The Turning of the Bones

My mood had changed drastically after hearing the big news. Nothing could ever prepare you for hearing about a loved one dying, even when you know it's coming. That was the first time I saw my father cry and his lips quivered when he broke the news to me that Grandma Myra was dead. I had watched him turn from a man who'd never shared an ounce of vulnerability to a sobbing child. It scared me. I couldn't bear to watch him this way, so I ran and ran as fast as I could. In a way, I was running from the inevitable realization of death. 

"I can't do this right now." My father said as he limped a few feet, until I sprinted past the neighbor's yard. He called out for my Mom to help fetch me.

"What happened?"

"Maria, please go get your daughter."

"Oh, no, that poor girl."

I jumped over the stone fences of the neighbor's houses and passed by the untamed vegetation of a small forest that proceeded it. I ran almost as fast as those black spiny-tailed iguanas my Grandma Myra used to try and chase when she was a child. I scuffed my knee and tripped over a rotting coconut before landing head-first into the old well. 

"Oh, no, no, no!" 

I desperately reached for a rope but couldn't find it.

"Somebody..."

I managed to grab a hold of what felt like a furry branch, for a moment before finding the rope to pull myself out of there. I was breathing heavily before passing out onto the muddy grass nearby.

      I know I dreamt because I remembered seeing a large old tree the size of a skyscraper. It had elongated illuminated branches that stretched far past the thickest brushes of the horizon. On top of them were spider monkeys with faces of my long-passed relatives from old pictures from my Grandma's old leather-bound photo album.  

"Wake up, lazy-bones!" 

I woke up after a wandering chicken pecked the tips of my toes. I was drenched in this strange green muck from the well and noticed I had been covered in bites from the unruly mosquitoes. Those pest must have been intoxicated by my smell of rotten mangos and sewer water on my body. 

     My mom approached desperate when she found me. "Oh, Mami, I've been looking all over for you! Are you okay?"

"Yes..."

      She sat down on an old broken chair from the pile of trash the neighborhood burnt. 

   "Actually, no. I'm not okay, Mom. I can't believe Grandma is gone."

      "Your dad has been talking to your Uncles and Aunts for the last hour. It's not easy for him right now, Cynthia. You need to be strong for him."

      "But, she looked fine to me, and she promised me she'd visit us back home and she was going to make it to my school's play...She promised me she'd make it."

      My mom looked down at my clothes and shook her head. She tried to wipe away the grime with the sleeves of her clean sweater. "Oh, look at you. You're all dirty, Cynthia. You need to take a bath when you get back."

     I tilted my head down. "I'm sorry."

      She looked at me and pulled me close for a hug. "Look Mami, it's never easy. These things happen, But, you know what? We keep those beautiful memories we've made with Grandma and they'll stay with us forever."

        I shrugged and more tears formed. "It's not the same..."

My Mom's eyes wandered and I noticed she looked very upset about something. 

"What's wrong?"

      "Your Aunts and Uncles are fighting about their inheritance. Those freeloaders. But, your dad doesn't care about any of that. You know how much of a Mama's boy he was. He only loved spending time with her."

      My mom kissed my burning forehead and walked back into the house. "Take your time, Mami. I know you'll stay safe. You come back inside when you're ready? And not stray too far?"

      I wiped the tears away and nodded. 

I got up and headed back to the old well where I had fallen into. It was a surprise to see it had almost been fully drained. I walked back to follow Mom.

     Then a voice from beneath startled me. The whispers beckoned me closer then, it had gotten louder. "Pssst... Mija? Mija? Mija!?" 

      I quickly ran to the muzzled echoes from beneath. "Down here, Mija!" 

      I walked a little closer and could hear what sounded like an old man, maybe a little older than my father. I quickly grabbed the long thick rope dangling down the well and lowered the metal bucket at the end. 

     "Hey! Hold on, tight!" 

 I tugged it back and forth to try and balance it upright.

      "Hey, cut that off, Mija. You're -" the voice gurgled. "STOP!"

      "Sorry!" yelled Cynthia.

"You're trying to drown me!? Irresponsible, no manners!" 

      Cynthia yanked it again.

      "Ok, Ok, I'm sorry, so sorry, Mija. Just get me up please."

      "Be nice," I said tugging the rope to hoist whatever was in the bucket up.

      There had been mist down there, and it obscured it. 

"Oh, thank you, my Mija. I'll finally get out of that disgusting filth."

      Then finally, an old iguana came out with its small beady eyes glaring up to me as if it were annoyed. It struggled to get out of the bucket. 

      "Mija, how about some respect for your elders? Give me a hand!" 

 "What the?" My wide-eyes stared at it, but I composed myself and tried to place him onto the grass, but it fell on it's back. 

      "Aye!"

"Sorry! Sorry!"

"Okay." it said shaking his head to see clearly. "Please allow me to explain, Mija. I heard what happened to my little princess Myra. Listen, I'm your Great Great Grandfather."

      I walked away, wiping my eyes with my palms as if I could rub sense into my vision. "I drowned, didn't I? I- I, T-This is H-Heaven?!"

