Tag Archives: Priscilla

by serialjones | February 24, 2012

Forbidden Truth #170: Ordinary Life

As Dean and Gene rolled toward San Francisco in Cassidy’s van, Gene’s phone rang. It was on speakerphone.

“Gene. It’s Scilla.”

Dean waved his hands and lipped, I am not here to his friend.

“Hey, Scilla, thanks for having room at the inn for the Traveling Cassidys. Really appreciate it.”

“Oh, sure. Yeah. Um, Gene… Has Dean called you?”

“Nope. Called me about what? Somebody forget something?”

“No… So Dean hasn’t called you?”

“Nope. No calls from Dean Colfax. Things did get a little weird there toward the end.”

“Well, yes, and then, after you left? The old man? He had a massive stroke. After Dean gave his little speech he left. He hasn’t come back. We’re worried.”

“He’ll turn up, Scilla. ”

“I wish I were as confident as you.”

“Is the uncle going to be OK?”

“It’s too early to tell.”

“Well, that’s too bad. I am sorry for the old guy.”

“Yeah. And so, um, Gene, what about that bag thing that Dean gave you?”

“What? You”re breaking up? I wouldn’t worry about Dean. He’ll show up. Hey, I’ve got to go. Bye, Scilla, take care. He’ll turn up.”

Dean waited till he was sure the call was disconnected before he said, “Massive stroke?”

“Yeah. Weirder by the minute. Still don’t want to go home?”

“Nope. Can’t face the music yet.”

They rode along in silence. Dean opened up the deerskin bag and peered into it.

“So what’s in here?”

“Far as I can tell, this guy and his crew, a bunch of other old eccentrics, think they have come up with documented proof for some of the craziest shit you ever heard. Like, supposedly, there is this tiny cult of powerful people who control the politics of much of the world. They’re bent on getting more and more control till they’ve stifled all democratic processes that stand in the way of a one-world government. Run by them, of course. OK, that one’s not so farfetched.

“But they’re into some other, really weird theories, like extraterrestrials built the pyramids in Egypt and Mexico for navigational purposes. And there is supposedly an ET spacecraft buried in an Egyptian pyramid, and something called the zona del silencio in Mexico that’s linked to the Bermuda Triangle and this place off the coast of Japan called the Dragon’s Triangle. In that one, there’s this vast undersea city built over ten thousand years ago. They believe that ETs still use these places to conceal their spacecraft. And there are some earthlings, some of this tiny elite group with designs on one-world government, that have cut deals with the ETs that give them the right to harvest earthlings. And cattle, too. Or cattle parts, like eyes and tongues.

And they say some UFOs are of earthly origin. Supposedly, this tiny cult of power-hungry people have reverse-engineered some ET spacecraft that have crashed, like in Roswell, and learned how to blast through the speed-of-light barrier. They’re flying around with ETs, visiting other galaxies. Crazy shit, man, that makes me look like a mainstream, hypnotized lunkhead.”

“And the flecks of human flesh?”

“You know the box that’s shaped like a bar of soap? That’s heavier than it ought to be?”

“This one?”

“Yeah. But don’t open it while we’re rolling. You’ll spill it. It contains dozens of little bits of metal, shaped by some technology. Stuck to them are little bits of stuff like you find on old fishhooks when the bait’s been left to dry on the barbs. Well, that stuff, according to my friend Jesús, is human flesh. This gang of so-called researchers claim that these are implants removed from people abducted by extraterrestrials. There’s a directory. Supposedly, someone can check the abductees’ DNA with the stuff on the metal pieces. And the implants, they claim, if they’re analyzed, will show that they are made from extraterrestrial metals.”

“They’re nuts. He’s dangerous.”

“See what I mean? Now, considering all of this, are you Bad Daddy for snatching that thing away? Your kid was 14 when he tried to give that to him. And am I Bad Gene for opening the packages?”

Dean ignored the question. “What’s this one about?” He held up the cylinder.

“Rolled up tightly in there is a long piece of paper, acid-free, printed with a letter press in very small typeface. It has all that conspiracy theorizing on it. And the directory of the abductees. Or what they claim are. It also has a list of dozens of URLs and the names of researchers who supposedly know some aspect or two of the greater narrative. It is the key to the so-called ‘proof.’”

“Freaks. Wigged-out freaks. OK, so what about the ball?”

“It’s wood. You twist it in your hands and it pops open, into two hollow halves. In each half are these little grooves. Each groove holds a round plastic sheet with a little hole in the middle. Firmer than an old floppy disc but not stiff. They’re pale green. Supposedly there is this guy, one of them, who has built a machine that can read these. It’s a back-up to the scroll in the cylinder, plus some additional information. These discs have been created so the human race can have access to this information if there’s a massive ET invasion and they jam our computers.”

“Nuts! These people are nuts!”

“Yes! He picked Harlan because he’s young. And super bright. According to them, by the time people get old enough to make up their own minds, they decide these folks are screwballs.”

“Hm. Now why would that be?”

“Sure you don’t want me to take you to Noe Valley?”

“No. Still not ready. But, thanks, Gene.”

“For what? The ride or going back on my promise to you?”

“Both, I guess. Take the Ninth Street exit, will you? I gotta make a call.”

Dean took out his phone. As expected, it was filled with messages from Scilla and even a few from Candice.

Later. Later.

He called Bert Quant, his counselor friend and fellow volunteer at the Karma Light Fellowship Hospice. He went through the required pleasantries, the Happy Holidays, and the like, as efficiently as possible.

