Over Our Heads Read online

  “You were the last one she spoke to, Rachel,” Emma finally managed. “When you left that night, after she said goodbye to you, she didn’t say anything at all.” Emma didn’t tell her about the moans that came later, or how they gave Grandma morphine to calm them as that night turned to morning. She didn’t mention the death rattle in the back of Grandma’s throat that came with the dawn, or how her breath became deceptively soft again after that, then, following one last gasp, stopped altogether. She didn’t tell Rachel how in that moment, she put her hand over their grandmother’s chest until she felt the heart beat for the last time.

  Rachel was at the sink, running water as Emma spoke. She wheeled around and walked into the dining room. The glasses of water in her hands sloshed over slightly as she brought them down hard on the cotton mats. Emma thought she would blow then, but instead it looked like Rachel started to laugh, then, changed her mind. She’s losing it, Emma thought. Finally.

  “You could have called. I didn’t even get to say goodbye.” Rachel’s voice was a whisper. She’s forgotten, Emma thought. Rachel doesn’t remember Grandma’s last words to her, when she told Rachel she loved her. It was incredible to Emma that Rachel couldn’t seem to remember any of it. Grandma had held Rachel’s hand, looked in her eyes, said she was sorry, and then said goodbye.

  Emma sipped her glass of chardonnay slowly. She didn’t want her mind to get sloppy and slip into thinking about Grandma picking at the sheets, moaning, and searching the room as if looking for the exit. She had to control her thoughts, or the tears would come. That would send Rachel over the edge for sure. Like a light switch, she’d flip from cool and composed in a flash if Emma started blubbering, as if Emma’s display of normal human emotion were one more thing she personally would have to take care of.

  Thinking back to that night at Rachel’s, Emma took a breath to steady herself, as she stood in front of the door of the three stories of mortar and stone that she used to call home. She had forgotten to bring her key from Vancouver. She rang the bell and waited. Somewhere in the trees above the house, the machine gun knocking of a hungry woodpecker announced her arrival. Emma looked up to try to spot it, but the woodpecker stopped, as if self-conscious at being noticed. Rachel took her time coming to the door. When she opened it, she looked fresh and efficient. Emma felt dishevelled, her clothes sticking to her from the heat, and her eyes still puffy from crying. Rachel ushered Emma into the house, not speaking until they were both in the kitchen.

  “Would you like something to drink?” Rachel asked, as if Emma were a stranger. As if she had never lived there and helped create the air that the house breathed in and out every day. Emma nodded. Rachel got a glass from the cupboard, turned on the tap and poured Emma some water. In a second, it seemed, the glass was in Emma’s hand without her remembering how it got there. She lifted the glass to her lips and drank. Grandmother water, give me strength. Rachel’s taken over already. Here we go.

  “So, I made up a list to help keep us on track.” Rachel pointed toward the fridge. Emma looked at list on the fridge, but was too far away to read what it said. She didn’t bother taking a step forward. The words remained scribbles. She felt like a rebellious teenager. A rebel without a cause. Or, without a cause she’d explicitly stated. She didn’t plan on being difficult. It was a pattern between her and Rachel that was born of natural instinct, a result of the clash of their totem animals. Rachel was a rabbit – always in a rush, and Emma, a turtle, wanting to take her sweet time.

  She could just tell Rachel she didn’t want to sell the house. That would be more direct, but would also likely lead to confrontation. Emma took a step forward and looked at the list. “Hmm,” she said. “Okay. This looks doable.”

  Rachel turned toward the doorway, and began walking down the hall without a word. Emma followed her into their grandmother’s bedroom. Grief, she reminded herself, is sneaking its way through both of us.

  Rachel slid open the faux wooden shutter doors of the clothes closet. Grandma filled the room.

  “It smells like her,” Emma said, wrapping her arms around herself.

  “Of course it smells like her. It’s full of her clothes. Please, Emma, get a grip. Let’s not have a scene today, okay?” Rachel took a garbage bag from under her arm, and unfolded it.

