who broke her heart.
Aunt Bee stares at it a minute, two, three,
and just when I think maybe I’ve done
exactly the wrong thing,
she takes it from me and puts it
under her nose and
breathes deep and long.
A smile squeezes out words.
I haven’t seen one of these
in years, she says.
All your flowers are
coming back to life, I say,
and the words feel true.
Aunt Bee smiles real big then,
and it glows brighter than the
white flower in her hand.
Yes, she says. They are.
And then she tucks the flower
behind her left ear and pulls me
into arms that feel soft
and warm and safe.
FORGOTTEN
Three weeks without a call
or a visit or even a letter
from Mama, and we give up.
Maybe she forgot about us,
or maybe she doesn’t
want us anymore, but it’s
just easier to think that
we don’t need her, seeing as
Aunt Bee is our mama now.
Aunt Bee would make
a good mama. We’ve found out
she can cook nearly everything
Gran’s ever cooked, except with
a little more salt, and she buys
me new art supplies when my
old ones run out, and she takes us
shopping for new school clothes.
CALL
Gran called Aunt Bee yesterday.
Me and Charlie listened in
on Aunt Bee’s end of the conversation,
even though she tried
real hard to talk soft.
She even turned around
a few times, to make sure
we weren’t there, but she
couldn’t see us from
where she was sitting.
We were there, hiding
behind the candy table,
where Aunt Bee keeps her
chocolate-covered caramels
and her orange wedges
covered in sugar.
And from where we hid
we heard words like addicted
and how long and which facility,
and I don’t know about Charlie,
but now I’m more confused
than ever.
I wish I could have seen
what Aunt Bee drew
on the pad beside the phone,
but she tore it up after
she hung up.
TRIP
Today Gran comes to pick us up,
and on the highway home, she tells us
how Mama is taking a trip
for a few weeks
but will be back soon,
how this trip will be good
for her and good for us, too,
how we’re going to eat
one last supper together
before she leaves on her trip.
Like a send-off party, Gran says,
except it doesn’t feel much
like a party, since any way
you put it, Mama is leaving us.
DAY
Gran puts a silver pot
and a bright orange bowl
on the table while Charlie
sets out the plates and spoons.
Then we all sit in our places
and wait for Mama to show up.
We wait and wait and wait,
trying not to stare at the empty seat,
until Gran says, I’ll just go next door
and tell her it’s ready, and then
there are two empty seats.
I watch steam curl
above the buttermilk biscuits
we helped Gran cut out
with the top of a glass.
The best fried okra in Texas
is getting soggy in a bowl.
She’s not coming, I say.
Charlie narrows her eyes at me,
like I’ve said something wrong
instead of something true,
but Granddad lets out a long breath
like he knows it, too.
He takes my hand in one of his
and Charlie’s in the other.
Sadness can do strange things
to people, he says. But your
mama loves you.
And then
he says it again, in case we
didn’t hear him, I reckon.
Your mama loves you.
And she loved your daddy.
His . . . He doesn’t finish his thought,
just starts another.
It’s been hard on all of us,
but especially your mama.
But he doesn’t know the way
my daddy left that morning,
in a rage that turned his face
purple and his mouth
more than mean.
How Mama yelled back
until her voice just stopped
and the tears wet her cheeks
like the rain wet us that night.
How my daddy never looked back
when he spun the wheels and the
rocks spit in Mama’s face,
scratching her cheek like she
needed scars more than
his staying.
Maybe they loved
each other before,
but I don’t reckon
they did that day.
EAT
Granddad is watching my face.
I swallow the day and night
stuck in my throat.
He pats my hand again,
the tips of his fingers rough
and calloused.
Sometimes the way people
love us is hard to see, Granddad says.
It can be like a fire,
and we feel it burning all around.
Or it can be like a star,
and the only way we can see it
is by looking real hard for it
in the dark.
I don’t know if I’ve ever heard
Granddad say as many words
as he’s said tonight.
