On Tuesday afternoon, Coral finds a red and yellow cat's eye
marble. As if Gollum was reborn, she palms it, making it her very
own precious. Her older sister, Jyma, doesn't have a cat's eye
marble, Coral is almost positive. Jyma gets everything first. In
the fifth grade, Coral ate everything she could get her hands on,
trying to outsize Jyma so she could get Aunt Wilhemina's
daughters' hand-me-downs first. The only thing Coral managed to do
was put on ten pounds she couldn't get back off. And this year,
her first year of middle school, those ten pounds matter! Where
the sidewalk isn't heaved or busted up, Coral skips all the way
home.
Friday evening, Coral watches Jyma's father put her sister in
his shiny Camry and carry her off to the movies. It's their very
first visit together. Before he got there, Jyma'd taunted Coral
about buttered popcorn and fountain pop. Jyma's daddy is taking
Jyma school clothes shopping, too. That's what Jyma'd said. Coral
shrugs her shoulders and goes off to her room where she watches
the marble's colors swirl as she rolls and bounces it off the
baseboard.
Jyma wants my marble, Coral thinks.
She wants
it because it's mine, and she can't have it.
Sunday night, Coral doesn't wait for Jyma to invite her into
her bed. They always get in the top bunk after Mama hollers, "out
lights, good nights." Jyma's smoky skin glistens by the light
falling through the slatted window. Coral runs her hand across her
sister's shoulder. It's so soft. Jyma jerks away, turning her back
on Coral. It's shiny too. Coral pulls the marble from her
pillowcase and tucking her head into the covers, shuts her eyes
and dreams about tomorrow, about stealing the silky red bra and
panties she saw Jyma push to the back of her underwear drawer.
Thought you could hide it from me. Ha!
Monday morning, Coral's brushing her teeth, the panty and bra
soft under the tattered sweater Mama spent two dollars on at the
Goodwill, when she hears the splintering of glass, glass thrown
against a wall, anger pulsing through the house so thick Coral
thinks she can feel it on her skin. Mama screams, "oh Dear Lord,
not the body oils," and drags Jyma down the hall and through the
kitchen and out the front door and into the car, the beat up Chevy
with one bullet hole in the passenger door and a busted
windshield, courtesy of Mama's last boyfriend and a Budweiser
bottle. Coral wants to giggle, in a way; Jyma never gets in
trouble. But there was something in the way Mama screamed that
wasn't funny.
They went to the hospital. Whatever they found out, they
wouldn't tell Coral, but whatever it was took all the clear out of
Jyma's eyes, muddied them up.
Tuesday afternoon, Jyma won't be coming home anymore; She's
gone to her holy home. That's how Coral's teacher told it, put
Jyma's suicide. When Mama picked Coral up at the school, she could
tell Coral knew and Mama threw a hissy. She'd wanted to tell
Coral. It didn't matter. Jyma can't come home again, not to Coral
anyway.
Friday, the buttpuke sun shines. Buttpuke was a Jyma word.
Coral was thinking in Jyma today. She had on her sister's bra and
panty again. Coral felt soft in it. The cat's eye marble was
tucked in her hand which was buried in her pocket. Coral listens
to some minister the funeral home recommended talk about her
sister like he knows her. He screws it all up. Jyma wasn't a
typical young woman.
She was diatomic! Jyma'd always said
so. This man doesn't know her. While he talks, Coral stands up and
shuffles her way to the casket, trying to keep Jyma's black pumps
in place on her feet. She bends, presses her lips to her dead
sister's cold ear and whispers, "I know you wanted this. I'd have
shared. I was just messin with ya." Coral places the marble under
the pillow beneath Jyma's head. When she turns around and walks
away, she doesn't stop until she's out of the building, on the
sidewalk and breathing air that has no ghosts or secrets in it.
