Bury the Children in the Yard (5 page)

Turns out it wasn’t as hard as he thought.

After the class was over, she stood up from her bench, arms dusty up to the elbows with dried clay, and looked at Joel. Maybe she sensed some desperate, urgent longing in his stare.

“I’m Maria,” she said. She pulled an odd-looking sculpture from her canvas bag so she could put her sculpture tools in it.

“I’m Joel. That’s cool,” he said, pointing to the sculpture.

“Thanks,” she said. “It’s called ‘A Butterfly in Ice.’”

“Cool name.” Jesus, he felt like a putz. “So I haven’t seen you around campus. Are you new?”

“Kind of. My parents moved here from Arizona. Dad’s with the Air Force. We moved too late for me to enroll in the last semester so I have to do the summer thing.”

“Welcome to Ohio,” Joel said, feeling stupid. He was still marveling at the fact this mysterious girl now seemed so down to earth, with parents and everything. It seemed foreign to her.

“What do you people do for fun out here,” she asked, pulling her heavy backpack off the floor and slinging it over her shoulder. It pulled her shirt tight against her breasts. She picked up her sculpture and, watching the muscles in her forearm flex, Joel noticed the sculpture
did
look like a butterfly trapped in ice, in an abstract kind of way.

“This is the Midwest, we don’t have fun,” Joel said.

She laughed briefly. Joel’s insides melted.

“Right ... but I thought you like watched racecars and farmed and shot guns and stuff like that.”

“Well, maybe I’m not the best person to ask about recreation.”

“Why not?”

“Not many friends. I don’t really do much. Study. Read. Study.”

“Well, you have another friend now ... what was your name again?”

He coughed, ready to tell her his name when she put a hand on his chest, stopping him.

“I know,” she said. “It’s Joel. I was just kidding.”

She drew her hand from his chest, kind of sliding it downward as she did and asked if he wanted to do something this weekend.

“I’d love to.”

And then they went their separate ways. At the close of the next class, they made plans to go out on Friday after class.

The rest of the week was interminable. The class ended in the afternoon and they went to a bar close to the campus. They were both kind of drunk and decided the bar was too full for them. They went to a park and sat in a pair of swings, the empty park somewhat spectral in the moonlight and Maria told him she had never seen the ocean. Joel, whose family made regular trips to Florida, told her they would have to change all that. They ended up in his car, racing east on the highway. Sometime the next day they were in North Carolina at a nearly deserted expanse of beach.

“Well, here we are,” Joel said, as though they had taken a quick trip around the block.

The weather couldn’t have been more perfect. The sky was blotted with far away puffs of clouds. They ran along the beach all day, the water warm, splashing up around them, the sun baking them. There was a lot of laughter. Joel couldn’t remember laughing like that since he had been a kid. He couldn’t remember feeling that unabashedly
good
since he had been a kid. And it wasn’t just his lust for Maria making him feel that way. They had not done so much as hold hands at that point.

They stayed on the beach until sunset. Once the sun was out of sight, they retreated up to his car in the deserted parking lot.

“Maybe we should rest before driving back,” she said.

He couldn’t argue with her, having been up well over twenty-four hours. They both crawled in the backseat of the car and there they kissed for the first time. To Joel, that was what made the whole day a dream. Those innumerable seconds with his lips pressed against hers assured him he would be able to remember the day in shimmering glimpses at best. It was this he would remember in its entirety. He fought the urge to let his hands explore her. He didn’t want her to feel like she had to let him just because he had driven all this way and was her only real way back.

“Now, was that fun?” she asked.

“Yes,” Joel said. “That was fun.”

They fell asleep in the backseat, Maria’s head resting against his shoulder, the wild fragrance of her hair there to stimulate even his sleeping mind.

They awoke just before dawn, climbing out of the car to stretch and move into the front seat. In this meager blue-gray light, the beach now seemed sullen and cold, summer faded in a night. An old man walked slowly along the beach, casting awkward glimpses at the car.