Granddad leans back in his chair
just as Gran walks into the room,
like their moves are a dance
perfectly timed. She looks at him
and gives a tiny little head shake,
no words, but Granddad understands.
He spreads his hands
and says, Let’s bless this
feast your gran made.
So we do. And we eat it.
Without Mama.
STAR
Granddad’s only a railroad man,
but his words grow deep inside me,
so by the time we’re finished eating
and packed up in the car
and on our way back to Aunt Bee’s,
I can see Gran’s love in the food
she’s made over the years,
and I can see Granddad’s love
in the words he hardly ever speaks,
unless he knows they’re needed,
and I can see Mama’s love
in leaving us with Aunt Bee,
who loves us in a thousand
fire ways.
One time, back when me and Josh
were still friends,
we put this action figure on the hood
of his mama’s car to see
how far down the road to school we’d get
before the figure man fell over.
He held on the entire trip,
flying on his back.
I feel like him today,
flying on my back,
staring at a black sky,
watching Mama’s star.
AFRAID
School starts soon, and Aunt Bee
needs to go to her office
to take care of a few things, she says,
so today we’re going with her.
My heart beats against my chest
as soon as I shut the car door,
even though I try to tell myself
this isn’t the first day of school.
My heart doesn’t care, I reckon,
seeing as by the time Aunt Bee
parks the car on a road
down the way from the school,
I’m sweating like I’ve
walked all the way
from her house to here.
We’ll park here, Aunt Bee says.
If someone sees my car,
we’ll be here all day.
Aunt Bee winks at us.
Teachers like to talk,
and everybody needs something
from the principal.
A long sidewalk stands in front of us,
ending at a building bigger
than my last school but still
small enough to feel okay.
The grass is impossibly green
for summer. A playground
sits off to the side.
I see all this from the window.
I haven’t gotten out yet.
Aunt Bee and Charlie are both
looking at me through the glass.
Nothing to be afraid of,
Aunt Bee says, patting
my shoulder when I
finally open my door
and climb out.
I don’t answer, since she can
probably feel the heat through my sleeve.
She doesn’t say anything else.
She heads toward the doors,
and we follow.
TOUR
The building is cool and dark.
We follow Aunt Bee into her office,
where important-looking papers
stack her desk much neater than
they stack the corners at home,
and posters with things like
READ TO SUCCEED and
NEVER GIVE UP and
STAY CURIOUS ABOUT THE WORLD
fill her walls.
Me and Charlie sit in seats
that stick to our legs while
Aunt Bee opens one of her drawers
and pulls out a pen and
disappears into a room off
the side of her office.
She comes back with
a bundle of papers.
It only takes her a few minutes,
and then she says, Let me show
you around, Paulie, like it’s the
most normal thing in the world
to come to a school
in the middle of summer
and walk down empty hallways.
She turns down what she calls
the fifth-grade hall and tells me
about the teachers, three of them,
who are some of the best teachers
in the whole state.
I touch their nameplates,
hanging on the walls
beside the doors,
on my way past.
Aunt Bee shows us the cafeteria,
which will probably be my favorite place,
and then she shows me the music room,
and I think maybe that will be my
favorite place, and then
she stops at the door
of the art room, which will
most definitely be my
favorite place of all.
TEACHER
It surprises me
that someone’s inside.
Mr. Langley, Aunt Bee says.
A tall man turns around.
His eyes shine
from all those feet away,
glowing like flashlights.
His skin is dark brown,
and I think that’s what
surprises me most.
We didn’t have any teachers
like him at my school last year.
No students, either.
When I asked Mama why
the two black boys
who lived on our dirt road
didn’t go to my school,
she said they were supposed to,
but people were up in arms
about it and had kept
them out so far.
I don’t understand why people
wouldn’t let a boy go to a school
on account of his skin color.
Mrs. Adams, Mr. Langley says.