“Bert. Do you know Allen’s cell phone number? He’s the duty nurse tonight at the hospice, is he not?”

Yes and yes, and Dean had the number.

It took some persuasive juice but, citing the poor timing of a family problem on Christmas Day, Dean’s own no-room-at-the-inn story swayed Allen to agree that, yes, he could sleep in the one spare bed in the hospice but he had to be out by 7:30 the next morning. Graciela would be in to spell Allen at 8:00, and she stuck close by the rules.

Dean slept better than he had expected that night. His prospects seemed not as gloomy after Cassidy’s inventory of the bag. Blake was off the charts with his paranoid fantasies.

For eight months the idea that Dean was protecting Harlan had felt like a lame rationalization to avoid admitting that he feared a stranger might have superior rapport with his son. That was all turned inside-out now. The old man now seemed grotesque. What might have happened had the deerskin bag not been diverted from Harlan?

And, since no one knew of his jealousy of Blake, Dean could be vindicated simply by presenting the contents of the leather bag in a family show-and-tell. From thief to prescient protector.

The price for this invincible empirical support was Dean’s disappointment that his friend had failed to comply with a simple promise. Maybe it was something he and Gene could work out at the dart board over a pint or two of home brew.

Dean slipped beneath the symphony of snores and coughs and nightmare moans that surrounded him, the songs of finality caught by the open beams of the old mansion as it held, perhaps sacred, the final exhalations of broken bodies in the last of their hours on earth.

He awoke at 7:00, hurried into his clothes and bid Allen Goodbye with a grateful squeeze of the shoulder.

Though it was a legal holiday, the Monday after a Sunday Christmas, Dean found a breakfast joint that was already open. He took the last vacant seat at the counter. He soaked up an unspoken camaraderie with the community of people eager for the return to ordinary life.

After he ate, Dean went walking without any particular destination in mind. He wanted to open up the little deerskin bag, now safely in his coat pocket, and examine the contents, but he needed to find the right place. It was a nice day, still no sign of rain, the morning brisk with the light of new winter.

As he walked up the hills through Pacific Heights, he shed his wool cap. On the Fillmore Street steps his heart sent hot blood throughout his extremities; perspiration streaked down his cheeks.

He let his eye guide him. If down a side street, a building looked interesting, he turned and walked by it. Ordinary life had returned to other families, too. He counted three stripped Christmas trees cast into the gutter awaiting pickup.

Soon, without intending it, he was in Alamo Square. There were park benches. Perhaps he could find some privacy on one of them. He walked along a pathway.

Before he got there, Dean came upon a couple, youngsters, it seemed, embracing on a park bench. They had not noticed him. Her hair surrounded his head, making them appear to be one figure. They rocked gently. First Dean thought they were necking, but then it seemed more like they were quietly sobbing.

So mine is not the only family that has been through a rough Christmas.

To give them privacy, he turned around. He thought he might walk some more.

By noon he was at the JavaPort on Chestnut Street, sipping a latte. Buzzing with fresh adrenalin, he went out to the street. He had to do something decisive. He had walked for hours, he had seen the cast-off holiday trees, he had seen the sobbing couple, and he had thought about what to expect when he called home.

He would have to call home. He would have to go home. It would not be so bad, he counseled himself. He went stiff with anxiety when he contemplated the grilling Scilla would subject him to.

But, for the first time since he had taken the little deerskin bag, he felt he could justify his thievery. If he played it right, maybe he could justify almost everything, even lying to Candice. Concealing it all from Scilla, that would be harder to explain. This was the part that stiffened him and made his heart race. Where was Strong New Dean? He so wanted to be him. Maybe he could find a way to do it as the strong new husband. Maybe with enough I’m sorries his family image would survive the Christmas to Remember.

Dean took out his phone and called Scilla. His heart was raging, feverish, drum-like in his ears. What would she be? Furious? Relieved? Relieved now, furious later?

“Dean! Are you all right?”

“Yes, I’m all right, Scilla. I am sorry if I worried you. I am very, very sorry, for everything.” He hated that his voice quavered but he thought maybe that was not such a bad thing.

She paused, as if deciding to extend a virtual hug or a virtual hammer. He held his breath. Thud, thud, thud went his heart.

“It’s OK, Dean. Just come home, please? We’ve all been so worried.”

Her voice was tight and her words sounded wet, as if she were fighting back tears, as if her words wanted to come through the phone and hug him.

Maybe it is going to be all right.

“Soon as I can, Scilla. Soon as I can.”

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Tagged as Allen, Bert, Dean, Gene, Priscilla

by serialjones | February 23, 2012

Forbidden Truth #169: For Lease

Harlan awoke early on Monday, the day after Christmas, hung over.

It could have been booze.

Before the siren from the departing ambulance had faded into silence, the party was effectively over. There was a brief coffee and tea circle in the living room with the few who remained at the party. Grandad and Dolores and Scott and Hazel all left even before the paramedics arrived. Artis and Mitchell followed the ambulance to the hospital. Before they left, they instructed Josh and Dewey to drop Josefina at her parents’ and then go directly home to theirs to await further news.

The remaining adults sat with their warm beverages and talked and re-talked about the events of the evening. Uncle Burton’s collapse was a useful distraction from having to talk about the old man’s ruse and Dean’s confession and his running out into the night. It was all-stroke-all-the-time, and related topics like crazy old people doing crazy old people stuff. Hank held the floor with his medical authority before he and Flo went next door for the night; Darryl and Francesca told stories of their peers who had been stroke patients — some with good outcomes, others, not so good — before they, too, left to return to their hotel.

