Quite an Undertaking: Devon's Story Read online

  “More like two,” she said, but I could tell I had her attention.

  “Okay, two, but why did we have the wake at the Washington’s?” I answered my own question. “So I could meet Rebecca.”

  “Okay, keep going.”

  “Remember how you told me about that secluded hallway in the funeral home?”

  “Yeah.”

  “That’s where I met her. I mean I knew her from French, but I hadn’t met her before. She helped me when I was crying my head off back there.”

  “Oh, Squirt, Rebecca saw you crying?”

  “Yeah, and I was really going at it, too. It was embarrassing, actually. You know, for a little while I thought maybe the only reason I had a crush on her was because she helped me at the wake and the funeral.”

  “Obviously you changed your mind. How come?”

  “She gave me that.” I pointed to the snow globe in Missy’s hand. “Grandma’s been manipulating things from…” hesitated.

  “Heaven? The great beyond? The celestial bridge game in the sky?” Missy suggested.

  I laughed. “Yeah.”

  “Sounds farfetched, Squirt, but I have to admit those are a lot of coincidences. Rebecca’s taking you to the cemetery tomorrow?”

  “Uh huh. It was her idea.”

  Missy pursed her lips and nodded. “Her idea, huh? I’ll keep my fingers crossed for you. Maybe Grandma can help me with my love life, too.”

  “Why? What happened to Mr. Chemistry major?”

  “Oh, well. Let’s just say he was more interested in a hit and run.”

  “A what?” It dawned on me what she meant, and I blushed. “Oh.”

  The conversation turned at that point, but I was pleased that Missy hadn’t made fun of my idea about Grandma helping me find Rebecca.

  WHEN I HEARD a car pull into the driveway, I stood up from the living room couch so fast I dropped my cell phone on the floor. Missy looked out the front window and nodded at me in affirmation. Her grin was so loud that I widened my eyes and glared at her.

  “Mom,” I yelled toward the kitchen. “She’s here.” I pulled my coat on and plunked my black ski cap on my head.

  “Okay, honey,” she said walking into the living room. “I’d tell you to have a good time, but I don’t think that’s appropriate in this case, is it?”

  “I think it’s okay because one time I talked to Grandpa about fishing.”

  My dad put the Sunday paper down and looked at me. “Fishing?”

  “Yeah, Rebecca likes to go fishing, so I told Grandpa about it.”

  My dad narrowed his eyes. “Lures or worms?” It was something he and Grandpa had argued about all the time.

  “Um, sorry, Dad. Worms.”

  He shook his head. “These kids today. Go figure.” He waved me toward the door and picked his paper back up. “Carry on.”

  “Have a good time.” My mom opened the front door for me. “Tell Grandma and Grandpa we said hello.”

  I smiled. “Okay.”

  “Oh, honey,” my mom said sharply. “You’re going in a hearse?”

  Missy burst out laughing.

  I looked out the front storm door. “Apparently.” I shrugged with a smile.

  “In the snow? Can Rebecca drive that thing in the snow?”

  “Of course she can, Mom,” I said in the most reassuring voice I could find even though I had no idea if Rebecca could drive a hearse in the snow. All I knew was that I had to get out of the house quick.

  My mom frowned for a moment as if wondering if I had lost my mind, but then shook her head. “Oh, okay. Go on, but make sure you come right back. Don’t go driving around town in that thing.” She gave me a quick hug.

  “Don’t worry, Mom. We won’t.”

  “Good luck, Squirt,” Missy teased.

  I shot Missy another wide-eyed look and then completely ignored her as I said, “Bye, Mom. Bye, Dad.” I trotted out the door and let my mom close it behind me. I hadn’t realized that the snow was sticking. The world looked covered by a soft white blanket, peaceful and calm. I wasn’t calm, though, when I open the door to the hearse.

  “Hi,” I said as I got in.

  “Hi, yourself. Ready to go?”

  “Yup. No caskets?”

  “No caskets.”

  Rebecca backed out and headed toward the cemetery.