I didn’t think I’d see you
until school started.
I brought my nephew
I told you about, Aunt Bee says,
pushing me forward.
This is Paulie Sanders.
She chokes on the name,
same as my daddy’s.
Mr. Langley holds out a hand,
big and thick, with dark fingers
stained by paint.
I shake it, and his grip is
strong and gentle
all at the same time.
Mr. Langley will be your
art teacher, Aunt Bee says,
and Mr. Langley
winks at me.
I’ve heard you like
to draw, he says.
I nod, not sure I could
say anything even if
I wanted to.
Mr. Langley leans close.
He smells sweet like oranges.
Will you show me?
He turns without waiting
for an answer, and I follow him
to the corner he came from.
ECHO
I sketch the big tree in front of
Aunt Bee’s house, and Mr. Langley
tells me about the charcoals
he did as a kid, mostly
horses and birds and
his family dog, and then he
shows me what he does now,
flipping through face after face
of people I don’t know.
He stops on one that looks
exactly like Aunt Bee.
You know this one, he says.
I look toward the door,
but Aunt Bee and Charlie
have left me. The way
Mr. Langley looks at me,
with those lines crinkling
all around his eyes,
I feel like I’ve been let in
on some great secret.
And I don’t know what
comes over me, but I say,
like Aunt Bee, and then
Mr. Langley is staring at me
like I’ve said something wrong,
and I wish I could take it back.
She paints? he says.
He sits back in his chair
and closes his sketchbook,
my drawing somewhere
in its middle.
Well, he says.
I should get you back
to your aunt. I’ll walk you.
And he does, all the way
down one hall after another,
but he stops right before
the front office door and
shakes my hand again
and says, I’m looking forward
to seeing your work again, Paulie.
His eyes stare sadness into mine,
and I feel it all the way down
to my toes.
Then he turns away.
His steps echo
a song I don’t
understand.
GONE
I forget all about Mr. Langley
and the sad song his feet played,
being as Milo is gone
when we get back home.
I look in every corner,
behind the trees,
in the trees, even though
I know he can’t climb them.
I look under a pot that was
turned over in last night’s wind,
even though he’s too big
to fit under it. I look
through the fence spaces,
into the neighbors’ yards,
even though he always
stayed where he was
supposed to.
But Milo
is gone.
SEARCH
I run.
Out the door,
over the front
porch steps,
down the street.
Aunt Bee chases me,
calling my name,
and I hear Charlie’s
voice mixed with hers,
but I run and run and run
and don’t stop.
I guess they finally understand
what’s tearing from my mouth,
since they start yelling
Milo’s name, too.
And then we get to the end of that street,
where the yellow lines of a
busier road stop me.
Milo hasn’t come running to me
with his tongue hanging out,
like he would if he could hear me,
and the sorrow of it sits me right down
in the middle of the road.
Drops from the sky
pelt my arms and
curled-up legs.
I don’t want to go home
without Milo.
Just before Aunt Bee and
Charlie catch up and I’m pulled
from the heated blacktop into
the warm grass and
Aunt Bee’s arms,
I think about
how nothing good ever
happens in the rain.
Aunt Bee and Charlie
drag me back home.
I don’t even fight them.
WALK
All afternoon and the next day
and the two days after that
I walk the streets, calling
Milo’s name loud enough
for everyone to hear, so all
the people come out onto
their porches, asking what
kind of dog it is
I’m looking for.
I miss my
mowing day.
I miss weeding
the flower beds
with Gran.
And I don’t care.
CARE
Tonight Aunt Bee calls me home for supper,
her voice ringing out through the streets
from where she stands on the porch,
wearing those eyes that have only
said sorry since Milo disappeared.
I can’t look at them anymore.
It hurts too bad,
knowing what
they mean.
We sit around the table,
where Aunt Bee has put
a steaming pot of spaghetti,
but I can’t eat, seeing as
my stomach feels like it’s