While she made the tea and coffee, Scilla had asked Harlan and Candice to clear the remains of the buffet from the dining room table and into the kitchen.

At one point, Harlan held a Pacifico beer in his hand. The cap had been popped but the full bottle had been forgotten in front of the tin tub that was now just a pool of chilly water with little round chunks of ice floating in it. He could have chugged it before anyone noticed.

It was not that Harlan lacked motivation to find an escape. It had been the weirdest Christmas of his entire life. And not just the ambulance taking away some old man, but an old man who had posed as a homeless guy, to get into their house to give Harlan some weird gift. The same old man who had said those complimentary things about his curiosity when they had talked in the middle of the night, and who had asked him some weird things, like, Did Harlan know he had the capability of being nearly entirely awakened?

He had asked Harlan not to tell anyone that they had this conversation. He told Harlan his parents thought differently than he did. That was why nothing good would come of trying to talk to them about this. Harlan knew this was true, and he had kept the conversation with Blake secret for that reason.

Now, as he and Candice toted load after load of the party dregs, he wondered if maybe Blake sharing this insight about him might have played some part in the energy Harlan brought to the FOSOA?

Candice knew something about this gift in the deerskin bag. He was curious what she knew but he was not ready to talk to his little sister about something she knew more about than him, a skanky prospect at the best of times. Better to avoid her as they put soiled plates and flatware in the sinks, platters and bowls and glasses on the counters.

Harlan had been joking with his father earlier about his worldliness with booze. He had, in fact, not only never tasted alcohol, but had already decided to wait, maybe forever, before he indulged in that pleasure. In the eighth grade he had done a report on the neurotoxins in alcohol, had learned that some of the traditional symptoms associated with aging, an unsteady gait, memory slippage, depression, in many cases could be attributed to a lifetime of alcohol consumption. They were not inevitable.

He dumped the contents of the Pacifico bottle down the drain and put the container in the recycling.

So Harlan was not hung over from pleasure but from all that had been asked of him: the endless preparations, the adjustment to the semi-new family members and to the gay neighbors, for the first time admitted into the Colfaxes’ social life.

He was also hung over from the excess of sheer weirdness. His father looking so clobbered by life was a new thing for Harlan. And his public apology for uncool behavior was off-the-charts weird.

Were Harlan a bit younger, this would have seared him and left a mark. But he had been hard at work for a few years to find traits in himself that set him off from the old man. He had come to think he could outsmart him. The part of Harlan that adults had assumed was a male knock-off of his mom had always subtly assumed ascendancy over his father. This perception had been put at the service of the manchild trying to separate from the dad.

Now the dad was gone. He had never done this before. At night it was easy to attribute his absence to the need to take a long walk to clear the head. But Harlan was a little more disturbed when, the next morning, he went downstairs and found out that his dad had not come home. But he did not fall into a state of deep worry. He wondered, as he noted his lack of panicky concern, if maybe he did not care what happened to his father.

No. He would be messed up serious if anything were to harm him. It is just that he somehow trusted that Dean would return. Even as a 15-year-old with limited experience, Harlan could understand how sometimes a man needs to disappear as if he were a cat going off to die. As if, but not for real.

Late Christmas night, after the kitchen had been, if not restored to order, at least placed in the limbo state of controlled disorder, only Harlan and Candice and their mom were left. The three of them sat in the living room, smartphones on the coffee table, ready to pick up should there be a call.

Their mom told them all the people she had tried. Even Gene Cassidy. He had told her No, no call from Dean. He sounded tired and in a hurry to get off the phone, but maybe he was in his car. She said he didn’t sound too concerned.

Harlan had latched onto that. Dad’s best bud says not to worry.

The next morning, Harlan’s mom was busy on the phone while he ate his breakfast, and after, too. There were updates on Uncle Burton’s health, more calls. Have they heard from Dean?

Harlan learned that Uncle Burton was in a coma. He had suffered a massive stroke; the brainstem had been compromised. And still no word from Dad.

Yes, Harlan had a Christmas hangover. From the weird Christmas to Forget, so weird that it would always be remembered. It would top everyone’s story of the weirdest family Christmas.

He wanted to join with his mother and sister as they resumed their vigil in the living room. Harlan wanted to join them, not only in their vigil, but in the heart, too, where their worried faces showed the ache of uncertainty about the fate of Dad. Harlan’s secret thought was, Me and Gene, we know it’s going to be OK.

And besides, it was more convenient to think that his dad was suffering no harm and would return soon.

Harlan’s social world, suspended for the holiday, had dropped back into his consciousness with several text messages he found on his phone that morning. One from Ward, about Christmas weirdness and, What happened after he left? +news: no period 4 Regina. Spoze = no ! either. Not yet. We shd get2gether. Here or there? Another, from Geordie: Let’s talk FOSOA now that xmas over. A half-dozen, also, from Audre.

Before he came downstairs, Harlan had texted a reply to Ward and they had a brief, real-time exchange. Harlan told him he did not know when they could get together; he would text him later.

Harlan knew what his hangover needed: time with Audre. He read her messages and replied, telling her he thought it was the strangest Christmas he had ever had. Talk in person, soon?

