The Book of Why (14 page)

LANCASTER IS LARGER
than I remembered. We came here when I was twelve, a few months before my father died, but we didn't come into the city; we stayed in the county—working Amish farms, a one-room schoolhouse, an amusement park called Dutch Wonderland. We stayed in a motel, my parents in the bed, me on the floor, and when I looked out the window—awakened by the same crickets that had lulled me to sleep—I saw rows of corn in the moonlight, and I remember thinking that I could live in a place like this, could learn to milk a cow and churn butter and plow a field, could do without electricity, could wear the same black trousers and suspenders and plain white shirt every day.

I hadn't expected to return. Certainly not with cracked ribs, my head spinning with post-concussion disequilibrium, a relative stranger bringing me and my old, arthritic dog to find someone named Gloria Foster, a name spoken by my dead
father
.

Then again, it
is
April Fools' Day.

We park downtown, across the street from a café called Starving Artist, its front window boarded. A few doors down is a restaurant, Wish You Were Here. It's after three; the sky is dark with storm clouds.

I walk Ralph, who takes her time sniffing trees and poles, then buy her two hot dogs at a gas station. Years ago, I would have made her earn each bite—sit, lie, touch my finger with her nose—but she's too old to be made to work for something as essential as food, so I let her lie on the cold cement while I break off pieces and bring them to her mouth.

She drinks water Sam pours into my cupped hands.

Ralph climbs into the backseat for a nap, her head resting on my overnight bag. Never a good watchdog, she looks the part, and that's enough. The first drops fall, then the rain stops, a false start. But a few minutes later the sky opens and a sudden downpour sends us into the restaurant.

Too late for lunch, we order tea to go. Sam asks the waitress—blond hair, nose ring, pregnant—if she can tell us where Green Street is.

“Green Street,” the woman says, and looks up as if waiting for a divine answer. “Green Street,” she says again. “I don't think I know, but it could be in a part of the city I'm not familiar with. Hey, Mitch!” she says, and the cook comes out of the kitchen, a young man wearing a hooded sweatshirt, shaggy brown hair, a word tattooed on his wrist. “Where's Green Street?” the waitress says. He steps closer and I see the word, and I think, Maybe we
are
in the right place, but he says, “Sorry, never heard of Green Street,” and then I see that “Cary” is Gary, perhaps his father or brother or best friend, someone gone—remembered every time Mitch flips a pancake or washes his hands.

“Can you tell us where the cemetery is?” Sam says.

“Which one?” Mitch says.

“Lancaster Cemetery.”

“It's on the east side,” he says. “Do you know the city?”

“No.”

“Left onto Lime,” he says. “It'll be on the right side of the street. Can't miss it.”

The sky lights up, and I worry about Ralph.

“Supposed to be a bad storm,” the waitress says.

Thunder booms, the waitress drops a glass, and then we're all on the floor picking up chunks and shards.

“You said Lime Street, right?” Sam says. She isn't paying attention, and I hear her wince—a cut on her finger.

“Shit,” the waitress says. “I'm sorry.”

“It's not your fault,” I say.

“I have bad luck,” she says. “Let me get the rest.”

“It's just a small cut,” Sam says. She squeezes her finger until a drop of blood blooms, then she sucks it.

“I'm telling you,” the waitress says, “I have the worst luck.”

“You did say Lime Street,” Sam says.

“About a mile,” Mitch says. “Just before the hospital.”

“Thank you
so
much!” Sam says, as if he has told her the secret of life, the reason we're all here, and as if the reason is good.

“Careful out there,” the waitress says.

We run across the street to the car, where Ralph is pawing at the window. A gust of wind carries a newspaper down the street and pins it against the side of a church.

In the car, we catch our breath. We can't see through the windshield, even with the wipers on high. Ralph paces in the backseat.

“Damn,” I say. “I didn't bring her storm pills.”

Sam puts the car in drive.

“You can't drive in this.”

“You heard him—it's close.”

“I thought we were looking for Green Street.”

“There is no Green. Lime
is
Green.”

