Bailey's final resting place was nestled to the left of his Grandpa Sheen, Fern's grandpa too. Jessica Sheen laid just beyond, a woman who died of cancer when her son, Mike, was only nine years old. Rachel, Fern's mother, had been nineteen when her mother died, and she lived at home and helped her father raise her little brother, Mike, until he graduated from high school and left for college. As a result, the bond between Rachel and Mike was more like parent and child than brother and sister.
Grandpa James Sheen was in his seventies when Fern and Bailey were born, and he passed when they were five years old. Fern remembered him vaguely, the shock of white hair and the bright blue eyes that he'd passed down to his children, Mike and Rachel. Bailey had inherited those eyes as well–lively, intense. Eyes that saw everything and soaked it all up. Fern had her father's eyes, a deep warm brown that comforted and consoled, a deep brown the color of the earth that was piled high next to the deep hole in the ground.
Fern found her father's eyes as he began to speak, his slightly gravelly voice reverent in the soft air, conviction making his voice shake. As they listened to the heartfelt dedication, Fern felt Ambrose shudder as if the words had found a resting place inside of him.
“I don't think we get answers to every question. We don't get to know all the whys. But I think we will look back at the end of our lives, if we do the best we can, and we will see that the things that we begged God to take from us, the things we cursed him for, the things that made us turn our backs on him or any belief in him, are the things that were the biggest blessings, the biggest opportunities for growth.” Pastor Taylor paused as if gathering his final thoughts. Then he searched out his daughter's face among the mourners. “Bailey was a blessing . . . and I believe that we will see him again. He isn't gone forever.”
But he was gone for now, and now stretched on into endless days without him. His absence was like the hole in the ground–gaping and impossible to ignore. And the hole Bailey left would take a lot longer to fill. Fern clung to Ambrose's hand and when her father said 'Amen' and people began to disperse, Fern stayed glued to the spot, unable to move, to leave, to turn her back on the hole. One by one, people approached her, patting her hand, embracing her, until finally only Angie and Mike remained with Ambrose and Fern.
Sunlight dappled the ground, bending around the foliage and finding the floor, creating lace made of light and delicate shrouds over the heads of the four who remained. And then Angie moved to Fern and they clung to each other, overcome with the pain of parting and the agony of farewell.
“I love you, Fern,” Angie held her niece's face in her hands as she kissed her cheeks. “Thank you for loving my boy. Thank you for serving him, for never leaving his side. What a blessing you've been in our lives. “ Angie looked at Ambrose Young, at his strong body and straight back, at the hand that enveloped Fern's. She let her eyes rest on the sober face marked by his own tragedy, and she spoke to him.
“It always amazes me how people are placed in our lives at exactly the right times. That's how God works, that's how he takes care of his children. He gave Bailey Fern. And now Fern needs her own angel.” Angie placed her hands on Ambrose’s broad shoulders and looked him squarely in the eye, unashamed of her own emotion, demanding that he listen. “You're it, pal.”
Fern gasped and blushed to the roots of her bright red hair, and Ambrose smiled, a slow curve of his crooked mouth. But Angie wasn't done and she removed one of her hands from Ambrose's shoulder so she could pull Fern into the circle. Ambrose looked over Angie's blonde head and locked eyes with his old coach. Mike Sheen's blue eyes were bloodshot and rimmed in red, his cheeks wet with grief, but he tipped his head when Ambrose met his gaze as if he seconded his wife's sentiments.
“Bailey was probably more prepared to die than anyone I've ever known. He wasn't eager for it, but he wasn't afraid of it either,” Angie said with conviction, and Ambrose looked away from his coach and listened to a wise mother's words. “He was ready to go. So we have to let him go.” She kissed Fern again and the tears fell once more. “It's okay to let him go, Fern.”
Angie took a deep breath and stepped back, dropping her hands, and releasing them from her gaze. Then, with an acceptance born of years of trial, she reached for her husband's hand, and together they left the quiet spot where the birds sang and a casket waited to be blanketed in the earth, secure in the faith that it wasn't the end.
Fern walked to the hole and crouching down she pulled a handful of rocks from the pockets of her black dress. Carefully, she formed the letters B S at the foot of the grave.
“Beautiful Spider?” Ambrose said softly, just beyond her left shoulder, and Fern smiled, amazed that he remembered.
“Beautiful Sheen. Beautiful Bailey Sheen. That's how I'll always remember him.”
