Walk Two Moons

24 BIRDS OF SADNESS

As we were leaving the Badlands, Gramps swore at a driver who cut us off. Usually when Gramps cussed like this, Gram threatened to go back to the egg man. I don’t know that whole story, just that one time when Gramps was cussing up a storm, Gram ran off with the man who regularly bought eggs from Gramps. Gram stayed with the egg man for three days and three nights until Gramps came to get her and promised he wouldn’t swear anymore.

I once asked Gram if she would really go back to the egg man if Gramps cussed too much. She said, “Don’t tell your grandfather, but I don’t mind a few hells and damns. Besides, that egg man snored to beat the band.”

“So you didn’t leave Gramps just because of the cussing?”

“Salamanca, I don’t even remember why I did that. Sometimes you know in your heart you love someone, but you have to go away before your head can figure it out.”

That night we stayed at a motel outside of Wall, South Dakota. They had one room left, with only one bed in it, but Gramps was tired, so he said it would do. The bed was a king-size water bed. “Gol-dang,” Gramps said. “Lookee there.” When he pressed his hand on it, it gurgled. “Looks like we’ll all have to float on this raft together tonight.”

Gram flopped down on the bed and giggled. “Huz-huz,” she said, in her raspy voice. She rolled into the middle. “Huz-huz.” I lay down next to her, and Gramps tentatively sat down on the other side. “Whoa,” he said. “I do believe this thing’s alive.” The three of us lay there sloshing around as Gramps turned this way and that. “Gol-darn,” he said. Tears were streaming down Gram’s face she was giggling so hard.

Gramps said, “Well, this ain’t our marriage bed—”

That night I dreamed that I was floating down a river on a raft with my mother. We were lying on our backs looking up at the high sky. The sky moved closer and closer to us. There was a sudden popping sound and then we were up in the sky. Momma looked all around and said, “We can’t be dead. We were alive just a minute ago.”

In the morning, we set out for the Black Hills and Mt. Rushmore, hoping to be there by lunchtime. No sooner were we in the car than Gramps said, “So what happened to Peeby’s mother and did Peeby get any more of those messages?”

“I hope everything turned out all right,” Gram said. “I’m a little worried about Peeby.”

On the day after Phoebe showed her father the suspicious spots and the unidentifiable hair strands, another message appeared: You can’t keep the birds of sadness from flying over your head, but you can keep them from nesting in your hair. Phoebe brought the message to school to show me. “The lunatic again,” she said.

“If he has already kidnapped your mother, why would he still be leaving messages?”

“They’re clues,” she said.

At school, people kept asking Phoebe about her mother’s business trip to London. She tried to ignore them, but it wasn’t always possible. She had to answer some of the time.

When Megan asked Phoebe what sights her mother had seen, Phoebe said, “Buckingham Palace—”

“Of course,” Megan nodded knowingly.

“And Big Ben, and—” Phoebe was struggling. “Shakespeare’s birthplace.”

“But that’s in Stratford-on-Avon,” Megan said. “I thought your mother was in London. Stratford is miles away. Did she go on a day trip or something?”

“Yes, that’s what she did. She went on a day trip.”

Phoebe couldn’t help it. She looked as if a whole family of the birds of sadness were nesting in her hair.

In English class, Ben had to give his mythology report. He was nervous. He explained that Prometheus stole fire from the sun and gave it to man. Zeus, the chief god, was angry at man and at Prometheus for taking some of his precious sun. As punishment, Zeus sent Pandora (a woman) to man. Then Zeus chained Prometheus to a rock and sent vultures down to eat Prometheus’s liver. In Ben’s nervousness, he mispronounced Prometheus, so what he actually said was that Zeus sent vultures down to eat porpoise’s liver.

Mary Lou invited both me and Phoebe to dinner that night. When I phoned my father, he did not seem to mind, and I knew he wouldn’t. All he said was, “That will be nice for you, Sal. Maybe I’ll go eat over at Margaret’s.”