“What do we do if we find the house?”

“We ring the bell.”

“I'm not ringing a stranger's bell and asking for Gloria Foster because your dead brother threw dandelion clocks at a house.”

“Better not to have a plan,” she says.

“And what if she
is
there? What will we say?”

“I suppose we'd say hello.”

The few cars I can see through the windshield have pulled over. Sam keeps driving. Five years ago I stopped being afraid of everything except living the rest of my life, and so the idea of a car crash—another one—shouldn't frighten me. But my fear, after the accident in Chilmark, has been reversed.

I still wonder if my father's voice was part of a dream brought on by physical trauma. The brain's way of coping with near-death, the body's defense mechanism against annihilation.

Maybe. That's my mantra, or I'd like it to be.

For the past five years I'd believed in not believing—in shrugging my shoulders at the idea of anything not in front of me. Ruled by my senses. More like a dog. A creature of the present.

Maybe it was a dream. But maybe it wasn't. Either way, you weren't there, so I
am
a bit afraid that Sam might drive the car into a tree.

I don't think a tornado would stop Sam from reaching the cemetery.

I have this thought, and the rain turns to hail. Ice bounces off the windshield. Ralph is shaking in the backseat, and before I can turn to comfort her, she jumps into the front, knocking the gear into neutral. Ralph paws at my face as if I'm a door she wants to break through. She keeps jumping from my lap into the back, then onto my lap again. She kicks my ribs, and I lose my breath. Hail the size of golf balls cracks the windshield. Sam shifts the car back into drive and steps on the gas. I can't see where we're going. The car skids across the road, spins, and comes to a rest.

It's parked perfectly, but facing the wrong direction. When I look through the side window, I see the cemetery gates.

I hold my side while taking short, puffy breaths. Ralph scratches the window and barks. She has never understood that the storm is outside, not inside.

Sam slaps the steering wheel, presses the horn. “Do you see where we are? I mean, do you
see?
”

“Yes, I see.”

“Well, why aren't you flipping out like I am?”

“I
am
flipping out,” I say. “Jesus—look.”

“Right at the cemetery,” she says. “I mean, what are the odds?”

“That's not what I'm talking about.”

“I swear, I wasn't driving this car. Someone else was driving.”

“Listen to me,” I say. “Do you see what's happening?”

Day has become night. The wind bends trees; a limb crashes down beside the car. The cemetery gate swings open, slams closed, swings open again.

Ralph is lying down, panting. I suppose fear could kill a dog her age. I get out of the car and open the back door. Hail pelts my face, my chest. I run in the only direction the wind will allow me to run; Ralph follows. I hear Sam yelling behind us. I run to the nearest house, catch my breath on the porch. Trash blows across the street. Sam runs toward us, trying in vain to shield her head from the hail.

“What the hell,” she says when she reaches the porch.

“Looks like you were right.”

“I can't hear you.”

“You were right,” I yell over the wind. “Best not to have a plan.”

“What?”

“There is no plan!”

A young man is at the door. Short and muscular, shaved head. Blue cotton pants and shirt, work boots, a uniform—plumber, electrician. He's motioning for us to come inside.

“Hurry,” he says. “Everyone's in the cellar.”

We run through a small living room—sneakers and shoes on the floor, children's books, toys—and into a dining room, six chairs arranged in a circle, except there's no table, a setup more suited for a group therapy session than dinner.

Through a door and down a flight of stairs into a cellar lit by a single hanging bulb. Three more people down there—two women and a girl.

When I drop the leash, Ralph runs to the girl, who's sitting on the floor in the back of the cellar surrounded by storage boxes and dusty end tables and old cans of paint. She could be five or six, and has dark hair in pigtails. She closes her eyes and mouth as Ralph licks her face.

“Found them on the porch,” the man says. “All hell's breaking loose out there.”

“I'm Eric,” I say.

The man shakes my hand. “Jay,” he says.

Then he shakes Sam's hand. “Sam,” she says.

We wave to the women, and they wave back.

