November 27, 2006
Chapter 22
(Filed under: The Novel)Chapter 22
The sun came up over Richmond as Anwyn ran. It was a new day.
As she pumped her arms she felt life and her pulse and everything she loved about running. The sky stretched in every direction, just beginning to be lit up by the rising sun, and it seemed to be stretching with hope.
After Grandpa Frank revealed his forty year secret, Anwyn stayed with him and they didn't go out to see Guadalupe for their usual Spanish lesson. She just sat in her grandfather's lap, crying and holding him.
When she finally got up to go they both wiped the tears away and laughed at each other. They didn't say anything. They didn't have to.
Oliver found Anwyn and the two drove back to Richmond in silence, though Oliver noticed it was a different kind of silence. But again, Oliver didn't ask.
Anwyn ran south of the tracks and down to the river like she always did. It occurred to her that nothing had really changed. She still didn't know anything more about Isabelle and why she did what she did. She didn't have any answers. But something had changed.
As she turned left at the blacktop and headed south for the river she noticed again the dying and fading bits of Richmond. The empty Richmond Café with the name stenciled on the window, but the building dark and faded. A window or two was broken and the brick façade was beginning to crumble. Through the windows you could see that the roof leaked and had even caved in back in the corner.
Next to the old restaurant was another decrepit building, this one used to be a grocery store or a drug store. It had been closed for decades, empty and forgotten. The windows had been boarded up long ago, the door nailed shut. On the other side of the empty restaurant was the gas station, still humming with life. Its building was just as old as the others, but it had a fresh coat of paint—relatively fresh, it was still a decade or two old—and clean windows. A thousand tiny repairs had kept the building in better shape, plus the constant flow of people that doesn't allow weeds to grow up through the floorboards.
The town felt empty and deserted, but there were also hints of life. It was haunted with the past, with remnants both visible and invisible. There were the physical traces that you could measure and analyze, but there were also psychological traces that you could feel just by walking down the street.
Lily had once walked down this street. She had perhaps shopped in the old general store, maybe ate in the Café and surely picked up her mail at the post office. She might have taken Robert and Jill into the gas station to pick up a candy bar and a soda pop on a warm day.
Anwyn really didn't know. She didn't know anything about her grandmother Lily. She was tempted to have the same questions and anger over Lily's suicide as she did for Isabelle's. Perhaps if Lily hadn't done it her mom wouldn't have felt such pain and would have been stronger in the face of Isabelle's death. Maybe the presence of a grandmother in their lives would have given Isabelle some extra measure of hope and grace and she wouldn't have felt the need to do what she did.
And who knows. Perhaps Grandpa Frank is only the man he is because of what he endured, and if he hadn't gone through it he would have been a lesser man, and would have inspired lesser things in Jack, in Isabelle, in Anwyn and in Oliver.
She could quickly see that asking the questions and playing the 'what if' game didn't get her very far. She found strength in her grandfather's acceptance. What's done is done.
By now she had reached the bridge. She looked out over the flowing muddy water of the Arkansas River and she remembered the day her sister died.
It was like any other summer day. It was August 11 and both Anwyn and Isabelle could feel the summer slipping away, could feel the coming school year closing in.
"I want you girls to clean up the basement today," Jack called as he stood at the door, ready to head out for work. Jill had already left hours before, needing to get to the office early. Jack waited for a response.
"I'm waiting," Jack said, beginning to grow impatient. He finally heard two mumbles of agreement from the kitchen and decided that was good enough.
That was when Anwyn flicked on the radio to listen to some music while she ate her breakfast. Isabelle was sitting at the table reading a magazine—though really just flipping through it for something to do. The ready-made pop song came on the radio and Anwyn moved her head back and forth to the beat. Isabelle mocked the song, one of the conversations Anwyn had already recollected.
"So after breakfast should we start on the basement?" Anwyn asked. But she already knew the answer. Isabelle would want to put it off as long as possible. These kind of tasks that their father threw out just before he walked out the door weren't unusual. He didn't like his daughters sitting around and wasting away their summer, so if they didn't have something planned he usually gave them something. Earlier this week they had reorganized the kitchen pantry. Back in June he made them clean out the garage, a project that lasted an entire week. While each project involved a lot of work, Jack didn't have outrageous expectations. The first day he came home to find the garage barely touched. Anwyn had found a set of Nerf guns and her and Isabelle had spent hours shooting little foam balls back and forth at each other.
