The Sound of Building Coffins (36 page)

In dreams, she was vibrant and young, her mind sharp and clear. In dreams, she was not a doddering old woman who babbled endlessly and bitterly about shoes left in the middle of the damn floor. While asleep, all was right and peaceful. All this had been so—until Coco Robicheaux had come to call.

Since the coming of Coco Robicheaux her nights had brought only dread, the vivid calm of dreams stained by something dark and deathly. A ghostly thing had invaded her dreams, never far off but never too near—getting nearer with each night.

Coco Robicheaux
. His presence had become so strong that she now felt him even while awake—as a wisp of smoke encircling her heart, a noose slowly tightening. She didn’t know what he wanted, but she knew he was coming for her.

Tonight as she drifted off to sleep a heavy sense of dread fell—something like a premonition of her own death. She might have snapped awake had the dread evolved to fear, but the sensation of it had left her remarkably unafraid. Though dread and fear are often mistaken for one another, they are hardly the same thing. She dissolved into sleep with a thin smile on her lips as she let the dream take her.

*

The thin smile remains as she walks. She is walking now as she always does in dreams, at the bottom of a river. The object of her dreams, she believes, is to find
Manman Brigitte
, her spiritual mother, her personal
met tet.
It’s a journey that has yielded not one clue, but a journey full of wonder and gorgeous mystery. To Malvina Latour it is the mystery of a poem constructed by angels.

There is no perceptible current this far below the surface; Malvina moves easily, only remotely aware of the tons of water surrounding her, pushing down from above, reducing far away sunlight to luminescent brown, caressing her skin and causing her thick black hair to drift wildly about her eyes. She is strong in the dream; her joints do not ache, she is not short of breath, her back is straight and absent of pain, her head is held high and proud. She is beautiful in the dream; her skin is a glowing and fair tan, her breasts are firm, her stomach flat, and her eyes as bewitching as they’d been in her youth.

Suddenly she falls, landing softly on palms and knees. Her head turns to investigate what she’s tripped over.

Shoes.

In my damn way…

Dread and fear become one. This is not right, this cannot be. Mundane realities like this are not allowed in dreams. There are no misplaced shoes here, no regret, no betrayal, no guilt, no pain, no pain, no pain…

Not allowed, not here.

There is music now. She hears music; tinny and fine, joyous and troubling. Wisps of red and orange weave through the brown of deep river before her eyes: a subtle invasion. The wisps move easily but there’s anger in their movement, they are cool liquid fire. They petition her to remember things that have no business here, things not allowed in sweet dreams of night.

She means to get to her feet, she means to run, she means to wake, she means to leave—but the river floor is soft, slippery, treacherous and she cannot rise up. There is pain in her joints, her legs and back become racked with creaking misery, she can’t catch her breath. She notes the thick, flowing black hair so recently dancing around her eyes is now wispy and white. She wishes to sink into the river floor; disappear, be gone. She is ready.

She will not be waking up. This is Coco Robicheaux’s doing. He is, she presumes, the thing she’d called into the world on that black night so many years ago. And now, after a lifetime of anguish and regret, he has finally come to thank her with his cold touch.
Manman Brigitte
had been wrong; pain has healed no one, no one has done right by anyone, there is no saving grace. Promises were made but not honored, only bad things truly are.

Her eyes close tight.

There’s a hand on her forearm, lifting upward, its grip gentle.

“
Mother?” she asks in her mind, with eyes still closed, praying her search might be over, that questions might be answered, that an end might be near. She hears only a laugh in return. A deep, male laugh.

“
Nope. Ain’t nobody’s mama, and that’s fer sure.”

The voice sounds kind, but Malvina learned long ago not to trust untested impressions. She’d been tricked many times by kind voices in her life, had even tricked a few people with similar deceits of her own.

“
Kill me then. I know who you are, Coco Robicheaux. Know why ya come. Get it over with and be done with me.” She pushes herself up on trembling legs, her free hand covering her eyes, not wanting to see the demon’s eyeless face so close. Not wanting to see him at all.

