Dead And Buried

The summer before I turned 15 was meant to be spent in a wonderful golden haze. Back then, I spent most of my summers in our family’s barn, talking to the animals and imagining myself a prize pig farmer or world-renowned horse-breaker. The summer did not go as I had planned.

The barn was a tattered, worn building that was one strong breeze from a pile of matchsticks, but we all loved it more than our own house. That barn was where my brother, Jeremy, had been born, and not far from where he’d been buried. It was where we kept our three cows, Mandy, Marlowe and Calvin, and our horse, Nicodemus. It was where I’d learned to ride my bike and where I’d broken my arm falling off that same bike trying to do tricks.

The lofts of the barn were kept full of hay year-round and, I had found, were an excellent place to read until I fell asleep. It was there I learned of Jeremy’s death, there I went to remember him, and there I went to dream. It was there, in my 14th year, I discovered how my brother died.

It was mid-June, and summer’s full promise and peace lay stretched out before me. I had crawled up into the lofts with my favorite book, Babe the Sheep-Pig, and had fallen asleep clutching the book to my chest. I was startled awake just as the sun was setting by a scuffle below me. I crawled quietly to the edge of the loft and peered over, assuming it was one of the animals that had just gotten spooked.

A man I’d never seen before stood below me, his arm up to his elbow in the nests in our chicken coop. Several chickens scattered as he pulled his arm out, two warm brown eggs in his hand. He placed them gingerly in his pocket and looked around the barn. I ducked back so he didn’t see my dark hair falling over the edge of the loft. He reached into the coop again, pulled out eggs and placed these inside a small leather bag on the floor. From my place above him, I could just make out the glint of a revolver in the bag, right next to our eggs.

I gulped and slowly inched back from the ledge, trying to be silent. As I did so, I let go of my book and it tumbled from the ledge. A small, strangled gasp escaped from my lips as I reached for it and missed.

The book seemed to fall in slow motion through the dust mote-ridden air. It spiraled in and through sunbeams coming in through the faded red barn doors, my hand outstretched towards it.

When it finally landed with a ‘whoompf’ on the chicken coop roof, time rushed back into motion, but I did not. I was frozen, watching the chickens explode from the coop in a flurry of feathers, unable to back away as the man slowly lifted his head and made eye contact with me.

For several seconds, we looked at each other, both astonished and, to my surprise, both looking scared. The man suddenly leaped into action, throwing the last egg into his bag, closing it, and tossing it over his shoulder. I heard the eggs inside crack from where I still hung staring over the loft edge. The cracking eggs seemed to rouse me and I jumped to my feet, running to the ladder.

I stopped again with one foot on the first rung. What was I going to do? This man had a gun and was stealing from us. I was a 14-year old girl. What could I do? My eyes moved around the barn, looking for a solution, and landed on a pitchfork leaning against a wall. I scrambled down the ladder, grabbed the pitchfork, and ran out of the barn, yelling at the man.

“Wait! Sir? Wait!” I didn’t know what I would do if I caught him, or if he caught me, but I kept running. I had been raised to help people who couldn’t help themselves, and if this man was in the middle of nowhere stealing eggs from dilapidated barns, he obviously needed help. The man seemed to hear me and stopped, not turning around. I slowed to a walk and loosened my grip on the pitchfork, moving into a defensive stance, just to be safe.

Then I realized the man wasn’t listening to me at all. He was staring at the little headstone on Jeremy’s grave. The stone was only about a foot tall, roughly carved and with Jeremy’s name and dates on it, nothing else. We couldn’t afford much then and couldn’t bring ourselves to replace it once Pa started working in town and making more money. The man’s hands started trembling and he fell to his knees in front of the stone.

I let the pitchfork fall tines-first into the grass, staring at this strange man in astonishment. He hunched over and his shoulders shook. Was he…crying? Over my brother? This stranger was weeping over someone he’d never met.

I cleared my throat and spoke hesitantly. “What…what are you doing?”

The man’s shoulders stilled and he wiped his face. Without turning to face me, he said, “This is my boy.”

My jaw dropped and I slowly reached for the pitchfork again. This man was insane. He was out of his mind and imagining things.

