Larry touched the leather box, ran his finger across his name. “I thought it was gone.” He looked up at Tree.
Tree shrugged.
Dad stepped forward to say something, but Grandpa motioned him back.
Larry slapped Tree on the shoulder. The slap turned into a hug.
Curtis put an arm around Tree, an arm around Larry.
“We’ll be back on Memorial Day,” Curtis promised.
“Try to get the house finished by then,” Larry added. “And don’t grow anymore, okay?”
Over the next weeks, Tree knew something had changed.
In school, he and Sophie walked down the hall and Amber and her friends moved aside fast when they saw them coming.
At Dad’s, Grandpa started rewiring the downstairs. The new walls went up, and what had seemed like a construction site began to feel like a home again.
At Mom’s, Tree looked at the picture of his parents laughing at the beach, and for the first time, he didn’t get too torn up about it.
Mom sat him down. “How are you doing with the divorce stuff? How are you feeling about it?”
Tree said honestly, “I wish you hadn’t done it. I wish you and Dad had tried harder to stay together. But I’m okay, Mom. I’m okay.”
Phantom pain does get better.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
Rat a tat tat tat.
Rat a tat tat.
Luger hit the snare drum two-handed.
Rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.
Drumsticks rolled.
“Move it out!” the Trash King shouted.
The Vietnam vets marched in formation as the Ripley Memorial Day Parade began.
The vets were right behind the League of Women Voters float honoring the women’s suffrage movement. Mayor Diner, as Susan B. Anthony, was chained to a post, screaming that women need the right to vote.
Rat a tat tat.
Grandpa was marching next to the Trash King, swinging his right leg out as sharp and smooth as he could manage.
People lined the streets four deep, applauding, whistling.
No town needed a parade as badly as Ripley.
And now, Scotty McInerny, decorated twice for courage in battle, nodded to Luger, lifted his bagpipes to his mouth, and let the first mournful wail of “The Highlander’s March” rise from that instrument.
A bagpipe and a snare drum make everybody stand a little taller.
Tree held the American flag and marched alongside Grandpa.
He was there in case Grandpa pushed too hard. If he did, he’d be riding in the Army Jeep driven by Wild Man Finzolli, who was honking the horn and waving to the crowd like he was running for governor. Bradley was sitting in the passenger seat.
Tree raised the flag high. It caught the wind, billowed full.
He felt so proud.
Raising a flag is the best thing going.
Rat a tat tat.
Rat a tat tat tat.
Rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.
They marched.
Not for themselves.
They marched to remember the ones who didn’t make it back.
They marched because seeing so much loss can teach you about life.
They marched because we’re all fighting a war whether we know it or not—a war for our minds and souls and what we believe in.
Bagpipe sounds rising in the air, overcoming the Eleanor Roosevelt Middle School marching band a block ahead, struggling through the only known band rendition of “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction.”
Vets from World War II, Korea, the Gulf War.
Kids on Rollerblades.
Realtors in flag shirts.
Riding lawn mowers driven by Ace Hardware employees.
The high school jazz band blowing strong.
Grandpa feeling wobbly, but he didn’t want to stop.
Luger was behind him, watching.
The drummer is always in charge.
Luger slowed the beat.
Grandpa marched slower; his limp was getting worse.
“Grandpa, are you okay?”
Pushing, frustrated. But he was too stubborn to stop.
Tree moved closer. “Grandpa, I’m worried you’re going to hurt yourself.”
Mona Arnold was standing by the halfway mark at the parade route with her husband and son.
She watched the Vietnam vets marching sharp, except for Leo.
He looked at her, looked away.
He tried to walk better, but his leg was hurting.
She was alongside him now.
“Enough of this, Leo. I want you to ride.”
“A half mile more,” he said. Keep pushing. Just like Vietnam.
“This isn’t about making it until the end or you lose. You already went farther than I figured you could.”
“You losing faith in me, Mona?”
“I’m losing patience.”
The Trash King and the vets stopped marching.
Tree held the flag high.
Bradley barked.
“We’re all just ordinary heroes here, Leo,” the Trash King said. “No supermen allowed. Get in the Jeep.”
“All right, all right.” Grandpa climbed in good leg first, yanked up the other. Bradley crawled in the back.