“That's my wife, Evelyn.” He points to the younger woman sitting on an orange folding chair, smoking. Baggy jeans, white sneakers, Penn State sweatshirt. She takes a drag, then waves.

“That's our daughter,” Jay says. “And that's my mother.”

“Welcome to our beautiful home,” his mother says. “Let's hope it's still standing tomorrow.” She laughs—a loud, sudden
ha!
She's a fleshy woman in her fifties and has gray hair, short and spiky. She asks Ralph's name, and when I tell her, she says, “Here, Ralph! Come here, boy!”

“Actually, Ralph's a girl.”

“How did
that
happen?” her son says.

“Long story,” I say.

The girl stands, comes closer. In the glow of the light she slaps her hand against her leg twice. She signs something to her father—too fast for me to see. Touches her head, makes her hand into fists, shakes her arms.

“Most dogs are,” Jay tells her.

I look at him, confused.

“I forget we need to translate,” he says. “She says your dog's afraid of thunder.”

“She doesn't speak,” Evelyn says.

“She speaks,” Jay says. “In her own way.”

“She sings,” the older woman says.

“She
hums
,
” Evelyn says.

Jay's mother stands and offers Sam her hand. “My name's
Dinah
.”

Jay reaches into a cardboard box filled with tools and nails and screws, and pulls out a flashlight. The light flickers before going out.

The girl hooks her index finger around her nose twice and pulls down.

“They'll be fine,” Dinah says.

“Never should have gotten her those damn dolls,” Evelyn says.

The girl moves closer to her grandmother and makes the same sign.

“Honey, they'll be fine.”

The girl starts to cry, and Ralph licks her face.

“I'll get the dolls,” Jay says.

“No you won't,” Evelyn says.

“It'll take two seconds.”

“You're always giving in to her.”

Evelyn sighs, lights another cigarette. “Go up and get them, then. But if anything happens to you, so help me—”

“Jesus,” Jay says. “I'm not flying to the moon. They're right upstairs. I'll get the other flashlight while I'm up there.”

“Careful,” his mother says. “Listen to it out there.”

The girl rubs her chest, keeps rubbing it.

“All right, all right,” Evelyn says. “And you,” she says to her husband, “you better come back.”

“Don't worry.”

“Come here and give me a kiss.”

“I'll be right back,” he says, and goes upstairs.

“She loves those damn dolls more than us,” Evelyn says.

“She's five,” Dinah says.

“That's all she thinks about—the Foster children, the Foster children.” Evelyn drops her cigarette, puts it out with her sneaker. “That's what she calls them,” she tells us. “It's our last name, but it sounds like they're foster children.”

“Let her make up her stories,” Dinah says.

“I'm sorry, but she's my daughter and I don't like it.” I feel Sam looking at me as Evelyn lights another cigarette. “Damn it, where the hell
is
he?” She bangs on the ceiling with a broom handle. We all wait to hear his steps on the floor above or on the stairs, but there's only the sound of hail against the side of the house.

“I can go up and see,” I say, but before I reach the stairs, Jay returns.

“It's pretty bad out there,” he says. “A tree fell into a house across the street. And we've got a mess in our front yard.”

Jay gives his daughter the dolls, and she hurries to the back of the cellar to play with them. Ralph follows, then lies beside her.

The girl points at me with both hands, then pulls her fingers back toward herself. She keeps making this sign until Dinah says, “She wants you to play with her.”

I sit on the floor beside her. She gives me one of the dolls. She spreads her fingers and touches her chin with her thumb; then she touches her forehead with her thumb. She keeps going back and forth—chin, then forehead.

“She says she's the mommy and you're the daddy,” Dinah says.

“What are their names?” I say.

She signs letters, but I don't understand.

“Lucy and Vincent,” Dinah says.

My ears are ringing, I'm dizzy, and for a moment I forget where we are and how we got here. I close my eyes and breathe; my memory returns in fragments: Sam Leslie, car accident, Gloria Foster, Lancaster, cemetery, tornado, Lucy, Vincent.