Four Rubbings

Chapter Six: Josie Discovers Her Grave

Between his smoky fur and the shadows, I lose track of the cat as he darts away from my mother’s grave at breakneck speed. The crow that scared away the poor fellow caws and shrieks from his high perch in the cedar.

“Why couldn’t Sacagawea carry a slingshot?” I shout into the tree.

The crow cocks his head to the side and quiets. I stick a finger in my ringing ear and he jumps off the branch, landing on the stone angel. He studies me from her wing with a glassy black eye, and I wonder… but the distant sound of the cat startles me into action. His throaty caterwaul cuts across the property and I search for him again.

Desperate to find my new friend, I scan the grounds and spot a blur of motion near a knot of berry brambles a good hundred yards away. I slip and slide to close the gap between us, mentally cursing my choice of rubber-soled moccasins with each precarious step. He makes escape look so easy; a few swift bounds and he reaches the far edge of Lakefront Cemetery. He jumps on top of a three-foot wall of brambles and meows. His gray head cocks to the side and I am taken in by his cuteness. I have to catch him. I eye the wall and creep closer to the cat. I get within an arm’s length and the cat leaps to the other side of the wall.

“Great! I can’t do that!”

Beneath the thorns and ivy stands a three-foot high gate held closed with a rusty latch. I reach through the sharp brambles and push away the pain to grip the lock. I wrench the stubborn latch up, and it releases with a crusty click.

I can imagine Seth reciting tetanus statistics as I shove the gate in with a hip, but the rotting boards are too riddled with ivy and thorns to give. Determined to catch the cat, I kick at the gate with my foot once, then twice, until I hear the wood groan and crack. The gap I make isn’t much, but it’s wide enough, and I squeeze past the splintered boards. The fringe of my dress catches, so I tug the fabric free and stumble inside, falling face first onto a carpet of moss and flowers. Should’ve worn kneepads tonight, Josie.

I look up; where I expect to find a rocky shoreline lies an eerie, forgotten garden. “What is this place?” I whisper.

A canopy of thick, steeple-high oaks runs in a straight flank from the gate to the lake, naked of all but a handful of crimson red leaves. Silky puffs of mint green lichen drape across the lowest branches as if the fog was caught on its great escape to the sky. A thin, gravel path cuts through the center of the grove and dead ends at a rose-covered archway that frames the steely gray lake beyond. My arms ripple with goosebumps as my eyes lock on the jade eyes of the cat. I spring to attention and freeze, afraid of scaring the poor thing. He rests on his fluffy haunches halfway down the gravel path and looks past where I stand.

“Waiting for me to catch up? How polite of you,” I say.

A flank of gnarled, low creeping bougainvillea bursting with out-of-season fuchsia flowers stretches behind the cat. Lush, lime green moss carpets the underside of the floral shrubs, a stark contrast to the fluorescent blooms that seem to glow in the shady space.

A worn wooden sign pokes out from within the shrubs. Elaborate black lettering scrolled across the damp wood reads “Non-Endowment Care Section.” I touch a finger to the painted letters and black chips crumble from the ancient sign. Non-endowment? What does that mean?

I have no time to think about the sign, as the cat zips further down the path in a noisy burst. He stops near a pile of rubble and stares at me while he grooms his charcoal face with a bubble gum pink tongue and swift white paw.

“Well, now. Nice of you to hold still for a minute.”

As my eyes adjust to the shadows, the tombstones that surround us come into focus. Gravestones are scattered here and there. No two are alike, except for their age and state of neglect. Some are no larger than a brick, while others are over two-feet high. The tombstones look like they were colored with the gray row in a 96 pack of crayons; Slick Nickel, Fuzzy Wuzzy, Silver Swirl, Manatee. A few of the tombstones remain whole and upright. Most are cracked near their bases and lie in fractured pieces across the ground.