Wild Man sounded the horn. “You did real good, Leo.”
Grandpa took off his fake leg and raised it over his head.
Wild applause from the crowd.
Sophie, dressed like a soldier of yesteryear, was standing with Tree by the big white oak. They were waiting for Mayor Diner to change out of her Susan B. Anthony costume so the rest of the Memorial Day festivities could begin.
“I stand here in this park, Tree, and I see your story.”
“What do you mean?”
“Look at these plants. There’s a bush that isn’t exciting. There’s a vine that means nothing. There’s a bunch of weeds. And there’s this tree that you can’t ignore.” She hit the bark. “It sticks out like a sore thumb. That’s who you are.”
Tree liked that thought, except for the sore-thumb comparison.
Mayor Diner was onstage now.
“Aunt Peach wants me to march in place while I’m playing my solo and salute when I’m done.”
Tree wasn’t sure about that. “Be yourself, you know?”
Sophie cleared her throat and spat big into a tissue.
They walked to the stage.
She played her flute medley of great war hits with true feeling for the instrument, even though the wind blew her cap of yesteryear off during “Yankee Doodle.” Tree could tell she was getting a mouthful of spit toward the end of “Over There,” but he bet he was the only one to notice. She got a great round of applause from everyone except the popular eighth-grade girls, but the unpopular seventh-grade boys and Aunt Peach more than made up for it.
Mrs. Clitter and the Senior Women’s Modern Dance Society formed the Memorial Day teardrop that symbolized the loss and courage of those who had died to make this country free.
Mayor Diner read, “In Flanders fields the poppies blow / Between the crosses, row on row . . .”
Then Inez, the ministry intern from Ripley Presbyterian Church, walked forward carrying a large candle, followed by the town’s clergy.
She faced the crowd as a strong wind blew, and said the words she’d been practicing over and over.
“We light this candle of hope to help us remember that hope can always be with us. We light this candle to thank God for helping us through the flood. We light this candle of hope now . . .”
She struck a large match, but the wind blew it out.
Tried again.
“We light this candle of hope now . . .”
A flicker on the candle this time, but the wind was too strong.
A few ministers surrounded her.
“We light this candle of hope . . .”
“Lord,” shouted Rabbi Toller. “We need a blowtorch.”
“We light this candle of hope . . .”
Not today, they didn’t.
Inez turned to the crowd, her big moment snuffed out. She was going to have to write this up for her weekly intern report.
“It’s a metaphor, okay? We’ll just be hopeful—no flame.”
“Amen,” said the people.
Sophie pushed Tree forward.
“What?”
“You’re bigger than those people. Stand in front of the candle. Stop the wind. You can do it!”
No. Tree couldn’t.
“Go on!” She shoved him forward.
Sully walked up, slapped him on the back. “That wind is history.”
Inez gazed up as Tree, embarrassed, lumbered across the stage. “I can stop the wind, maybe.”
He smiled. Not many kids could say that.
Tree stood over the candle, tucked in, felt the wind trying to crash past him.
Inez shouted, “We light this candle of hope to remember that hope can always be with us. . . . ” She looked at Tree.
“Light it!” he said.
She lit it.
The flame caught, burned.
Tree guarded the flame until it got serious.
Inez raised the candle, triumphant.
The people applauded.
“I told you!” Sophie screamed from the crowd.
“Yes!” Sully stamped his feet. “Yes!”
Tree felt like he’d just made a winning free throw in the fourth quarter.
Cameras flashed, flags waved.
His mom smiled proudly from one end of the crowd.
His dad smiled proudly from the other.
Curtis and Larry were clapping and shouting.
Tree looked at his grandpa, and he could see the face of war and peace right there, backlit by the sun.
McInerny lifted his bagpipes and played “From the Halls of Montezuma,” which was the Marines’ song. McInerny himself was in the Army, but he thought the Marines had a better tune.
The purpose of a bagpipe is to reach deep into the heart.
Everything’s got a purpose, really—you just have to look for it.
Cats are good at keeping old dogs alive.
Loss helps you reach for gain.
Death helps you celebrate life.
War helps you work for peace.
A flood makes you glad you’re still standing.
And a tall boy can stop the wind so a candle of hope can burn bright.
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