But there is one thing to be done.
I stay in cobalt-blue darkness for a long time. I stay there with my eyes closed, until the shhhs, sh-booming, and sh-booing subside. Until the Dr Pepper runs dry. When I open my eyes, I find that it’s my own fingers in my mouth, that I am suckling myself. No Dr Pepper flows from my fingertips. Only the taste of sweat.
The sound inside the cactus has changed. Gone is the oceanic hum; now there is a faint metallic buzz, like a dial tone. A dead dial tone.
I turn to my right. Beside me lies a shrunken body in a black suit. The color of the face is very white, the mouth open wide. The green eyes are open too, staring up at the sky—or where the sky would be if I were not inside a cactus. If there were a sky.
It is my father’s body. My father the dead. He wears the black bar mitzvah suit and the black tie, and on his head is the white yarmulke. His feet are bare.
He is a small doll, a replica of my father. A wax figure. I reach over and touch his hair, the curls of the man. They are still the same. His mustache is there.
I don’t know what part of the story this is.
The part where I bury my father?
The part where I bury my father.
I have no tools—no shovel or red sandcastle bucket, and only one good hand. I take my friends the rocks out of my pocket and examine them. Pink and Gray won’t be of help (pink is too small and Gray too round). But Door is flat like a shovel. A door underground.
Using Door, I begin to dig. I dig through the uppermost crust: sand, dirt, pebbles, and stones. I dig deeper, through slab and slate and rubble. Door is a strong and hearty gravedigger, taking all these layers in stride. As for me? I am frightened.
And do I scream and cry? Do I throw dirt? Get in the hole? Of course I do. I do all of these things. It is a Bulgarian funeral.
Down, down, down. Into the earth you go. Where is the bottom? I am uncertain. But I keep digging. Digging and crying. Dig and cry. Dig and cry.
I cry until my tears fill the grave hole with water. I cry until the hole becomes a well. A private tear trove. A little seep or spring. Made by me. A small sea. I cry until the water has nowhere else to go. Sideways, then, it begins to flow. Flowing deep inside the grave hole. An underground desert river. Such is the miracle of feeling. The miracle of the Bulgarian funeral.
But my father the dead. Where is he? His waxen figure. He is no longer with me.
I search the edge of the underground river: the thick sludge and slimy herbs. I do not find him. I feel through emerald weeds and blue aloneness; gold and fool’s gold; possible serpents. I do not find him.
He must still be in the cactus fortress. While I am here in the underground river. Up to my knees in the realm of feeling. Wading wearily. But wading.