Page 78 of And Still Her Voice
“We’ll catch up later,” she said, kissing me on the cheek before taking a seat in the row behind our pew with three of her younger brothers whose names and ages I couldn’t quite remember at the moment. But I knew who was missing. My cousin Frederico “Freddy,” killed recently in Vietnam, and I’d learn nothing more than he died a hero in combat. The family liked to talk about everything except death.
After the wake, Mom was in good hands. I wasn’t up to any gathering and asked Maggie to drop me off back at the apartment.
***
In New Orleans, River picked up the phone. “Remember, I’m there with you in spirit,” he said before hanging up, and yet I felt terribly alone.
Still jetlagged, I passed out on the living room couch before taking off my shoes.
When my family got home, Michael woke me up. “Goldilocks, you’re sleeping in my bed.”
“Anna, go to the room,” Mom said, and I felt like a kid being punished again.
***
I bawled during the Mass at Cristo Del Rey the following morning unable to read what I’d prepared, so Maggie took over:
Let love be the answer
Let us not die with Dad
Le us think of death as a second birth.
Let him transcend.
And we can keep on living.
Maggie finished by talking about how much fun Dad was sometimes and it was true. All the camping trips, the outings to the park. I even remembered the trips to the Pike in Long Beach where I was brave enough to go on the roller coaster. I was the boy he never had until Michael, “a softie” who, according to Dad, would grow up afraid of his own shadow, but I was the one afraid of my shadow.
Michael hugged me, and then when the lone singer sang “Amazing Grace,” I lost it, my whole body quaking.
“You had everything you needed, I tried to make sure of that,” Grandma whispered. “He loved you and only did his best.”
His best? I didn’t have the energy to argue in church and so I would lose ground again by staying silent. Father Reynoso held the chains connected to the incense thurible, and after three swings, the smoke hovered over the first few family pews.
I felt faint and cradled my heavy head burdened with the guilt of thinking badly about my father, the remorse about his stabbing and the events leading up to that night, for running away and breaking his heart, for setting things in motion leading to the day he killed himself.Oh Dad, I hopeheaven gives you a second chance.
We followed the casket down the aisle, shuffling out into the mottled daylight where Mom stood under the dark clouds hanging so low, she wore them like a widow’s veil. And then the sky spit onto the mariachi band that Maggie had arranged to perform. I knew Dad loved the Mexican culture, this seemed like overkill to me, but it’s what Mom said he’d want. I also knew how much he loved my mother—almost to death. This was all really fucked up.
My gut ached. Except for coffee, I hadn’t eaten anything that morning, even though Mom had gotten up before everyone else to make breakfast.
But now, I couldn’t stomach being around people anymore and didn’t feel like going to the burial. Grandma Phoebe didn’t push me to go either. We both knew he was already partying with the dead somewhere else. After some heavy sprinkles, an umbrella appeared over my head like my own personal black cloud. I turned to see the handsome Mexican man with the nice smile from the wake holding the handle.
“Thank you. Do you have a car?”
CHAPTER 27
The Funeral
The ’57 Chevy Bel Air had been his dad’s car. A set of dice hung from the rearview mirror, swinging sideways as the car hydroplaned across a wet, oil-slickened road. I braced myself, grabbing the armrest. A blaze of red brake lights and a boulevard of amber lights flashed all the way through downtown. I heard sirens.
After he slowed the car and pulled over to a stop, I turned toward him.
“I guess I should introduce myself, Anna.”
“Yeah, if I’m gonna die in a car crash, today, I guess I should at least know your name first.” I turned to look into cinnamon eyes, lashes like long black lacey mantillas. Not fair.
“I’m Ruben Moya,” he said, raising a right hand to make the sign of a cross and then he signaled to get back on the road.
