Dakota Blues (4 page)

She may have failed to apply that same care to her marriage, but at least she still had a job.

A short white sign poked up through the grass on the shoulder of the highway to announce the remnants of the village of Lefor, and here the hearse slowed and turned. No more than a dozen houses remained to mark the town, and these were ramshackle and hidden under the ancient, spreading limbs of elm and cottonwood trees. Broken-down cars and rusting farm equipment nudged up against the homes, and weeds dominated the yards. The hearse followed the narrow road until the pavement ended, then bumped down the lane and through the wrought-iron gates at the entrance to St. Elizabeth’s Catholic cemetery.

Karen stepped out. The sound of car doors slamming and muted voices, the occasional chuckle or a baby crying displaced the quiet of late morning. Lena’s family and friends followed the pallbearers up the gentle slope, weaving carefully through the headstones and monuments. Adjacent to the graveyard stood St. Elizabeth’s Church, a banner proclaiming “Queen of the Prairie” unfurled in the breeze. Originally built of sod and then of stone, St. Elizabeth’s was rebuilt one final time, in 1929, of cement and rebar, and finished with bricks. She had sheltered the farmers from dust storms, tornadoes, and blizzards. Her steeple soared over the shrinking parish, having presided over the birth and death of a culture.

The mourners pooled around the open grave, some of them finding chairs under a shade awning. As Karen took a seat nearest her mother’s casket, a blacktail deer burst from cover and trotted along the fence line, ambushing a covey of pheasant.

“Lena would have loved that,” said Aunt Marie, watching the deer bound over barbed wire fences until it faded to a beige speck against green fields. The cemetery seemed even more remote than when Karen attended her dad’s funeral, but Lena had liked the idea of being laid to rest in the middle of nature, surrounded by family. She said it would be like an everlasting picnic.

Father Engel took his place at the head of the casket. When the group quieted, he opened his Missal and began the prayers. Karen bowed her head. Her mother’s body lay almost within touching distance, yet forever out of reach. The cicadas droned along with the priest, and Karen’s attention wandered as her mind returned to matters of corporate survival. Had she filed that last report on time? Did she remember to update everybody about the new terms of the collective bargaining agreement? Was that sexual harassment suit going anywhere? She itched with anxiety, covertly checking her watch.

Gesturing for the congregation to stand, Father moved toward the gravesite, where he sprinkled droplets of holy water on the open grave, consecrating the ground where her mother and father would spend the next million years. “Let us pray. ‘Our Father,’” he began, leading the beloved communal prayer. Karen chanted along, her throat tight, the familiar words returning. When the prayer ended, silence enveloped the crowd. She heard a bit of rustling behind her and then the simple notes of “Amazing Grace,” from Uncle Rudy’s accordion. The family sang along, right through two entire verses.

They must have had a lot of practice to know the words, Karen thought, wiping away tears.

The song ended, and silence fell again. Father Engel stood with his hands clasped in front of him, allowing for a moment of meditation. A light breeze rippled his vestments. Overhead, a meadowlark rode a telephone wire and sang complex melodies.

It is peaceful here, Karen thought. She closed her eyes and inhaled the aroma of grassland and freshly turned earth.
I wish you weren’t going to be so far away, but this is where you wanted to be. I’m happy you found peace.

The cemetery workers repositioned bouquets of flowers, clearing a path to the casket. They wore solemn gray slacks and work shirts, and moved about their duties quietly and without haste. The wind whispered through the trees, and wispy clouds drifted overhead.

“Hang in there, sweetie.” Lorraine’s arm crept around Karen’s shoulders. “It’s almost over.”

The priest touched the casket as he prayed, and the workers stood ready to operate the mechanism that would lower her mother into the community of the dead. When Father Engel paused, the funeral director walked over to Karen and held out a basket of roses. For a moment she failed to comprehend, but then reached forward and selected a small red bud. The congregation passed the basket around until everyone held a rose. When the director turned and walked back toward the casket, the family stood and followed him. Each one rested a hand or touched a forehead to the burnished surface.