He wanted to be next to her. He wanted to embrace her and kiss her. He wanted to feel that blissful fever with her. He was like an addict in withdrawal. There was so much to tell her. The dad’s confession, the old man’s ruse last April, a barely remembered incident left over from the spring that had now become a major story in his life.

He wanted to wear the fedora she had given him. He wanted to see her face say what she said in one of her text messages, that she loved the Electric Flag vinyl, how did he find that? Wanted to know if he had really scored with that; wanted to tell her how he went to Xerxes and met Phantom and how they couldn’t find a good copy in his bins, how his mother found one on eBay and it had arrived on time, and all the rest. He wanted to be next to her, to smell her and feel her body heat.

And he wanted to know what she meant in that line in one of her text messages where she said that there was a problem in her family; that they may even have to move.

Harlan met Audre at Alamo Square. He had taken the train from Noe Valley and then the bus; Audre had bussed from downtown, where her mother had driven to return gifts.

They sat on one of the benches and kissed, just enough for them both to get a little feverish and for Bone Daddy to poke around for any party events to which he might be invited.

Then they talked. She thought he looked hip in his new fedora. She put it on her own head and he took a few shots with his phone. They laughed at them, the really bad one and the one where she mugged. She loved the “Long Time Coming” vinyl, had already played it twice. She told him that he really needed to get into vinyl. He said he would think about it.

Then at last the heavy news. Audre took a deep breath and began.

Her dad had a personal financial advisor, someone who had helped him ascend to wealth and importance, some guy named Archie Argento. But he had — Whoosh! suddenly left town. The week after Thanksgiving, her dad had gone to him as usual, had gotten some strategy tips that the guy then followed up with e-mails. But suddenly there were no more e-mails, and the ones her dad sent to the advisor were returned as undeliverable. So he went to Argento’s office. It was empty, a FOR LEASE sign in the window.

“Now my dad’s in huge trouble at work. All these people want to get advice from him and he doesn’t know what to tell them. My mom and dad are yelling at each other, a lot. Christmas pretty much sucked. She may have to go back to teaching.” Audre paused. “They can’t afford Hout tuition now. I– I think I’m going to have to go back to Lincoln.”

Harlan’s emotions, thus far untouched by his dad’s absence, turned heavy in a hurry. A hot lump prevented him from swallowing. He knew he had to say something brave. “Hey. I’m not giving up on you, you know.”

She wrapped her arms around him then and bent into him. Her hair, without her intentionally tossing it, wrapped about his head, enclosing them both in its curtain. They hugged, then, one hair-covered hive, and they sobbed, their skinny young bodies shaking with rage and fear.

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Tagged as Audre, Gene, Harlan, Priscilla

by serialjones | February 22, 2012

Forbidden Truth #168: Grotesque

Dean had been right when he delivered his confessional to those gathered around the table tennis court, that they would know what had happened within a few hours. It turned out to be a lot sooner than that.

Shortly after Dean ascended to the main house and made his escape, Mick stuck his head through the open door. He was trying to call his brother Gene to hustle up, that Jerry had to be at the airport when they called out the names on the standby list or he would be dropped.

Gene nodded, began to bid a hasty Happy Holidays! to the members of the downstairs party. Scilla waved impatiently. She was too preoccupied with the old man and what he knew about any of this.

“Here we go — I am ready to kick some ass! Who wants to play?” said Staycee Gellen, but there was no response. Her soft voice and unfamiliarity with the sporting challenge struck little fear in the hearts of the other players.

Scilla turned from Blake. She was quite confused. “Harlan? Where’s Dad run off to?”

“I don’t know. And I don’t know what he’s talking about in that speech he gave. Lies? Who did he lie to? About what? I know nothing.”

“Wait!” shouted Blake, as best he could. “Just wait, everyone. Please. Be quiet. Please.”

Gene stepped in front of Blake on his way to the stairs, where Mick had just implored him again, with ever increasing urgency, to either hustle up the stairs or throw Mick the keys to the van so he could drive Jerry to the airport.

Blake grabbed Gene’s upper arm with both his hands.

“Dean gave you my little deerskin bag, didn’t he?”

From the door into the main house, Mick said, “Hey, let the man go. We gotta get our brother to SFO or he’s gonna miss his flight. Come on, man, let him go.”

Gene brushed off Blake’s hands and turned to go up the stairs.

“Later, man. I have to talk with Dean, but first I gotta get my brother to the airport.”

Then Gene smiled and waved at Flo: ”Great talking to you. Keep looking for the truth. Stay brave. Don’t let ‘em scare you into silence.”

“Come on, Gene. Jerry’s already out at the van. And Mom and Maggie, everyone. We’re all waiting on you.”

To his hostess, Gene said, “Scilla. Great party. Thanks for having my whole crew.”

“OK.”

“No. It was great. Really appreciated.”

“I insist that whoever has my little deerskin bag, that they return it immediately.” Blake’s voice was void of any expectation that his stern pronouncement would produce anything.

Then Candice spoke up. “My dad did have it. He told me it was a present for Harlan for when he turned 16. He told me he got it for him, and that I wasn’t supposed to tell…” She turned to Scilla, “…my mom. That’s ’cause Staycee and me– Well, I don’t want to get into it, OK?”

Blake’s reddened. The skin stretched across his face as tight as a balloon just before it pops. “He told me he doesn’t have it anymore. Please! Who has my little deerskin bag?”