  Emma let go of herself. “All I said is that it smells like her in here. Which it does, does it not?” Emma took a breath, and reminded herself to be patient.

  “It’s not a big deal. It’s putting clothes into garbage bags. Simple.” Rachel licked her thumb and forefinger to pull the plastic apart, then shook the bag open with a fluttering of air.

  Emma stepped toward a row of dressing gowns. Sam got her one every Mother’s Day, and Grandma never had the heart to throw any of them out. Emma reached out to a deep purple terry-cloth bathrobe, as old as Emma’s memories on Indian Road. She brought its sleeve to her nose and inhaled.

  “We’re not getting rid of everything are we? I mean is that what you had in mind? Because I thought we’d be going through stuff, you know? See what we want to keep for ourselves.”

  “You’re kidding me. Most of her clothes are in tatters. I already threw out all those polyester-blend pants in the dresser. Every single pair were altered by hand or just left hanging. And those elastic waistbands she used to cut when her back was hurting? Oh, but you wouldn’t know that would you? You weren’t around for that part.”

  Emma turned her back on Rachel and her garbage bag. Her voice was a whisper. “Some of these sweaters are nice.”

  “I bought her most of those. She never wore them. So if you want something with sentimental value you’ve got nothing there with those. But keep them if you want. They’re all good quality. Brand names, every one. At least better than the stuff she usually got from K-Mart or wherever it was she used to shop. I don’t think any of this stuff will fit me anyway, so if you want to go through it, fine. I’ll be in the dining room.”

  “No. I mean, don’t you even want to look at her hats or scarves or something? I could give you first pick of those if you want.” Emma looked at the garbage bag dangling in Rachel’s hand as if it were a gun.

  “First pick. How generous of you, Emma. No, you go ahead.” Rachel thrust the garbage bag toward her. Emma left her hands at her side, and took a step back. Of course Rachel would take out her anger on Emma. Where else could it go? Rachel had to think of herself as the rock. It was the only way she knew how to stay solid, by telling herself that it was everyone else who was falling apart. It was an old trick, and Emma had seen it a million times. It was a reprise of the “Ballad of Rachel the Martyr.”

  Emma should know better than to let it get to her. Still, there was that old feeling again, that mild itch of violence crawling under her skin. That impulsive reaction that made her want to throw something, a glass or a cup no one wanted. She wanted to smash something – hear it shatter when it hit the ground. At least she could acknowledge it, this urge. But Rachel? With Rachel, everything was held in tight, only coming out in ways that were twisted.

  Rachel let the bag go, turned and left the bedroom. The black plastic trembled to the ground.

  10.

  AT HER FATHER’S FUNERAL, there were pictures where Rachel’s dad should be, and a vase that Sam said was full of his ashes. The vase was a rusty silver colour and Rachel wondered if they found his head and burned that too. She looked up at the ceiling of the room they were all sitting in. It was like a church inside but more boring, and without the stained glass windows. The ceiling was yellow with wooden crossbeams that had been painted yellow as well. Rachel imagined what would happen if the ceiling caught on fire with all of them inside, which of the beams would fall down first, and in what order. She wanted to check the light switches she saw at the back of the hall, but just put her hands under her bum instead. There was a preacher guy at the front of the room telling everyone about her dad. The preacher said Dad had be
en a good provider and liked to do gardening. He said he had liked astronomy and had loved his family. Rachel didn’t like the preacher, and the way everything he said about her dad was in the past tense. His hair was bald on top and parted way down on the side, like he was fooling anyone. Some of his hair was going the wrong way, flopping down over his ear, waving at them. Rachel wanted to laugh and for Sam to laugh at it too, but Sam was just looking down at his hands. He hadn’t taken his gloves off yet. Rachel started to whisper to Sam about the waving hair, but he wouldn’t look up. “Fuck-off, Rachel,” he said.

