Kathryn Erskine - Mockingbird

At home I think about Devon’s Heart. I sit on the sofa and look at his chest. It’s still under the gray sheet. There are rays of light coming in through the blinds and the dust swirls around in the beams and hits the chest and I wonder if any of the dust particles are Devon and if I can feel him.

I close my eyes and remember some of the things that happened on The Day Our Life Fell Apart. That’s what Dad calls it. After we came home from the hospital that night — with no Devon — Dad was yelling and kicking the furniture and the walls and he started pounding the chest with his fists and shouting, Why? Why? WHY? and he threw the woodworking books and Scout manual into Devon’s room and slammed the door and said, No no no no no, until I screamed at him to STOP IT! STOP IT! STOP IT! Then he put the sheet over the chest and now he never even looks in that corner.

I press myself against the sofa and squish my eyes tight and even though I try not to I remember being at the hospital and how there were sharp lights and siren noises and loudspeaker noises and beeping noises and medicine smells and finally people dressed in green pajamas and paper slippers said to Dad, We tried but we couldn’t close your son’s chest. His Heart — there was nothing left — there was nothing we could do. Nothing we could do.

I’m shaking and sucking my sleeve and I try to stop thinking about The Day Our Life Fell Apart but when I open my eyes Devon’s chest is staring at me so I slide off of the sofa and crawl over to it and pull the sheet up from the bottom and push underneath it and get inside the empty hollow chest and I imagine myself as the Heart. Devon’s Heart. My arms are atria and my legs are ventricles and I pump the blood all around the right way because there has to be something I can do. Something I can do. First I pump the blood to the lungs to pick up the oxygen then to the left atrium and ventricle then to the aorta to go all around his body like it should. All my valves are working so the blood flow is right and I can feel the beat and I rock with it because rocking makes me feel alive and I want his chest to be alive. I pump the blood around Devon’s body. Dev-on. Dev-on. Dev-on. I say it louder and louder to make it true and my whole body is beating for his louder and louder and wilder and wilder and my head is banging the sides of the chest but I don’t care. DEV-ON! DEV-ON! DEV-ON! And I hear Dad’s voice screaming like at the hospital and I don’t want to hear it because I don’t want any part of The Day Our Life Fell Apart to happen again so I focus and become the Heart louder and louder and harder and harder but then I fall out of the chest because there’s no way to close it and I feel Dad grabbing me but all I can do is scream the words from the green hospital people, I TRIED BUT THERE WAS NOTHING I COULD DO!

Caitlin! Caitlin! I hear Dad yelling but I can’t stop crying. I feel him wrap me in my blanket and put me back on the sofa and I feel his arm around me as he sits next to me in the dark. The ringing in my ears finally stops but then the phone rings.

I feel Dad get up and watch him disappear into the kitchen. He comes running back into the living room and turns on the TV and stands there looking at it. He breathes heavily.

The man on Fox Five News has a microphone in his hand and is talking in front of a brick building. I’m at the courthouse where the remaining killer from the Virginia Dare Middle School shooting has just had his preliminary hearing. The hearing found that there’s enough evidence against him to be put on trial for the murders of teacher Roberta Schneider and young students Julieanne Morris and Devon Smith. That horrific shooting was a devastating blow to this small community — oh! There he is! The picture jumps around wildly until it’s on a boy in an orange suit with police all around him. He doesn’t look much older than Devon. Mr. Fox Five News shouts as he pushes his microphone past a crowd of people, What do you have to say for yourself? The boy in orange stares into the camera and grins a half smile. Then he lifts his handcuffed hands and gives a thumbs-up sign. Dad goes to the bathroom and throws up. The camera switches to a lady sitting inside at the news desk. She says, We’ll hear more about this story later but isn’t it good that we now have closure?

I suck my sleeve. I don’t think there is anything good about any of it. And I wonder how CLOsure can help. And what it is. When Dad comes back to the living room and turns off the TV I ask him, What is CLOsure? He says he has to call a neighbor but when Mrs. Robbins comes over he forgets to ask her what closure means. He just says she is going to take care of me because he has a headache and needs to take a shower. I wonder if it is one of the crying showers. I close my eyes.

I can see the light come on through my eyelids and I hear a creaking sound and then Mrs. Robbins’s shaky voice. Can I get you something Caitlin? Hot chocolate? Warm milk?

My Dictionary.

Dictionary?

Yes.

Oh. I was thinking of —

PLEASE.

More creaking. Okay dear.

I look up CLOsure and it says: the state of experiencing an emotional conclusion to a difficult life event such as the death of loved one. I do not know how to get to the state of experiencing an emotional conclusion so I ask Mrs. Robbins, How do I get to the state of experiencing an emotional conclusion to a difficult life event?

Her mouth opens and closes three times and makes a squeaky noise. Excuse me, she says, and runs into the kitchen but I can hear her blowing her nose and now I can hear Dad crying in the shower so I put my purple fleece over my head and close my eyes and plug my ears and with my elbows I squeeze my Dictionary tight against my chest.

I WAIT ALL MORNING FOR MY MRS. Brook time. I run-walk to her room because of No Running In The Halls. I push the door open without even knocking and ask, How do I get to the state of experiencing an emotional conclusion to a difficult life event?

She stands up from the round table. What do you mean?

Closure, I say. I’m talking about Closure. How do I find it?

Sit down Caitlin. Is this… are you talking about the news? The boy from the shooting?

I nod about a hundred times because she is a little slow Getting It today.

This is very stressful for our entire community. We’re all looking for Closure.

I Look At The Person. But she’s not answering my question.

Come sit down.

I’m still standing.

Okay , says Mrs. Brook, I’ll sit. She puts her hands in front of her on the table and clasps them together. She takes a deep breath and lets it out. Slowly. She closes her eyes.

Is she praying? This isn’t church, I remind her.

I know. I’m thinking. She scratches the part in her hair then puts her hands together again. Sometimes the process of a funeral and burial and doing things like putting wreaths on grave sites help give Closure.

Devon was cremated so that will not work for me.

Some people go to church.

It’s not Sunday, I point out.

I mean on Sundays do you and your father go to church?

I shrug . We used to go to one with the Boy Scouts but not anymore. Now we just drive past it.

Church might be helpful. Or seeing a counselor.

I Look At The Person. You’re a counselor. I see you.

I know but your dad might like to go see a counselor too.