  She was oddly quiet, so I tried to fill the space. “You guys were amazing this weekend.”

  “Thanks. Was that your first dance concert?”

  I nodded. “I’m ashamed to say that, yeah, it was my first one.”

  “Well, thanks for coming. I, for one, appreciate the support.

  Did you see Jessie on Saturday?”

  Hearing Jessie’s name made me feel like I’d been punched in the stomach. Why did she have to go and bring her up? “Yeah,” was all I could say.

  “I saw her, too, but I’m glad she didn’t try to give me flowers or anything.”

  “Me, too.” I was shocked at my boldness.

  Rebecca looked at me and said softly, “I’m glad you did, though.”

  “Give you flowers?”

  “Yeah. My parents were relieved when I told them they weren’t from Jessie. They don’t like her, either.”

  I laughed. I guess my disdain for the basketball wonder was no secret from her. “Did you tell your parents who they were from?”

  “Nope. Not yet.”

  “Do they know about you?”

  “That I like girls?”

  I nodded.

  “Yes, they know.”

  She didn’t elaborate as we pulled into the Greystone cemetery. Someday I’d have to ask her how to come out to people, especially how to come out to parents. That kind of scared me to death.

  She maneuvered the immense hearse down the tree-lined road that brought us to my grandparents’ gravesites. I never realized how tranquil the cemetery looked covered in snow.

  She pulled the hearse up to the same spot and put it in park. “I’ll keep the engine running for the heater, but please don’t think I’m rushing you.”

  “Okay.” I got out of the hearse and walked through the snow to my grandparents’ side-by-side graves. I brushed the accumulated snow off the top of the headstone and took a deep breath.

  “Grandma, did you see the snow globe Rebecca got me? It’s a sign, isn’t it? I know you had something to do with it. Oh, my God, I’m so freakin’ nervous. Oh, sorry. Freakin’ isn’t really a curse, though.”

  I looked at Rebecca where she sat in the hearse. Like the last time, she didn’t look my way. I was glad because that would have made me more nervous than I already was. Even my hands were sweating inside my gloves.

  “You guys,” I said to the headstone, “can you maybe not watch when I get back in the hearse with Rebecca? I mean, we might say some personal stuff. Maybe you could go play bridge. You play bridge in heaven, right?”

  I wasn’t sure what else to say and since my nose was getting kind of cold, I decided to finish up my visit. “I love you guys. Mom and Dad say hi. Missy, too.” I looked at the headstone for another couple of seconds. “Okay, I’m going back to the hearse now, and you guys are going to play bridge, right? Right.”

  The wet snow clung to my boots as I walked back. The black hearse looked like it had a layer of snow icing on top. I got back in and was glad Rebecca had the heat turned up high. She had her jacket undone and had even taken her gloves off. I took mine off, too.

  Rebecca turned toward me. “Finished already?”

  “Yeah, they weren’t very talkative today.”

  She laughed and then smiled at me in such a way that I swear my boots melted. She made no move to put the hearse in drive. In fact, she took off her seatbelt. I took that as a cue to keep mine off as well. The snow that covered the windshield made me feel safe and snug inside our private cocoon.

  An awkward silence overtook us, but then Rebecca smiled as if she suddenly remembered something. “Oh, oh, oh! I got the letter.”

&nbs
p; “What letter?”

  “They want my audition DVD.”

  “Who does?”

  “The Karen Swanson School of Dance in New York. The summer program.”

  “Ahhh,” I squealed with her and reached my arms out for a congratulatory hug. She hugged me back, and when the squealing was done I started to pull away, but she didn’t. She kept her arms wrapped tightly around me. The smile on her face turned serious, and I almost forgot to breathe.

  She leaned her face toward mine. My heart pounded as she inched forward and touched her lips to mine. They were as soft as I imagined. We kissed gently at first, tentatively, but then something deep inside of me woke up, and I kissed her back with so much passion, I almost scared myself. My arms were shaking as I put them around her thin waist. Through her jacket, I felt her uneven breathing. When she reached up and held my face with both hands, I didn’t think I could take much more.