Another gentle laugh. “Open your eyes, little mother. Probably not who you think, mayhap. I mean you no harm.”

“
I ain’t afraid of you, trickster.” Defiance.

“
Well, if yer so all-fired brave then look at me already. I ain’t as ugly as all that, now. Keep it up and you’ll wind up hurting a person’s feelings.”

Malvina takes one quick step back before removing her hand from her eyes. The man only smiles at her, hands in pockets. Not a bad looking man, this Coco Robicheaux demon. Her eyes widen with recognition.

“
I know you,” she says.

“
Mebbe so, mebbe so,” says the man who is not Coco Robicheaux. “Who might I be, then?”

Malvina crinkles her brow. “Can’t be who I think—bein’ that somebody’s long dead.”

“
Talk sense, old woman,” the man says impatiently. “You are of the understanding that this is a dream, ain’t that right?”

“
Well, yes. I mean it would have to be. We’re under water for Pete’s sake.”

“
Well, then. Why would it trouble you to know I
am
dead? Why not talk to a dead man in a dream? Folks do it alla time—ain’t that right?”

Malvina takes a cautious step forward. “Well, of course they do. But it’s just that…”

“
Yes?”

“
Well, you look so…so…
solid
.”

“
That be so, dear. In this place I’m plenty real. Realer than you, statement of fact. Looky here…” The man holds his hand out towards Malvina. The warmth of his voice tells her it’s all right, and she places her hand in his.

“
See that?” says the man.

Malvina stares at their clasped hands. His hand is solid, firm and opaque—her own is…not quite there. Transparent by comparison. “Well, I’ll be…”

“
Interesting, wouldn’t you say, dear?” There’s warmth in his touch, and he gives her hand a squeeze. “You see, things ain’t exactly how you might think ’round here.”

“
How so?” Malvina is still eyeing the contrast of hands.

“
Rationally, you’d think since I’m the one dead, that I’d be the ghost here. Well, that would be true in your waking world, but this ain’t no air-breathing, hard-living world we’re in at the moment. This is the Spiritworld. And in the Spiritworld, it’s the spirits who are solid and real. When living folks show up, it’s they who are ghosts. That’s because they’re not really here. They visit this place only when they dream.”

“
I’m a ghost?” says Malvina, organizing her thoughts.

“
Down here, yes.” The man’s answer is firm.

“
So…you’re just a real live dead man talking to a living ghost?”

“
Ha! Ain’t quite thought of it that way,” he laughs.

Malvina is smiling now. “I’m sorry I never got to know you better while we was both living, Noonday.”

“
That’s all right, Malvina. We traveled in diffn’t circles, you and me. Me bein’ a Christian and you bein’ a hoodoo mambo and all. Wasn’t till I passed on that I realized it’s all part of one big circle after all.”

“
Well, there are similarities,” Malvina doesn’t quite follow Noonday’s meaning.

“
No, not similarities. It’s the
same.
” He looks at her directly, but she is looking past him.

Her eyes have wandered about ten yards beyond the spot where he stands; there is a man and a boy there, they are playing. The boy is on his knees, stacking innumerable buttons into clever, intricate, and recognizable structures; a chapel, a plantation house, an automobile with wheels that turn—all made from various buttons of stone, metal, cloth, and wood. The man laughs and jumps, shadow-boxing near the perfectly balanced button-structures, pulling his punches just short of toppling them over. The boy looks mildly annoyed but grins as the man skillfully endangers but never destroys.

