Four Rubbings

Chapter One: Josie Leads the Tricks and Treats

Chapter One:  Josie Leads the Tricks and Treats

It is Halloween, the night the dead speak, and as I walk with my three best friends to Lakefront Cemetery, my overactive imagination has me convinced that the whistle of the wind is not wind at all. It is the graves five blocks away whispering to be rubbed. Imagination is my blessing and my curse, I suppose. It’s the magic ingredient that helps me sketch interesting pictures, and the poison granules that nurture my wild, vivid nightmares.

Nightmares like the one I had last night; in it, my friends and I stumbled into Lakefront. I got separated from them and had to walk alone to find a grave to rub, my mother’s grave. As I cut across the dark grounds I fell, nearly tumbling into a wide, open grave. I gawked into the hole and as my eyes adjusted to the darkness, a silhouette formed in the shadows.

Goosebumps erupt down my arms at the memory. Imagination, meh.

“Bye, Josie!” shouts my little seven-year-old brother, Owen, from half a block away. “Watch out for zombies tonight. They prowl cemeteries looking for brains to eat, you know!” With dramatic flair, he hops away on one foot, his yellow alien antennae bobbing above a crown of red curls. His neon green costume hurts my eyes and I huff with relief as he grabs our father’s hand and skips off to beg the neighbors for candy. Owen is a great kid, but tonight his happy energy makes me want to shrink into the background. I am worried the evening will not go as planned.

My father sends the group of us off with a hearty, “Good luck!” and jogs away with the boy.

My friends do what I don’t think to; they wave goodbye and make spooky noises at Owen’s back. His high, soprano giggles burst through the muggy air and sprinkle around our feet like confetti.

I brush off the tops of my moccasins and give the suede pouch at my side a quick pat to make sure the tube that sticks out of the top is still tucked safely inside. The rubbing kit feels too heavy for something made up of paper, charcoal, and tape. Maybe the weight is due to the heavy load of desperation I slipped in at the last minute and the cracked rubber band of hope that binds everything together.

“You sure your father’s up for trick-or-treat duty, Josie?” asks Blaze, a six-foot boy/man dressed in a tight blue shirt, crimson cape, and knee-high white boots.  The light blue shirt makes his bronze skin glow. He is really working the superhero vibe tonight. I grin as I think how close he came to having his own Mini-Me. Owen’s runner-up costume–a red cape, blue unitard, glossy white boots and all–lie across his bedroom floor back home.

“Yeah, he’ll be fine. I made them a map of the route so Dad won’t get lost. Even wrote down some of the rules he might not know, like ‘Check candy before eating,’ that sort of thing.”

“Jeez! Who do you think took you trick-or-treating when you were little? They’ll be fine,” scolds Casey. Worry lines ripple across her porcelain forehead. Her tiny form is swallowed up by the gigantic football jersey and oversized white pants she wears.

“Actually, my mother always took us trick-or-treating. Well, technically, she was only able to bring Owen out once before she died,” I whisper, trying to cap any conversation about my mother that might make me cry. But more gushes out before I can put a cork in it. “And then after that it was always me, you know, that took Owen.”

Casey drops her gaze to her cleats and lets a curtain of black hair fall over her pretty face. She hides behind her hair when she feels bad, easy to do when you are growing out your bangs. With a tight laugh, she stuffs a battered gold helmet on her head. And I feel guilty because it should be okay to bring up my mother, but for some reason it never goes well.