The Same Stuff as Stars

Angel stood behind Miss Liza and Grandma. Grandma never raised her eyes from the ground. She had hardly spoken since they got the news of Ray Morgan’s death. It was a good thing he’d made his own arrangements. Angel wouldn’t have known what to do about getting him buried, and Grandma wouldn’t have been of any use. And they didn’t need a special car to bring them to the cemetery, no matter what the undertaker thought.

Miss Liza was crying softly, dabbing her eyes with a handkerchief. She had loved Ray Morgan, Angel felt sure of that. Maybe she was more like a mother to him than Grandma had been. Angel was glad he’d had Miss Liza to go to. She must have been the one who had taught him about the stars and told him he was kin to them.

The preacher was still reading from his book. “‘The Lord is my Shepherd,’” he began. Miss Liza and Eric joined in. They had the whole thing memorized. When they said something about the valley of the shadow of death, Grandma’s shoulders began to shake. Angel reached out and grasped them tightly with both hands. She could feel the old woman’s sobs through the wool of her overcoat, sobs so deep inside her that they couldn’t even burst through to sound.

One of the undertakers took the flag off the coffin, and, when Grandma made no move to take it, he put it on her lap. Then he nodded at the men in work clothes, who came forward and lowered the coffin on ropes down into the grave. When it reached the bottom and the ropes were pulled up, the preacher stepped around the end of the dark hole and took a handful of dirt from the mound. He threw it onto Ray Morgan’s coffin.

“Ashes to ashes,” he said. “Dust to dust.”

Tears filled Angel’s eyes. She shook her head. No, she thought. Astra to astra, stardust to stardust.

TWENTY

Take Something Like a Star

Grandma, please, you’ve got to eat something.”

Grandma lifted her chin from her chest and stared at Angel. Her eyes were lifeless. She was worse than she’d been when Bernie disappeared. Since the day they’d buried Ray, it was as though she’d dug a grave inside herself and was more dead than alive.

“Look, Grandma. I went to all the trouble to build up a good fire in the stove to make you some nice roast chicken, and you won’t even come to the table.” No response. “I even made mashed potatoes. What do you want me to do? Pick you up and carry you over here?”

“I never went to see him in the hospital.” The old woman’s face crumpled into her hands, and she began to cry.

“I’m sorry, Grandma.” She went to the rocker and patted Grandma’s shaking shoulder. “I’m really sor

ry, but if you don’t eat, you’ll die, and then where will I be? I need you.”

The old woman snuffled. “Horsefeathers,” she muttered. “When did you ever need anybody?”

“No. It’s the truth. I do need you. And what if—what if Bernie called, and you weren’t here and Welfare has already taken me off somewhere? What would Bernie do then?” She shook Grandma’s shoulder. “You got a responsibility, Grandma!”

“You got a lot of nerve.” Grandma pulled out a dingy handkerchief and blew her nose. “Well, help me up, girl. I’m stiff as starch.”

Grandma played with her food, but by begging and cajoling and threatening, Angel managed to get the old woman to take three bites of chicken and a spoonful of mashed potatoes. “Where’s the gravy?” Grandma asked.

“If you eat two bites more, I promise you I’ll make gravy tomorrow, okay? I swear, it’s worse’n trying to make Bernie eat.”

“Hmmph.” Grandma gave a tiny hint of a grin.

***

She didn’t mention the telescope to Grandma. She thought it better to wait for a while before talking about Ray’s things, still over in the trailer. Besides, she didn’t know how heavy it was, or whether she’d even be able to carry it from the trailer to the house. The first clear night after Ray’s death, she visited the field. She knew he wouldn’t be there. Still, something inside half hoped to see the star man.

It was a perfect night for viewing. He wasn’t there, of course, but with her naked eye she picked out the great Andromeda Galaxy. If good people went to heaven when they died, that’s where the star man would be—in that glorious cluster. He might be two million miles away, but he would always be there, burning bright among the stars of another galaxy.

“Hi, star man,” she whispered. “It’s me, Angel. I won’t ever forget you. Promise.”

***

Little by little, Grandma came back to life. “I’m too mean to die,” she said, which was probably true. She’d gotten along all that time on canned beans and peaches, hadn’t she? Angel hated to leave her, but she had to go to school on weekdays and to the store and the library on Saturdays.

Miss Liza could be counted on to get her good books, including short, funny picture books that she could read aloud to Grandma. Sometimes she lingered longer than she should have talking to Miss Liza. They’d talk about Ray Morgan, about how he’d longed to go to college and become an astronomer but went, instead, to war, and in that short time lived through so much killing he drugged himself for years afterward, trying to dull the pain of all that horror.

Grandma was always grumpy when she was later than usual, suspecting that it was Miss Liza who had detained her, but Angel needed that time with the librarian more than she needed almost anything. On the Saturday after Ray’s burial, Miss Liza read her his favorite poem. It was by a man named Robert Frost, who had lived in Vermont in the years when Ray was young.

The man was talking to a star, not wishing on a star but asking the star questions, as though he wanted to know what it was like to be a star, then finally realizing that the star wasn’t explaining itself but asking something of him.

“‘Not even stooping from its sphere,