Free The Secret Hum of a Daisy by Tracy Holczer Page A

Daddy’s favorite and the poem where Mama found my name.
    Ah, when to the heart of man
    Was it ever less than a treason
    To go with the drift of things,
    To yield with a grace to reason,
    And bow and accept the end
    Of a love or a season?
    But no one came.
    I refused to give up, though, and eventually, I didn’t see Daddy, but I could almost hear Mama’s husky voice speaking the words alongside me, making a harmony. If I worked hard enough at following the clues, maybe I could bring all of her back and God would admit a mistake.
    As long as I didn’t write the After, anything was possible.

10
    Worldly
    Perspective
    The reality of these last few weeks, of Mama being gone, down deep in the earth at Fox Hill Cemetery, was still there, but there had to be more than the deep dark earth after you died. Not that I’d given it much thought. Mama and I weren’t ones for church, although we had snuck into a few when they’d come across our path. Like when we drove all the way to Tiburon from Turlock on one of our Getaway Days—days where she just had to be somewhere else, so I’d skip school and off we’d go—and found this tiny white-steepled church sitting on a hillside of straw-colored grass. I swore I’d go back and get married in that church one day, and we must have sat there for a good hour, me lying on the pew with my head in Mama’s lap, soaking up the stained glass light.
    I didn’t know how these things worked and it was making me nervous. What if God was looking the other way or something while she sent me signs? Mama was known to be sneaky from time to time, like when she’d crave fresh-baked cookies. If we didn’t have the ingredients, or the money for a store run, she’d let herself into whatever diner she worked in, in the wee hours of the night, and bake. Twirling a spatula and listening to the cook’s radio turned down low, she’d sing along with the music, humming when she didn’t know the words, while I ate chocolate chips and pretended it was our kitchen in a big farmhouse out in the country. With horses.
    I hated to think Mama was being sneaky, that if she got caught up there in heaven by the angel police, or whoever was in charge of such things, it might all end. Because it couldn’t end. Not until I figured out what she was trying to tell me. I couldn’t wait to talk to Lacey tomorrow morning so she could help me sort things out.
    â€¢Â â€¢Â â€¢
    On the way to school, Grandma asked me what my favorite subjects were after my first week. She was wearing her gardening uniform again: dirty knee pads and overalls, the same blue bandana holding back her wavy hair.
    â€œI guess they would be art and English.”
    â€œArt was one of your mama’s favorite subjects,” Grandma said, and I wondered if she’d ever stop telling me things as though I didn’t know my own mama.
    â€œYou should do the laundry today. Looks like you’ve been wearing the same clothes all week,” I said, thinking about the soap-bubble mess that was waiting for her and trying not to crack up.
    â€œI already did the laundry.”
    â€œYou did?” I said, confused, since I’d switched the soaps two days ago.
    â€œI did.”
    I couldn’t read Grandma’s face. Was she trying not to laugh?
    â€œWell,” I said. “How did it go?”
    â€œIt went the way laundry always goes. Everything got clean.”
    I didn’t know what to make of that as I got out of the truck and ran up the front sidewalk to school, my backpack bumping against my side.
    I’d managed to keep my distance from Jo and the other girls for most of this first week, although I saw them huddle from time to time and look in my direction, like they might be hatching a plan. My plan, however, was to walk wide circles around everyone like they had something catching, chicken pox, maybe, or a really bad case of bedbugs. This