Kent Kelly - And the Ashes

And only because she had promised to finally sleep if he told her, he had spoken of the final call with Tom.

“I couldn’t believe it,” Mitch was whispering. He had Sophie’s rapt attention. She leaned in, took his hands, sat him down with her on the overturned plastic crates. “I mean, Tommy was in NORAD, for Christ’s sake. How on earth had he managed to make a phone call out of there? And I could tell he had been crying. First thing he said to me when I picked up, ‘I already talked to Lacie’s grandmamma.’ Who? But he just kept going. ‘I told her and she thinks I’ve gone crazy.’ I got him to slow down a little.”

Mitch ran his fingers through his thinning hair, shaking his head, staring down as if the dirt of the cellar floor was some kind of mathematical conundrum requiring a life-and-death solution. Whatever it was he saw there, he did not have the answer.

“It’s okay,” said Sophie. “I heard his last words for my own. You don’t need to tell me.”

“No. I do. I must .” Mitch glared at her, and she backed an inch away. He only realized then that she believed he was angry with her for some reason. “Sorry,” he said then. “He, he told me — demanded — that I go to her house in the Springs, until then I never even knew where your mother lived. He said I needed to go over to her house, get Lacie, and that she would fight me.”

“ Fight you?” Sophie asked. But already, she understood.

“You know, like I was crazy or something. But I went in and I told her a — a secret, that only Tom knew about her treatment of you as a child, like Tom had told me to, and that it was life and death now, and to do it for Patrice. Give me Lacie for Patrice, who had asked her mother only to take care of you, Sophie, and any children you might have. And I begged your mother to come with me. And she came . Tom had said, and I could hear yelled orders and even sobbing in the background on his end by that time so I… I was guessing, I guess I knew, he said, ‘Take grandmamma if you can, punch her if you have to. I’m dead serious.’ And I said, ‘Tom, you’re frightening me What the fuck is going on?’ And he said, “The thing .’ See, we used to talk about this all the time, when I was thinking about joining the NSA instead of him, and then again when I was taking the job at Rocky Flats, and I…”

Sophie did not dare say anything, she did not want to hear this, and yet she did . Her spirit, if nothing else, demanded it of her.

And Mitch was able at last to continue. “And I just lost it. That was the last thing I ever said to my little brother before he died. ‘What the fuck is going on?’ And he said, ‘Look, they’re going to find me. You saved my life once, you swore you’d let me one day make it up to you. This is that , right now. I am begging you to save my daughter. No time. I love you, big brother. Believe that. I always have.’ And I was like, “Tom, no, God, what am I supposed to say?’ But he’d already hung up, you know? He was going to hide, find a place for another call. He tried one more call to me but it never came through to me. And the sentries? The soldiers? How he eluded them all, I’ll never know. He had about another three hours left to live.”

She knew.

“They were hunting him down,” said Mitch. “My baby brother. He was already dead. He hung up on me, he’d never told me he loved me since daddy died, he hung up just so that he’d have a little more time to call you.”

The coal bin was piled high with country quilts and scalloped pillows, every one a masterpiece, each crocheted, knitted or woven by Auntie Jemm over the many years. Mitch had once told Sophie that Jemm owned a mean antique spinning wheel, and knew how to use it. At the time, she had thought it was the funniest and quirkiest joke the charming Mitch had told her yet. But now, she could see that the wheel was real. It was sitting enthroned upon a table and haloed in hovering strings of coal dust, protected by a yellowing plastic sheet.

Sophie crawled into the coal bin, and as she did so it became another world. The pillow-crowded space seemed enormous. More than that, it felt perfectly safe. She felt like she was sneaking into her daughter’s sleepover and breaking a promise by doing so. She crawled over, looked down on Lacie sleeping. Her nose was running, the tip of her nose was scabbed, and one knee that was peeking out from a big hole in her jeans was scraped and bruised. But that was all.

Lacie was nuzzling in sheepskin, the inner lining of Tom’s old leather bomber jacket. Sophie had taken it from the shelter on a whim, and yes, because it was the one thing that smelled the most like Tom… his cologne, his sweat, amber and sandalwood, his tears, if tears could be said to hold a scent, a scent of salt and memory. And here now was her daughter, Tom’s daughter, resting with a little smile and inhaling, nodding, fighting sleep and trying to wake. Lacie sensed her mother was very near.

Sophie crawled in further, nudged her daughter awake. She rested her head in the palm of one aching hand, stretching her entire form out and waiting. As Lacie woke, her fingers began to trace the old patches that Tom had stitched into the jacket during his nights in the half-built shelter. There were granddaddy’s Vietnam patches, some kind of radio interest insignia, mountaineering and ski patches too. The jacket had passed from father to son, son to wife, wife to beloved child. To see Lacie lying there, the floppy bulk of the jacket framed around her shoulders like the hug of a big man possessed of gentle might and grace, it was a miracle.

Lacie opened her eyes. “Hi, mommy,” she whispered.

Sophie grinned. “How’s my little princess?”

“I think, I’m going to be okay,” said Lacie, sitting up a little and crossing her legs. “Really.” Her bare feet stuck out of the jeans’ legs, and so did her shins. She was going to be a very tall girl. She would grow strong. “Don’t talk about daddy, or anything, okay? Not yet. Don’t make me remember. Please.”

“Okay,” said Sophie. And Lacie did not so much hug her, as turn her back and flop down into her mom’s embrace. They looked out together up at the last lit lantern, listening to the drip of water and Mitch’s methodical snoring.

“We’re going to Grand Teton and Yellowstone soon,” said Sophie. “Remember? Remember how I always said you’d love it there?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay then. We’ll go when it’s safe, I promise.”

“Wyoming, right? Are the big and little bears there?”

“What?”

“Bears,” said Lacie. “You know, like in cartoons, or in the movies.”

“Yes, more like in the movies,” Sophie agreed. “There certainly are. But I’ll protect you. Mostly they stay in the back country, I think.”

“Oh. Mommy?”

“Yes?”

“What is the world like?”

Sophie did not know how to answer this. She hugged her daughter closer, kissed her hair. But she could not yet speak. When she opened her mouth and was almost ready to try, to say something simple and profound, Lacie turned in her arms. Mother and daughter stared at one another, noses almost touching. Lacie frowned and nuzzled Sophie’s free and bandaged hand.

“I miss Silas already,” said Lacie. “I felt him, knew him, it was like he was amazing. I could tell, mommy, he loved you.”

And that was when Sophie began to cry.

Lacie brushed the tears away with her fingertips, drawing them off and drying them in her own hair. It was the most adult, almost ancient, gesture that Sophie had ever seen in a seven-year-old child.