Surfacing (Spark Saga) (8 page)

             
“Sounds nice,” I reply.

             
“Wear some old jeans,” she adds.  “For digging.”

             
“Got it.”  I finish up my breakfast and go back upstairs to change my pants.

              The drive to the cemetery isn’t long, but the silence is overwhelming.  My mother stares ahead, and I watch the trees race by in a blur, trying to think of something to say.  I keep wanting to turn on the radio, but I don’t want to make my discomfort apparent.  I try to busy my mind with thoughts of the emails.  Is it even possible that my father is contacting me, somewhere from the future?  And if so, did he actually die?  Is he still alive?  Did he manage to cheat the irony of the grave?  My thoughts are consumed with the enormity of possibility.  And, with no one to discuss this matter with, I am even more disturbed.  But it’s actually a good sort of disturbed…sort of like going into an old abandoned house just to explore what’s there—wondering the whole time if something ghastly is going to jump out.  There certainly is a fine line between fear and excitement.

             
Thoughts of Tess also pervade my mind.  She had been lovely the other day, standing in front of the lockers—so lovely in her absolute ignorance of what has transpired between us.  I wonder, suddenly, if she has romantic interest in anyone else.  The idea pains me, although I realize I must be prepared for the possibility.  The prospect of winning Tess is difficult enough, but fighting for her, on top of winning her—that is enormous.  My hearts flutters with the anxiety of it.  I wish I could simply capture her and take her away to another time and place and never come back.  I imagine this scenario so clearly—Tess and me, alone, holding each other, her long, pale fingers entwined with mine as I whisper love in her ear—but then, I am derailed from the reverie by my mother’s voice.

             
“We’re here,” she says, pulling into a parking lot. 

             
We get out and she hands me some bags.  We walk solemnly to the grave.  It’s been a while since I’ve been here.  For the first year after his death, we came several times a week, it seemed. 

             
My mother immediately starts pulling up the weeds grown up around the
headstone
.  She tells me where to place the mums and I busy myself digging the holes.  The ground is hard and it’s more difficult than I imagined it would be.  I make one straight line of four holes, then come out and make a second staggered row right in front of it.  Year after year, the flowers would shrivel and die, the spent flowers feeding the roots that would stay insulated in the ground for the next season. 
I wonder how long they will bloom.  How many years?  Maybe forever.  The natural cycle is timeless
.  And the thought makes me smile, as I gently place each mum in the ground, scooping the soil around each one, patting it down with care.

Tess

             
Cricket wrote down the clue from the bricks, placed the slip of paper back in the cylinder, and returned it to its hiding place.  Within minutes, we are back in Cricket’s car on our way to Fuller Park.  On the way to the park, I drive so Cricket can write more in her notebook.

             
“This is gonna be so cool,” she says, her pen going wild.  “Hey, who do you think put the clues out?”  She asks, looking at me.

             
“Who knows?  Could be anyone….Ok, so to Fuller Park?”  My heart skips a little, thinking about that place.  But, for adventure’s sake…

             
“Absolutely!”  Cricket is way too excited about this, I’ve decided.

             
It’s about 10:30 when we get to the park.  The whole time in the car, I try to think about other things, but apparently my body wasn’t into that, because my palms are sweaty and my heart is racing by the time I park the car. 

             
“You know?  The trees
are
sort of overgrown here.  It’s run down,” Cricket points out.

             
“
Fuller
has a double meaning, then.  But would we expect anything less from a poet?”

             
Cricket chuckles.  “Not at all.  C’mon.  I have the app loaded.”

             
We pass the phone back and forth, watching the blue dot.  We pass the swings, the pavilions and benches, all the way to the edge of a small lake that contains a forest of cattails.  “Now what?”  I ask.  “It can’t be under water.”

             
“Well, technically, I suppose it
could.
”

             
I shake my head.  “No way am I going in there.”

             
“Me either.  Let’s walk a little to the left and right and see if the target gets clearer.”

             
We move left first.  There is a pile of flat rocks along the edge of the water, leading to a small dock.

             
“We’re actually getting closer,” Cricket notes.  “Keep moving.”

             
We step cautiously onto the dock.  It’s a bit worn and discolored, but still sturdy, and we begin looking around for any place where a clue could be hidden, but we find nothing.

             
Cricket sits down with a sigh.  “It’s like we’re right on top of it.  But there’s nothing here.”

             
“Maybe someone moved it.  I’m sure it happens all the time.”

             
“Maybe.  That would suck.  I mean, without this clue, our adventure is pretty much over.”

             
She lies down on her back, her hands behind her head, and closes her eyes.  “The sun feels good,” she says.  Then, she rolls over on her stomach and places her chin on her hands.  She is staring at the water.  Suddenly, she cries out, “Wait a minute!  What’s this?!”  She reaches down near one of the posts and pulls up an old rusty piece of chain.  Sure enough, there is a small black plastic container attached to it.

             
“Waterproof?”  She mumbles, fiddling with the box. After a few failed attempts, she finally opens it and inside is another cylinder, exactly like the other one, with a slip of paper inside.

