Prayers and Lies (38 page)

“I expect you boys better get yourselves on home,” he said.

“I’m so sorry, sir,” Paul whispered. “I’m so sorry I hurt her. I tried to stop her….”

“I know you did, son. I heard the police report. It wasn’t your fault.” He sighed and ran his hand across his swollen eyes. “Hell, it wasn’t anyone’s fault, ’cept maybe mine.”

He dropped into the recliner and stared sadly at Mother.

“Helen tried to tell me, all those years. But I wouldn’t believe her. I kept saying she’d get better.”

Paul watched him anxiously, then backed quietly out the door. I couldn’t imagine how he must feel.

Brian stayed a while longer, helping me make a pot of tea, fetching a blanket to drape over Mother on the couch, asking my father again and again if there was anything he could do.

Finally, Daddy told him he’d done more than enough—more than anyone had a right to expect. And of course, Daddy was right even more than he knew.

It was Brian who’d lifted Tracy’s mangled body from the railroad tracks and run back to the house with her—past Reana Mae, who was standing on the sidewalk, her fist shoved against her mouth, shaking uncontrollably, just the way Tracy had all those years ago when she’d watched Jolene beat Reana Mae with a belt.

It was Brian who’d called the police and the ambulance. Brian who’d run across the street for Dr. Statton, in case anything could be done to save Tracy.

Brian, covered in Tracy’s blood, had talked to the police and the ambulance driver and the firemen. And he’d told them each the same story. He and I had just come home from school, he repeated over and over. Tracy and Paul were having an argument on the porch, and then Tracy lost control and began running down the street. And she’d tried to beat the train and had fallen.

Paul and I just listened at first. Then we repeated the same tale when it was our turn to talk. None of us said out loud that we would lie. We just did it. To protect Mother and Daddy from knowing that Tracy had done it on purpose. To shield them from her final pain.

None of us mentioned Reana Mae.

Daddy called Melinda and Nancy, then Aunt Belle. He led Mother by the hand to the bedroom and helped her into bed. Finally, he walked back out to the front porch, where a puddle of Tracy’s blood was drying, and began to sob. I sat in the living room, watching him. I wanted to go out and help somehow, but I knew I couldn’t. So I just watched him for a long, long time.

Finally, at about four in the morning, I walked upstairs to my bedroom. The lights were off, but I knew Reana Mae was there. She’d run upstairs hours earlier, after we knew that Tracy was dead, before the police came. I hadn’t seen her since.

Once my eyes adjusted to the dark, I could see her, kneeling on the floor by her bed, her head dropped into her hands. She didn’t move when she heard me, but I could see her breathe harder.

I got undressed in the dark and climbed into bed. I felt like I was in the middle of a movie—a horror film—or maybe a nightmare. Tracy was dead—beautiful, hateful, angelic, demonic Tracy. Her body had been crushed beneath a locomotive and seventeen freight cars. I’d counted each one as it passed. I couldn’t help myself. It was as if I had to mark each car’s passing, to acknowledge it.

When Brian picked her up, she looked like a rag doll. Her head lolled to one side, blood dripping from her mouth and nose, half her face looked entirely gone. And she looked small … too small to be Tracy. Small like a little girl.

I stood still in shock when Brian ran forward to pick her up off the tracks. And I could only follow him as he ran back toward the house, Tracy’s blood drip, drip, dripping onto the sidewalk as he ran. He’d laid her on the porch and run inside to call the police. And all I could do was sit down on the porch by Tracy’s bloody body and hold her hand. That’s when Paul threw up the first time, right in the bushes by the front porch.

Tracy was dead. I’d watched them lift her onto the gurney and cover her with a white sheet, just like they’d done to Araminta. And when they drove away, it was to the morgue. Right now, right this very moment, my sister was lying dead in a morgue.

And it was because of Reana Mae.

I looked over to her bed, where she still knelt. And in the gathering early dawn light, I could see her lips moving. Reana Mae was praying. I hadn’t seen her pray in years, not since she first came to live with us, when she prayed every night for Caleb to come.

I turned my back to her and cried then. I cried harder and longer than I’d ever cried before. I cried till I had to get out of bed and go into the little bathroom and puke.