  Breathless, we dragged ourselves away from each other.

  “Devon, I hope that was okay.”

  I smiled as I caught my breath. “Do you hear me complaining?” I reached up and stroked her cheek like I had imagined doing in French class. “So soft.”

  She blushed and kissed the palm of my hand. I couldn’t believe how amazing it felt to have the palm of your hand kissed.

  “Devon,” Rebecca said in between kisses, “I want to say so much to you.” She grabbed the hand she’d been kissing and held it. “First of all, I don’t care about the black/white thing. It took a while to figure out, but I don’t have a problem with you being white. That honor goes to my stupid friends.” She made an air quote with her free hand when she said the word friends. “Jessie most of all. I always let her influence me. It’s funny,” she said with a sigh, “when I dance I put myself out there for all to see, but I can’t...”

  Rebecca seemed to get choked up, so I didn’t say anything for a while. After almost ten seconds of silence, I finally asked her, “You can’t what?”

  “I can’t stand up to Jessie.” She looked up at me as if searching me for strength.

  I put on the bravest face I had and hoped she’d never know that I had no idea how to stand up to Jessie, either. “Oh, don’t worry about her. She’s not a problem anymore, is she?”

  “No, I guess not. She was always more talk than action, anyway.” She kissed my palm again. “I was so pig-headed about you, and I’m sorry for that. That was not me, and I’m not letting you get away from me again.” She looked down at our hands and then squeezed mine. “If that’s okay with you.”

  I simply nodded, speechless, and let my perma-grin speak for me.

  “Devon, I’m so grateful you kept persisting. You were relentless, you know.”

  “I was?”

  “Yeah, you’d look at me during French with those baby brown eyes of yours, that cute little nose, and those pink cheeks. And then you’d smile and make me melt. Then you started giving me all those black and white stuffed animals. I did get it, you know, black and white. Very clever. I didn’t want to ignore you during French, but I thought it would be better for both of us if I did.”

  “Why? You were sending such mixed messages.”

  “I know. I’m sorry. Well, like I said, my friends gave me a lot of grief about hanging out with the white girl. And…”

  “And, what?”

  “And I think I stayed away because I didn’t want Jessie harassing you.”

  Too late, I thought. “I can take care of myself.” I wasn’t so sure about that, but hopefully, Jessie really was all talk and no action.

  “I know you can. I’m glad. It was so hard to stay away from you when all I wanted to do was hold you and kiss you and be with you.”

  “You did?” I swallowed hard. I had no idea. My heart sang in triumph.

  “I mean, at first I wasn’t sure if I was attracted to you out of sympathy for your grandma, but when I couldn’t get you out of my mind, Devon, I knew.”

  “You did?”

  She nodded. “You know what else?”

  “What?”

  “I hate beer.”

  “Oh, my God, me, too. So why did you drink so much that night at Bruster?”

  “‘Cuz you were right there so close in the car with us, and I kind of panicked. Maybe I thought I could let you know how I felt about you if I was drunk enough.”

  “I knew you were sending me a sign!”

  “When I stumbled against you in the woods? Oh, yeah, Ms. Devon Raines, that was a big flashing neon sign, but then I had to get back in the car with Jessie.” She flashed me that sad smile again, but continued, “I’m so glad you didn’t give up on me. Somehow you found me on the other side of my wall.”

  “The black and white wall?”

  “Yeah, I guess. I…I don’t know why people are such jerks. Why can’t people just be people? Not black, not white, not whatever—just people.”

  “I know.” We were silent for a moment. “What about that pregnant lady in the mall?”

  “Which—”

  “Remember? ‘Diluting the blood, man,’” I mimicked Jessie. “The black guy and the white woman?”

  “Oh, yeah. What about them?”

  “Her baby. Is her baby going to be white or black? I mean, the baby’s going to be mixed.”

  “Sometimes blacks can pass for white.”

