The Color of Silence (21 page)

Chapter 45

I feel like I'm standing inside one of those paintings I used to make when I was little—the kind that my dad would stick to the fridge so everyone could see what a genius I was. A bright blue sky with a brilliant yellow sun shining down on glowing green grass—kindergarten colors in big old messy brush strokes that fill the paper with energy and life.

But I'm a long way from kindergarten.

I'm standing in a graveyard.

I can't really believe I'm doing this. Cali would laugh at me if she knew.

If she could still know and could still laugh.

Do dead people laugh? Do they sing about watermelons and make fun of nerdy best friends who walk around in graveyards probably talking to no one?

I already stopped by my mother's gray stone.

Alone and flowerless.

I should have brought her flowers.

I didn't stay long, even though I have lots to tell her.

Too many people to visit in one place.

Joanie's stone is small and white. I don't know who bought it, because as far as I know there's no family to do it. It doesn't have a picture on it. Just words that don't say much—her name and dates and a quote from some poem I remember reading in school.

Joanie Watson

1995–2012

“Remember what peace there may be in silence…”

Searching for enough words to tell us who she was. Maybe no one knew enough about her to find them.

“What peace there may be in silence.” My silence has been dark and stormy and painful. Anything but peaceful.

Was Joanie's silence peaceful? Was her mind calm and filled with happy thoughts? Or was she angry at life, frustrated by the body she was forced to live in?

I always got the feeling that she was pretty peaceful—that she had things figured out. But I don't really know.

Maybe whoever picked that poem did know her and did find the words to tell us who she was after all.

Maybe.

I wonder if anyone ever read poetry to her. Did she like poems? Did she have her own poetry inside of her mind?

If things had turned out differently, would a robot have read them to me some day?

Someone left a small basket of flowers on top of the stone. No one has watered them, so they're wilted and losing their colors.

I should have brought her fresh flowers. I never remember flowers.

I did bring her rainbow. I pull it out of my pocket and hold it out in front of me with both hands. The stones catch little pieces of sunlight, trapping them inside until the colors start to glow.
I wonder what Joanie thought when she looked up and saw them hanging from her ceiling day after day. Did she wish she could wear them around her neck? Or did she like to just look at them and watch the way the light makes them sparkle? Did she think about the person who gave them to her? Who
did
give them to her? What did they mean to her?

Would she really have wanted me to have them?

So many questions that I didn't get a chance to ask her.

I stand staring at them for another moment or two, thinking about Joanie and her big eyes that held so much. Thinking about the word
blue
and how much it meant to her that she could actually say it for the first time. I really never knew that one word could be so important or exciting.

I think about missing her.

I wonder if she misses her life and the people in it or if she's found something new and different where she is now that fills her days with something more than colored stones.

Should I leave her rainbow here for her?

Cali would tell me not to. She would tell me that someone would just steal it or it would get all rusty in the rain or something practical like that.

She would probably be right.

I hold it up again so the sun can catch its colors.

Just in case Joanie can see.

“I'll keep it safe for you, OK?” I touch her gravestone for a second and then tuck the rainbow safely back into my pocket.

Cali would approve. Maybe Joanie would too. I hope so.

I start looking for Cali's stone even though I'm pretty sure she would tell me to go home and find her somewhere else, because she wouldn't be caught dead in a grave.

I accidentally smile for a second.

It doesn't take me long to find her.

Not her, I guess. Her stone.

It's big, pink, and shiny. There's a teddy bear engraved on it.

Cali liked pink. And teddy bears.

But not gravestones.

Calliope Prescott

1995–2011

Beloved daughter

We love you forever

Love You Forever
. Robert Munsch. Cali's favorite book. She read it to me once, which was weird because we were fifteen at the time and it's a little-kid book, but she loved it so much, she just had to share. I had heard it before, of course, but it sounded different when she read it. Her voice was full of music even when she wasn't singing. She could have been an actress someday. The great Calliope Prescott, daughter of the gods.

Except she isn't going to have a someday.

Her voice is trapped in a box under a pink stone with a teddy bear on it.

Maybe.

“I don't know why I'm here. I know you would tell me that you're not even in there and I'm just talking to myself, but I don't know what else to do. It's just…well…I need to talk to someone, and you're my best friend, you know? No one understands me but you. And I'm not even sure you totally get me. Got me. Whatever.”

My throat hurts. Too many words. “Remember all those movies we watched where people died? You said you hated those scenes in the graveyard—when the leftover people talk to a stone and tell it that they miss the person rotting underneath it in the ground. You always told me that there wasn't anything in the ground but a box full of bones that was polluting the earth—that the person had gone away. But you never told me where you thought the box-people ended up. Are they floating around like ghosts, watching us? Or are they up in some heaven or down in some hell or somewhere in between? Where do we go? My dad says my mom is still somewhere around, watching over me.
Are you still here somewhere, too?”

I look around, as if she might be standing behind me watching with a big grin on her face, shaking her head at how nuts
I sound. There's nothing there, of course. I'm standing alone, talking to a stone. Maybe I should direct my comments to the teddy bear. At least he looks interested.

“They wanted me to see a shrink. At the beginning, right after you…Did you know that? Bet you think that's funny. You
always said I was nuts so…I guess I am. I don't talk to people anymore, at least not much. My dad—I even stopped talking to him for a while, but I couldn't keep it up. He kind of broke me down. Which wasn't hard because I was already pretty broken. He's a good dad, though. You always used to tell me that.”

There are flowers on top of the pink stone. I reach over and touch them. Silk I guess. I wonder what happens to them in the rain.