Jack just nodded in approval and ducked inside before he was pelted with foam balls. The next day the dove a little deeper into the garage and deeper still the next day. By the end of the week they had made clear progress, and that was all Jack cared about.
He just didn't want to see his daughters sitting around in front of the TV every single day for an entire summer.
"Maybe," said Isabelle. Her one word answers were especially annoying to Anwyn. It was as if Isabelle were trying to save her energy so she minimized her words.
"Well I'm going to get started on it now," Anwyn said. That was often how these tasks went. Anwyn would get started on her own and Isabelle would join in out of guilt or boredom, depending on the day.
After putting her dishes in the dishwasher, Anwyn flicked on the light and started down the basement stairs. The stairs themselves were old, worn wood, big and thick like you could only find 100 years ago when the house was built. The basement walls were rough concrete, not the smooth, well finished walls you find in newer houses.
There were a few shelves at the bottom of the stairs and then the washer and dryer in the corner, along with a drying rack and other miscellaneous laundry supplies. The water heater and boiler were in the middle of the basement and the far back corner, the opposite one from the stairs, had both floor to ceiling shelving on both walls, each shelf bowing from the weight of the random boxes and junk stacked upon it. There were even a few overflowing boxes stacked on the floor in front of the shelves.
The mission, much like every other job they undertook that summer, was to go through the boxes, pull out the junk and the garbage or anything that could be sold or given away, reorganize what had to be kept, and put it away neatly. Hopefully they would end up with space on the shelves and a hefty load to take to Goodwill.
Anwyn pulled the string and the bare lightbulb came on with a buzz, lighting up the drab corner of the basement. She pulled one box off the shelf and got to work. Inside the box was old cords and various electronic miscellanea. As she pulled out some of the cords she could hear her sister's footsteps on the old wooden steps.
"Hey," Isabelle said when she came up behind Anwyn.
"Hi," Anwyn said. "Check out this ancient stack of telephone cord. Do you really think we need this much phone cord?" Isabelle took the length of cord Anwyn had been holding up and looked closer at it, noticing the left over residue from various bits of tape used for who knows what.
"Trash it," Isabelle said. That had become their favorite phrase as they dug into these old clean up jobs. At times it was a game to see how much stuff they could possibly throw away. "I swear, Dad thinks he needs to keep everything and then makes us clean it all out."
"Yep," Anwyn said. But she knew it wasn't just their dad.
"Oh, check this out," Isabelle said, reaching into the box and pulling out an ancient rotary phone, all fancy with a thin handle and chrome parts. When it hung up the entire cradle went down to disconnect the phone and hang up. It was the kind of phone you saw in movies being used by women who wore fur coats and smoked cigarettes in those long sticks. She picked up the receiver and spun the rotary dial, watching it click as it went around.
"I am so keeping this," Isabelle said. That was another hazard of the clean out projects. Junk that should probably end up being trashed ended up being reclaimed.
"It doesn't have any speed dial," Anwyn pointed out. "More like slow dial. By the time you dial your friend's number they'll already be busy."
"But that's not the point," Isabelle persisted. "Just imagine how I'll look talking on this phone." She threw her hair back and picked up the phone, flashing her eyes and giving a fake, movie star smile.
"Because the people you talk to on the phone can almost see how you'll look," Anwyn said.
"But I'll know how I look," Isabelle said, refusing to be dampened by Anwyn's simple logic.
The phone went in a pile and they continued digging into the treasures lost in boxes in the corner of the basement. Sometimes they talked and laughed, telling stories related to random bit of junk, other times they just worked quietly, and sometimes they snapped at one another, simply getting testy from the dust and work and boredom, as siblings do.
When they quit for lunch the job was half finished. Isabelle grabbed an apple and a magazine and sat down in front of the TV, leaving Anwyn to pull something out of the freezer and put it in the oven. Isabelle would later pick a few chicken nuggets from Anwyn's plate. At this point in the summer she was used to it and just cooked a few extra.
"I'm heading back down," Anwyn said after she finished lunch.
"OK, I'll be there quick," Isabelle said. But she wasn’t. As Anwyn dug into another box, this one full of old college text books bearing bright yellow 'used' stickers across the spines, Isabelle sat upstairs and flipped through her magazine, willfully avoiding the work in the basement.
It wasn't anything new for Anwyn. She finished up the shelf she was on, dealt with the various piles, and called it a day herself. Their dad would be happy as long as they just made progress, and they'd made enough progress for the day.
"I’m going to the library," Anwyn said from the door. "You want to come?"
