And Then the Gray Heaven Read online

  This is why Theo’s good. Even when they’re making fun of me, I feel comforted.

  We take the weekend to plan. We lay out maps of each museum over the kitchen table like we’re staging a heist with some kind of vault situation at the end. I think about being the person who gets into the vault but can’t get out. The staged world can have me too.

  We pack camping supplies, emergency food and water, clothes, books, travel guides, and I tuck B into an old army backpack they used to take on their research trips. I cover the pool and take some of the more fragile plants inside.

  I am trying to call the hurricane by their proper name. Seems to me the proper name of a hurricane is probably in a language made of golf-ball sized hail, so we can’t ever know what a hurricane calls themself. But I know Beryl is powerful, and I submit. I also know Beryl is supposed to go right over this beach on Tuesday, so I’m planning to be in a day in Gainesville by then. It turns out beryl is a kind of emerald that can be used to protect travelers, so that feels important. And I read somewhere that an Italian warlock named Pliny the Elder used beryl to cure diseases of the heart, which I’m thinking would include gutted by grief to the point of felony. We eat dinner with Tina and tell her as much information as we can without telling her where we’re going or why. She thinks we’re having some kind of carefully planned (by which she means gay) tryst, which funnily enough reminds me to call the dishwasher man one last time.

  Can you come before Beryl gets here, I ask him over the phone.

  The hurricane shouldn’t affect your dishwasher unless your electrical goes out, or well I guess depending on the flooding.

  I just want to make sure everything is working properly. I want you to know this will be the last time I call.

  Are you breaking up with me, he says, with an awkward laugh.

  I prefer to do these things in person, I say.

  Oh no, wow he says. Okay, how’s 8?

  When he arrives, he checks the filter and the little computer and tests the rinse and dry cycles.

  All good here, he says, wiping his hands. I never noticed the tattoo on his calf before: two men on their hands and knees. One man is holding their other man down with his whole body and they are both grimacing with pain, or pleasure, or both.

  Are they fighting or fucking? I say, pointing.

  The dishwasher man blushes up a storm when I say this and shouts, what?! He spins around, trying to look at his leg to figure out what I’m seeing. He says: they’re wrestling. Jesus, they’re wrestlers. I love—I mean, I coach, wrestling at the high school.

  Then I say, I think it’s time we moved on.

  Wait, he says.

  I say: me, the dishwasher, you.

  But, he says, touching his belt. I mean, you still have a warranty.

  I hope this doesn’t break your heart, I say, and I mean it.

  When a hurricane is on the way, people remember how to do the magic of listening. They talk to their neighbors, read the rustling leaves, look up and up and up. I do a little air and water spell to ask Beryl to be gentle with them.

  Theo drives the first leg because they know the good shortcuts to avoid the tourist traffic this time of year, though we realize quickly many tourists have gotten the message and are vacationing north. The roads are desolate, and the sky is already that hurricane yellow with heavy pulls in every direction like a new kind of gravity. B rides shotgun with me, and although this is already our quietest family trip, I can hear them. I can hear them laughing about me going back to Gainesville for this.

  Theo asks me: So what did B like to do in town?

  Oh you know, we had a pizza place. They used to go to this used bookstore all the time. Uh, there’s a decent drag scene, karaoke, lots of places to swim and be in nature. UF stuff, museums.

  Well we’ll definitely see a museum or two, they say.

  Cute, I say. Sounds like a blast.

  But is there anything else you want to do while you’re here?

  You mean, like in memoriam?

  If that’s what you want to call it. Or just, places and memories to reconnect with.

  There is one spot I can think of.

