An Honest Lie(46)

“Where’s my mother?” she asked them one more time.

“She’s in the chapel,” Ama said simply, looking her in the eyes. Taured motioned for her to step forward. She glanced behind her at the procession of women sent to collect her from hell, and they nodded encouragingly. Her discomfort stalled her feet; from behind, she felt one of the women give her a little shove forward. Was she more afraid or less afraid after being locked in that place? Summer considered that as she moved slowly toward him. He looked like an actor in a movie, but not a handsome actor like she used to think. He looked... She couldn’t find the word.

You’re too tired and hungry to be scared, she thought. But she knew that wasn’t true.

The word came to her as she came to stand sentinel in front of him: Small, she thought. He looks small. Or did I get taller?

Taured didn’t say anything until she was right in front of him. He looked sick. His eyes, which were usually alert and dancing, now looked dry and red. She shifted her feet, fixing her gaze on his face. What she saw in the deadness of his stare made her so uneasy her bladder stung for release.

“Congratulations and blessings on you, Summer, for the tremendous feat you have accomplished. You have shunned your flesh, defied it and risen above in triumph.”

She’d heard all this before. Her mouth was dry, and swallowing made it worse. She flinched halfway through his speech as a result, and his eyes focused sharply on her face, his words becoming more clipped. She didn’t know what he was saying and she didn’t care.

When he was finished, he nodded to the women behind Summer, who stepped forward at once to collect her. Their procession would now move to the chapel. She kept her eyes on him even as they steered her toward the doors, twisting her neck as far back as it would go, conveying her hate and her weakness all at once. He stared back unmoving, the cold of his eyes reaching for her, as well.

She could hear singing as they turned down the hallway where the chapel was, the hypnotic hum of voices. It wasn’t so much singing as it was chanting, the men and the women holding hands, eyes closed, their mouths molding over the words holy, holy, holy.

Sara had left the procession at some point and had gone ahead to the chapel, because when they entered through rear doors, she saw the back of her friend’s head in the last row. They’d snuck in here together many times, using the key they’d stolen. Now her back was to Summer, her shoulders pressed forward; Sara wouldn’t look at her.

Look at me, look at me, Summer thought, focusing all her energy at Sara’s head. It was like Sara could sense her there, because she twisted her body away from Summer, toward the wall. And then they were past Sara, and she focused her attention ahead.

It all happened in one ugly moment, the moment that would burn into her memory with a hot, shocking pain that throbbed through her already depleted body. The song, the flowers, the glossy box ahead. She didn’t believe it right away, or maybe she thought it was someone else—one of the elderly. But there was the photo, the name. She still looked through the faces frantically with every step forward they took; when she slowed down, she felt Dawn’s hands on her lower back, moving her forward.

“Walk,” she said into Summer’s ear. Before they reached the front row, the row where they meant for her to sit, she started screaming. The wails of “Mama” shrill above the singing. She looked back at the faces behind them. Maybe she was sick, too, maybe she had what Taured had, and she was hallucinating. But then they were at the front of the church, near the place where Taured addressed them, and she could see it all.

She was at her mother’s funeral.

She didn’t stop screaming until they removed her from the chapel, Bob and Marshall hauling her down the hall, her feet dragging. Her breaths were ragged gasps. A boy—Ginger—was in the hallway. He looked to be exiting the bathroom; when he saw them coming, he flattened himself against a wall until they had passed. It was like the last time, just with a few different players, except now, she didn’t care what they did to her; in fact, she wanted them to kill her—she wanted to die.

They took her to her mother’s room this time and locked the door. She curled up on her bed, on the quilt with the tiny, embroidered roses, and howled as loudly as her vocal cords would let her, the grief growing heavier by the second. Eventually, her voice gave out to a skinned, gravelly sound, and she was only able to sob. When she woke, she remembered, and the pain started again, fresh, a billowing wound that was all-encompassing. She lay in one spot, refusing food or drink until they sent Sara to comfort her. But she didn’t want to see Sara, who had betrayed her. In the end, they left her alone with her grief.

On the third day, Taured came to see her. He was dressed in his nice clothes: black pants and a blue oxford rolled to the elbows. In his hands was a tray with what she assumed was breakfast. He set it down on the little table where Summer sometimes did her homework and turned toward her with a brilliant smile.

“Good morning, Summertime. I’ve come to keep you company.”

Her stomach clenched.

“I’ve made you breakfast. Will you eat?”

He motioned to the table and Summer froze. She had eaten very little, mostly drinking juice and eating pieces of bread rolled between her fingers into little balls. She’d pretended they were communion and she was eating her mother’s body and drinking her blood in remembrance. On the table was a plate, piled high with steaming yellow eggs and thick pieces of bacon. Her mouth was wet and her stomach groaned miserably. But then, out of her rolling stomach came a memory: another table covered in food...Taured leading her into his office...his smile as he closed the door. The vision ended as soon as it came, skirting something significant she couldn’t recall. When had that happened? Lifting her hands to her head, she cradled her own face. She was outside of herself, a coating on her own body like sweat.