The letter haunted me, begging me not to open it, while some force deep within me told me I needed to know what was inside. I hid it from Cliff, from Poppy, but most of all from myself. When I could stand it no longer I ripped it open, ravenously devouring the words. I wanted it all to be lies. But I knew it wasn’t. And then I took the letter to Poppy. I only wanted him to explain how he could do these things to me, to Mum, and how Sandra Peterson knew more about my life than I did.
I dreamed last night the house burned down, that awful grey house down by the shore, the one we were living in before Jewel was born. I stood watching the flames engulf the walls, thinking how that house was begging for a painting it was never going to get.
Good riddance! A wave of relief washed through me. I closed my eyes, delighting in that feeling. Poppy was beside me with that gleam in his eye. It seemed quite natural that he be there and not Cliff, I mean. We held hands as the flames spread. That’s when I saw them, Jewel and Jacob, standing in the attic window, waving frantically down at us.
“They’ll die in there!” Poppy cried out.
“They need to die,” I stated calmly. “If I want to survive, they’ll have to die.”
I awoke with those words sealed on my lips, a deep knowing rested in my heart, a secret even I hadn’t known existed before that dream. It was as if I’d figured out some deep mystery, something that had been plaguing me for months; the mystery of me, who I was—Elizabeth Mackay.
I jumped out of bed, afraid that if I didn’t, everything that was now so clear to me would end up murky, befouled like my very existence here in the Forties Settlement. The dream frightened me more than I wanted to admit. My words. They need to die. Spoken with such clarity, such conviction. I had to remove myself from Jewel and Jacob for fear of what those words really meant. When I came downstairs, Cliff was in the kitchen.
“Did you remember to take one?” he said, pointing to the small box of pills on the counter. “I think you might have forgotten yesterday. They won’t work if you don’t take them every day. That’s what Dr. Scott said. Remember?”
When Cliff wasn’t looking, I spat the pill out and watched it disappear down the sink drain. It was in good company with the small mound of little white pills already hiding down there in the dark. It was hardly something I could keep track of, but surely a healthy number had collected there these past months.
The dream taunted me throughout the day. When I could stand it no longer, I made up my mind to leave, to free myself from this house, from Cliff, from the secret I held deep inside me. In a brief moment, before hurrying out the door, Cliff reached out and grabbed my hand. A soft look settled over him, but it quickly disappeared. He knew about the dream, could see me for the monster I was, and him knowing all that left me naked and exposed.
“Lizabeth, stay,” he whispered. I pulled back. I didn’t need Cliff. What I needed was solitude. Peace. Quiet. To be responsible for no one, to straighten all this out in my mind, decipher the dream’s true meaning.
I spent the night in the woods, sleeping on a bed of dry moss. Cliff wouldn’t come looking. Cliff is not the kind of man to go searching for anything. He accepts what is, takes each day as it comes, never expecting or wanting more. This was not the first time I’d gone off in search of the solitude I find only in the woods, the smell of hemlock and pine, the swaying and creaking of tree branches, the whispering of thoughts that are trapped in my mind, things I can’t say to Cliff, things only Poppy knows about. But then, I could always count on Poppy. Poppy never let me down. You don’t need to explain, Elizabeth, he used to say. No need to explain to me.
Poppy appeared and settled beside me on the ring of moss. For a time I was content, cocooned within my own sweet memories, oblivious to the rest of the world—just Poppy and me. His words produced the same magic they had when I was small. And I listened while he weaved a vivid tale of a king and queen, and a beautiful princess named Elizabeth. I didn’t interrupt. It had been so long since he’d told one of his stories. I absorbed every detail, saw it in my mind, felt it in my heart, relishing every bit. The tale ended shortly after the prince appeared. The prince brought darkness with him, so heavy and deep, the very mention of his name held me paralyzed with fear. His evil plot to capture the queen and the princess, and hold them prisoner, was eventually spoiled by a knight in shining armour who fought long and hard for their release from the cold dark tower they’d been imprisoned in.
I clung to Poppy’s words, eager for more. His voice blended in with the night sounds. Sweet thoughts replaced all the fearful notions I’d been harbouring. I smiled. My knight in shining armour had come through for me again. With true fear comes salvation, and the brave knight always arrives in time. Maybe not in real life, but in the world of make-believe he does. I’d be willing to stay in a fantasy world if it meant I could stay here with Poppy forever.
Poppy cleared his throat. “Are you ready for sleep now?”
“Not yet,” I whispered as disappointment ran a gentle hand across me. He hadn’t yet told me his very best story. I wanted to remind him yet feared I’d sound ungrateful. Our time together was special, not to be frittered away with disappointment over an untold story. I would let go any wish, even the wish for Poppy’s best story, for this precious time spent with him. I would. I would.
“You’re looking to hear something more. I can see it in your eyes,” he said, patting my head. I held my breath and crossed my fingers behind my back, waiting to hear what Poppy would say next. I settled down farther into the moss and waited for him to begin.
