Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close

even know how many pounds I was, because I'd been so busy trying to find Dad.
    It was extremely hard work, and I was only strong enough to remove a little bit of dirt at a time. My arms got incredibly tired, but that was OK, because since we only had one shovel, we took turns.
    The twenty minutes passed, and then another twenty minutes.
    We kept digging, but we weren't getting anywhere.
    Another twenty minutes passed.
    Then the batteries in the flashlight ran out, and we couldn't see our hands in front of us. That wasn't part of our plan, and neither were replacement batteries, even though they obviously should have been. How could I have forgotten something so simple and important?
    I called Gerald's cell phone and asked if he could go pick up some D batteries for us. He asked if everything was all right. It was so dark that it was even hard to hear. I said, “Yeah, we're OK, we just need some D batteries.” He said the only store he remembered was about fifteen minutes away. I told him, “I'll pay you extra.” He said, “It's not about paying me extra.”
    Fortunately, because what we were doing was digging up Dad's grave, we didn't need to see our hands in front of us. We only had to feel the shovel moving the dirt.
    So we shoveled in the darkness and silence.
    I thought about everything underground, like worms, and roots, and clay, and buried treasure.
    We shoveled.
    I wondered how many things had died since the first thing was born. A trillion? A googolplex?
    We shoveled.
    I wondered what the renter was thinking about.
    After a while, my phone played “The Flight of the Bumblebee,” so I looked at the caller ID. “Gerald.” “Got 'em.” “Can you bring them to us so we don't have to waste time going back to the limousine?” He didn't say anything for a few seconds. “I guess I could do that.” I couldn't describe where we were to him, so I just kept calling his name, and he found my voice.
    It felt much better to be able to see. Gerald said, “Doesn't look like you two have gotten very far.” I told him, “We're not good shovelers.” He put his driving gloves in his jacket pocket, kissed the cross that he wore around his neck, and took the shovel from me. Because he was so strong, he could move a lot of dirt quickly.
    It was 2:56 when the shovel touched the coffin. We all heard the sound and looked at each other.
    I told Gerald thanks.
    He winked at me, then started walking back to the car, and then he disappeared in the darkness. “Oh yeah,” I heard him say, even though I couldn't find him with my flashlight, “Janet, the older one, she loves cereal. She'd eat it three meals a day if we let her.”
    I told him, “I love cereal, too.”
    He said, “All right,” and his footsteps got quieter and quieter.
    I lowered myself into the hole and used my paintbrush to wipe away the dirt that was left.
    One thing that surprised me was that the coffin was wet. I guess I wasn't expecting that, because how could so much water get underground?
    Another thing that surprised me was that the coffin was cracked in a few places, probably from the weight of all that dirt. If Dad had been in there, ants and worms could have gotten in through the cracks and eaten him, or at least microscopic bacteria could have. I knew it shouldn't matter, because once you're dead, you don't feel anything. So why did it feel like it mattered?
    Another thing that surprised me was how the coffin wasn't locked or even nailed shut. The lid just rested on top of it, so that anyone who wanted to could open it up. That didn't seem right. But on the other hand, who would want to open a coffin?
    I opened the coffin.
    I was surprised again, although again I shouldn't have been. I was surprised that Dad wasn't there. In my brain I knew he wouldn't be, obviously, but I guess my heart believed something else. Or maybe I was surprised by how incredibly empty it was. I felt like I was looking into the dictionary definition of emptiness.
    I'd had the idea to dig up Dad's coffin the night after I met the renter. I was lying in bed and I had the revelation, like a simple solution to an impossible problem. The next morning I threw pebbles at the guest room window, like he wrote for me to in his note, but I'm not very accurate at throwing, so I had Walt do it. When the renter met me at the corner I told him my idea.
    He wrote, “Why would you want to do that?” I told him, “Because it's the truth, and Dad loved the truth.” “What