  We get to the Super 8 off I-75 and drop off our stuff before heading to the museum. Theo has plans to pay in cash and use their mom’s name at the desk: we need to call in all our ghosts for this one, they say. We scope out the continental breakfast area, which is my favorite part of motel life, and this one looks pretty good. They have catering trays for hot food, a juice machine, a little fridge with yogurt cups and milks, and three waffle-makers: luxurious. I wonder about Daniella and if she would be any help. I wonder about all my ancestors and whether they keep track of me or even know to wonder how I’m doing. Blood family always seemed overrated to me, but it’s good to imagine someone out there with karmic clout when things feel messy.

  The Florida Museum is packed with groups of camp kids all wearing the same t-shirt, gigantic strollers, and sunburned people in bucket hats. Theo and I enter separately two hours before closing as we planned. I have an hour to inspect B’s hammock forest and check on access, terrain and floor plants, lighting, camera location, and any other potential problems. Then I’ll meet up with Theo in the butterfly rainforest to verify my hiding spot is completely hidden from the aerial camera and other viewpoints. After debating all morning about what colors I should wear, and I end up going with green shirt black pants. When I see some young goths by the waterfall, I’m grateful for their whole seasonally inappropriate, unfriendly vibe. I pretend to do some intense birdwatching and sidle up close as I can get to my actual hiding spot while Theo uses their phone to inspect the live webcam. Then they move all around the room, checking every hole in every leaf for a glimpse. There are fewer cameras in this part of the museum because of the canopy camera, which is blocked in many places by massive ferns; and there is little regular custodial work in here. After the botanical and wildlife staff close up for the night, it’s just a sleepy indoor rainforest.

  There is good night security here, but Theo managed to snag their rotation schedule on their way back from the bathroom, so we know when they’ll be in which rooms and for how long. Once I bury B, I retreat to the staff administration area that’s closed to the public, where there is only one security rotation at midnight. I leave with the first shift out that back door, when the alarm is reset until morning. Theo is waiting with the truck across the street at the Hilton. This is the plan, and it’s near-perfect for a weekend of planning, a few hours in the museum, and two and a half viewings of Oceans 11.

  They make the museum closing in ten minutes announcement, and Theo gives me a long hug.

  Don’t fuck it up, they say, rubbing my shoulders.

  I feel like I’m about to cry, but I swallow it and snort-laugh instead. I tell them: if I don’t make it to the Hilton, remember me brave.

  20

  In the Hilton parking lot, Theo is so happy to see me they scream, but I’m breathing hard and sobbing. I’m covering my face because I am eaten by shame and I can feel Theo looking between my fingers to find my eyes.

  What’s wrong what is it? they say.

  Notice anything missing? I say, holding out my hands. I show them my back.

  Oh my god, they say. No.

  I had to leave B there.

  Wait, did you—

  Yeah, it’s done, I say. But then one of the guards was early, and I couldn’t reach the bag. I barely made it out as it was. The whole time I was standing there waiting for first shift to leave, I was trying to figure out how to get back into the hammock forest to rescue them.

  Okay, where is B?

  They’re behind some logs and underbrush near the corner of the background painting. My breathing has slowed a little and I can think. I realize it’s an army backpack, so camouflaged as if for this strange purpose.

  Don’t worry, Theo says. We’ll get it tomorrow.

  I nod, grateful not to have to hide this time.

  Think of it as an addendu
m to the plan, they say, which worked pretty well, right?

  I’ll count it as a victory when we get B out, I say.

  Back at the Super 8 I’ve been tossing and turning in our squeaky queen bed for what feels like hours, and I nearly jump out of my skin when Theo starts talking without opening their eyes or moving at all.

  Hey, they say.

  I turn toward them. Are you—are you talking in your sleep?

  Nope, they say. Are you?

  I haven’t really been sleeping.

  Yeah, they say, about that.

  I’m sorry am I keeping you up?

  You and that spider. They point straight up to a large brown spider dangling halfway down over our heads.

  Now I definitely won’t sleep, I say, groaning into my pillow.

  It’s cool. We eat about eight of them a year on average.

  Wow I hate that.

  They prop their head up on their elbow. Did you know that spiders can tune their strings?