"No, that's OK," Isabelle said, not looking up. Anwyn shrugged and walked out the door. It was the last time she saw her sister alive. Alive perhaps, but not lively. It was a typical summer day.
When Anwyn came back from the library Isabelle was gone and her dad was home. Isabelle had gone out with friends and wouldn't be home until later, though it was so normal that Anwyn didn't even ask.
She had dinner with her parents, watched some TV, read a book about physicist Richard Feynman—the book belonged to her dad and she thought it sounded interesting. Something about a science nerd with a sense of humor appealed to her. She went to bed just before 11, shutting off the lights and making sure the porch light was on for Isabelle. Her parents had long since retired to bed.
When she woke up in the morning it was early and her dad was sitting on the edge of her bed.
"Hey beautiful," he whispered in as calm a voice as he could manage. She rubbed her eyes and moaned, thinking her dad was waking her up early for some ungodly chore.
"Wake up, Anwyn," he said a little louder. "I need to tell you something." Now his voice gave himself away. It wavered this time and as her eyes adjusted she could see the emotion in his face. He looked old.
"What is it?"
"It's Isabelle," Jack said, pausing while he searched for the words. Anwyn immediately assumed she hadn't come home last night. Anwyn remembered thinking that Isabelle had finally taken her drama to new heights. She wandered if it was another boy, another make-out session in a semi-public place.
But her father didn't continue with some tale of Isabelle's late night indiscretions. Instead he ran his hand through his hair and cleared his throat. He reached for Anwyn's hand and finally choked out the words.
"Isabelle's dead," he said, simply and to the point. Any of the usual euphemisms felt awkward to him and he stuck with the plain language he knew. "She—she killed herself last night." He squeezed Anwyn's hand as he finished and lost it, the tears streaming down his face again.
As Anwyn stood on the bridge south of Richmond remembering how she first found out about her sister's suicide, it still pained her to think of her initial reaction.
As she looked at her weeping father and realized this was no joke and no simple night of poor teenage choices, Anwyn realized she'd have to finish cleaning out the basement by herself.
Thankfully she kept the thought to herself and instead managed to question her dad.
"What? What do you mean?" she asked. "Suicide?"
"As I was getting ready this morning her door was open and I looked in on her," Jack said. "She was sprawled across the bed, still dressed. I thought she must have gotten home really late and crashed and I came in to check on her and make sure everything was OK. I was rehearsing my lecture when I saw her eyes. They were open. Glazed over. That's when it hit me. I checked her pulse, but she was already cold. The ambulance is on the way—I wanted to tell you before they showed up."
The simple reality of it set in.
"Is she—is she still there?" Anwyn asked.
"Yeah, she is," Jack said. "The police said to—"
"The police?" Anwyn interrupted.
"Yeah, the 911 operator said they'd need to investigate," Jack explained. "I told them there was an empty bottle of pills on the floor—I don't even know where they came from—but they said it's standard procedure or something."
By now Anwyn was sitting up, legs crossed in front of her, still holding her daddy's hand and picking at her lip with the other hand. Her dad had a vacant stare, old and pained. He was clinging to the simple facts in order to cope. Simple, straightforward procedures. It reminded him or programming language and it kept the emotions from overwhelming him.
"Mom's on her way, too," Jack said, remembering another detail. "She had just gotten to work—she might have to fight traffic to get home. She's really upset—she'll need you." It was a thought that proved fruitless. Jill was indeed upset—she started screaming into the phone when Jack told her. He somehow managed to calm her enough, and she said she was on her way before hanging up. But then she flung the phone against the wall and stormed out, leaving it lying in pieces on her office floor. When she did make it home she was distant and cold and even though Anwyn wrapped her arms around her mother she didn't feel close.
Anwyn and Jack sat there on the edge of her bed holding each other. Jack kept thinking through details, checking them off and sorting them by priority. Anwyn found herself thinking how disruptive it would be—an ambulance coming down the street (would they use their siren? she hoped not, it was still early and she didn't want it to wake the neighbors), strange people in Isabelle's bedroom, the body (it felt so very odd to suddenly call her sister a body), her distraught mother trying to fight traffic on the way home, breakfast—would it be rude to have breakfast while they hauled her dead sister's body out of the house? The random questions and thoughts kept coming, and tears dripped down her face.
Her dad reached up with his sleeve to dab them, and it made Anwyn cry all the more because they weren't tears of pain and loss, they were tears of guilt for thinking such terrible things in the face of her sister's death. She wasn't crying for Isabelle, she was crying for herself.
Posted by kevin at November 27, 2006 10:17 PM
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