Hidebehind

Forty-Two

My mother's and father's faces were before me; I stood at their caskets, looking onto the wax mannequins that some horrible person had carved them into. Penny was beside me, holding my hand, and I'm not sure which of us squeezed tighter. These weren't my parents. This wasn't the mother that had tucked me into bed every night for as long as I could remember, kissed my forehead, told me I was her boy. This wasn't the mother who had picked me up from school when I was sick, who had read a million books to me, who had told me I was clever even when I felt stupid. This wasn't the father who had helped me with homework, who took me to the library every Saturday, who had helped me build a LEGO city as big as a table. This wasn't the father who had picked me up when I'd fallen off my bike or who'd every year let me put the angel on the Christmas tree. These weren't my parents. The people who had loved me more than the world, who had held me as a baby, who had promised to be there for me forever.

And yet, they were.

They were.

Something strong had hold of me, was pulling on me. My monster . . . it had me . . . and yet, I was unafraid. Was I breathing? I was too cold to know. Too cold to feel anything. Darkness all around. Silence and darkness. Such cold, and yet it was warm, somehow.

And then somewhere far away, so far I wasn't sure they were real, I heard voices, watery at first, and then slowly forming into bits and pieces I could understand.

. . . entirely submerged . . .

. . . the girl is shaken . . . all right . . .

. . . hypothermia . . .

. . . where's the old man? . . .

It's going to be okay.

My eyes opened. Popped open, just like that. All of everything had turned into such a blur of dark and noise and cold that I couldn't tell where I was, or how much time had passed, or even what had happened. I couldn't remember any of it. But then I saw the people in scrubs, the IV tubes in my arm, the bed I was in, and I knew that I was in the hospital. How long I'd been there, I didn't know, but when I woke, they called Great Grandma and Penny, and they were there within moments, so I figured I had maybe not been there too long.

Twenty-four hours had passed, they told me. Nearly a full day since I'd been pulled out of that water and Penny had been rescued. She seemed fine. Pale, but fine. And Great Grandma kissed me and cried a little and left to tell someone to get me a hot meal, now that I was awake to eat.

That left me and Penny alone, though there was a nurse there, fussing over me, taking my temperature and checking who-knew-what. When she finally left, I looked at my sister, whose eyes were as big and dark as my last memory of the cellar, and she stared back at me as if afraid speaking would break me.

Finally, I leaned toward her and hugged her hard, then quickly plumped back against my pillow. "Where were you?" I asked, beginning to recall what had happened (though somewhat unwillingly).

"The cellar stairs," she said. The top of them."

"But I came down the stairs; I didn't see you."

"No, the inside stairs."

I didn't understand.

"It was Jay," she said. "He said he had something to show me. I followed him into the house. It was . . . so spooky. Everything creaked. I . . . I thought it would all cave in around me. It was like the whole house was moving, but I followed him, and then he opened the cellar door . . . when I went in, he shut it." My sister shuddered as she remembered, and her eyes glazed over a little before she looked at me squarely again. "Thank you. For rescuing me."

My head shook before the argument even entered my mind. "But I didn't. I . . . I drowned . . . or almost did, I think. I don't know. And Penny—"

She waited, expecting me to say something, but I couldn't finish what I'd started. I couldn't explain it to her, what I'd felt, what I'd understood.

"I . . . I saw them."

"Who?"

"Mom. Dad." The words had felt so heavy, soft and heavy, like water-logged clothes, but I said them. Words I hadn't been able to say in so long . . . such a long time. They came out, and as heavy as they felt when I'd been pondering them, the minute they left my mouth, they became light, and they floated. I could almost see them drifting upward, toward the ceiling, moving somewhere far away, lessening the weight inside of me. I hadn't realized how much they'd been filling me, pressing on me from every which way inside. Taking up all the room they could and yet not satisfying me in any way.

And then the tears began to come. I couldn't help them. They welled up inside, they slipped out my eyes, they heaved up from my chest in sobs that had been buried for so many months.

"They're g-gone, Penny. M-mom and dad are gone. They aren't coming b-back for us."

My sister took hold of my hands, but I pulled away, cried a little more, and wiped my eyes.

"I know it, now. I know it."

I calmed myself, though it took some difficulty. Another thought occurred to me. "How didn't I drown?" I asked through my snuffles.

Penny handed me a tissue from a box nearby. "Grandpa came. He found us. He got you out."

I blew my nose hard and rubbed at my eyes some more. My Grandpa! He'd saved us both. I'd never have come out of that cellar without him; I was sure of it. "Oh Grandpa. Where is he? Is he in the hospital, too? Probably getting better. Can we go see him?"

Her eyes widening, then softening, Penny looked down at her lap. "He didn't make it, Rob. Grandpa is dead."