young officer drove me home as dad was unable to drive again due to his love affair with brandy. Ultimately, I think the chief knew what happened but couldn't prove any of it. I think he may have even suspected Kirk's old man of doctoring things up and going by the chief's reputation, he'll find the truth one way or another. I hope he does anyway.
* * *
When my tour of duty was up I came back here. I could have gone anywhere else to start over but for what? So I could spread more misery to new and exciting places? Guilt pulled me back home with an insipid gentleness reminding me that I'll never be free of anything.
The day I was drafted dad left town after marrying a girl that I'd gone to high school with. I live alone now in the big house still filled with all of mine and mom's things. Some days I'll bury my face in one of her sun dresses hanging in her closet and the scent of Dove soap and Jergen's lotion lulls me to sleep. On a good day I'll dream of warm evenings bathed in orange and gold sunlight and buzzing honey bees and mom's laughter at dad burning the hot dogs on the patio grill while I help her make lemonade. The patio is overgrown now and there are people staying at the house, draft dodgers and their girlfriends, new faces mostly. I don't like them but when I come through the door from a night at the cemetery there's always a beer offered or some white rail. It's better than being alone I guess.
Sometimes I can see Irma and Cam even without a fool moon and sometimes she'll stare at me with these coal-black eyes and I can see my reflection in those twin pools of tar. On one of my bad nights though, she looks like she has sharp teeth and my heart jumps for fear she'll devour me. Then she moves and I can see it was only a play of shadows on her white face and she's really smiling. I think it's a forgiving smile too, and in it I find peace and courage. I take comfort that she died pure, that she died for love, and in the end that love evened the score for her one final time.
You see, the cops found Bunny that morning wide-eyed and dead on top of Irma's grave of what was later discovered to be a heart attack. There was a beautiful little pewter cross pendant stuck through one of the flowing skirts she had worn. I think that what happened Halloween night as we were racing away Bunny, flying high and fueled by diet pills, believed a vengeful dead Irma was grabbing her from the great beyond. And maybe she was because I don't quite know what a cross pendant was doing there snagged in Bunny's skirts instead of a fork. It had still been in Irma's truck the night we killed her. Well, I think Irma can fill me in. I'm going to ask her to tonight.
True love washes the pain and savageness away. It makes everything kind and human again. As I sit here waiting I'm humming an old Southern Baptist hymn they made us sing at mom's funeral; mommy, warm and safe with her soft kisses and big blond hair and frosty white lipstick. It took a year for the cancer to eat her alive and in the end she didn't even know who I was. Well, this handy little hymn asked, "Are you washed in the Blood of the Lamb?" Yes, I am, for what else is true love in this world but the surrendering of your own life's blood? True love found or lost; either way you bleed. Not even the Lord Himself could escape that awful truth and neither can I.
So I'll be going now, I've written all I can stand and I feel the pure whiteness inside me taking over now, letting me escape from breathing. But there's one last thing you should know. Tonight I died brave and true, and my blood has washed away all of the pain and hell. I'm brave from the silent strength I see in Irma's endless eyes and I'm pure from my love for you Human, because humanity is only lovable from a distance and that's where I intend to be.
Finally, here they come now. They're holding hands as usual and sitting near Irma's grave. She is smiling at me and I can see those teeth. They look very real and red, but maybe it's the moonlight. I'm just very tired.
I hope what I've written opens your heart. I hope you will see what I finally learned from mom and Irma; that there's always a better place to go. I hope you'll stay here until midnight sometime and see Cam and Irma for yourself. I hope you'll look for me, I'd like for you to at least, because I'll be real then. Look for me please. I'll be whole and maybe a little noble too, and you'll see me watching these beautiful, timeless stars with my friends, unafraid and free.
And maybe then you'll love.
THE END
------
Paula Grant-LeClaire
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