Perhaps Candice and Staycee were carried on their memories back to that drizzly spring day when they had the escapade at Dolores Park, with Farley Ralston and his crew and the police and the homeless guy, the dog running off with the deerskin bag in its teeth and Dean and Chato in that unexpected embrace on the sidewalk. As they had laughed at the homeless man’s plight with his rain-pants that would not stay up, they now laughed at Blake as his voice went tight and tiny. It seemed they wanted to contain their mirth but the backs of their hands were not sufficient to damn it up.

This only increased Blake’s frustration. “I want my little leather bag and I want it now!”

“Gene, Bro, just throw me the keys then, I’ll take good care of your van. We gotta get Jerry to his flight. Come on, man.”

Gene took one more step up the stairs. He put a hand on Blake’s shoulder. In a soft voice he told him, “I have your little bag. Man, we should talk. You know? In private. Just you and me.”

“Are the contents disturbed? They were not intended for you.”

“Like I said, we should talk. But I gotta get my family rolling. Seems like we been trying to get to SFO for hours. So, OK, man, we’ll talk, but later.”

With that, Gene bounded up the stairs.

Scilla turned to Blake.

“What’s this all about? Aren’t you the man who spent the night with us in April? The homeless man my husband brought home from his cult that night? What are you doing here?”

“Aunt Scilla,” said Josh, “this is Uncle Burton… He came with us. He’s spending Christmas with us. Uncle Burton, this is so uncool, what you’ve done. My dad’s gonna be mad at you. You have some problems, Uncle, and you ought to see, like, some geriatric professionals or something. This is so not cool. You messed up this Christmas. These are nice people here, and you messed it all up.”

Blake put on a smile that stretched nearly ear to ear. It was rubbery in its grotesque shape, and stubborn. It froze to his face as if it were stuck there. Then the smile collapsed and his countenance collapsed, ancient with fatigue. “I need to sit,” he said. “I don’t feel so good.”

“Who’s surprised? I mean, after all that you’ve done.”

Scilla was not at her most compassionate. Her trouble with Blake’s machinations was compounded by the pieces of the puzzle Candice now supplied, as she told how she and Staycee had discovered the deerskin bag in Dean’s underwear drawer in her parents’ bedroom. “A long story, Mom, don’t go off on me with this, OK?”

Staycee squeezed Candice’s hand and whispered into her friend’s ear a barely audible “Thank you” for not incriminating her in the telling of the story.

All this made Blake more upset: ”He took what I had given to Harlan, and he did whatever he did with it. He gave it to that man with the silver hair. I don’t know why, I don’t know why.”

Dewey suddenly stood and went upstairs. No one questioned this; the look of urgency on his face suggested he was on his way to the toilet. But as trivial as his exit appeared, it was, nonetheless, duly noted along with everything else, by Josefina Sedgewick, her thumbs still dancing over the keypad of her smartphone.

Dewey, though, did not go to the toilet. He went to his dad in the living room, where Mitchell sat with Dewey’s mom and his Grandpa and this semi-stranger, semi-relative Uncle Hank.

Dewey hung back for a moment and waited for a break in the conversation. The adults were energized by a discussion about old-growth redwoods. It seemed Hank and Flo lived near an old-growth grove. There appeared to be cordial agreement about the majesty of these giants, along with some different angles on the rights of property owners and whether a two-thousand-year-old tree has any legal standing in a sane political society. After Grandpa asked the rhetorical question, “Yes, but are stoned hippies sitting in trees in protest the most rational way to settle these notions of legal philosophy?,” Dewey saw his chance to interrupt.

“Dad. Uncle Burton — he’s downstairs. He’s done something weird.”

“Just now?”

“No, not exactly, though he is being a little weird right now. He’s downstairs with the table tennis. I guess he, like, angled for the Colfaxes to put him up? You know, to take him in as like a homeless guy or something, in need of a place to stay. Back last April. And he never told them he was, like, related to us. It’s really pretty weird. Aunt Scilla is seriously not happy with him. They’re all down there in the garage.”

“Excuse me.”

As Mitchell stepped down the stairs he walked into what appeared to be more of a courtroom, with a full-open-throttle cross-examination of the alleged perp by Chief Prosecutor Priscilla Colfax. With his booming voice, those tight-knit eyebrows casting daggers of shame to anyone within range who might be questioning whether they had done the right thing of late, Mitchell quickly commandeered the proceedings.

“Uncle Burton! What have you been up to? Come on. Out with it. What’s this all about? Did you insinuate yourself into this family’s life? Why would you want to do something like that?”

Blake sat in one of the folding rental chairs. He stretched his legs out as if he were sleeping on an airplane, his hands carefully folded in his lap. He closed his eyes. His upper lip quivered with an involuntary spasm. His mouth opened but what came out of it was mostly mumbled and incoherent. “All by… by zeezearch, ina deerzin bag.” He opened his eyes. They had a distant, crazed look in them. “Zere’s two Mitchells now, zere’s one zere and…” He tried to rise up but fell back onto the chair, bounced off it and landed on his side on the garage floor.

“Oh, my god!” said Mitchell, “I think he’s having a stroke! Someone, call 9-1-1 — Quick! Who’s got a phone down here?”

“I’m on it!” said Josefina.

“I’ll get Hank.” Flo bounded up the stairs, taking two steps with each stride.

Minutes later, the sound of sirens rose and fell with ever-increasing volume as they approached Regan Street.

