During their final year of marriage, Maddie set the yard on fire. The lilacs, having bloomed late that May in ’44, banked the clothesline that bore the twins’ cloth diapers, her stained nightgown, and an abundance of rags. But the sheet into which she’d given birth had no place among the breezy linen.
Later, as her eyes hardened over the scorched carcass of yard, the fireman asked Maddie why she did it; why did she lock her children in the house and run for the lilacs?
The lilacs. Her husband called them her harbinger of spring, but she knew better; they were a reminder of how ephemeral life could be. Still, she had pressed the violet petals inside the pocket of his army uniform, tracing the stripes with her fingers before crossing herself. The twins bobbed on her husband’s knees to Old King Cole. Then he was gone, dust scattering under his polished boots as he walked to war, a war that would take him from Lenover Lane to Normandy.
The summer had been plagued with drought and tornadoes, forcing Maddie to sleep with the twins on the screened-in porch. The lingering fragrance of lilacs had begun to smother her, threatening to last all summer. The sooner they were gone, the sooner her husband would return home.
She had been clipping their blooms, the faded and the vibrant, when the Western Union telegram arrived. She buried the paper stating the death of her husband, finding the dirt below the lilac bush hard and cracked. By the time she returned to the house to feed her children lunch, the labor pains had begun.
Three days later she gave birth to their stillborn son.
She carried her baby in a soft white blanket to the lilacs. Holding him in one arm, she took a spade to the ground until she reached the roots. His too-small body soon disappeared under her hands as she spread soil and clay over her son. She trembled through her Hail Marys until the lilacs bowed overhead, scraping her neck and shoulders. Reaching up blindly into the branches, she began to hack at the flowers.
When the wind picked up and the wet linen slapped on the clothesline, Maddie crawled away from the lilac bush. She retrieved the bloody sheet and threw it into a metal trash can at the back corner of the yard. She ignited the sheet and turned her back to it. The mound of dirt under the lilacs had already fallen into the shade. Behind her back, the volatile, dry air teased the flames. They jumped and licked the edges of the trash can. The wind whipped harder and the flames spilled over the metal sides into the overgrown fescue. The sheets snapped once more as blades of tall grass bowed to the ground. She smelled smoke and spun. Her hand shot out over the burning yard.
It spread, as suddenly as the first labor pain that had hit Maddie in surprise. The baby was too early. The fire raced toward the lilac bush.
“No!” she screamed.
Her body leaped forward, molting out of her skin. She ran to the door of the house to locking the twins inside, before falling upon the fresh mound of dirt. Her fingers, digging, digging. The fire singed her hair. Pale purple petals vanished into ash that floated on the smoke. She clawed at the dirt for her baby. Maddie began to melt among the lilacs.
She was still digging when the trailer carrying a water tank buckled down the gravel country road. The fireman grabbed her muddy arms and lifted her from the flames.
She slashed at his neck, painting him in stripes of blood and dirt.
“My baby!”
The faces of her twins appeared against the glass squares of the door. Maddie watched their eyes as they tracked the fireman, his uniform wavering in the heat. The fire roared and toppled the lilac bush before the fireman could gun it down.
She collapsed in front of the twins, pushing one hand against the glass, smearing it with blood-dirt streaks, while the other hand, gripping a dirt-covered blanket, fell lifeless and empty.
Kimberly Zook holds an M.S. in Biology and an M.A. in Education. She’s currently working on two novels: a short story collection based on her experiences of living in a tropical rainforest and a YA dystopia story. She blogs about writing at The Good Hook. (http://thegoodhook.blogspot.com)
http://www.kimberlyzook.com
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