Here's the first excerpt. Please bear in mind that this is a first draft and still needs a lot of work. I'll post the second half of this piece soon.

Gone

I was five the first time my Mama went away.

Gramma stands in my Mama's place outside St. Cecelia's, squinting in the summer sunlight. She's got the baby, Samuel Taylor, on one hip and my other brother, Henry David, hangs off her other arm. 

"Where's my Mama?" I ask her. "Are we getting another baby? We really need a girl this time."

Gramma doesn't answer, just gets that look all my grown ups get sometimes, then turns and nods toward the black Desoto with the spaceship fins parked part way up on the curb. My Daddy says Grampa doesn't know how to stop unless he runs into something. You can hardly see Grampa's head over the steering wheel.

I love Grampa's car. He calls it Liz or sometimes titsloren which makes my Mama punch him on the arm and say "not in front of her" which means me. It gleams because he washes it everyday and shoe polishes the white walls and inside it's red - my favorite color, even if it clashes with my hair. I need to ask Grampa what "horeouse" means because that what my Daddy says whenever he sees that car. I think maybe he'll let me drive so I run around to his window and lean in. He's already scooting back the seat just enough to squeeze me in.

Gramma puts the baby in the port-a-crib in the backseat. Henry David crawls up in the back window to stretch out. I can't believe he ride like that even when it's this hot but you can't tell him anything. Gramma gets in and slams the door a little harder than you really have to to get it close. Grampa looks at her over the rims of his little round sunglasses but just says "Edith" in his don't voice. I push the D button and off we go.

Grampa gives directions and works the pedals since I can't reach but I do all the really hard work like steering and staying inside the lines and ducking when the deputy rolls by in his patrol car. I tell Grampa when to slow down or go fast which I don't hardly ever and when he needs to start braking. He says, "Good girl!" when I get it right and "Are you sure?" when I don't and never, ever yells at me. Sweat rolls down the back of my legs from the bend in my knees but there's a breeze through the open windows so it's not really like an oven like Gramma says.

We turn right at the last corner which means we're going to the Tastee-Freeze instead of straight home. Now I'm sure its a new baby and I can't wait to tell my Daddy when he gets home. We get out of the DeSoto to eat our ice cream because nobody ever eats anything in Grampa's car and he asks me about Vacation Bible School. Me and Grampa wonder if the Sisters don't get real hot in their get ups. I think they should at least have short sleeved ones for summer or maybe some other color instead of black and Grampa says I ought to tell Mother Superior that. Gramma spills her ice cream on the baby which makes him cry. She says, "Good heavens, Laurence!" and then it's time to go. I let Grampa drive by himself this time so I can sit in the back and hang my head out the window and catch the breeze.

At Gramma's house, Grampa's already set up the wading pool and, after he scoops out the drowned ants, me and Henry David strip down to our underpants and splash all the water out quick as we can. Grampa chases us around the yard with the hose threatening all kinds of stuff we know he'll never do. After he refills the pools, Grampa pulls up his lawn chair, puts his feet in the pool, and they baby between his feet and we all mostly just loll around. We have to be careful not to get Samuel Taylor's face wet or he'll cry and that'll just bring Gramma down on us and then we'll all have to take a nap.

Mostly, I'm hoping that Gramma brought my new dress to wear to the hospital and all the petticoats that go with it and that she remembered to bring ties for the boys even if she things it's silly to put ties on little boys. My Daddy's real particular about how we look when we go out with him and don't ever want to disappoint my Daddy.

When I'm all pruned up, I ask Grampa, "When are we going?"

"Going where?" he replies in his not really paying attention voice, twisting Samuel Taylor's wet hair into curls.

"To the hospital, Grampa!" Sometimes you have to remind him about stuff because his mind just wanders off. Grampa scoops up the baby and scoots real fast across the yard, hollering "Edith" in his come here right now voice. Gramma opens the screen door, wipes her hands on her apron, and says it's time for a nap and that she can't believe he let us run around out there half naked for the whole world to see.
Gramma drags me inside and stands me up on the toilet seat lid to  brush and rebraid my hair while Grampa puts the boys down. She not real careful about the tangles like my Mama is. But Gramma's much better at keeping up with things than Grampa so I ask her, "When are we going to the hospital?"

Gramma stops braiding for just a minute and it gets real quiet. "We're not going to any hospital."

"But who's going to pick out the new baby? If we let my Daddy do it, he'll just get us another boy."

"Good heavens! The things you say! The last thing we need is another baby! That's not where your father is." She's braiding my hair real tight now and jerking my head back a little while she does but she doesn't mean to. Gramma's just excitable.

"Well where are they? We didn't get the maps out. We always get the maps out." They go away a lot, my Mamma and Daddy. We always get the map out so I know where they'll be and can worry about the right stuff like alligators if it's Florida and blizzards if it's Minnesota or earthquakes if it's California or seat cushions that float if it's Havana. And I still worry about that one all the time because not one of the chair cushions I put in the wading pool ever floated, not even for a minute.

Gramma turns me around to face her and tucks some short stray hairs behind my ears where I cut bangs when I shouldn't have. I cut Henry David's hair too and nobody seems to care that somebody's hair has to get cut when you're playing Beauty Parlor and hair just grows right back anyway. Now even the fingernail scissors have to stay in the drawer unless I have a really good reason like paper dolls and a grownup who's looking right at me when they say it is okay.