  “What does that mean, though? Why does a person have to pass for white? Do whites pass for black? Can’t we all just be humans? Aaah, this is so confusing.”

  “I know. Now you see why I had to take some time to get it figured out in my own head.”

  “You know what?”

  “What?”

  “We’re not that different, you and me.” I pulled up my jacket sleeve and motioned for her to do the same. I placed my white forearm against her dark one. “We’re just different shades is all.” I rubbed my arm on hers. “See, we even feel the same.”

  She laughed, but then I reached down for her hand and kissed her fingertips one at a time. “I think that blacks and whites and yellows and reds and browns will only be able to overlook their differences when aliens invade Earth.”

  She laughed. “Aliens?”

  “Yeah, then we’ll have to become the human race and not the black race or the white race or whatever.”

  “Good theory, but I don’t have as much faith in people as you do.”

  I smiled at her knowing this was probably the first of many conversations we’d have on this topic. We were quiet for a moment, until she commented on the snow accumulating on the windows and suggested that she take me home.

  “No, not yet!” I squeezed her hand with both of mine and blurted, “Rebecca, I think about you all the time, and I don’t even care if Jessie beats me up. I think about you every morning and all day long and before I go to sleep. I think about things to tell you during French. I think about what it would be like to touch your cheek. I just…I just…” I ran out of words and started to choke up.

  “Shhh,” she said slowly and touched a finger to my lips. “I know, Devon. I’ve known for a long time.”

  She slid her finger down my lips, circled my chin for a moment, and then put her arms around my neck. I put my own arms around her waist and pulled her closer until our noses touched. I tilted my head to one side, so I could kiss her. I rubbed her back over her coat. With a boldness I didn’t know I had, I reached under her coat and touched her warm back. She moaned, so I caressed her back while we kissed.

  We finally broke apart. I melted when I saw the look of love reflected in her soft brown eyes.

  I know my expression turned quite serious when I said, “I’ve got a tough question for you.”

  “I’m pretty sure I can handle anything right now, so go ahead.”

  “Who are we going to eat lunch with?”

  She smiled. “I guess we’ll have to start our own table.”

  I nodded in agreement. “That’ll be quite an undertaking.”

  “We’ll do it together, right?”


  “Yeah, we will. What about Jessie?”

  “We’ll do that together, too.”

  I believed her as she flashed a reassuring smile. I let her kiss me again as the snow buried us against the world.

  About the Author

  Barbara L. Clanton is a native New Yorker who left those "New York minutes" for the slower-paced palm-tree-filled life in Orlando, Florida. She currently teaches mathematics at a college preparatory school in the Orlando area. When she's not teaching, playing softball, tiling her floors, or evicting possums from the engine block of her RV, "Dr. Barb" plays bass guitar in a local band called The Flounders with her partner who plays the drums. Her ultimate dream is to one day snowbird between upstate New York and central Florida.

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  Out of Left Field: Marlee's Story

  High school junior Marlee McAllister lives and breathes softball. She's the pitcher for the Clarksonville Cougars in the North Country of upstate New York. With the season opener approaching, Marlee and her best friend, Jeri D'Amico, go to scout their rivals, the East Valley Panthers. The Panthers star pitcher, Christy Loveland, took the All County pitching title the preceding year. It is a title Marlee covets. Marlee and Jeri settle in for the game but as the Panthers take the field, Marlee finds herself staring at Susie Torres, the Panther left fielder.

  For reasons Marlee doesn't understand, she's drawn to Susie. Over the course of the next few weeks, Marlee and Susie will slowly act on their mutual attraction. But suddenly Susie pulls away without explanation and Marlee realizes it has to do with Christy. Susie won't explain the bond she and Christy share but whatever it is threatens Marlee's burgeoning relationship with Susie.

  Struggling to maintain her grades, dealing with the ever-increasing estrangement from her best friend Jeri, and handling the pressures of the All County Pitching competition, Marlee also has to confront the bittersweet realities of what it might mean to be gay.

  ISBN 978-1-935053-08-8 1-935053-08-6