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Tagged as Blake, Candice, Dewey, Gene, Mick, Mitchell, Priscilla, Staycee

by serialjones | February 17, 2012

Forbidden Truth #165: Christmas Soap

Dean had never felt his way before. He had been embarrassed on dates as a teenager. He had been embarrassed, by the pre-accident Scott, for his relative naïveté so many times that, had the process not been arrested, it would likely have etched lifelong lines into his self-image. And Scilla, a few times early in their relationship, had certainly humiliated him, mostly when he competed with her around math skills, before he threw in the towel and took a subordinate role to her in this region of intellect.

None of those incidents compared to this nightmare.

He was not able to answer Scilla’s question: ”Is this all true?” Did not know how to answer it because the answer was too easy: Yes. One word, Yes. Knowing the answer was not the hard part. Saying it was. It was all true.

He had ruined the most important relationships in his life, those with his wife and children, by betraying their trust in him.

His only living parent, his dad, was upstairs talking with Maggie’s mom about the old days in the printing business. Ho-hum. He meant no offense to the wonderful old working-class guy, but Dean had so little in common with him that it was scary to think how thinly frayed their lines of communication had gradually become, with every college class, every degree, every meal in a place like L’Olivier or conversation around the arts or current events that Dean shared. His father would have found any of these foreign and rife with discomfort. Each one of these had thinned, and continued to thin, the fabric of those connections.

There was a residual sweetness preserved in the bond. Just upstairs, Dolores, his dad’s Mexican-American second wife, had been laughing with Maggie’s mom and telling stories in English. When they got to one of the punchlines, delivered in Spanish, Dean’s dad and Gene’s mom teasingly objected: Aha! Not fair, out with it in English, if you don’t mind. Por favor.

Then they all laughed. Glasses were refilled. And it was sweet to see them all having fun together. But these were not the people Dean dedicated his daily life to.

The juice, the real love charge, the power supply that sent love rippling through him every day was in the three people whose trust in him had just been torn into pieces and scattered all over the garage floor.

Dean wanted to get down on his hands and knees and collect all the pieces and put them back in place and start over again.

He wanted to find again the deerskin bag on that sheet of paper with Harlan’s name neatly calligraphed on it and leave it there till the boy came downstairs for his breakfast that April morning. Dean could then direct him to the daybed, and tell him that the guest had left something for him. He wanted to sit at the breakfast table and eat his cereal and watch his son unwrap the three little objects. He wanted to go to the kitchen drawer where they kept the household scissors and hand them over to his son with an admonition that he mind the edges and the sharp points as he negotiated the quirky corners of the objects he found in the little leather bag.

And Dean wanted to preserve for Candice those final days of her innocent childhood before she learned too soon (and is it not always too soon?) that adults will sometimes lie to and betray the ones they love. And sometimes more readily than they would their enemies.

Dean also wanted to share with Scilla what he had found on the daybed, and how he had heard Harlan and Blake talk in the middle of the night, that he had heard their voices but he could not make out the words.

But he had done none of this. This was the salient fact of his dilemma. He feared that the reticulate of connective tissue that suspended the family from chaos was not strong enough to receive this fact.

Dean knew, though, as dysfunctional as his psyche felt as he leaned against the fender of Flo and Hank’s van, that he might be able to reinforce that webbing of connection by telling the greater truth, that the reason he had stolen the bag was a simple and ancient one, one known to millions of men and women who have committed far more heinous crimes than his, when they, too felt within them that terrible sense of disequilibrium when facing the loss of influence over their child to forces outside their control.

It should serve to mitigate the pain that the emergence of this drama is actually often a sign that the parent has successfully launched their child. But, too often, this only exacerbates it.

Dean knew this was why he was jealous of Blake. He knew this was why he stole the property that rightly belonged to Harlan. This was the wrong that eclipsed the wrong of Blake stalking him in order to gain access to his son. And it eclipsed the wrong of Gene Cassidy disclosing to all who gathered around the table tennis game the existence of the little deerskin bag.

While Dean did loathe Blake for setting all this in motion, he loathed himself more.

“Dean. Talk to me.”

Scilla drew closer and tentatively touched him on the back. He pulled away from her touch. His body convulsed with reverse peristaltic waves. He wondered if he was going to throw up on his guest’s car. He made a gagging sound and hacked, a sickly sweet drool that he wiped away with his sleeve.

But he had a plan. It was not a highly inventive one but it was a plan for action. He knew what he needed to do. He had only one course of action. There could be no other: Cop to the thievery and the manipulations, and fall on the mercy and pity of those he had wronged. If he kept out of his account that one damning part, his jealousy of Blake, he might be able to tell a version of the story that would not lower him into even greater humiliation, even though to do so would speed the healing. He could not pay that price.

With the simpler confession, he would hope that the three people he loved more than any others had it in their hearts to forgive him. It was time.

After that, he would need to find a hole with a flat rock to cover it, needed to crawl into the hole and pull the flat rock over him. But now: time to fess up.

He turned and faced the crowd. He opened his mouth, but before he could get a word out, Estelle appeared at the door at the top of the stairs.

“Come on, Ward. We gotta go to Grandma’s.”

Dean’s convulsive breathing stopped suddenly when he saw two things. The first was seeing Ward shoot a look at his mom and then back to Dean and then to Harlan, and back to his mom. It was an unambiguous nonverbal communication: Ah, Ma, please don’t make me miss the good stuff. Harlan’s dad is about to get real and I want to be here to see it.

But Estelle snapped her fingers. “Come on. Traffic could be hairy and we don’t want to keep Grandma and Grandpa waiting dinner on us. And I’m sure your dad’s getting antsy out in the car. Come on. Let’s go.”