“I talked to someone else for a while too. A girl I met…had to meet…a friend. Someone I tried to help. Kind of like you helped me. Well, actually not much like the way you helped me. Actually, completely different. Anyway, the thing is, she ended up helping me instead. Her social skills were a lot better than mine. Mine still pretty much suck—worse than ever since you left.
Since you left
. Stupid. That makes it sound like you went off on a trip or away to school or something. People do that, you know. Pretend that death isn't real by calling it something else. Passed away. Moved on. Taken to heaven. I heard all those after you died.”

My voice cracks on the last word. The crack spreads through my whole body until I feel like I'm going to crumble into so many pieces that all the king's horses and all the king's men couldn't put me back together. My legs go first, and I slump to the ground. I pull my knees to my chest, wrapping my arms around them, trying to hold myself together. I lean my head against the pink stone. It's cold against my cheek.

“How can you be dead? How can you be sitting beside me singing one second and then just gone? How can we disappear so easily? I don't understand. You never hurt anyone. You weren't a bad person. Why did you have to go away? Go away. Not go away. Die. Why did you have to die?”

Stupid question because I know the answer. I risk moving one of my arms to rub my face. I'm surprised that it's wet. I'm crying again without even knowing I'm doing it. Seriously losing it.

“It's a stupid question, right? We both know why you died. I screwed up, right? Even though my dad says it wasn't really my fault, at least not totally, you and I know I should have made it different—somehow. Right? Stuck by you like I promised. Stopped you or driven the car myself. Then you wouldn't be dead. Right?”

I stare at the stone, waiting for it to answer me. The pink teddy bear grins at me silently. His little pink eyes and silly pink smiley mouth seem to be mocking me, which pisses me off.

“Why were we so stupid? Why did you take off on me and end up with Matt's keys? Why did I let you? What the hell were you thinking? We didn't need to take some stupid guy's car to get a stupid cup of stupid coffee! We were so, so stupid. And your teddy bear is stupid too.”

I wipe the back of my hand over my nose, which makes my hand disgusting, so I wipe it on my pants. Cali would be completely grossed out. “What am I going to do now? They want me to go back to school. How can I go back to school and face everyone? How can I go back without you?”

If this was one of those movies that Cali hates, the ghost of the dead person would suddenly appear and say wise and encouraging things that make the crying mess of a person feel better. Then the mess of a person would stop making a mess of everything and get up and say good-bye in a tear-jerking and pathetic way as the ghost fades away and the closing credits start to roll.

“If you did come and talk to me, it wouldn't be all soft and mushy like in the movies, would it? I bet you'd tell me to shut up and stop feeling sorry for myself. To get my butt back to school and get on with my life and all that crap. To stop worrying about what other people think and just worry about myself—like you already said to me about a million times. Right?”

I sit and wait. I don't know for what. I know this isn't a movie. Her ghost isn't going to come and talk to me, but I still wait. I'm sniffing still, but the tears have finally stopped, at least for the moment.

“I really wish you could come back, just for a second, and tell me that. Just be one of those movie ghosts. Just for a second. Be a star. The great Calliope. Or just be you and fix me like you always do. It's your job. You can't stop just because you're dead. Please, Cali?”

I shake my head at my own words and close my mouth.
I know she isn't going to come, but I keep on sitting there anyway.

“My dad asked me if I thought you were mad at me for letting you drive. I shouldn't have done it. I should have driven the car for you. I am so so so so sorry.”

Sorry
. That word again. Only I really mean it. I'm so sorry. I want her to know how sorry I am.

I want her to tell me it's OK. That she forgives me. That I'm going to be OK.

I don't know how long I sit waiting for nothing, but eventually my legs start to cramp up, and I realize I've lost feeling in one of my feet. I force myself to stand up.

“I guess I should go. I don't know if you can hear me.
I don't know where you are. I don't know if you're anywhere. But just in case…”

I stand there looking at her pink name engraved for all time on her pink stone under her pink teddy bear. My eyes start to fill again, but I tell them to stop being such babies.

I stand for another minute, trying to find Cali in all of the pinkness. I look around to make sure I'm alone and then close my eyes. I take a deep, shaky breath and let it out slowly.

And for the first time in almost a year, I get ready to sing.
I had thought of singing the recital song that I never got a chance to perform, but I can't remember the words. I guess I could do a little watermeloning, but that's always been Cali's trick, not mine.

There is one other song I could try.

I put my hand in my pocket, feeling the cool smoothness of Joanie's gift as I take another deep breath and start singing a rainbow to my friends.

My voice is soft and rusty in the pink silence, and I'm glad that there are only birds around to hear me.

Although, if Cali were here, she'd probably tell me I sound très sexy. And if Joanie were here, she'd smile and dance to the music with her eyes.

I wonder if Joanie and Cali might be together somewhere, sharing things that I don't understand. If either of them is watching, they likely think I'm completely out of my mind for standing alone in a graveyard, singing about rainbows to a shiny pink stone.

As I finish the song, I swear I can hear someone laughing…

Maybe two someones.

Acknowledgments

I would like to once again thank Margie Wolfe, Carolyn Jackson, and all of the other wonderful staff members at Second Story Press. Your unfailing support and patience is greatly appreciated.

My amazing editor, Alison Kooistra—you have once again managed to take my swirling mass of words and redirect them into a story that makes sense. Your passionate involvement in the development of my characters makes me feel as if we are both walking around inside their lives.

I also want to acknowledge all the wonderful speech therapists at the Upper Canada District School Board who have helped so many of my students find their words.

And finally, a word of thanks to all of those families who have been both brave and kind enough to share their personal journeys with Eye Gaze Technology on the Internet so that the world can see all of the wonderful advancements that are being made in helping everyone find a voice that others can understand.