I couldn’t be in our living room. It was still too full of an empty bed. People were eating casseroles or brisket sandwiches made by Mrs. Rosenblatt.
So I sat on our couch in the garage staring at a pristine 1967 Mustang in case the tears came. Because they were trying hard to make an appearance.
We’d buried Grandpa hours earlier.
He’d wanted a standard military graveside service.
Right next to the love of his life, a girl he’d met at the hardware store.
A soldier played taps. Grandpa’s coffin was draped in a five-by-nine-and-a-half-feet, four-pound cotton American flag, precisely refolded by soldiers wearing white gloves.
They presented it to my mother. And me.
Tim LeMoot, the Texas Boot, held her up.
And Denny sang, but not because I asked him to. Because he remembered Grandpa telling him he could sing at the funeral if he sang a song Grandpa liked called “Tell My Father,” which I thought had been a joke, but which Denny took as an order. He sang it so well that I had to bite the inside of my cheek to keep from crying. I swear to you that the planes stopped flying overhead and the world paused and saluted a great patriot.
It was beautiful and incredible. Like chill-bumps-on-a-hot-day incredible.
Man, Denny Rosenblatt was born to sing. Grandpa would have liked it.
I don’t know when the service was officially over. I’d trained my eyes to stay focused on the fake green carpet they put on the ground near Grandpa’s burial site. I had to let my eyes fill up with green.
Green. Green. Green.
I guess I stared at the ground for a long time.
Denny had to nudge me out of my fog.
Denny whispered, “Out with it.”
“What?” I asked.
“I know you. You have that classic Wayne-needs-to-unload-a-fact look.”
“More of an odor, really. Like I can smell it coming.”
“It’s nothing.”
“Come on,” Denny whispered. “You’ll be factually constipated if you don’t get it out!”
It wasn’t a fact that weighed on my mind. Nothing like that.
I said to Denny, “I was just thinking I’m glad you didn’t wear too much cologne today.”
Denny and I walked to the car and rode back to Cedar Drive.
And I lined up the series of events in my life that had led me here.
Maybe if Reed hadn’t been raised to be a soldier, he wouldn’t have joined the army.
And he wouldn’t have protected his unit in battle and died for them.
We wouldn’t have gone to his funeral.
And returned on a plane that crashed.
And lost my voice and a flag.
And found a friend with a unique voice.
And been taken care of by a patriot.
Who was getting sick.
And needed his daughter and grandson.
And one last mission and a good death.
I got Denny. A chance to really know Grandpa. Even photographic evidence of Wayne Kovok running on autopilot, being fearless and brave.
Mom hung my photo on the wall across from the Wall of Honor.
“I’m starting a new wall!” she said.
“What are you going to call it?”
“The Wall of Honor, Part Two. How’s that?”
Now Grandpa’s picture would stare at me forever. His picture on the Wall of Honor was next to Uncle Reed’s. But Mom? She was crazy happy about a wall. Again. I liked her crazy happy.
“It’s perfect, Mom,” I told her.
So after the funeral, I hid out in the garage and let my eyes fill up with the Car.
The perfect car.
I stared and stared until the red gleam was impossibly shiny. Until I saw a letter on the dashboard. A letter addressed to me.
Dear Wayne,
We said most things in life. There’s not much left to say, but I want you to have it in pen and ink that I think you are a straight arrow. Did you know I’m proud of you, Wayne? So proud. Proud of the way you respond to the world when she hits you upside the head. She’s going to do that to you, you know. There’s no getting around it. But as I’ve told you in different ways, it’s the way a man responds that is the true measure of his worth. You tell your own sons and daughters that, Wayne. Names don’t mean anything. You taught me that. So you tell them my stories and the stories of our family. We need more Wayne Kovoks in the world. You look after your mother. Take care of Hank Williams, too. Remember me when you eat a cheeseburger. Especially one with heavy pickle.
The Car is yours.
At ease, son,
Grandpa
There may have been waterworks.
There may have been a waterfall of waterworks.
Okay, there was an unstoppable force of tears.
They leaked even though I was smiling at the same time.
How did he make me do that? Smile and cry.
“Hey, are you okay?” It was Mom.
I stood up straight and rubbed the side of the Car with the hem of my shirt. “Yeah. Yeah.”
“Nice car you got there, huh?” she said.
“I knew.”
“Hey, did you know that the thing you have to remember with old cars is that they don’t just start up cold as soon as you turn the key? You have to pump the gas twice and then hold down the pedal.”