  Rachel knew that when terrible things happened, everyone was supposed to be sad and all messed up, but that’s not what happened in their house. Grandma didn’t let it. After the funeral, she decided that she was moving out of her condo in Florida and moving in with them for a while. She took over everything, even the air. She wore lavender perfume, watched The Bob Newhart show, and played ABBA and Sonny & Cher albums way too loud on the living-room hi-fi. Once, she threatened, to pour all of Mom’s rum down the drain, so Mom had to hide it in a suitcase under her bed after that. You could still smell it on her, but Grandma let it go. Likely because, other than the drinking, Mom did what Grandma said. She acted like a little girl, one who talked to herself out loud. “It’s only grief,” Grandma said. “It’s normal.”

  After she was done bossing Mom around, Grandma got two men with big muscles and tattoos who rode up on motorcycles to take Sam’s secret trunk right out of his room and put it in their van. Sam came home just as they were getting it out onto the front lawn.

  “What the fuck?” he yelled.

  Then the bald muscleman walked over to Sam and said, “Watch your mouth, boy. It’s time to grow up. Be a man and look out for your family now or I’ll be back so we can talk about it some more, you understand?”

  Sam looked at him, then at the ground. Grandma stood in the doorway nodding, before she went back inside to get dinner going.

  As for Rachel, Grandma pretty much left her alone during the first few weeks after the funeral, even when she caught Rachel messing with the light switches. The first time Grandma saw her go through the on, off, on, off routine, she just stopped sweeping the floor and stared at Rachel with a sad look on her face.

  A few weeks later, Grandma decided that Rachel should have a party since she didn’t do anything for her real birthday, other than eating ice-cream in bed and trying not to scratch.

  “You only turn nine once,” Grandma said. “And if you spend your birthday with the chicken pox, you should be allowed to have a do-over.”

  Rachel was allowed to invite as many people as she wanted to her not-birthday party, and there were balloons and cake, and Marcia Miller won a deck of cards and some sea monkeys for being the best at pin the tail on the donkey. Grandma gave Rachel a book called The Secret Garden, and Mom even got her something; a longhaired calico kitten Rachel called Diana Prince, who slept in her dirty clothes hamper. Sam gave Rachel twenty-five bucks cause he was only washing dishes at the Burger Chef now.

  “I’m sorry, Rach,” he said. “I’m lying low for now, so the cash flow’s tight. I’ll get you the other fifty bucks when I’m back in the game.” He winked, and Rachel told him thanks and that twenty-five bucks was excellent. She never did figure out what she’d do with seventy-five whole dollars anyhow, and was happy to get anything since Sam had found out that Rachel had scratched his Ziggy Stardust album.

  After her birthday, Grandma told Rachel, “In a couple of weeks, you and me are going to clean up that backyard of yours.” They had to wait a while for the frost to stop coming in the morning, but when that finally happened, they went out with rakes and cleaned up all the bits of paper and plastic and tin cans. Then, they found a spot by the fence where a flowerbed had grown over.

  “We’re going to make a special spot for you here, Rachel,” Grandma said.

  When they were finished preparing the soil, they planted some forget-me-nots and other seeds, and Rachel made a sign: “Rachel’s Secret Garden. KEEP OUT!”

  Nothing happened for what seemed like ages, even though Grandma made Rachel water the dirt every morning before school. Then one day, Rachel went out with Diana Prince and saw that tiny blue flowers had burst out all around the edges of the grass.

  “Those are crocuses,” Grandma told Rachel. I planted those the year your Grandpa died. And that bush over there is lavender, that’ll be blooming as soon as it warms up. The forget-me-nots won’t come up until next year, but you’ve got sweet peas in there too. Your mother planted those. She used to insist that we put them on the table. She never would tell me why.” Grandma said, shaking her head. “They don’t bloom until summer, those ones, but they’ll still be fragrant when you head back to school in the fall. Trust me, it’ll be sweet, you’ll see.”

  11.

  EMMA WORKED HER WAY through her grandmother’s closet. Each piece of clothing called to her, had a story to tell. But she knew better than to dawdle, Rachel was on a schedule. There was a list to contend with on the fridge, a mission to be accomplished. Rachel needed her lists. They were her security blanket.

