Fly Like a Bird

CHAPTER 1: BEST LEFT UNSAID

Chapter 1BEST LEFT UNSAID

Iowa’s late sunset showered bright colors of red, gold, and orange across the broad horizon like an explosion of fire in the summer evening sky, and the Iowa sun bowed behind the prairie skyline.

The hot summer night in 1966 produced only a slight breeze as eight-year-old Ivy put on a thin summer nightgown and pushed her sweaty strawberry blond hair off her neck. Grandmother Violet pulled back the yellow daisy-printed quilt and Ivy jumped into her antique sleigh bed.

“A little bird told me that you rode your bike out past the Thrasher place today,” said Grandma. “I’ve told you not to go out there. If you do it again, you will be in deep, dark trouble with me. Do you hear me, little missy?”

“Why?”

“Never you mind. You need to do what I say because my job is to protect you.”

“Okay, Grandma, but I don’t—”

Grandma shook her head. “Uh. Uh.”

The crickets serenaded outside Ivy’s bedroom window and the glowing fireflies danced. Ivy kissed the black-and-white picture on her bedside table and snuggled into her bed. The old photo showed her father with curly hair and dark eyes. Beside him stood her mother, wearing a silver heart necklace engraved with a rose, the only possession of her mother’s that Ivy owned. She never took it off.

In many ways, Ivy’s parents only existed through Grandma’s stories and a few photos. Most of Ivy’s newly created images of her parents drifted thin and fuzzy, like half-remembered dreams, and the hazy thoughts of their tragedy haunted her.

Ivy held her Grandmother’s hand and floated away on her dreams.

A few hours later, a nightmare of exploding colors, crashing metal and terrifying screams jolted Ivy straight up in bed. She felt the cold wetness of the sheets and her urine-soaked nightgown clung to her skin. She crawled out of bed and crept down the dark stairs to find Grandma.

She padded lightly down the expansive stairway of the old Victorian. When she reached the bottom of the wide stairs, Uncle Walter’s voice boomed from the kitchen where he and Grandma played cards.

“She’s just a little girl, but don’t you think she has a right to know what happened? There’s a few in town that have their suspicions. Someone might tell her.”

Grandma muffled a growl in her throat. “Now, Walter, you know some things are best left unsaid. Even if anyone suspects anything, they’ll stay quiet because I know too much about them. Everyone’s got family secrets. Now that’s the last I want to hear of it.”

Uncle Walter mumbled something Ivy couldn’t hear. She turned and tiptoed back up the stairs, and crawled into her wet bed. The pungent smell of urine pierced the humid air as she huddled in a dry corner of her bed. Her wet nightgown stuck to her skin. Grandma’s words inflamed Ivy’s worst fears. Were they hiding something horrible about her parents’ accident?

The headlights of passing cars moved around the walls of her room as she picked up the picture beside her bed. Having no parents made her feel empty. She needed to find out what Grandma and Uncle Walter were talking about.

Ivy could hear Grandma’s heavy steps climbing the stairs. She hurriedly set the picture down on the table just as Grandma peered in.

Ivy sat up. “I wet the bed again.”

“Why don’t I change your bed while you get on a new nightgown?”

Ivy pulled a clean nightgown from her drawer. “How come nobody ever talks about my parents’ accident?” she asked as she changed her clothes.

Grandma finished tucking the clean sheets under the mattress and Ivy climbed back into bed. Grandma patted Ivy’s cheek and sat down beside her, her weight making a deep dent in the mattress. “Too painful, I suppose. Time often stands still in families.”

Ivy fingered the silver chain around her neck and Grandma shifted on the bed, making the old bed springs creak. Ivy tucked her hair behind her ears. “Tell me about my mom.”

“Well, she grew up in Stilton and she was beautiful. You look a lot like her, you know.” She patted Ivy’s freckled cheek. “She liked to have her own way. Your father loved your mother more than life itself. Your mother had that effect.”

Ivy fiddled with the ring on Grandma’s finger. “How come my mother isn’t buried in the cemetery with my dad?”

“Guess it just wasn’t meant to be. You’ve always liked this ring, haven’t you?”

Ivy nodded. She picked up the framed photo of her parents and lay it on the daisy-printed pillow next to her. Grandma pulled her soft housecoat around her ample lap and stared into the distance as if looking into the past.

“On my wedding day Sam Taylor gave me his ring and a bottle of lilac perfume. I’ve worn that fragrance ever since, and I’ve never taken this ring off.” She sighed. “Sam Taylor and I thought we would always be together. But life changes your plans. When he died, he left me three grown sons and 4120.” That was the nickname she gave to her big Victorian house on 4120 Meadowlark Lane. “But families survive tragedies. You have to go on.”

Grandma touched the tip of Ivy’s freckled nose. “Your Grandpa would have adored you. Now go to sleep. You promised Uncle Tommy you’d take the birdseed over to his place early tomorrow.”

With no brothers or sisters, Ivy spent a lot of time with her two uncles who lived in Coffey, a small farming community in southern Iowa. She loved being with her Uncle Walter. And, at Grandma’s insistence, she reluctantly spent time with Uncle Tommy.

Ivy’s uncles hadn’t spoken to each other since 1959. No one quite remembered the incident that started the silent treatment, except that a pastrami sandwich at her father’s funeral was to blame. Ivy felt drawn to her uncles’ feud, and she was driven to find out what had started the long-standing sandwich war.

Ivy nodded, clutching Grandma’s hand. “You’re not going to die tonight, are you, Grandma?”

Violet Taylor, who was sixty-one, gave the same response she had given every night since she had a breast removed because of a cancerous lump. “No, I’m not prepared for death. I’m only prepared for life. Death can’t touch me. I have you to raise. God won’t take me until you’re ready.” Grandma covered Ivy with the sheet and kissed her forehead. “I love you more than the great blue sky.”

During the previous winter of 1965, Grandma had discovered a lump in one of her breasts. Two weeks later, the cancer specialist in Des Moines removed one of Grandma’s breasts without much contemplation or concern. “As if it was just a moldy piece of bread,” Grandma said. “Maybe he thought a fat old woman wouldn’t miss her sagging breast. Fool. But life can’t wait for breasts. My brassiere will never know the difference.” She shook her head and rearranged the miscellaneous stuffing in her bra.

Grandma soon adjusted to the change. Loss was nothing new to Violet Taylor. She stuffed her large, vacant bra with socks, kitchen tea towels, or anything she could find, and went about her business.

That night, Grandma sat on the bed and sang the old Western cowboy song, “Red River Valley” like she did every night. The crickets outside chirped along in chorus. Ivy’s sun-streaked hair spread tangled on the pillow. Her eyelids closed.

“Goodnight, Grandma. I love you, too.”

Pushing the floor with her feet, Grandma bounced the bed until Ivy’s breathing slowed and she floated on the edge of sleep. “I pray I’m doing the right thing and that you will have a forgiving heart, for all of us,” Ivy heard Grandma say as if from a million miles away.

Grandma brushed the stray hair off Ivy’s face, so much like her mother’s, and put the photo back on the bedside table. The crickets’ rhythm thumped like the heartbeat of the night. The fireflies played hide-and-seek, flashing in the darkness of the woods. The wild birds settled in the trees. But the squirrels never slept. Neither did Grandma. She cooked, cleaned, or watched TV at all hours. Ivy worried about Grandma dying, but hearing Grandma’s constant sounds in the night, gave her the comfort to finally drift away into that deep sleep.