As the line filed past, most wiped away tears, and Karen choked back her own. These folks seemed to care so much for her mother– these bent-back women with their thinning hair and blocky figures, the men frail and withered. Soon these shuffling old children of immigrants would die with their memories of near-starvation, or of a neighbor trampled by a team of horses, or a child suffocating during a dust storm. Their own parents, already gone, were the only ones who remembered saying goodbye on a German dock to come to America and live in a hole in the ground until they could build a house from sod. They bore children and cultivated the prairie, alone under the sun, the only sound that of the plow blade ripping through the astonished grasses.

Karen closed her eyes. Her mother had known her to her very bones, knowing without asking what her daughter was feeling and what she needed, whether reassurance on a windy morning or fifteen hundred miles of distance from a difficult father. Karen had always thought her gratitude was enough, but now she tasted the acrid bitterness of doubt.

Father Engel reached the end of the last prayer and closed the book. He gestured to Karen to come forward. With Aunt Marie and Lorraine clutching her arms on either side, she approached the casket, her legs wobbly. The breeze freshened, snapping the canvas tent cover, and the trees rustled and bent in the wind.

As a child, Karen had been terrified of the weather, and especially of the wind and dark storms that formed funnel clouds. While her parents slept, she would lie awake in the early hours of a morning, listening to the branches of the trees beat against her window. She worried that a tornado might whirl through town, pick up their house, and kill them. Torn between hiding her head under a pillow and remaining on guard to warn her parents at the first sign of danger, Karen would thrash, alone with her burden, until she heard her mother’s voice calling softly from down the hall.

“It’s just the wind, honey. There’s nothing to be afraid of.”

.

Chapter Four

B
ack at the house, cars lined the street up and down the block, and the walls of the house practically bulged with people. Inside, Karen found a feast that expanded by one dish per every new arrival. Meatloaf, fried chicken, mashed potatoes, and green bean casserole crowded the kitchen counters. Shivery Jell-O molds in red and green with bits of fruit suspended within, potato salad dusted with paprika,
fleischkuecle,
and sliced ham were followed by coffee cake, brownies, and rhubarb pie.

As soon as decency allowed, she slipped into her bedroom, closed the door, and called Peggy. “You need to get back here PDQ,” said the older woman.

“What’s going on?”

“Wes is on a rampage. He’s been firing people all day. Calls them into his office in little groups.”

Karen heard Peggy inhale. “Are you smoking?”

“What the hell are they going to do to me? Just a sec.” Karen heard Peggy stabbing out the cigarette. “Manuel the security guard had to walk so many people out of the building he started hyperventilating. We had to call 9-1-1. Are you still there?”

Karen sat on the bed, head in hand. “Manuel? He’s a rock.”

“Not today. Sorry to be telling you this on top of everything. How are you holding up?”

“The house is full of people. I’m hiding in the bedroom.”

“Get out there and get some hugs, like on your way out the door. I’m not kidding. You and me are all that’s left.”

“I’ll be there at the crack of dawn, day after tomorrow.”

“No sooner?”

“Peggy, I can’t astral-travel.” Karen hung up, pained by the stress in her buddy’s voice. She considered her a friend, even though they never saw each other outside of work, and there was an age gap. But they’d worked together ten years, and they’d had each other’s backs since the beginning.

She stuffed the phone back in her purse. As soon as she got in the air, away from all the grieving and politicking, she would think of something. She always came up with something. By the time the wheels touched down at John Wayne in Newport, she would have a strategy for reining in Wes.

Her flight left in two hours. In the meantime, she needed to get out there and show the flag. Closing the bedroom door behind her, Karen dove into the crowd and moved from group to group, accepting condolences and making small talk, working her way from the front sidewalk to the back porch. By the time she got through the rope line, she was exhausted.

In the living room, Father Engel nibbled a brownie and listened to a woman’s earnest tale. A crowd of women, all about Karen’s age, stood in the center of the room discussing something with great animation. A tall woman with short gray hair spotted Karen and stepped away from the group. “Hey, you. I’m Glenda. I was a grade ahead of you at St. Joseph’s.”

“I thought you looked familiar,” Karen said.

“I knew your mom from the convalescent hospital. We volunteered together. I’m a nurse.” Glenda maneuvered Karen toward the group of women. “Recognize any of these characters?”