33
Sisters and Cousins

F
or the second time in a month, our house was filled with mourners. Nancy and Melinda had arrived before I came downstairs the next morning. Melinda hugged me tight and said it was a blessing that Brian and I had been here. Nancy kissed my forehead and told me that she loved me and that I’d been a good sister to Tracy. Nancy’s husband, Neil, sat quietly in the front room, watching anxiously for a chance to help.

Neighbors and church friends came and went, bringing casseroles and pies and banana bread.

Daddy and Mother had gone to the morgue to claim Tracy’s body. I cried thinking of them seeing her like that.

Brian arrived around noon. He and I took a pan of soapy water out to the front porch and scrubbed at the dark stains in vain. We were still there when Mother and Daddy came home. Daddy held the car door open for Mother, then took her arm and helped her up the walkway toward the house. She looked very fragile, just as fragile as she always said Tracy was.

She stopped on the front porch to give me a kiss. Then she kissed Brian on his cheek and said, “Thank you for trying to help her.”

Then she went inside, back to her bedroom, and closed the door behind her.

Daddy left soon after for the airport to pick up Aunt Belle. Melinda and Nancy drove to the grocery to buy milk.

Reana Mae stayed upstairs most of the day, venturing down around three in the afternoon. She looked like hell, but I guess we all did that day. Without a word to anyone, she put on her Wind-breaker, pulled Bo’s leash from the closet, and walked out the back door. She leashed Bobby Lee’s old coonhound and left, walking slowly down the street, away from the railroad tracks, away from our house.

Brian asked if we should go after her, but I just shook my head. She needed to be alone, I thought.

And I didn’t want to be around her.

Aunt Belle’s arrival brought some life back into the house. She bustled in, took a tray of soup and crackers to Mother, sent Nancy and Neil out to arrange for flowers, supervised Melinda in the kitchen, then shooed Brian and me out to take a walk.

“Don’t keep worryin’ over them stains,” she said, shaking her head sadly. “Bloodstains don’t never come out.”

We walked slowly, holding hands, quiet.

“Thank you,” I finally said.

“It’s okay,” he said, squeezing my hand.

“I guess you aren’t so envious of my family now.”

“Not today,” he said. “But your family will be all right. They love each other, and they’ll get through this.”

We walked in silence again. Then he said, “I’m worried about Reana Mae, though.”

I shrugged.

“Bethany,” he said, pulling me to a stop beside him. “I know it’s her fault, hers and Paul’s. But she didn’t mean for this to happen. She didn’t mean for Tracy to get hurt.”

“I think she did,” I said flatly. “I think she wanted to hurt Tracy.”

“Okay, maybe she did want to hurt Tracy. She wanted to get back at her for all the times Tracy hurt her. But she couldn’t have meant for
this
to happen. She couldn’t have known Tracy would do what she did.”

“I know.”

And I did know. I knew she didn’t mean for Tracy to die. Still, Tracy was dead.

“She must be pretty torn up about it.”

“I guess so.”

“Should we look for her?”

I shook my head again. “She’ll come home when she’s tired,” I said. “Or when she gets hungry.”

He looked at me sternly, straight in the eyes. “I don’t know, Bethany. Maybe she’ll think you don’t want her there.”

“I don’t.”

And that was true. I didn’t want Reana Mae in my house, in my family’s house, in Tracy’s house. For the first time ever, I wondered about how hard it had been on Tracy to have Reana Mae there. I thought about what she’d said at Araminta’s funeral, about Reana stealing Mother away.

I shook my head hard, trying to clear away the image of Reana Mae sitting atop Paul, smiling past me at Tracy. I’d known she hated Tracy. I’d seen how much anger she was holding inside. And I’d done nothing. Hadn’t talked to her about it. Hadn’t talked to Mother about it. I’d just pretended it would go away.

And now, Tracy was dead. My sister—the fragile, hateful stranger I’d shared a room and a family with all those years—was dead. And it was Reana Mae’s fault … and maybe mine, too.

“I want it all to be like it was yesterday,” I said. “I just want …” But the words caught in my throat.

Brian pulled me close and let me cry then, just let me cry against his chest. After a while, we walked back. I stared numbly at the bloodstains on the porch, then kissed Brian good-bye and sent him home. I figured he’d had enough of our family for one day … or for one lifetime.

We sat down to a quiet supper of split pea soup and bread. Of course, it was store-bought bread, because Reana Mae was still out. But it didn’t matter. None of us ate much.