“You know about the fairies that live nearby, don’t you?” Yes, yes, his best story; he remembered. I lay quite still, afraid that if I moved the moment would be lost, the story gone. Excitement churned inside me as he spun a tale about the fairies, the ones who lived deep in the woods not far from home. Nymphs, he called them, devilish creatures. How I longed to become one. To play tricks on unsuspecting folks. Cruel tricks. Run barefoot through the Forties Settlement, open up barn doors and pasture gates as fairies have been known to do.
When the story was over I curled around Poppy the way I used to as a child. I could feel his warmth, his breath, upon my neck as he lay there softly snoring. I awoke much later, feeling about for him in the dark, sensing quite quickly that the place where he had been lying was empty. Moonlight, wind, treetops surrounded me. The moss crunched beneath my feet. I called out for him, but the answer came from the wind and an owl off in the distance.
“Where are you, Poppy?” I cried out. The owl quieted as I waited for a reply, and then the wind released a lonesome song. Darkness surrounded me, so thick and heavy I could scarcely draw a breath. “Where are you?” I whispered, falling to my knees.
And then I remembered.
He was laid out in the funeral home with his hands crossed at his chest. Cliff had taken me to see him. I’d looked down at him and shaken his shoulder. “Wake up,” I’d said. “Wake up.”
I cried myself to sleep, then; dry, hard tears that made my chest ache.
Sunlight pierced me in the early morning as it snaked a path through the treetops. I lay still and allowed the sun to spread inside me, to caress my very soul. And then I cried once again for my dear, sweet Poppy going in the ground that afternoon at two o’clock. Thin tears slid between the cracks of my eyes, but they brought no relief from my sorrow.
I hurried home to find Cliff in the living room with Jacob and Jewel, all three of them wearing their best clothes, Jewel with a blue ribbon up high on her head. It was obvious that Cliff had fixed it for her with his clumsy hands. They were waiting for me to come home, knowing I’d be back in time to say goodbye to Poppy. It was the one thing Cliff would count on.
Jewel raced toward me, but I held her back.
“I need to change,” I said, running my hands through my hair.
“Wash your face,” Cliff said. His words stopped me cold. He hadn’t even asked where I’d been all this time. Could he tell I’d spent the night in the woods, Poppy there to protect me? Was there something about my appearance that gave my secret away?
As I hurried upstairs, I heard Jewel whining. Cliff was telling her something, but I couldn’t make out what he was saying. A dress was laid out on the bed and I pulled it down over my head. I brushed my hair and washed my face and avoided looking directly into my eyes; the mirror wouldn’t give a clear picture. How could it? I wasn’t altogether sure who I was at that moment. I wanted to go and see Poppy. That was what I centred my mind on.
The smell of mothballs wafted about the cab of the truck with each bump we struck in the road. Jewel fussed about the hat Cliff had told her she had to wear right before we’d left the house. It was covering the blue ribbon in her hair, which was what she was objecting to—that and the smell of the mothballs.
“You can’t go into a church without a hat. They have their rules,” he’d said, opening a crumpled paper bag moments before we left for the church. When two mothballs fell from the bag and skidded across the floor, Jewel raced to pick them up, but he told her to leave them be, that they were poisonous.
“Where did you get these?” I said as he held out a hat with a small, stiff veil.
“Joan—I got them from Joan.”
I pulled my hand back.
“I already told you. You can’t step foot inside the church without a hat, Lizabeth. Do you want to miss out on your own father’s funeral because of some stupid church hat?” I took a cleansing breath. I wasn’t about to let my concentration fade, no more than I was about to forget the whole purpose of the day. I put the wretched thing on my head. I’d rather have worn a tattered dishrag than anything Joan Mackay had set her hands on, but I had little choice.
Staring at the road ahead, I waited for the church to come into view. A sea of vehicles was parked along both sides of the road as we pulled up to the wrought-iron gate. There was an empty spot beside the hearse, waiting, ordering us to come closer. Jacob squirmed beside me. Finding his way closer to the edge of the seat, he peered through the windshield.
“Look at all the people!” he cried.
Here’s the church
here’s the steeple
open the doors
and see all the people.
But we didn’t need to open the doors to see the people; they had spilled out of the church in search of a place to sit. They were standing and sitting. Waiting. Chairs were lined up outside.
“I knew there’d be a big crowd,” Cliff said.
We didn’t get out of the truck for a time…seconds, minutes, I can’t be sure. The only thing I was sure of was our sitting outside the church in Cliff’s old truck, a horde of onlookers waiting like vultures, Jacob squirming to get out, and the smell of mothballs filling my lungs.
Cliff took my arm as the undertaker headed toward us. My feet moved toward the church while my body remained inside the truck. Cliff’s grip on my arm tightened. “Come along, Lizabeth,” he whispered.
There was a pause before we entered the church, as we stood upon the threshold of neither here nor there. A split second held us in limbo. A voice boomed out, “All rise.” There was a shuffling of feet. My breath stopped. A sharp pain caught me in the chest. I wanted my fairy ring, the bed of moss Poppy and I had slept on.