      "Calm down! I know it's strange because you're not supposed to see me like this, but I couldn't bear to see you this way. In our family when someone passes, those of us who can come back to attend the funeral can come back reincarnated, but only for a brief moment. The reason I'm talking to you now Mija is to make sure my little Myra is buried here in a proper way. We need to make sure her favorite pottery is with her, an old tradition for us Lencans so she is blissful in the Spirit World. Not with a cross from that terrible institution."

      "Shut up, you fool!" someone else called out.

      "Excuse me?" said the cranky old iguana. 

      I heard it like a gust of wind, as it left a trail of sand, another spiny-tailed reptile standing on it's hind legs. He stood very domineering.

"Now what is this?"

      "I'm your 7th Great-grandpa, my dear. Don't listen to that scoundrel there, Pedro de Alvarado was a great man who had brought us the way of salvation. And besides our first priority is deciding what beautiful roses we will place in baby Myra's coffin corner. We will make sure the family decorates with beautiful ceramic marble. Bright blues and reds, and pinks and.. -"

      "Callate!" the old Iguana had enough and head-butted the other. 

      Then the chicken that had woken me up appeared again and pecked the both of them. "You fools barely knew Myra. She was a lot like you, Cynthia. Full of energy, she once ran away from home but came crying back because her foot got stuck inside a Coconut shell. Have you heard that story? The poor thing had to crawl her way back home from the cuts." 

I smiled and was eager to listen to the chicken more, but then it seemed like all types of creatures had been surrounding us now. They were very abrasive and demanding with their ideas for the funeral and the visitation. 

      One little parakeet squawked and landed on my shoulder, "Please, please, please, just do not even think of cremating her. We need to make sure her soul makes it to heaven!" 

      The two reptiles, the chicken, and a few other creatures turned over to the foreign bird. They noticed her accent wasn't quite right, and she had bright red feathers under her wings, obviously not from around these mountains. 

      They all yelled almost in a singular voice. "Who the demons are you?!"

      "Ohh, Hehe. Well, I'm here for moral support for my beautiful great great granddaughter, Cynthia. Couldn't leave her alone with you crazies."

      "You're not my wife!" said the old Iguana.

      "The spry spiny one then tail whipped the old one on his sides. "Imbecile, she's from the mother's side, like she just said."

      "Oh. Yah..." 

      I began to get frustrated with all of them, I tried to walk away towards the main road and followed the fresh scent of field corn on the grill. I knew that smell, of the village sisters making tortillas from fresh masa, it was not too far from Grandma's place. But, they kept following close behind.

"Guys. Please... Stop it, people are going to wander why a bunch of weird stray animals are following me... And I need to think about all of this...". I looked back at them standing quietly. "Please..." Another tear streamed down my cheek.

      Something pressed down on my skin on my ankle and climbed up and constricted around my arm with it's dry scales like I was a tree branch. "Oh, no, no, no. My sweet Little Buck. "This is all natural. You don't need to be unhappy now, your Memaw isn't in pain anymore. Y'see?"

      I had almost jumped, but tried very hard to remain calm seeing a large green grass snake around me. She slithered closer to my face.

      "Are you family too?" I asked shakened. 

      "Of course, my love, I am your 10th Grandma from the beautiful village of Wandala." 

      "Ehm... Where?"

      "Oh, you might know it as Cameroon today. If it were up to me, I'd be speaking to you in my native language of Njerep, but it makes me sad that it's no longer spoken in this realm." she rambled, but I felt I couldn't interrupt. "Oh yes, a young 60-year old man from the tribe is the last known speaker. You see, much like the short life of people, languages too die eventually. Listen her funeral should be a glorious celebration of our lineage. We need to make sure there is a balance of happiness to remember those beautiful moments, we must make sure the family has set aside the drummers, and we have enough wine, and food for the feasts for this great celebration."

      "Celebration!?" the two native Iguanas gasped in unison, their large pink mouths hung open. "Are you mad, woman?" 

      "Have you no respect?'

      But, the little green frog croaked in agreement. That tradition likely stemmed from the part of my Mother's family, the Caribbean lifestyle slow-paced side. "Not a bad idea, Nena. That tradition is mas viejo que el frio!"

      "No!" spiny-headed Grandpa said. "We must not allow it."

      "Shut up!" I had gone fed up. "I can't deal with all of you."

I ran as quickly as I could when they continued arguing. Grandmother Snake struggled to keep up, Grandma Frog was too small to get through the large puddles from the rain before, and everyone else had been too slow."

      I ran down to the house and kept pacing back and forth rubbing my forehead thinking I had gone crazy! I imagined it all. It must have been the humidity!

      "Cynthia." My mom interrupted my thoughts. Her tone suggested something had been serious. 

She pointed to the closed door where my Grandma's bedroom was.    

      She gestured for me to go inside with the tilt of her cheek.

      I cautiously walked in and could hear my dad sobbing again.