  Tune how? I say.

  They tell me: Like violin strings, they tune them to different frequencies so they can detect a predatory bird or a bat coming for them.

  Whoa that’s a lot. It’s like, I’m not sure how people believe in god when spiders are right here doing engineering stunts like that.

  So to you, these spiders disprove the existence of god?.

  I just think their existence is more beautiful, I say.

  But does that make a god any less true?

  I’m pretty sure most people who believe in god don’t believe in god because of truth but because god’s a more beautiful idea to them.

  So you’re agnostic? they say, smirking.

  No, I say. I’m tired. In every possible way.

  In the morning we make waffles and head back to the museum a little while after it opens, and everything seems normal. As in, it doesn’t seem like anything has been derailed because they discovered someone was in the museum or they’ve found a backpack full of human remains in one of the exhibition halls, et cetera.

  Theo and I work out that they’ll create some kind of diversion, at which point I’ll slip into the back corner and grab B. Planning this gaff is the first time this experience has felt as cartoonish as it is, or cartoonish enough to alleviate some of the terror.

  In the hammock forest, we both jump around a little bit trying to see if we can see the bag, and I catch sight of the open zipper pocket just before crashing into one of the bucket hat people. I realize I’m falling too late, and hit the iron bar that cordons off the diorama from the viewing area. People are rushing over to see if I’m okay, and I’m hurt but more a special excruciating blend of worried and humiliated: I’m wormiliated. Then I notice Theo emerging from the shallow woods with B on their back.

  They mouth to me you okay? I stand up, throw my hands in the air, and announce that I got carried away because I was just so lucky to see fifty different plants and animals—FIFTY! Plants AND animals! The bucket hat people smile, and I do a weird curtsy and trot after Theo, who’s already out the door and halfway to the museum exit. This is who I am: might as well use it for heists.

  On our way out of town, we stop by Colclough Pond. It’s the same sweet loamy gem in a quiet pocket of the wetlands.

  Our first night in Gainesville, B and I came here after a few hours of curb scrounging, and we ate ice cream sandwiches while some local folks fished around us from the bank. B had a net with their research pack that we used to catch tadpoles. There were thousands, and the full surface of the pond moved with them. It looked like rainwater.

  21

  On our way up to Atlanta, I’m playing some of B’s favorite songs that I made into a roadtrip playlist, which was Tina’s idea. She said after her husband died, she took his iPod with her everywhere, sometimes listening to a song she didn’t even like because she wanted to think about him singing it in the shower.

  When B and I got together, it was the golden age of pop, and B was adamant about my music education, seeing as I’d grown up without any adults to impose their tastes on me and was fresh to the experience. FM did have a Dolly Parton’s Greatest Hits cassette tape she would put on all the time at the airbrush shop, and when she stopped coming in after Ben left, I would listen to “9 to 5” over and over again feeling a glistening sense of indignation. Other than that and church hymns, B’s music was my whole scene. I’m driving up 75 and Theo’s crashed out in the passenger seat. B (less of B than before) is in the middle backseat, and my playlist is taking me back.

  Stay Monkey (The Julie Ruin)

  When Kathleen Hanna came back with The Julie Ruin, B was leaving Fran and New York to come back to Florida. They had been cool enough as a teenager to actually find Riot grrrl and use that punk meteor shower to fortify feelings the rest of us were still oblivious to or trying to hide. They were growing their hair back out. They were going to patch things up with their parents. They were helping Mr. Nguyen hang his new solo show at an upscale gallery that happened to be blocks away from the boardwalk where they would see a line of angry people lined up outside an airbrush shop. They were listening to this song just moments before they walked in and saved me. They said it was like my walk-on anthem.

