We settled
in the new house and after the new furniture was in place we had just enough
room to walk around. Daddy set up the TV
in the living room and put up an outside antenna that he could go out and turn
depending on which station we were going to watch. We were so excited, because there were three
stations that we could get out of Miami.
Three stations!
One day in
August we got terrible news. One of
Daddy’s older brothers used to live next door to us in North Carolina. We were real close. His wife had died of brain cancer when
Rebecca was real little. Now, there was
just him and his son, Lin. Lin loved
airplanes and made models and hung them by fishing line from the ceiling of an
outbuilding that his daddy had given him to use as his own workshop.
Lin was real
quiet, but he would always let the children in to see his planes and he joined
the service about a year before the family moved to Florida. He was stationed in Germany.
Rebecca and
Robert were not called to supper. That
had never happened. They always pushed
coming in from play to the last minute, but when they weren’t called they got
curious and went home.
They found
daddy sitting on the couch. Just sitting
there. He hadn’t cooked supper and mama
was still at work. He looked up but he
didn’t say anything. Both of the
children realized that he looked funny.
“What’s wrong Daddy?” both of the children asked in unison.
“Lin is
dead,” he replied.
“Dead?” both
children said at once.
“How,
Daddy?” Rebecca asked as she slumped at his feet.
Robert sat
down beside daddy and buried his head against daddy’s arm already crying.
Mica told
the children what he knew. “He was
flying in a plane they call a boxcar and his plane and another one collided in
mid-air.”
Rebecca
jumped up saying, “But, Daddy that is not possible. Look up at the sky. There is just so much room up there that it
would be impossible for two planes to hit each other. That can’t be right.”
“Rebecca, it
would seem that you should be right, but they did hit head-on and all aboard both
planes were killed.”
“Well, when
are we leaving for North Carolina for the funeral?” Robert asked.
“We aren’t
going,” Daddy replied.
“Not going
to the funeral ….” Rebecca couldn’t
believe what she was hearing. “But,
Daddy everybody always comes to the funerals from no matter where they
are. Always. You know we all have to bring food in and sit
with each other and pet Uncle Ice. We
have to go. We always talk and are all
so sad together then we begin telling stories about the person and start
laughing at those stories. We always
help each other. Then we go to the
funeral and to the graveyard and cry all over again. Then we go back to Aunt Pet’s house and eat
and the out of town folks start leaving.
Daddy we just have to go.”
Mica
replied, “I know, Rebecca,” he began stroking her short brown hair. “I know, sweet girl, but we just can’t swing
it right now.”
Aunt Lou and
Uncle John decided to go to the funeral so daddy rode up with them. He took the children aside and told them to
behave while he was gone. Mama stayed to
work and while she was at work Rebecca and Robert had to stay home by
themselves. They were not allowed to go
outside until mama came home. The
children felt abandoned and they also felt that they had abandoned all their
kin. They didn’t even misbehave or fight
with each other while they were home alone.
They laid on
the bed looking at the clock. Robert
would ask Rebecca, “What are they doing now?” Rebecca told him, from her memories of previous wakes and funerals, what
she thought the various family members were doing. “Do you think Aunt Betty made a banana cake?”
he asked.
“Of course
she did, Robert. You can’t have a proper
sittin’ without a banana cake and lots of other cakes and pies. There’d also be green beans and potato salad,
ham and chicken, sandwiches, every kind of sandwich that you can think of,
there’d be pickles and beets and deviled eggs and many other things. About everything there is to eat would be
there for all the family. Friends and
family and church people see to those things.
The church ladies see to the dishes being washed up and everything else
that needs to be done.”
“Do you
think the men go out for a snort?” Robert continued.
“You know
they do,” Rebecca answered. “I guess
they are putting what’s left of him in the ground ‘bout now,” Rebecca
said. Then they just laid quietly on
their respective beds saying nothing.
When daddy
got back he told them that it had been very sad.
Patty F.
Cooper, April 4th, 2015, Elizabethton, Tennessee
© All Rights
Reserved
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