The Grave SleeperThey would never know how he managed to get to the cemetery. He remembered his mother sitting at the back of the bus by the window. It must have been almost a year ago. She sat straight up in the back seat, her black purse on her lap, her fingers nervously wrapped around each other. She stared out the window until she saw the gas station with the winged horse on its sign. Then, she pulled at the cord above his head. It was green and made a pinging sound that lifted the driver's head up into the rear view mirror, and the bus then slowed and pulled over to the curb.Now, at ten years old, he boarded the bus alone, quickly handed the driver his coins, and headed to the back seat. While keeping his eyes glued out the window he watched row after row of houses, storefronts, and vacant lots pass by, searching and waiting for the sign with the winged horse. He did not notice the bus driver eyeing him through the rear view mirror. When the sign appeared in the back window he yanked at the cord before he even knew he did it, and when the bus came to a stop the driver had to tell him to pull open the back door to get off. As he walked across the street, a light drizzle covered his bare head and the sidewalk around him. He stepped past the old woman selling flowers and entered into the cemetery. Rows and rows of gravestones spread before him, and he fought to remember whether his mother turned left or walked straight. Finally, he chose left and followed the winding path, listening to the crunch and echo of his footsteps. They were the only footsteps he heard. He walked a little faster, wondering what if he did hear other footsteps, footsteps growing louder but no one to be seen, footsteps behind him, gaining on him, nipping at the very heels of his sneakers. He was running. As he neared the little grave on the left, he was panting and out of breath, and he slowed to a walk. The back of his throat tasted like blood, and he tried to whistle through the rain by sucking air in rather than blowing it out. A girl's name was on the gravestone. Born the same year as him. He remembered his mother saying that teardrops covered that grave from morning till night, just before she turned down the path on her left, her black purse dangling from her arm, her back as straight as when she sat in the bus. He stopped, but no one was there. No footsteps. He was safe, he told himself, and jangled the remaining coins in his pocket. The coins he would leave by the grave. No one mentioned it was his father's birthday, but he remembered even if they did not. Turning down the same path past the little girl's grave he saw something move. Quickly he told himself it couldn't have been. He saw it again, and told himself that the finger was just his imagination. There was no way possible. His mind was just playing games on him. But what if it did move, the dirt stirring, and then the hand, an arm lifting out of the soil, bony, dirt-crusted elbows, fingers stretching, groping. He ran, then fell down, then ran faster. As he passed the cement bench, he was breathing hard and crying. Then, at the corner where the paths crossed, he stopped. As soon as he saw it out of the corner of his eye he recognized the gravestone. All thoughts of footsteps, of hands and arms lifting themselves out of the earth vanished. Even if they pushed up all around him now it wouldn't matter. He was transfixed in the spot where he stood, the only spot where he could possibly be, a spot he fit into perfectly. There was the sound of crickets in the distance, the sound of his own breath in his ears, the sound of the rain hitting the path. He stood for a long time silent, thinking what his classmates, his teacher, his mother would think of him now. What they would think of his standing at a distance, rubbing his eyes, buttoning the top button of his shirt against the biting chill swirling now across his stinging cheeks. The same button he always refused to button when told. When finally he walked, he walked all at once, unchecked, headlong, the gates swung wide open. He didn't stop until he was directly in front of the stone, less than an arm's length away. He felt a chill, wondering what he would do if a hand, if his father's hand came out from the earth below him? He didn't look down but reached his hand out and touched not the stone but the letters, just the first letter, the "L." He didn't think of the letters as being part of the stone, forgetting just for a moment that the stone existed at all. The letters had a life of their own, suspended in their own plane, own seam, own solution awash in clarity and drops of pure shape. The drops of rain were not noticed as he traced each letter with his small finger. Slowly, carefully tracing, transforming, he moved as an artist dropping deep into his medium. After the last letter he began working his way back again a letter at a time, telling himself they were just letters. Each one standing on its own, no different from the time back when, not so very long ago, in the linoleum-floored room, rubber galoshes on the floor of the closet with yellow raincoats and rain caps hanging on hooks, they learned one letter at a time. It was only when he again reached the "L" and stopped, thought for a moment what to do next, that he realized that he was standing on the grave itself. That very instant he knew he should step off, leap off, dive even if he hurt himself. He felt the earth damp beneath his feet, and his weight on the damp earth. Then, he imagined his feet sinking slow and sure, his body growing warm in the stinging droplets of rain. A warmth rose from within soothing his skin, his forehead, his lips, which he now held a finger against wondering when the sinking would stop. Hoping without saying it, without thinking it, that it would not. He found himself kneeling down, his knees touching the earth, his fingers reaching, his shirt growing damp, his father just below him. He placed his hand down on the soil, palm down, where he thought his father's hand would be. He could feel the palm beneath his, through the soil, only a layer of soil between them. He laid his cheek against the ground and felt warmth. Then he stretched and curled his body. His father would protect him. He closed his eyes and listened to the earth, what was below the earth, to the rain falling against his cheek. He breathed in the damp smell of the soil. Lying in the rain, making an effort to keep his eyes still and closed, he imagined himself again tracing over the letters on the gravestone, but this time he saw the letters vanish beneath his touch. When he was done he pictured the stone blank and smooth, and watched himself step to the next one. He followed these new letters with his finger, watching open-eyed as they vanished with a touch and rub of his skin. From stone to stone he moved methodically removing the letters, the names, thinking of all the smiling faces, the lives he had changed, brought back, reunited, and the families all sitting together for the first time in how long? The crickets had grown silent and the clouds had parted in a slant, a seam wide enough for the setting sun to filter down onto the smooth surfaces of the blank stones. He thought of what names he would put in their place. What name he would put on his father's stone now that his father was home sitting at the table, the gold watch band wrapped tightly around his wide wrist, hands folded in front of him as his mother paced between the kitchen and the dining room, wondering where he, only ten years old could be. Why he was so late. What name to put on the stone? His sister's? He shook his head, a drop of rain falling down his cheek. The teacher who yelled at him in the schoolyard threatening to punish him? He shook his head. Himself? His own name? Yes, his own name. They would understand. His father at the table would say, "What a young man we raised." Yes, his own name on the stone. He opened his eyes, it was growing dark, and the letters on the gravestone remained unchanged. He stared at them and then reached into his pocket, still staring, and pulled out the coins. Placing them in a pile stacked perfectly even, he lay back down and listened to the footsteps on the path. They were loud, growing louder. Running full speed. Running towards him. He placed the palm of his hand on the spot, leaned his cheek against the damp ground just where he thought the other cheek would be, closed his eyes and clenched his small fist. A hand was underneath his stomach and a voice whispered, "My God, you're so young. What on earth are you doing here?" The man was bent over him, his nails and fingers were caked with dirt, his elbows crusted, his face worn and lined, the dark uniform creased and dusted and earth stained. The boy didn't move but lay there staring at the fingers, the hand, the elbow, listening to the whispering kind voice, beginning to feel warm and sleepy. He let his hand slide into the large one and felt the dirt ingrained fingers grasp around his. He never remembered standing but just walking hand in hand, trying to keep step for step with the large boots, down the path, into the dark and the rain. |