The Final Flight

I first thought it was a mausoleum, but it’s called a columbarium. There are niches within these miniature buildings that hold the ashes of loved ones. Some of them are large buildings with stained glass windows and hundreds of niches, and some are small stand-alones dotting the cemetery landscape. Both my parents were interred in one of these on August 4th at Floral Memory Gardens in Dade City after my mother passed away in July, seven years after my father.

It was quite peaceful there. They’re under the white marble Jesus (as opposed to the black granite one in the other half of the cemetery) in the niche just below my cousin Karen is interred. My parents are just underneath that. On the day of the commitment we asked the caretaker if any of the other niches were available on that side; she said all but the bottom one on the right were available. Curious, we asked why we couldn’t have the corner one, and we were simply told it was unavailable.

That niche in question was surfaced with a slightly different shade of white marble. The other pieces had slightly darker marble, gray with age, but this one looked more recent. There was a crack in the stone that made the face uneven. It couldn’t have been hit by a landscaper or any other vehicle; there’s cement surrounding and protecting it. My husband and I considered buying a space there in the future, but for now it’s home to two of the most important people of my life.

November 1-2 is Dia de los Muertos, celebrated by Latin and Roman countries around the world. It is believed that on these days the spirits of the dead come back to join the living. The first day is for the innocents; babies and children who died young; the second is for adults. It’s a day of celebration and families gathering, first at home with ofrendas that hold food, candles, photos, and mementos of the loved one. Then the celebrations moved to graveside in the cemetery, with spirits joyfully reuniting with their families for those two days. A picnic at the cemetery which many Americans find morbid.

This year, however, I didn’t feel like celebrating. I was as hollow as the pumpkins that lined my front porch. I hesitated, but I wanted to help my mother on her journey. Her death was unexpected, and I was having a difficult time coping with the fallout, the family squabbles, the questions that remained unanswered. I felt that something was not as it should be, that there was something I was overlooking, something terribly out of place.

“I’m going to the cemetery,” I flatly told my husband. “I need some time alone.”

He looked at me. “Go ahead. Be careful out there. Are you sure you don’t want us to come along?” He knew I hated driving, but I felt compelled to go. He knew I’d be crying.

I needed to do this alone. After school on Friday I stopped by the grocery store to pick up some marigolds. Flowers were important in Dia de los Muertos; they represented the fragility of life, and the bright colors attracted spirits and guided them. I found a bunch, along with some mums, and then headed over to the bakery section. Another important part of the tradition was bringing favorite foods of the loved ones to the cemetery as part of an offering to further encourage the spirits to come. I ended up with a package of pastelitos de guayaba and circus peanuts for my father, Kedem Tea Biscuits and a shot of Benedictine for my mom, and some sugar skulls for both of them.

The drive down to Dade City was over an hour long. I had some Midnight Syndicate and Nox Arcana on a playlist keeping in line with my dark mood. I turned onto Clinton Road, and my heart grew heavier as I drove toward white Jesus of the Wasps, a nickname we gave it because a wasp’s nest had settled under one of the outstretched arms of the statue. I pulled onto the narrow road in front of the memorial and parked near the front of the columbarium. I was glad there was no one in the cemetery that afternoon. Mourning without intruding eyes makes it easier. I cut the flowers, opened the packages, poured a shot, and brought them to the white marble sepulcher. My breath caught when I saw the bronze plaque with both their names on it. It had only one name etched on it a few months ago.

It was a dry day, wet only where my tears hit the ground. The buzzing of dragonflies and grasshoppers provided the only sounds. A lizard ran across the cement and up the side of Jesus. I placed the marigolds in the flower holder and placed a framed photo of my parents and cousin on top. Beside it I placed the pastry and cookies, ants appearing out of nowhere. The sugar skulls, in bright hues of blue, green, and orange, represented the souls of the departed. I put those between the two foods and stepped back to take in the whole scene. I knew one day they had to die; it’s part of the natural order of things that parents die before their children do. The hard part was the ache of understanding that when they died, part of my soul died, too. I won’t lie; I sobbed. My body felt as if it were being squeezed, finding it harder to breathe. I needed a tissue and headed back to my car. That’s when I heard it.

At first it was low, soft, a gentle hum similar to the murmur of a radio left on at night. I didn’t recognize it, nor did I know where it was coming from. I turned and faced the columbarium. Something from the west side of it, near the chair I set up, had moved. Figuring it was something on my glasses, or make-up mixed with tears, I opened the console in my vehicle to get those tissues. I checked my phone on the seat and found a text from an unknown number, 1102645. Another piece of meaningless clutter, I thought. I get spam texts, email, and phone calls all the time. I retrieved the Kleenex and cleaned my glasses. Then I looked in the side view mirror to wipe my eyes. I saw something black swiftly pass by in the background.

The sun was starting to set, and I remembered the song from Fiddler on the Roof that I danced to with my father at my wedding:

Sunrise, sunset, sunrise, sunset

Swiftly fly the years

One season following another

Laden with happiness, and tears.

Maybe the dying sun was playing tricks on my eyes. There was nothing out here except me. I walked back to the niche but heard nothing more. I looked around the cemetery for the source of the sound I heard earlier. Nothing. I walked around to the other side of the columbarium – nothing but more niches. A soft sound came from out front. My pulse quickened as I peered around the corner.

The marble slab in the bottom right had cracked open. The fluttering continued, and I stared in fear and disbelief. There was something moving around inside that niche. Something agitated, something angry, perhaps at my presence. I stumbled toward the grass trying to get away from this sound. At once, something flew out of the niche: a black crow with a single white feather flew toward me and over my shoulder as I ducked down. Petrified, I watched its path away from the darkened niche and toward the sunset. My mother believed crows brought both good and back luck depending on when and where it was seen. According to Spanish tradition, crows serve as an intermediary between life and death. It’s the crow that helps take spirits into the afterlife. Seeing this bird in a cemetery, at sunset, on Dia de los Muertos, I felt a shiver pass through me.

It wasn’t over. I heard the murmuring sound again, a voice coming from within the center of the marble. It didn’t make sense, but it remained constant. Too scared to get closer to the niche at first, I crept back to get a better sense of what I was hearing. The day’s light was gently fading into a future storm, and shadows formed long pictures against the white marble. I finally discerned a voice, words that sounded like “no debby have her merto.” I played with those words over and over in my mind until it made sense, and then the phrase rolled over me, suffocating me…. No debí haber muerto.

I raged at the dying of her light, and she was there to tell me her final secret, the one that had been eluding me for months, the weight on my soul, the damp shadows infecting my mind. The number on the phone 1102645 wasn’t random; it was the date and time of the moment of this sunset; her final flight into the next world.

“I shouldn’t have died.”

The thing I felt flow through me the day she died had awakened.