The Secret Life of Sparrow Delaney by Suzanne Harper

from vicious raspberry bushes scratched my arms. Finally I stepped out into a small clearing. Grandma Bee was sitting on a boulder, looking mournful and (incidentally) presenting her best profile to her audience (me).
    There were four small granite headstones arrayed in front of her. Each one bore the name of a former husband. My sisters and I had given each a name based on the epitaph he had been assigned. The Dearly Departed was Grandma Bee’s first husband, whom she married at a very young age (“I was a mere child!” she always said. “A babe in arms, practically!”) after a dramatic elopement that involved climbing down a drainpipe from her bedroom window. The Beloved Husband was William Charles Emerson, my grandfather. The Sadly Missed was her third husband, an irascible oil baron whose fortune turned out to exist largely in his own mind. The Late Lamented was her fourth and (so far) last husband, a sickly man who could take Grandma Bee’s forceful personality for only eighteen months before turning up his toes and joining his predecessors in the backyard.
    My grandmother sighed deeply, wiped a nonexistent tear from her eye, and said, “I do so hate coming out here to tend their graves, my poor dead darlings. It’s such a mournful thing to do. But after all”—she leaned down and delicately plucked a strand of crabgrass from the Late Lamented’s grave site—“it is my duty.”
    She turned her magnified gaze on me. “Unless,” she added thoughtfully, “I could find a loyal and loving granddaughter who was willing to shoulder this burden for me.”
    â€œOh, for heaven’s sake!” I admit this heart-tugging performance used to work on me, but by now I had now spent far too many afternoons on my hands and knees, pulling up weeds and scrubbing headstones with extra-strength kitchen cleaner. “No one wanted them buried in the backyard in the first place! They should be in the cemetery where they belong!”
    â€œBut I wanted my darlings close to me,” she said mournfully. “It’s such a comfort to know that they’re nearby.”
    I sighed and dropped resignedly to my knees. I began pulling up weeds in a desultory fashion as Grandma Bee sat back, content now that she could direct operations from her rocky throne.
    â€œYou missed a dandelion, Sparrow,” she said. “Over there, by your hand. No, your left hand. That’s it, dig those rascals out by their roots! Oh, and as long as you’re down there, here are the garden shears. Trim that grass in front of Everett’s stone, dear. I can barely make out his name.”
    I started clipping as quickly as I could, totally focused on getting to the privacy of my bedroom as soon as possible. Unfortunately I was going so fast that my hand slipped, and the shears accidentally scraped the Dearly Departed’s headstone.
    â€œSparrow! Watch what you’re doing!”
    â€œSorry.”
    â€œI don’t know what’s wrong with you these days,” Grandma Bee commented. “You’ve had your head in the clouds for a week now.”
    I muttered something about having a lot on my mind.
    She leaned closer, her eyes fixed intensely on me. “Mmm. And what kinds of things do you have on your mind, I wonder?”
    I moved on to the Beloved Husband, conveniently allowing me to edge away from her stare. “Just the usual. Nothing much. You know.”
    â€œMmm.” I could tell she wasn’t buying this. “How old are you now, Sparrow?” she asked ever so casually.
    I sat back on my heels. “You know I just turned fifteen!”
    â€œWell, I am getting older, you know.” She tried adding a pathetic quaver to her voice, but her glance at me was sharp and glinting.
    â€œDon’t try to sound like you’re about to go to Summerland. We had my birthday party two days ago !”
    She dropped the act and flapped a hand