      "Why, Lord, did you take her so young? Why didn't you give me a few more years?" 

      I looked back at my mom and hesitated. I was scared to deal with something so real, yet, I continued on for him.

      My dad looked at me and smiled and gave me a big hug. "How are you, my little bug? Did you get a chance to clear your head?"

      "I'm fine, Dad... I love you." I cried in his arms.

      "I love you too." he said.

      *****

      After an hour had passed my Dad had fallen asleep.

      I heard a small peck at the window. 

      It was a ragged grey-feathered bird. I had a feeling it was calling for me. 

      I carefully walked out of the room to meet it.

      My mother had been making hot atole de elote and cooking with my Aunts in the kitchen, and my younger cousins had been on the hammocks in their phones.

      I closed the door and confronted the bird. "Would you, shut up!?."

      "I beg your pardon?"

      "No. Bad-bird! You need to go." 

      "I will do no such thing."  

      I threw a piece of a branch to try and scare it, and it did fly away but quickly returned. 

      "I will offer you my advice first, brat. A suggestion, if I may? I brought here two shiny pennies for her eyelids and ample bandages for the body. There is a cave not too far from here, near the ocean."

      "A cave, what are you saying?"

      "For the transport of the body, of course." 

      "There's no way that we are family."

      "I am indeed your Grandpa from your Father's side. Several hundred years ago. I had been involved with a beautiful Portuguese woman, you see..."

      "Oh, shut your trap!" Shouted the Caribbean frog. Disgusting colonizer!"

      "Shut up, you animals! This isn't about you or your differences. We need to help the young girl deal with this tragedy." barked a small stray dog rustling by dead leaves. "It's a great tragedy, and we are here for you, Nieta."

      "Tragedy? Oh, no, this is the cycle of life." said Grandma Snake.

      "And how do you bury them again?" 6th Great Grandpa snickered. He was an old spider-monkey hanging from a small morro tree.

      Well, let me tell you, young man. In my tribe, we have a wonderful ritual. We call it, the Turning of the Bones, where we guide the spirit to the afterlife. The members of the family all dance to celebrate their lives right before the body gets their newly fresh wrappings!"

      "Eww!" yelled another. "You mummify it? It seems disrespectful to me."

      "Quiet, you two." said the ragged bird. "Dear Cynthia, what we require for your Dearest Grandma is a proper send-off. What my ancestors did was more traditional. You have beautiful rivers here to set her adrift in the ocean!" 

      Another animal interrupted. "A parade! Yes ma'am, a parade is required, your Nani was an intelligent woman, therefore we sprinkle yellow dye on her body and carry her down to the nearest town, with her family beside her before of course, then we cremate her."

      "Oh no no no!" shouted the frog.

Another creature said. "The soul must enter heaven, so we must not do such a thing. We must let the vultures consume her, thus eliminating the empty vessel so her soul could depart to the Heavens!"

      "Pearls!" said a wild ocelot before spitting out a few white orbs to my feet. "This is all of OUR family here, generations of them."

      "What about a Tower of Silence." mumbled a Tapir. 

      A Killdeer said. "You're all wrong, we dress her up in her favorite clothing. Sit her in her favorite chair. Place a cigarette in her lip-"

      "Enough! You guys are all annoying now!"

      "Cynthia?" My mother came out and noticed me murmuring. "Everything ok?" 

      I went back into the house and sat by my Aunts, Uncles, and Parents speaking about Grandma. 

      "...And remember that time," said Auntie trying to hold her laughter in. "When she chased your Dad around the house because he brought in that dirty little piglet. He made a huge mess around the house and broke her favorite ceramic plate! Remember?"

      "Ha Ha." 

      "Oh, your father always did love his animals." Auntie said to me.

      "Grandma is now with Dad. Those lovebirds are together now."

      "Oh, my Mother was just the same, she was a troublemaker herself."

      "I heard she came back crawling with a foot stuck in a coconut?"

      My Aunties all smiled. "I remember that story. You must have spent a lot of time with her, haven't you?"

      I nodded. 

      "She loved you so much." 

      The next night, was the wake. I had dreaded it, I couldn't bare to see Grandma that way, but my family all supported me. All generations of them. I heard stories that day for the first time about her life from her friends.

      Dad noticed all the animals around the crowd of people and smiled.

      I guess he knew deep down.

      When her body arrived in the coffin, dressed in her beautiful floral dress and her hair was braided with butterfly pendants in two ways like a little girl. I cried again. 

My Dad noticed I had a few items in my purse.

      "What do you have in there, little bug?" my Dad asked.

      "Just some things Grandma enjoyed."

      "Thank you for giving me strength, little bug." 

      The wake was a beautiful quiet celebration of Grandma Myra's life, followed by prayers and passages from a professional mourner.

I shared some stories of her life with my much younger cousins that day so they wouldn't forget her.

*****

     The next day when It was time to bury her I said a few last words to her. "I'll never forget you, Grandma." That's when two butterflies landed on my shirt for a moment before flying away. I knew they were my Grandparents saying Goodbye back to me.