The trip back was not nearly long enough for Joel. They talked about books and music and movies, told stories from their childhoods, lived nearly a continent apart but with eerie similarity.

5.

“Familiar, huh?” Snow said, his breath icy on the back of Joel’s neck.

“What the fuck is going on?” Joel said. “I want to talk to her.”

“Why? She wouldn’t know who you are. That’s not who you think it is. That’s her twin sister.”

“She didn’t have a twin sister.”

“How well do you think you really knew her?”

“What is this? Is this some kind of game?”

“This is life, Joel. And you’re making a mess of it. Not quite following orders. I can tell when you do not do as you’re told. It’s all over your sleeves. It’s all over the floor. I want you to get back in the bed.”

“And what if I don’t want to get back into bed?”

“Then you will never know what happened. I have the answers. You have the questions. Who has the power?”

Joel didn’t know what to think. He knew what he wanted to do. He wanted to tear through the glass in front of him. He wanted to float down on the summer breeze until he stood in front of that model of perfection sitting languidly on the parkbench. Maria didn’t have any twin sisters. He would have known if she did. Even though he had never been invited back to her house (there hadn’t been any time for that) he knew she would not have left out a detail such as that. Nevertheless, his mind raced. Part of him still wanted to believe what this man was telling him. That was the same part of him that wanted to believe Snow was there to help him.

“Get back in the bed, Joel ... and I’ll tell you a story.”

Reluctantly, Joel pulled himself away from the window. What could he do, really? Would there be any escaping this man in his current weakened and doped-up state? He didn’t think so. There wouldn’t be any fighting. There could be little resistance of any kind. Even without Snow’s suggestions, the only thing Joel really wanted to do was to get back into bed, curl up under the white blankets that afforded at least a modicum of warmth and listen to the air conditioning hum continuously from the vent overhead.

Joel climbed back in the bed, his muscles hungrily reaching for the mattress, wanting nothing more than to be immobile. Snow came and sat on the side of the bed, staring off across the room. He took a deep breath, preparing to tell Joel why he was here.

6.

The first time Joel had sex with Maria was like this:

It was the weekend after their beach excursion.

He had driven them to the nature reserve at dusk. He was pretty sure they both knew what it was they wanted. They found a clearing located deep enough in the woods for them to hide and spread a quilt out on the ground. He had stuck some incense into the soft earth around the quilt and lit it. Soon the air was redolent with the sweetness of summer and the perfumes of nag champa.

It didn’t take them long. They greeted each other’s bodies with near ferocity and, afterwards, they lay there in silence, smoking cigarettes and looking at the stars. She lay on her stomach, her legs bent so her feet dangled above her rounded ass. He stroked the two strange, nearly-identical scars on her back and fought the urge to ask her how she got them.

“This is our spot,” she said out of nowhere.

“What?” he asked.

“This is our spot. The next time we do this, it has to be right here. For now. And then we can make more spots.”

“Sticky spots,” he said. He wrapped an arm around her shoulders and pulled her nakedness closer to him. There they kind of drifted off.

And awoke nearly an hour later to a rustling in the woods.

“What is that?” he asked, startled.

“Some kind of animal,” she said.

“Then it’s a fucking huge animal,” he hissed under his breath. He figured it was more likely a park ranger and, gathering their clothes and the quilt, they both sprinted along the trail until they reached his car.

7.

“I’m surprised you don’t remember what happened.” Snow’s voice was annoyingly calm. Devoid of any compassion whatsoever. “It was so tragic. But I guess some minds can simply erase tragedy. You’ve been here ever since.”

“What happened?”

“You really don’t remember, do you?”

“You promised.”

“It was a terrible car crash. You were driving. You were a little more than drunk. Shouldn’t have been driving. You swerved to avoid something in the road. Your car turned over and slid down a hill. You went into a coma. This morning was the first time you came out of that coma. Maria was killed. Not instantly. No, for a while, she was here with you. She died this morning. That is her sister out there, ready to go home, ready to begin preparations for the funeral. It’s a short story really.”