A beautiful young coffee-skinned woman watches the two play; her sweet smile dances below troubled eyes. The boxing man is her brother, the young boy her only child – both having been so devastatingly lost to her; and now: so wondrously found. Still, her eyes speak of a deep hole that remains unfilled. Someone important is missing – the love of her life. A vivid memory of her lover’s eyes – boring into her own in her moment of dying, angry and hurt – weighs heavy on her soul. She bears him no ill will for having removed her from the world of the living, for having murdered her – only wants for him to rejoin her and their child, to see that everything will be all right and always has been. It is not yet his time, she understands. He has a certain penance to pay above before he can be received below. Such effortless wisdom and spiritual clarity are newly acquired by Diphtheria in death – they do little to ease her longing – but she allows herself comfort in the knowing. In the Spiritworld there is a different kind of faith; and that is the blind, baseless belief that the living will somehow, and against all odds, find their way to redemption.

“
I know these two,” Malvina says, pointing towards the man and boy. “These faces I know.” Malvina is trying to place them in her mind. “They’re beautiful.”

“
Thank you, dear. They’re my kin. My youngest son and my only grandson. Dropsy and West. And the pretty young lady is my daughter, Diphtheria.”

“
Of course they are,” she says with a smile. “But why here? They all so young—”

“
Miss Malvina, I’d like you to meet my oldest son, Typhus,” he interrupts. “Today is his first day in this place. And I’ve got a special surprise waiting on him—just like the surprise I got for you a bit later on.”

“
We’ve met,” Typhus says with a cautious smile. “In the shop. Miss Malvina comes in regular.”

“
Hello, Typhus,” says Malvina, unable to pull her gaze from the amazing button structures of West Bolden. “Can this be?” Her eyes are full of wonder.

“
Now comes the good part, and I’m glad you could be here to bear witness. It is a moment my family has long waited on.” Noonday has fixed his stare on a swirl of motion from a nearing river cloud, his eyes brightening steadily. “And there she is, the one and only love of my life.”

“
Typhus,” a breathless female voice can be heard. “Typhus, come here to me.”

Typhus’ eyes go wide. His freshly unencumbered heart is melting fast.

A woman is walking towards them from the murk, her arms extended.

“
Mama?” It’s the first time the word has ever passed his lips in the presence of the woman it was made for, but it won’t be the last, not by far.

The woman Typhus has only known as Lily for so many years is smiling at him, her deep brown eyes clouding the water about her drifting hair with trails of lilac tears.

“
As beautiful a sight as I’ve ever seen,” says Malvina, enjoying the spectacle of mother and son united in death. Then, in a whisper; “Noonday, how did Typhus die? I didn’t even know he was sick.”

“
Wasn’t sick a’tall. I killed him myself, just this morning.” Noonday says this with a tone of fatherly pride that Malvina finds both distasteful and inappropriate. He ignores her reprimanding stare and continues: “Now, just look at them. Both dead, both happy.” His voice takes on the rhythm of a sermon:
“So long in pain before today. No more, no more; Praise Jesus, no more, and amen!”

“
It’s wrong to kill children, sir,” Malvina scolds. “If that’s really what you done.”

“
Surely it is,” Noonday concedes. “But he was nearly dead already, I just guided him that last little bit. Long story. Tell ya all about it later, sister—if ya don’t mind. Lots of time later, not much now.”

Malvina tightens her face, never having cared for backtalk (much less shushing) from a person so much younger than herself. Noonday just smiles, takes her again by the hand, leading her past Typhus and the beautiful woman whose name is Gloria and not Lily, into a thick of gathering light.
Malvina’s mind fills with uneasy questions as they walk past the night’s first reunion, recalling recent feelings of premonition. “Something bad gonna happen, Noonday. I just don’t know what.”

He squeezes her hand once more. “Now, whatever may come will do so on its own steam, and that don’t necessarily reflect on you or me or things we mighta done in our past and above water. Plenty of blame to pass around. Ain’t no one innocent here.” His smile fades. “Don’t be afraid ner concerned, but I want you to come with me.”

“
Where to?”

“
Some folks been waitin’ on ya. Be glad to see you, too. See if we can’t straighten out all this fear and bad feelin’.” A pause. “See if we can’t make things right once and for all.”