Authors: Tawni O'Dell
The preacher’s comments are brief. He says a prayer.
Bert steps forward and places his last yellow rose on her coffin.
Rafael crosses himself and gives her a string of rosary beads.
Luis takes the red handkerchief from his pocket, dabs his eyes with it, and lays it over her.
Next Klint steps forward.
He pulls a folded piece of paper from inside his suit jacket and puts it on top of the coffin, too.
I don’t know much about funeral etiquette. I’ve never seen this done before. Nobody put any precious mementos in with Dad. In hindsight, I’m sure this was a good idea as I picture the inappropriateness of a coffin covered in baseball cards and empty beer cans.
A part of me hesitates, wondering if I’m doing something wrong, but a bigger part of me pushes me forward and I walk over to the coffin and take back Klint’s piece of paper.
I have to know what it is.
I unfold it and see the Western Pennsylvania University letterhead across the top.
My hand starts to tremble as I begin to read it.
Dear Klint
,
On behalf of the Western Pennsylvania University athletic department, I’m very happy to accept your letter of intent and look forward to welcoming you as a member of our 2009–2010 varsity baseball squad. As discussed earlier, you will receive a full scholarship with …
I don’t finish reading it. I drop it and run. I only have ten feet to cover to reach my destination, but I do it at a sprint.
I throw my arms around Klint and hold on to him for all I’m worth while I blubber, “thank you,” over and over again.
I’m not just saying it to Klint; I’m saying it to Miss Jack, too. I thanked her for saving my brother’s life, but I never got around to thanking her for saving mine.
Klint’s as stiff and unyielding as a board, but he doesn’t pull away. He lets me cling to him and cry against his shoulder until his surrender.
His arms wrap around me and I hear him crying, too, and I know my brother has finally come alive again, instantly.
“T
his is it, then,” Cameron says to me.
“Yes, I suppose it is,” I reply.
We both look around the grand foyer at Candace’s paintings. My gaze comes to rest on the entrance to her parlor. Inside the room, I spy Kyle’s cat sitting on her favorite chair.
Cameron notices, too. He starts to say something, then stops himself.
“You’re sure you know what you’re doing?” he asks me.
“I appreciate your concern, Mr. Jack, but yes, I’m very sure.”
His face darkens at this response.
We both turn and walk slowly to the front door. I arrive first and open it for him. He steps outside and I follow.
Kyle and Klint are helping to unload some boxes from their aunt’s car. Their sister, Krystal, is sitting on the porch in Candace’s favorite chair, fanning herself with one of Candace’s Spanish fans that I gave to her.
She smiles at us.
“Buenos días, señorita,” I call out to her.
“Buenos días,” she returns the greeting with a giggle.
Cameron ignores her.
“Shall I walk you to your car?” I ask him.
“No, thanks.”
He starts down the stairs, then pauses to look back at me with malice twisting his features.
“I’ll fight this.”
“You will lose,” I assure him. “There are forces at work here that are greater than you and me.”
I wait for him to depart and the boys to pass by me with their boxes before I join Aunt Jen.
Not surprisingly, she’s in the process of lighting a cigarette. She’s wearing cutoffs and a tank top, and her exposed legs and arms are painfully skinny.
“You should stay for lunch,” I tell her.
She glances at me suspiciously.
“Why?”
“Why? Because I’ve asked you to stay and because it will be the best lunch of your life. We’re having croquetas de pollo,” I entice her, remembering how much she loved them before. “Y ensalada de codorniz escabechada con vinagreta de piñones.”
“What the hell are you saying?”
“A salad with tender, sweet, pickled quail meat and a pine nut vinaigrette.”
“That’s one of the weirdest things I ever heard of,” she says with a derisive laugh, but I see hunger burning in her eyes.
“And flan,” I add.
“What’s flan?”
“A sweet custard with caramel and if you like, I will top it with a little rum.”
The tip of her cigarette is burning down without her placing it into her mouth.
“You sure you want me to stay?”
I gesture at Kyle and Klint who are on their way back to the car.
“They are your family. They need you.”
C
ANDACE LEFT ME
everything with the stipulation that upon my death it will all go to Shelby. I wonder if I will ever get over my astonishment at this. I wouldn’t have even attended the reading of the will if Bert hadn’t insisted that I go.
