46

 

The misty, morning painted the Arkansas sky a dull white. The cicadas echoed in a rhythmic hum. No sounds of traffic. Even the river seemed to have gone quiet to mourn the passing of Earl Dale.

Lilah walked up the long, winding road from the chapel to the top of the hill, Jake’s sermon ringing in her ears.

A good man. A quiet man. The foundation of his family. Of the town. Jake retold stories that brought folks to laughter, to tears, though not one of them experienced or heard first hand. The Earl Dale that Jake met was nothing like the man he’d known. “Obituaries are rarely that way.” He’d told her the night before. At his father’s mega church, often the pastor never even meets or knows parishioners first hand. Close to God, but not so much to each other. “Not like here,” he’d said. Was he intending to stay?

On either side of the grassy path, centuries-old headstones bowed their heads in moss-covered disarray. Leaning oaks wove through the ghostly crowd, with exposed, knotted roots. Grave markers told the final tale of families, generations gone. Of children buried too young. Soldiers returned from war, taken before their parents. Her own mother laid to rest, there, at the crest of the hill.

She headed toward the spot marked for her grandfather’s earthly remains. Where Astroturf topped the freshly dug plot, and where the three distinct rows of white folding chairs waited under a tasteful canopy, along with countless wreaths and hapless sprays of memorial flowers.

And the brass handled casket.

So wrong...Papaw shouldn’t be here—he should be scattered in the river. But Nana’d put her foot down. They were going to rest forever together on the hilltop, just as they’d planned.

She paused at the crunch of approaching footsteps and turned toward the sound. The lanky glassmaker shuffled his way up the path, then froze under her gaze.

“You following me, Guthrie?”

“Not intentionally...uh...Lilah.” He tried out a grin at using her name, but seemed to think better of it. Instead, he dragged the cap off his head, held it wadded and bunched at his middle. “That was a right pretty sermon your man gave.”

Lilah nodded. “Jake’s got a way with words.”

“Why aren’t you in that big black car with your’n? Your grandma and sister?”

“I needed some air.” Tipping her gaze to the limousine, she shook her head. “Walk with me the rest of the way?”

“Oh, I don’t think—”

“Please.” She looked up into Guthrie’s haunted eyes. “I could use the company.”

Together, father and daughter stepped up the winding path, side by side, separated by the gulf of time and a host of unanswered questions neither one of them considered asking.

Lilah hesitated at the rise, frowned at the folding chairs lined up and waiting for her, for Eden, for Nana. At last, she found her voice.

“P-papaw always said he knew more f-folks here than in town.” Like a dam overfull, her grief finally spilled over. Tears of loss and longing for a time she’d run from. For all she’d missed. Her steps halted, she fisted her hands to welling eyes. “I shouldn’t have run. I should have stayed.”

“Don’t.” Guthrie pressed a clean handkerchief to her hand, gave her shoulder a hesitant pat. “You can’t get the time back, so no sense in trying.”

“I left Eden.” She dragged the mascara-darkened cloth under her eyes and blinked up at the scattered cotton sky. “I left all of them, chasing the wrong guy. The wrong idea.”

He nodded, eyes wide in a knowing stare. “Often wondered how that worked out for you.”

“I failed at that, same as with everything else.” Her breath stuttered out. “All I can do is sling hash, cast a line. All of that, thanks to Papaw.”

Guthrie focused on her. “Think those things aren’t worth doing?”

She couldn’t help but study Guthrie’s features. This time, he did not look away. His eyes, the same color as hers. She recognized herself in his shape of face, like looking in a distorted mirror. At once, she saw her reflection in his strong jaw-line. Even the shape and mannerism of Eden’s in his calloused thumb, worrying each fingertip. Lilah found the part of herself that never fit in the Dale mold, here, in this man. She slow blinked and turned back to the gathering crowd. “Not sure I’m ready for a father-daughter talk, yet.”

“No. Not the time or place.” He un-pocketed and pressed a hand to hers, pressing something small, cold in her palm. A silver key.

She blinked up at her biological father. “Is this—”

“You take that now. That river place’s all I’ve got to give you.” he pressed lips together. “I get the feelin’ Eden’s happier in town.”

Laughter mixed with tears as Lilah nodded. “You’ve pegged her right.”

“Well, then. See you up there.”

Guthrie continued up the path without looking to see if she followed, while Lilah rolled the key to the river house over in her palm, at last in charge of her own destiny.