Ward grudgingly ascended the stairs with a single look back at his friend. Dean saw Harlan roll his eyes.

The other sight that brought him to some stability was seeing Josefina’s thumbs hard at work on her PDA. He had no idea if she was on Twitter or Facebook, or checking celebrity gossip or post-Christmas sales announcements or something else that had vacuumed up her attention in the midst of their drama. There was no way to tell, till she stopped and looked up like a court recorder pausing while a witness fell silent.

Dean immediately got it. He had become a character in the reality Christmas soap opera she was composing for her followers. He found this amusing. But the amusement was like an aspirin treatment for head trauma, better than nothing but certainly no cure. The pain roared back in.

There is nothing left to do, he thought, but go ahead with this confession. He took a deep breath and then he spoke:

“I know I have disappointed some of you. I have spoiled my wife’s Christmas after she worked so ver hard to put on a splendid show. That was not my intent. Please believe me, Scilla. Neither was it my intent to disregard the wishes of Josh and Dewey’s Uncle Burton. I know this is all going to sound confusing, but in a few hours, probably as you talk and piece this together, you will be able to figure out what happened.

“Nor was it my intent to steal the property of my son. I set a very bad example in doing that. Or, perhaps, the property of Uncle Burton. This will all be revealed. It was not my intention to ensnare my little girl and her unwitting friend in my manipulations. But my biggest error was not letting the gift left by this man into the possession of my son. I was afraid. I was afraid to let my son, who I thought was too young, be given something by a man whose motives I knew too little to trust. This one error led to a whole chain of events in which I kept information from my son, my wife, my daughter, her friend. And I lied.

“My only hope is that, once I find a space to retreat to where I might, perhaps, burn off my shame, that those of you who can, will return me to your hearts where I will be forgiven. But right now, I need to be alone. Please respect that.”

Josefina, with her big eyelashes and bee-stung lips, finished off her dictation, aimed her phone at Dean and took a few pictures as he hurried up the stairs, on his way to find that hole with the flat stone cover, that he might scrunch into his shame till he felt once again that he could face the world.

From the far-flung corners of the intricate Web, items of interest and intrigue (some even stranger than fiction):

Everyone is a Journalist

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Tagged as Blake, Dean, Estelle, Gene, Harlan, Josefina, Priscilla, Ward

by serialjones | February 16, 2012

Forbidden Truth #164: All True

It was while Dean and Blake where having their discussion at the top of Regan Street that the confrontation took place between the tinfoil hat conspiracy nuts, on one side, and the academic rationalist and crime stats analyst on the other.

Or, if you prefer, the truth-speaking rationalists with the courage to look at the facts, as opposed to the bright but hypnotized truth-deniers.

Really, take your pick. We seek only to report incidents that evolved from the inevitable encounters between types of personalities that were fairly common in educated families during this era in U.S. history.

As Blake and Dean entered the house, leaving the Cassidy brothers on the porch to reload their cardiovascular systems with nicotine, Dean said to the old man, “Please, be discreet. Please. There’s a lot at stake here. We’ll get that stuff back to you, if you let me take over. OK?”

“Yes, well, we’ll see, won’t we?”

“I am serious, man. Do what I say. First off, don’t go blabbing about anything, or I will tell your nephew and niece that you’re a stalker and maybe even a child molester.”

“That’s not true!”

Dean put his finger to his lips in a “hush” gesture as they moved through the hallway.

The living room was different. There were many empty chairs. Gene’s, Flo’s, Gene’s brothers; Darryl’s was empty, too. Mitchell was still there but his face looked even grumpier than usual. He seemed intent on discerning patterns in the molding where the wall met the ceiling.

Scilla was still in the kitchen, where she had been when Blake arrived with Mitchell and Artis. Flo and Artis had been in the living room, gushing out their reunion emotions when Dean and Blake went out. Now, Artis was in the kitchen with a plate of food, talking to Scilla and Francesca about something. Barry and Shiloh had gone. The vibrance of the party, too, was gone. The jolly tone had been deflated.

Darryl came out of the bathroom shortly after the sounds of flushing and basin water rose and fell from behind the closed door. Dean nearly bumped into him. Close behind Dean was Blake, as if he were a goat being lead to a county fair exhibition hall.

Darryl’s eyes were moist and red-rimmed. He gave Dean a brave but weak smile. Then he looked at Blake, turned back to Dean and said, “Now, who do we have here?”

“This is… Uncle Burton. Mitchell’s uncle.”

The older men shook hands.

Dean told Darryl they were looking for Gene Cassidy.

“Who?”

“My friend. The guy with the black and silver, actually more silver than black, hair?”

“Oh. Yes. Maybe downstairs. He and Flo were talking. I think they concluded that it would be better to carry on their conversation elsewhere. And that is fine with me.”

“Ready for another scotch on the rocks, Darryl?”

“You are telepathic, Dean.”

“Hardly. Kitchen counter. Help yourself. Make it a double, if you need to.”

“Thanks. I ‘m overdue.”

Dean led Blake down the stairs to the garage. Flo and Gene were standing at the table, each with a paddle held up, ready to receive a serve. Josh was at the other end, ready to hit the ball.

“Whoa, two against one,” said Dean. “That’s hardly fair.”

Josh curled his fingers around the ball. His paddle hand motioned to his opponents.

“Don’t worry about me, Uncle Dean. These two challenged me. I’m not gonna back down.”