Karen’s mouth fell open. “Marlene. I remember you from–”

“Yes, sixth grade.” A zaftig brunette hugged Karen. “We fought over a boy.”

“Paul something. How embarrassing that you remember.”

“I not only remember. I married him. Look over there.” Marlene pointed.

Karen recognized the man, rounder now, his curly dark hair a distant memory, but when he smiled shyly and waved, she saw the boy again. She waved back.

A tiny blonde with a camera pushed forward. “And I’m Denise.”

“I don’t believe it,” said Karen, embracing the woman. “You took pictures at all the high school football games.”

Denise nodded. “It was a great way to meet boys. Now I’m a photographer for the historical society. What about you? You always talked about seeing the world.”

“I got as far as California.”

“You make it sound like nothing much, but your mom was very proud of you,” said Glenda.

“When did you see her last?”

“A few days ago.” Glenda frowned. “She didn’t seem like her usual self, almost as if she’d lost some of her spark.”

“I thought so too, last time I talked to her,” Karen said, “but she said she was fine. I should have dropped everything and come back here.”

“Don’t beat yourself up.” Glenda had a funny, wry smile that seemed to say nothing much rattled her. “It wouldn’t have made any difference. That last afternoon, I have to be honest with you, she told me she was tired and she missed Frank.”

“When you hear that–” Denise shook her head, not finishing the thought.

Karen turned to Glenda. “When you saw her last, did she still seem clearheaded?”

“For the most part. She was a bit more distracted. It’s not that uncommon in elders. People think they’re going to live forever, but we get to a point where we really do wear out.”

“Lena will be sorely missed,” said a woman who joined the group. Karen didn’t recognize her. “She was so good, even to strangers.”

“She helped me serve hot meals at the homeless shelter,” said another woman. “I don’t know who got more out of it, her or the needy folks.”

“She started after Frank died. She said she needed to feel useful,” said Glenda.

While the women offered their memories of Lena, Karen felt a burning sensation in her gut. Maybe if she had stayed in North Dakota, her mother would have been happier. She wouldn’t have had to adopt strangers in order to feel needed.

“Lena jumped right in after Frank died. Got to work and stayed busy, almost like nothing had happened.”

Karen drifted inward.
It’s called duty,
she thought.
Weiler women are good at that.

“She worked so hard. Never slowed down.”

“She worked tirelessly for others.”

Aunt Marie, joining the circle, put her arm around Karen. “You look pale. Come and eat.” She took Karen into the kitchen and loaded a dish with North Dakota grief relief. Karen sat down at the table, picked up a fork, and studied the mound of food.

“Eat until you feel stronger.” Aunt Marie stood by the edge of the table, waiting for Karen to respond.

“I’m fine. Go and visit.” Karen took a big bite, releasing her aunt. The kitchen was crowded with women. They stood at the sink, hip to hip, washing, drying, and putting away. With their reddened hands and faded aprons, they kept the production line going, a sort of old-fashioned ministry. As they worked, they talked and laughed, elbowed each other playfully, dismissing the occasional tear with the swipe of an arm.

“Lena was such a tiny thing,” said one. “I remember when she came to St. Joe’s, she wore clothes from the poor box. I always had to roll up her sleeves because they were too long.”

Another woman nodded. “I wore a lot of those charity clothes too, and I was happy to have them. We all were. Those were hard times.”

Karen took a bite of hot potato salad, tangy with cider vinegar and dill. She remembered her mother talking of losing the family farm in the Great Depression. Lena had been sent to live with a relative in town who worked her as a maid in exchange for room and board. She was eight years old.

“She may have been tiny but she was a spitfire,” said another. “I remember she played the drums in the high school band, which was unusual for a girl at the time.”

“Lena was independent. She never let anybody boss her.”

Until she got married
, Karen thought.

An old auntie approached, cradled Karen’s face in her warm hands, and said something in German. Smelling the familiar gardenia perfume, Karen mumbled an excuse and escaped to the back porch where she sat down on the chipped cement steps. In the distance a tractor chugged across a field, its blades releasing the rich aroma of freshly turned earth.