What's In A Name?

My anger and my grief faced off like sharpshooters in a western duel. WHY?! Why did you wait 36 years, with your deathbed beckoning beneath you, before you stroked my hair and whispered softly, “I love you, Genevieve”?

I could hear the bell ring across nine acres of meadows and woods. I didn’t want to be pulled away from the dusk and my friends and the army game unfolding in the tall grasses. But I knew the bell meant come and come this instant. I didn’t want to upset her. It was never good to upset her.

As I ran through the woods I couldn’t resist checking on the newly built fort from a fresh fallen pine. It was the absolute perfect angle and with the addition of smaller branches, I had created quite a den for myself. I would return later with my flashlight and book in hand.  And Anne Marie. Anne Marie knows all of my secrets and loves me anyway. When I was six and Anne Marie’s arm tore off, I cried so hard that Daddy put a paper bag over my mouth and told me to just relax and breathe. He rubbed my back in slow circles and used his most soothing voice to calm me. It wasn’t until her needle and thread had repaired the damage that I could breathe easy, though. I would be lost without Anne Marie.

I drove down the road, crying with the same force I had at six years old. I’m not sure how I made it back home and why the rhythmic “Mommy, Mommy, oh my god Mommy” came screeching from the depths of me. I had never heard that voice. I had never felt such a contortion of my face and neck. I have no idea if anyone saw me on the drive home that day. I had no idea of anything other than she was gone and I had to get her clothes together to take to the funeral home at 2 o’clock. Daddy wouldn’t be able to do it like she wanted. He never did.

After her death I had the dream. She was in the kitchen. That was her favorite place. She baked incessantly though her trim figure contradicted such a pastime. She was standing at the stove in her tiny shorts and I was inspecting her legs. I was frantic to make sure no decomposition had developed that would render her a permanent resident of her grave. “Mommy, you MUST remember to take the brown potion!” My voice was high-pitched and breathless. “Mommy, if you don’t remember to take it, you won’t be fresh enough to come out next weekend.” And I awoke with sweat pooled in the small of my back and clenching the sheet beneath me. I needed water and to just breathe. This grief thing was exhausting.

I don’t know why my sixth year is so clear in my memory. I remember taking great care to pick out the day’s outfit for Anne Marie as I had also done for myself. I loved going to school. The only part I didn’t like was leaving Anne Marie. I took her to the kitchen and sat her up in the little chair. I laid out her clothes with detailed and strict instructions for Mommy to feed her a good breakfast and make sure she was dressed for the day. Mommy said she would but was mad because I needed to tend to myself and not worry so much about Anne Marie.

I was excited as I flew off the bus that afternoon and I raced down the long dirt driveway in a hurry to see Anne Marie. And she was still sitting there. In her pajamas with her head slumped forward onto the table. Her daytime outfit still folded neatly in a pile. And I cried because I didn’t want her to be hungry and in her pajamas. And Mommy was mad again because I was being Sarah Burnheart. But I didn’t know who Sarah Burnheart was and I was secretly happy to go to my room and miss my snack because all I wanted was to hug Anne Marie. She hugged me even when I cried. When I was supposed to be a big girl but I wasn’t.

And as the years went by Anne Marie was eventually relegated to the cedar chest. I would take her out occasionally and change her clothes and brush her hair. She closed her eyes and said “Ma-Ma” in her mechanical doll-voice when she was laid on her back. Sometimes I would lay her down four or five times to hear her repeat the word. Because Ma-Ma means love in Anne Marie’s world.

As I faced her impending death, I felt shattered and betrayed. I couldn't fathom how this woman who had rarely touched me had such a hold on my life. I would have done anything for her. And then she died. But not before she finally uttered the words my soul craved more than any other thing. Those words are imprinted in the recesses of my mind. The words spoken to her child adopted as an infant. Her child who never quite reflected her likeness in thought or appearance. She once told me her first choice was to name me Genevieve. But when Daddy brought me home from the foster home that day, she changed her mind. If only I were Genevieve.