  Emma stuffed all the sweaters and dresses into the garbage bags at her feet. There were already three full bags ready to go to the Sally Ann, and one almost-full bag of things Emma wanted to keep for herself. Her eyes had puffed up again. Her mascara was smudged and smeared on her wet sleeve. When she came to her grandmother’s dressing gowns, she lifted the hanger that held the purple terry-cloth one up off the rack. Her legs buckled as the smell of it wafted over her, and she crumpled down, settling cross-legged on the floor. The bathrobe landed in her lap. It was her grandmother’s favourite, the one she had decided to bring when she went to the hospital that last time. It was the only thing Emma had taken from her grandmother’s room that night. Rachel must have brought it back and hung it up.

  Rachel had told Emma that she had gone to visit Grandma that last morning before work and found her sitting on the bathroom floor. “She wasn’t upset, wasn’t crying or calling out when she heard me come in. She was just sitting there like it was the most natural thing in the world.” Rachel had tried to help her back on her feet, but Grandma said, “Don’t bother love, these legs of mine are done for. Call your sister now, will you dear? I want her to do my hair.”

  “It’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard,” Rachel said, when she got Emma on the phone. “You should see her. She hit the sink on her way down. The bruises on her ribs are already purple. She really needs to go to the hospital, but she won’t let me call an ambulance until you come. She said she wants you to do her hair. Can you believe it? I really shouldn’t even listen to her, but you know how stubborn she is. She said she’s not going anywhere till you get here. So I’ve booked you a flight from Vancouver. It leaves in two and a half hours. You can pick up the ticket at the counter. Then take a cab from the airport. I’ll give the driver the fare when you get here.”

  Emma had hung up and wiped the sleep out of her eyes. Outside it was still dark, her window with a view of the mountains, a black square on the wall. All she had said to her sister during the call was, “Hello, okay and goodbye.” Emma had been expecting the news. She had already known that Grandma had started travelling. Lucy, from the Java Hut had told her that’s what they called it in the Caribbean – travelling. Moving from the land of living to the land of spirits apparently didn’t happen in a flash, it was a journey.

  Emma remembered hearing about a cat in a nursing home that would sense when someone’s soul started travelling, and would sit on the person’s bed with them until they passed on. Or about the man in great health, who suddenly decided one day to write out his will and get his affairs in order, then died immediately afterward. It was if someone’s actual death was like thunder, nothing more than an echo of something that had already occurred.

  Emma had first felt her grandmother embark on that journey a week earlier, when s
he had dreamt of a snake losing its skin. It was the same dream she’d had before Barney died. The next morning, she had done her laundry and called the cat sitter. Then she’d had a dream that all her teeth fell out of her head. She knew about that one from a translation of Artemidorus’s Interpretation of Dreams, a book Lester had bought her for her birthday one year. Even in second-century Greece, losing a mouthful of teeth meant the death of someone you knew was likely. The morning after that dream, Rachel had called.

  When Emma’s cab arrived at 66 Indian Road later that day, Rachel and Grandma were in the bedroom. Grandma was sitting on the edge of the bed in her purple terry-cloth bathrobe. Rachel was standing, scolding her for not using her walker.

  “I mean this is why I got it for you.” She spoke as if Grandma were deaf, or a foreigner.

  Emma stood in the doorway watching for a moment, then said, “Rachel, could you kindly give us a moment so I can do her hair?” Rachel looked stunned for a second.

  “Oh you’re here. Sure, fine – whatever. Go ahead,” she said, and left the room. Grandma laughed.

  “Emma! Come here and let me see you, love.” Emma patted the air around her grandmother, who seemed smaller than she had remembered her being when she last saw her at Christmas. Emma asked to see the bruise. Grandma lifted her shirt. Emma drew a breath, but didn’t say a word.

  “You don’t have to be so hard on her. She does a lot for me you know,” Grandma said, as Emma plugged in the curling iron.

  “I know Grandma. We all know. We are constantly reminded.” Emma took a tube of hand cream from her purse. Grandma held out both her hands. Emma squeezed a dollop of cream onto each, and massaged it into her grandmother’s skin.