I wanted.
I wanted.
I wanted.
My knees threatened to give way. I wasn’t ready, not one bit ready.
I wanted my fairy ring.
I wanted the feel of Poppy’s hand in mine, his breath on the back of my neck.
Whispers came from both sides of the church as we stopped in front of the casket. Poppy was lying so still, his hands clasped around a single red rose. His hands were pale, his fingernails bleached white as if he’d never done a hard day’s work.
What a lie, what a miserable lie his hands were telling.
I freed the wretched flower from his grasp. A tiny prickle caught my finger.
Why a rose, Poppy, when you never liked the smell of roses? Why not a tomato stalk—green and healthy? You took such pleasure in growing tomatoes.
Cliff grabbed the rose and placed it beside the satiny fabric near Poppy’s shoulder, but not before a drop of my blood hit the coffin lining. I didn’t want to stop looking at the blood stain after that. He was taking me with him—at least a small part of me—to a faraway land where the dark prince would never find us.
“Lizabeth,” Cliff whispered. “Sit down.”
The first night after Cliff told me Poppy was dead, I heard him outside our bedroom window. I recognized the dull clank of his ox bells, heard Poppy give a quiet, “Whoa.”
I raced to the window, but he’d already gone.
The organ began to play. Long, drawn-out notes echoed throughout the church. The music was Cliff’s idea. He’d insisted on doing it all. He picked out the oak-grain coffin with light blue lining. (Poppy never looked good in blue.) He ordered the flowers. The night the minister came Cliff made me sit quiet while he thumbed through the hymn book looking for something he said would be fitting. I could have told Cliff that he wouldn’t know “fitting” if it jumped up and bit him in the ass.
“What do you think of this one, Lizabeth?” he asked, poking his finger at the page.
And I then thought I saw Poppy move. I couldn’t look away after that. I waited, watched, waited, and watched for one tiny little breath, the one thing that would tell me this was all make-believe. If only he’d gasp, draw some air into his lungs, I knew he’d come back to life. We could all go home. I could laugh at Cliff and say, “See, Cliff, he really was outside our bedroom window the other night!”
The choir began singing. Cliff grabbed my hand when I jumped up.
“I come to the garden alone.”
“Sit down, Lizabeth. The family stays seated.”
“While the dew is still on the roses.”
“Lizabeth!”
Cliff’s arm wrapped about me as we sat back down. Some woman hit a high note. Feet shuffled. Pages turned. There was too much noise. It was drowning out my thoughts. I tried to think then whether Poppy liked hymns. For certain he didn’t like roses, even if they were dripping in dew.
“And He walks with me, and He talks with me.”
When the music ended, the minister spoke. He opened his book, his voice echoed. I searched his soul through the window he opened when he looked down into my eyes. He knew no more about Poppy than he had the other night when he came to the house asking questions.
“Everett was a good family man, a man of integrity who gave back to his community, a man who put his family first; a simple man, a farmer, municipal councillor for many years, and a friend to all, as is evident by the number of people here today.”
Say it all, damn you—a man who loved life, who could weave a fairy tale and make it come true, a man who would always be my knight in shining armour—say every last bit!
There were things I still needed to tell Poppy, words I needed to take back. I’d forgive the past, make no mention of it ever again, if only he’d open his eyes. I looked quickly back at Poppy, but saw nothing. No breaths. No movement. I shouldn’t have looked away, shouldn’t have allowed my concentration to waver. He might have moved and I could have missed my only chance. It was the church’s fault, and the tall skinny minister who wouldn’t shut up. He talked about seasons and time and living and planting and war and love and Poppy’s life—something he knew nothing about. Cliff had no business telling the minister anything about Poppy the night he came to the house.
And then we put him in the ground beside Mum.
Green carpet.
Deep hole.
Down…down…down.
“Earth to earth; ashes to ashes; dust to dust.”
Tiny beads of dirt fell from the minister’s hand, skidded across the oak casket, and formed the most unusual pattern, which slowly became one with the wood grain. It was beautiful. I wanted to stay and watch it forever, but Cliff pulled me along. I stumbled across the green turf, toward the crowd with their mournful faces. People were speaking—a whole line of them. Bodies and voices and faces and arms wrapping around me, suffocating and restrictive. Shuffling and speaking and touching. Their voices came all at once like a hundred whispers in my head.
“So sorry, Elizabeth. So sorry. A darn shame. He’ll be missed. Sadly missed. Take care. Deepest sympathy. Sympathy to all. Sympathy. Sympathy. Sympathy. Sorry. So sorry….”
A cluster of clouds then drifted across the sun, covering me with shadow. I shivered. A whisper broke through the din; it slid out between the shadows and blew in my ear, carrying a sinister message, one that brought the past along with it, the past that had been neatly put away, the lid closed and locked up a long time ago. I drew back when I saw who was whispering in my ear as spikes of bitter rage cut into me like a knife. She had no business being here, no business at all.