             
“I’m getting goose bumps again!”  She exclaims.

             
“What does it say?”

             
She reads:  “
Congratulations, you have found the second clue.  The adventure continues.  Hard stone will not contain me, but its timeless message is of grave concern.” 
She rolls her eyes.  “Here we go again.  I think this guy enjoys confusing his treasure hunters.”

             
“Ok, a little bit at a time, just like before. 
Hard stone.
  Go.”

             
“Hmmm.  Rocks, quarry, cliff…”

             
“No, I think this is something very specific.  Think things made out of stone.”

             
“Sidewalk, wall, countertop, statue…”

             
“Let’s move on… maybe there’s a clue within the clue. 
…will not contain me
.”

             
“That means the stone does not contain the clue.”

             
“Or maybe the person who planted the clue.”

             
“Good thinking.”

             
“
But its timeless message…
”

             
“Leave it to a poet to have a timeless message,” Cricket scoffs.  “Perfect, right?”

             
“
….is of grave concern.
”

             
“Meaning, it is something very important…”

             
“Or something rather dark and foreboding….”

             
“Maybe both.”

             
“Also, somber or serious…”

             
“Hold the phone!”  Cricket squeals.  “Hard stone and grave!  We are looking for a
grave
.  Somebody’s headstone?”

             
“You know, I think you’re right.”  I examine the words again and nod.  “Yes, definitely.”

             
“So that just leaves the question of where.”

             
“Where’s the nearest graveyard?”

             
She snaps her fingers.  “Hmmm. Maybe we can do a random geocache search with the word ‘cemetery’ in the search line.”

             
“Good idea!”

             
Cricket starts typing into her phone, while I wander away from the dock and look around.  Directly behind me is the hiking trail and forest.  In front of me is the play area, the dilapidated swings where I fell so many years ago.  It seems surreal, that this place changed the course of my life forever.  Such a simple, average place.  Not where you’d expect life-altering events to take place at all.

             
Cricket comes walking briskly toward me.  “Cox Cemetery…it’s about three miles from here.”

             
“I think I know the place.  Should we go check it out?”

             
“We’ve gone this far,” she replies.

             
“Yes, we have.”

             
As we pull out of the parking lot, I glance in the side view mirror.  There,
much closer than it appears
, is the swing set.  It is an ironic moment.  That place in those few seconds of a stormy day, will forever be closer to me—a part of who I am—even if it seems millions of miles away.  It’s like time froze there, and I can’t touch it or see inside its hard shell.  Understanding it completely may be outside my grasp forever.  But the impact will be felt, and lived, every second of my life.             
 

Zach
             
             

             
I am so engrossed in planting the mums, replaying in my mind the dream I’d had the night before, that I don’t notice the car pull up.  My mom mentions it first.  “Those two girls look about your age, do you know them?”

             
“What?”  I look around, and sure enough, there are two girls walking through the cemetery.  They are far enough away that I’m not sure they’ve even noticed us.  As they get closer, it takes only seconds for me to realize who they are.  Tess and Cricket. 
What in the world are they doing here?
  I realize I am staring, and I don’t want my mom to ask a lot of questions, so I just look down, shrug, and mutter, “I dunno.  I think they go to my school, but I don’t really know them.”

             
One of the girls seems to be fixated by her cell phone, and I notice that they are staying relatively far away.  Maybe they did spot me.  “There.  I think that’s all of them,” I say, picking up the plastic bag and trowel. 

             
My mom nods.  “I think that’s it.  Why don’t you go ahead and put those things in the trunk and I will be there in a minute.”  She hands me the key.

             
I make my way back to the car, taking care not to look at Tess and Cricket.  I must admit, my curiosity is definitely aroused.  I long to go up to Tess and, as casually as possible, ask her how she’s doing.  But, I realize it isn’t exactly the most ideal place for that.  I mean, a graveyard makes people nervous to begin with.  I place the items inside the car and get back in the passenger seat, watching my mom.  She stands with one hand rested on the headstone, the other sort of wrapped around herself, her head down.  I wonder if she’s praying, or talking to my father, and what she might say to him, if she could.  I feel a twinge of guilt, given that I had allegedly made contact with dad recently
.  If it really was him, he had some explaining to do.  On the other hand, if it wasn’t, then who was it?
  I feel the hairs on my arm stand straight up as I think about the enormity of my secret, the daunting idea that someone out there knows, and understands, and wants to contact me.  Sitting there watching my mom, I feel not only guilt, but the hint of tears emerging, and I hope beyond hope that it really was my father, that there’s a really good reason why he hasn’t contacted my mother, and that someday soon all these things will be answered.  She turns and heads back to the car.

Tess and Cricket seem to be wandering aimlessly.  A few times they glance at my mother, then turn the other way and start wander
ing some more.  It’s almost like they are looking for something, but what?  Then I see them turn around and get back in their car.

             
As my mom and I are leaving, I glance back to see them get out again.