“No, he ain’t,” I gripped the pitchfork so tightly my knuckles went white. “That there’s my brother an’ you best be getting’ along, now.”

The man’s head turned slowly and he stared me up and down. “Y-your Annalise?”

I widened my eyes. “How d’you know me?” I lifted the pitchfork as threateningly as I could. “Who are you?”

He stood slowly, his hands raised in surrender. “Jeremy talked ‘bout you a good bit. Every time I saw him, he was goin’ on about how you was growin’ up.” His voice was scratchy and deep, full of emotion and worn from whatever hardships caused a man to steal eggs.

I lowered the pitchfork again. “Every time you saw him?” My mind was racing, trying to figure out who this man was and if I had, in fact, seen him before. I took a half step closer and looked into his haggard face. His beard was wild and tangled, but his eyes were dark blue and kind – just, I realized, like Jeremy’s had been. Blue as the ocean during a storm, Ma used to say.

“I don’t understand.” I took a half step back from him. “Pa’s our father, not you. I never seen you before.”

The man chuckled, a sad smile on his leathered face. “I never let no one else know I was ‘round. Your Pa woulda skinned me had he ever seen me.” He slowly extended his hand toward me. “Name’s Jedidiah.”

I looked up at him, then down to his hand, and slowly reached out and shook it.

“How did…” his face closed over with grief. “Why’d they put my boy out here?”

I shook my head. “Pa said he fell off a horse. I wasn’t ‘round when he passed. They didn’t have time to get a doctor and we couldn’t afford no fancy grave.”

Jedidiah shook his head as if trying to clear his thoughts. “Ain’t no horse took my Jeremy. Why would they…” he trailed off and his jaw clenched, lips thinning into an angry line. “They didn’t want you to know.”

“Know what?”

Jedidiah opened his mouth to tell me just as a resounding crack echoed through the clearing, bouncing off the barn walls behind me. Jedidiah let out a pained roar and fell to the ground, clutching his leg. Dark blood gushed from a gunshot wound.

I whirled around and saw my Pa coming toward us from the house, holding a shotgun.

“No!” I screamed. I jumped in front of Jedidiah, arms pin-wheeling wildly. “Stop, Pa, don’t hurt ‘im!”

“Get out of the way, Annalise!” Pa’s face was contorted, nearly unrecognizable with rage.

Jedidiah reached out one blood-covered hand and gripped my wrist. I turned to him, tears starting to fall down my cheeks. “Get outta here, little lady. This ain’t none of your problem.”

“No,” I said again, quietly this time. “I can’t let him hurt you.”

He let go of my wrist and pointed toward the barn. “Go on,” his voice was quiet and calm.

I shook my head adamantly. “I won’t,” a sob broke loose from me.

Pa roared again and I turned back to him. “Get out of the way, Annalise, now!” I stood my ground, crying so hard I could barely see. What was happening? Why was Pa so mad?

“This man,” Pa said, leveling the barrel of the shotgun at me – or at Jedidiah, who was directly behind me. “Dropped a boy off here then couldn’t leave us alone. He poisoned Jeremy’s mind, tried to take him from us…” his voice cracked. “Then he tried to take him back from me and-,” he adjusted the gun in his hands. “And Jeremy got in the way. This man is responsible for your brother’s death. Now get out of the way.”

I looked down at Jedidiah. Tears streamed from his eyes, too, but he shook his head. “He got in the way, but it wasn’t my gun that killed Jeremy, and you know that.” He pointed at Pa. “You killed my son and you can’t even admit it to yourself.”

I gasped. How could this be?

“Pa?” Pa cocked his gun. “Pa! Is that true?”

Pa leveled his gun at the man again, and again I stepped in front of him. His face was covered in angry shadows. “Move, Annalise. I gotta do this.”

I stood my ground. “You don’t, Pa, you don’t gotta do nothin’.”

Pa looked into my eyes and I could see unrecognition there. He was so blinded by hate for Jedidiah and grief for my brother. He looked at Jedidiah behind me and shook his head slowly. “Move, or don’t, I still gotta do this.”

I did not move.

Pa aimed the shogun and pulled the trigger.