Joel didn’t know what to think. His heart thudded sickeningly in his chest as he lay there. Why did he have any reason to doubt this man? What else would explain why he was here in a hospital?

“How long have I been here?” Joel asked.

“Three months.”

“Why am I wearing a straitjacket?”

“It’s not a straitjacket. Your hands are covered so you won’t scrape out your eyes in your sleep. We’ve discovered some people who undergo violent trauma suffer very physical rages even while in a coma.”

“Why is everything white?”

“Lack of stimulus.”

“But you let me look outside.”

“That was because I wanted you to feel like you were looking at Maria for one last time. Trying to trigger some memories. I shouldn’t have done that. It’s not in the rules.”

“I’m glad you did.”

“I need you to take this pill for me.”

Snow placed the pill in his mouth just as he did last time. Then he stood to leave. This time, thinking he was some kind of murderer, Joel took the pill, let it slide down his throat, hoping it would quell some of the strong emotions that had risen within him.

8.

The next weekend and the next weekend and the one after that, they went to their secret place in the woods. There was always a sound to creep them out, always the thought of someone looming just outside the perimeter of the clearing, watching them, listening to them, consuming them. Maybe it was just some sick voyeur or maybe it was a park ranger or maybe it was some horrifically huge shaggy beast. Neither of them knew. Neither of them cared. They left fulfilled.

On their last night together, a stranger thing happened.

After their lovemaking, they lay in their customary position, Joel flat on his back, Maria curled up between his arm and torso. He saw something flutter just above them.

“What is that?” She had seen it too.

“I think it’s a butterfly,” he said. He reached up casually, not expecting to catch it. But it seemed like the butterfly wanted to be caught. At first, he had thought it was just one of those butterflies you see flapping through summer fields, the small white kind.

After bringing it down into his palm, he saw that it was different. It looked like it was covered in ice crystals.

“Oh, this is beautiful, Joel,” Maria said and Joel could have sworn that the butterfly turned toward her voice, acknowledging her in some way. “It’s just like my sculpture.”

“Touch it,” he said. “It’s cold.”

She reached out a finger and stroked the back of the little white butterfly. “Feels like ice.”

“Weird, huh?”

“Put your clothes on, Joel. Let’s let it go and see where it lands.”

He had realized that she was able to make a game out of just about anything. He was usually willing to play along and he always enjoyed himself.

The night was strange. A clear full moon kind of night that seemed way too bright. A night full of shadows that moved.

He put his clothes on, watching Maria slide into hers. He had always found this nearly as sensual as watching her slide out of her clothes. Once clothed, they chased after the strange icy night butterfly. And it was like the butterfly wanted them to follow it, the way it hovered there at the edge of the clearing, never letting itself escape their range of sight.

Beckoning
, he thought. It’s like the butterfly is beckoning us.

9.

Again, consciousness found him. Opening his eyes in the winter room, a sudden panic seized him. He had to get out of here. He had to get out and get as far away as possible because this place was not any good. Not any good at all. This place was a prison, an icy prison, and he knew the longer he stayed, the thicker and stronger the ice would freeze until he would not be able to even entertain any thoughts about escaping.

He melted from the bed. Some form of stored heat inflated his muscles, making him feel strong again. He didn’t think his legs would give out anytime soon. He half expected Snow to be there in the room with him, there to shove him back in the bed and cram another pill down his throat, to ice the sweat beading on his forehead.

Joel ran to the door and pulled at it. Locked. Of course. This only reinforced the idea that this place was a cell.

He crossed the room until he reached the blinded window. How had Snow made the blinds go up? Joel ran his fingers around the edges, not finding so much as an opening. He wanted to scream but knew that would not do him any good. Screaming would only attract attention. He went back to the bed, pulling on it, sliding it out from the wall, thoughts of dismantling swarming his brain. Memories trickled from his thawing thoughts. Memories, he knew, that were the correct memories. Even though they were not as solid and resolute as the memories Snow had supplied for him, he knew they were the correct memories because they were
his
.