Belle poured some bourbon into Daddy’s Coke and he drank it, but he didn’t eat any of his soup. After a few minutes, he went back to the room where Mother still was, closing the door behind him.

I was cleaning up the dishes when Reana Mae finally came back. She fed Bo, kissed Aunt Belle, and went back upstairs to our room, never meeting my eyes. Belle watched her go, looking from Reana to me, but she didn’t say a word.

Later, sitting in the living room with the evening news on TV, Aunt Belle turned to me and asked, “What’s wrong between you and Reana Mae?”

“Nothing,” I lied.

“Well, that’s a load of horseshit, and you know it,” she said briskly. “Whatever it is, now is
not
the time. You go right upstairs and make peace with your cousin.”

I sat still, staring at the television.

“Bethany Marie!” Belle’s voice was sharp. “You do what I say, child, and you do it right now. Your mama and daddy don’t need no more drama in this house, ’specially between you and Reana Mae. Now you march yourself up them stairs and you make peace with your cousin, before I drag you up there myself!”

I wanted to scream at her, to tell her the truth. But I didn’t. I couldn’t. So I stood and walked slowly up the stairs to the attic, where Reana Mae was.

She was on the floor by her bed again, her head bowed, her lips moving silently.

“What the hell are you doing?” I asked.

She lifted her head to look at me.

“I’m prayin’ for Tracy,” she said softly.

“Like that’s gonna do any good,” I sniffed. “You don’t even believe in God.”

“But Aunt Helen does,” she said. “Aunt Helen believes in God. And Tracy believed in God. And I figure, if there is a God, it can’t hurt to pray for her.”

I simply stared at her. All I could see when I looked at her was the smile on her face when she’d seen Tracy in the doorway.

“I ain’t prayin’ for myself. I know better than that. What I done is past prayin’ for.”

I said nothing.

“Look, Bethy.” Her voice was pleading now. “I know what I done was wrong. Cruel, even. I know that. I wanted to hurt her. I wanted to hurt her like she always hurt me. I wanted to hurt her ’cause of all those things she said about Caleb, ’cause they were true, after all. And I hated that. I hated that she was right. I just wanted to hurt her.”

Her voice broke into a strangled sob.

“But God, Bethany, I didn’t want her to die! You know I didn’t want that! You know I didn’t!”

She was crying now, tears running down her chin.

“What I done was purely wicked, I know that. And God Hisself won’t never forgive me. But
you
got to, Bethy. You got to forgive me. I ain’t got nobody but you now. Caleb ain’t comin’ and Aunt Helen will probably send me away for what I done to Tracy. She’ll send me back down to the river, or maybe to foster care. I know I don’t deserve to live with her no more, not after what I done. I don’t deserve to be in her house. Tracy’s dead, and it’s all my fault.”

She was still on her knees, her face buried in her hands, her shoulders shaking furiously.

I dropped to my knees beside her and wrapped my arms around her, pulling her close. It was her fault that Tracy was dead, that was true. But I knew then she didn’t mean for it to happen. Tracy was the way Tracy was, and that was all there was to it. Reana Mae was wrong, but I knew she was sorry for it.

I held her and told her that I loved her and that Mother loved her, too.

“She can’t love me! How could she, after what I done?”

“She doesn’t know. No one knows except me and Brian and Paul.”

She stared at me, tears still dripping from her nose and chin.

“How come?”

“Brian told the police that we came home and saw Paul and Tracy having an argument. And that Tracy got mad and ran off and tripped on the tracks trying to beat the train. And that’s what everyone thinks.”

“Why did he do that?” she asked. “Why did he lie?”

“He didn’t want Mother and Daddy to know she did it on purpose,” I said. “They think it was an accident. They have to. They can’t know the truth.”

“But I got to tell them, then,” she said urgently. “I got to tell them it was my fault. I can’t stay here with them not knowin’. It’s my fault, and they got to know that!”

“No, Reana!”

My voice was louder and sharper than I’d expected. She was on her feet, and I thought she might run straight for the stairs to tell Mother about her part in Tracy’s death. I couldn’t let her do that, not to Mother, not now.

Then we heard steps on the stairway and both of us froze. But it was only Aunt Belle carrying a plate of peanut butter crackers and two sodas.