“He wanted you to have this.” Mike Sheen placed a big book in Ambrose's hands. “Bailey was always designating his belongings. Everything in his room has a specified owner. See? He's written your name on the inside.”
Sure enough, “For Ambrose” was written inside the cover. It was the book on mythology, the book Bailey had been reading that long ago day at summer wrestling camp when Bailey had introduced Ambrose to Hercules.
“I'll leave you two for a minute. I think I'm okay . . . but then I come in here and realize that he's really gone. And I'm not okay anymore.” Bailey's father tried to smile, but the attempt made his lips tremble and he turned and fled from the room redolent with Bailey's memory. Fern pulled her legs up and rested her chin on her knees, closing her eyes against the tears that Ambrose could see leaking out the sides. Bailey's parents had asked them to come by, that Bailey had belongings that he had wanted them to have. But it could wait.
“Fern? We can go. We don't have to do this now,” Ambrose offered.
“It hurts to be here. But it hurts not to be here too.” She shrugged and blinked rapidly. “I'm okay.” She wiped at her cheeks and pointed to the book in his hands. “Why did he want you to have that book?”
Ambrose flipped through the pages of the book, not pausing for the mighty Zeus or the big-breasted nymphs. With the book heavy in his hands and the memory heavy in his heart, he kept turning until he found the section and the picture he'd thought of many times since that day.
The Face of a Hero. Ambrose understood it so much better now. The sorrow on the bronze face, the hand on a breaking heart. Guilt was a heavy burden, even for a mythological champion.
“Hercules,” Ambrose said, knowing that Fern would understand.
He raised the book so Fern could see the pages he perused. When he held it upright, turning it so she could see, the thick pages fell forward, fanning out before he could smooth them back, and a folded sheet of paper fluttered to the ground.
Fern leaned down to retrieve it, sliding it open to ascertain its importance. Her eyes moved back and forth and her lips moved as she read the words printed on the page.
“It's his list,” she whispered, her voice colored with surprise.
“What list?”
“The date says July 22, 1994.”
“Eleven years ago.” Ambrose said.
“We were ten. Bailey's last summer,” Fern remembered.
“His last summer?”
“Before he was in a wheelchair. Everything happened that summer. Bailey's disease became very real.”
“So what does it say?” Ambrose crossed to Fern and sat beside her, looking at the sheet of lined paper with the fringe still attached, where Bailey had ripped it from a notebook. The handwriting was juvenile, the items listed in a long column with details listed out to the side.
“Kiss Rita? Get married?” Ambrose chortled. “Even at ten, Bailey was in love.”
“Always. From day one.” Fern giggled. “Eat pancakes every day, Invent a time machine, Tame a lion, Make friends with a monster. You can tell he's ten, huh?
Ambrose chuckled too, his eyes skimming the dreams and desires of a ten-year-old Bailey. “Beat up a bully, Be a superhero or a super star, Ride in a police car, Get a tattoo. Typical boy.”
“Live. Have courage. Be a good friend. Always be grateful. Take care of Fern,” Fern whispered.
“Maybe not so typical,” Ambrose said, his own throat closing with emotion. They were quiet for several long moments, their hands entwined, the page growing blurry as they fought the moisture in their eyes.
“He did so many of these things, Ambrose,” Fern choked out. “Maybe not in the typical way, but he did them . . . or helped someone else do them.” Fern handed Ambrose the page. “Here. It belongs in your book. Number four says Meet Hercules.” Fern pointed at the list. “To him, you were Hercules.”
Ambrose pressed the precious document back between the pages of the Hercules chapter, and one word leaped from the page. Wrestle. Bailey hadn't clarified the word, hadn't added anything to it. He'd just written it on the line and moved to the next thing on his bucket list. Ambrose closed the book on the pages of long ago dreams and ancient champions.
Hercules had tried to make amends, to balance the scales, to atone for the murder of his wife and three children, the four lives he had taken. And though some would say he was not to blame, that it was temporary madness sent by a jealous goddess, he was still responsible. For a time, Hercules had even held the weight of the heavens on his shoulders, convincing Atlas to surrender the weight of the world to his willing back.
But Ambrose wasn't a god with super-human strength and this wasn't ancient mythology. And some days, Ambrose feared he more closely resembled a monster than a hero. The four lives he felt responsible for were lost, and no amount of labor or penance would bring them back. But he could live. And he could wrestle, and if there was a place beyond this life where young men lived on and heroes like Bailey walked again, when the whistle blew and the mat was slapped, they would smile and know he wrestled for them.