Memorial Day: A Short Story

Draft #2

Elvis croons sweetly of a simpler time when tender love was still alive. Some time before life began.

I used to watch the homemovies my grandfather made of my mother and her brothers as kids and cry. Horrible pangs of nostalgia for my mother 's lost peace. And something else.

They were silent but they flowed, dubbed over with Elvis songs.

I think I want to throw a stone at the sky.

The moon looks so nice tonight, nearly white and almost full

Enough to fill the gaps between the window blinds.

A couple stars sit nearby, atop some sacred river. I wonder, faintly, what lies in its bed, nestled cooly beneath such placid sheets and holy dreams.

I think I want to throw a stone and watch it miss everything.

I think I want to swim out

Sometimes I hear his keys move, atop a desk, in the pocket of his torn camo shorts, or on either side of the door, and it 's hard to tell between footsteps on the stairs and the heartbeat in my ears.

Sometimes, though, I can hear him smile, like when I stare at the photo album of my life he made for my birthday. The best gift I ever got.

Sometimes he laughs so hard he has to hold his scarred stomach, and his eyes look warm and brown, and not as army green.

In any case I weep.

Once, on the night before Memorial Day, we ate shortcake together at a cafe in Reno.

Sometimes, in cooking class, someone will slam a dish too hard and I 'll get angry, because I swear I can hear glass breaking.

I miss everyone. The Angel in the snow globe saying May still faces the window. I once told my father this and thought I saw water in his eyes. They seemed to be searching, maybe for the stars on their surfaces that only I could see.

His mother gave it to me on our last Christmas morning.

She died on Mother 's Day.

I think I 've faced away too long. The stars float on to someone else 's frame and I can 't remember the song. The cosmic movie 's silent. The night 's growing cold.

I 'd like to spit up a stone. I think. But there 's so much water here.

I can 't