  When Doves Cry (Prince)

  When B gave me Prince I went on a full bender: I fell asleep listening to my Purple Rain CD so much, my dreams for a whole year were spliced with heavy dancefloor fog machine synth. One time we drove down to Miami for an eighties-themed house party where people were downing mojitos two at a time and grinding on lawn chairs. By midnight B had stripped off their polyester and pleather skirt suit to do a backflip off the diving board. When they resurfaced, the first verse had started dig if you will the picture. They started singing and kind of swimming and dancing, and eventually everyone around the pool joined in. I remember them lounging naked on the pool stairs leading the party in song.

  Heartbeats (The Knife/José González)

  Somehow it never gets any less sweet: in the original version, it’s like windowshopping in the middle of a stampede. In the acoustic version, it’s much swishier, saleable: an advertisement for what exactly—parking lots at sunset? It’s clear to me now that every image I conjure comes from the same mall in Gainesville where B and I went to buy a window AC unit because our place was the one apartment in the state without central air. We got there just as the stores were pulling down their gates, and ended up on the opposite end of the mall from where we’d parked. We had to walk through the whole place, eerily emptied and so florescent. From the speakers overhead we heard the growl of the synths and knew immediately what was playing. Then something swooped past our heads, and we looked around in a panic. Once more, a streak of something in the periphery. B said oh my god it’s a bat, and we turned and saw it headed for us again and ran like hell. That bat followed us all the way to the entrance, hunting us to the tune of “Heartbeats.”

  On & On (Erykah Badu)

  This lilting refrain looped through our lives over the years, returning at times with an ancient flavor, something preserved in amber—the way we can be surprised by something with no edges, no beginning and no ending. When B and I would get blue over long-distance communication or a string of long workdays, there was Badu for lullaby and dark revelation. When we would disappear to each other for a little while, this song would come through, its waves cresting.

  Bidi Bidi Bom Bom (Selena)

  Fran called B in the middle of their junior year finals to let them know that Selena had been killed, and they cried together for hours. Fran had just seen her perform the year before in New York for the Amor Prohibido tour. He learned that this song started out as “Bidi Bidi Bubbles” when Selena first improvised lyrics about a fish swimming out in the ocean, and then became a love song later. B and Fran listened to their favorite songs, taking turns playing them for each other over the phone, and lit candles for Selena. Years later, B and I attended a museum gala in Denver. At around nine, the live band retired for the evening and a DJ set up in the
corner of the ballroom, kicking off the night with this legendary wah-wah bop. B teared up and led me to the middle of the floor, where we spun each other around for awhile.

  (Nothing But) Flowers (Talking Heads)

  B needed to take a research trip once to Jekyll Island in Georgia, and we went camping on a nearby island. It rained the entire time, but we made our own fun hiding out in the tent having sex and putting on shadow plays. One day we took a canoe out in the downpour and went into a natural tunnel under a landbridge that was so close to the surface of the water we had to bend all the way backward and lay flat with our backs on the canoe to make it through. There was something transformative about it: the experience took about four minutes but I came out on the other side feeling years older. Later we took mushrooms in the tent, and B told me they wished we’d known each other as kids, to which I said, I don’t know I think I was a pretty awful kid. They said wow I had no idea you still believed that. Then they grabbed me and said hey, I would have gotten held back one whole year in school just to hang out with you. We played this song over and over again, and watched the treeline.

  We Found Love (Rihanna)

  For most of the time B was working in New York, they were staying with their sweetheart Nico, who did seventies glam drag and hosted a weekly lip syncing competition in Hell’s Kitchen. Because Nico was a nightlife queen, B was getting up early to do detailed restoration work for one of the biggest museums in the world after nightlong warehouse parties. They were exhausted, but happy. When I came to visit, B was so wiped out they didn’t even make it to Nico’s show that night. I went to the show and nursed a beer by myself by the stage stairs. Afterward, Nico took me out in Brooklyn, and although we hadn’t spent much time together before that, we had a gorgeous night. At dawn, someone put on Talk that Talk and we slowdanced to this song and thanked each other, and I had this new sensation of loving B by loving this person they loved.