Her nephew did not take it well. I think I have a very good command of the English language, but he introduced me to some words I’ve never heard before.
Along with the house I also inherited legal guardianship of Kyle and
Klint, and since we have so much room, I thought it would be a nice idea to let Krystal come live here, too, upon the approval of Aunt Jen.
I suppose it is wrong to say Candace left me everything. She made sizable trusts for her three grandnieces and also for Kyle and Klint and Rafael.
She also left some money to Bill Fowler and the Mann family.
She provided Jerry with a very generous retirement package and gave him the house he’s always lived in, along with ten acres of property. Even so, he has agreed to continue to work here. He is the kind of man who will always work. I’m sure that even his vision of heaven includes a few wheelbarrows of celestial mulch that will need to be spread.
Miss Henry has agreed to stay on, too, but I’ve asked her to get a more becoming uniform.
I’m happy with my good fortune and hopefully someday I’ll be able to enjoy it, but for now I’m numb with loss. Each day without her drags on endlessly. I’m grateful to have the boys and their sister around. They keep me busy and my thoughts occupied. But nothing and no one can ever replace her.
I’ve spent as much time as possible these past few days searching for Ventisco. It’s a foolish pursuit. His domain covers hundreds of acres of fields, mountains, and forests. My chances of finding him are next to nothing, but I feel an inexplicable, desperate need to see him.
I let the cows out into the many pastures hoping their scent would attract him, but he continues to stay away.
Does he know she’s gone? I wonder.
Ventisco will be the last of Calladito’s descendants that I will ever see. I’m not saddened by this. Like all good stories, theirs must also come to an end—but only the acting of it. The telling of it will go on forever.
I hope she has found him. I hope they are at peace.
As for me, I am still part of the land of the living. I must go. I have nuggets to fry.
W
riting a novel is a solitary experience filled with frustration, bewilderment, and the constant nagging feeling that you should be doing something else. Each day you are alone in your head struggling to convey a fictitious story using words you hope will stir a bunch of people you will never meet while never fully understanding why you want to do it. This is the fourth time I’ve sat down to pen acknowledgments for a novel, and each time my initial reaction has been to write: I’d like to thank myself for writing a book all by myself for no good reason.
But then upon closer inspection of my life, I always come to realize that even though the work is solely mine, I’m surrounded by people whose love and support enables me to do it. So once again I’m rounding up the usual suspects who deserve my thanks.
One of the greatest gifts a writer can have is a good agent, someone you trust implicitly, who understands your work, and if you’re truly lucky, someone who is a wise, cool human being you like to talk to. I have all these things in Liza Dawson, and I treasure our relationship.
Many thanks to my editor, Shaye Areheart, who has shown boundless enthusiasm and respect for my books. She is quite possibly the funnest (why isn’t “funnest” a word?) editor in the world but also a wickedly accomplished woman in the publishing biz, a rare and wonderful combination.
To Molly, who is armed, dangerous, adorable, and loves me in the reverent way that only a little sis can love a big sis. Thank you for always being there for me and letting me be there for you. To my mom who is simply my best friend. (Is that corny enough for you, Mom?) I don’t know what I’d do without you. And finally, to my children, Tirzah and Connor, who are my Everything, y el amor de mi vida, Bernard, who has given me so much, not least of all España.
Te quiero, Nardo
.
T
AWNI O’DELL
is the author of three previous novels including the
New York Times
bestseller,
Back Roads
, which was also an Oprah’s Book Club selection. She lives in Pennsylvania and Spain with her two children and her husband, literary translator Bernard Cohen.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2010 by Tawni O’Dell
All rights reserved.
Published in the United States by Shaye Areheart Books, an imprint of the Crown Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.
www.crownpublishing.com
Shaye Areheart Books with colophon is a registered trademark of Random House, Inc.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
O’Dell, Tawni.
Fragile beasts : a novel / Tawni O’Dell.—1st ed.
p. cm.
1. Teenage boys—Fiction. 2. Older women—Fiction.
3. Coal miners—Fiction. 4. City and town life—Pennsylvania—Fiction.
5. Pennsylvania—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3565.D428F73 2010
813′.54—dc22 2009034352
eISBN: 978-0-307-46257-2
v3.0