Gene looked up as Dean and Blake stepped to the floor. “It’s a handicap. We’re lame, both of us, unless Flo here has concealed a serious talent. You know I am lame. Now, darts, I will kick ass. But Ping Pong, I’m a klutz. Josh here is the winner. The champ of his rooming group. Did I get that right?”

“Only ’cause the real killer player had mono. But, yeah,” Josh conceded.

“And he’s held the table longer than anyone today, right?”

“Yeah, I guess.”

“So we get a handicap, two against one,” Gene concluded.

Then Gene took notice of Blake.

“Hey, I’m Gene Cassidy,” he said to the old man, extending his hand.

“Hey, Uncle Burton. How’s it going?” Josh said to his uncle. “You guys just get here?”

“Yeah, pretty much. Your mom and dad are upstairs. Got a little tournament going, eh?”

Dean was very tense. He had told himself several times how it was important that he refer to Blake as “Uncle Burton.” He felt conspicuous. He had an intimacy with the old man that would not seem natural if he had just met him. Yet he did not know how to keep the old guy on a tight leash while pretending that he did not really know him. And there was Harlan, staring at the old man and looking like he was on the verge of making a connection to that night in April.

Dean was too uptight to adhere to his own counsel. As the old man stood beside Dean, he introduced him to Gene Cassidy.

“Blake– I mean, Uncle Burton, is the uncle of these two guys over there, your opponent and that other fellow, sitting down there. Great-uncle, if I have it right. Do I have it right? Great-uncle, huh? Hey, Dewey, how’s it going? You winning any games? Or do we call these matches, as in full-sized tennis?”

Dean had thrown out this drivel in an attempt to bury the mistake. Cassidy might not pursue it if Dean managed to pile enough verbiage on top of his blunder.

But Josh was bright. He heard it. So had Harlan, from the way his head rose up and his eyes grew even more piercing than they had been.

“Hey, uh, Uncle Dean?” asked Josh, “How did you know that Uncle Burton used to be called Blake?”

Dean glanced over at Gene.

Oh, shit, said Dean to himself. He knew that look on Cassidy’s face, the dawning recognition: Is this the same Blake of the little deerskin bag?

For what felt like several seconds of awkward silence in the makeshift game room, Dean hoped that Gene would not vocalize this thought. But his hope was in vain. Out it came.

“Is this the guy? The guy who left the little deerskin bag? The same guy? This could be some story! He’s their uncle? Or great-uncle?”

“Are you in possession of my property?”

“I never said that, did I, now?”

Both Gene and Blake then looked at Dean, who was so paralyzed by the horrific confluence of recognition that he said nothing. As the paralysis subsided for a moment, he opened his mouth to speak. He looked over at Harlan. Then he looked at Blake, and Gene. At Josh, Dewey, Candice and Staycee.

There was nothing he could think to say with these people all in the same room. They looked back at him with faces twisted into puzzlement.

Gene, out of what seemed a defense of unspoken accusations, continued, “Anyway, didn’t you give it to Harlan? I mean originally? Wasn’t that like the original plan? Then he must be the owner of it now. It should be his property. I mean, if you gave it up?”

“Just tell me this,” demanded Blake, “Do you have it now? And if you do, and I want you to tell me the truth, then what are you doing with it?”

Dean turned his back on the crowd. He could not stand all those eyes looking at him. He saw his relationship with his two children about to be shredded. He was so broken by the revelations that he did not know where to begin. Should he try to explain to Harlan and Candice, try to justify himself? Perform triage on the greatest hemorrhaging, and then hope for the best?

Or maybe he should address everyone there, find some way to justify his existence to them all, including his nephews Josh and Dewey, and Ward, and even the lovely biracial Josefina with her coppery skin, enormous eyelashes, her moist, bee-stung lips.

To whom does he begin to justify his way out of jeopardy?

Well, how about Priscilla Colfax?

The door to the upstairs opened and Scilla stuck her head down in the direction of the ground floor party.

“Is Ward there?”

“Yo,” said that kid.

“Your parents are here. Time to go to Grandma’s. But it is way too quiet down there. You people OK?”

She took a few steps down the stairs.

Even Scilla, relatively clueless when encountering the nuances of relationship dynamics, could tell there was something amiss. She descended, one slow step at a time.

“Dad,” asked Harlan, “what’s going on? What’s this all about?”

Dean stood up tall but he kept his back to the crowd. He walked with slow steps, the deliberate, studied walk one sees patients take in the halls of convalescent hospitals as they wonder How much of my previous mobility am I going to get back?”

Scilla walked up near her husband but she held back, as if he were radioactive.

“Dean? Come on. What’s wrong with you?”

Dean said nothing. He spread his palms on the fender of Flo and Hank’s van. He leaned over and bent his head.

Harlan then broke the silence: “Mom, look, here’s Blake. Remember him? This is him. He spent the night last April? Dad thought he was some homeless guy and he brought him home. Remember? He’s really Josh and Dewey’s uncle. Weird, huh? I guess he gave me something but I never got it. I think Dad took it and gave it to Gene Cassidy.”

Then Candice added what she knew: “It was a little leather bag. With some stuff in it. Dad lied to me about it when he wanted to get it back.”

Scilla turned back to him.

“Dean. Dean. Talk to me. Is this all true?”

From the far-flung corners of the intricate Web, items of interest and intrigue (some even stranger than fiction):

Still Getting Mono

Lies My Parents Told Me

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Tagged as Blake, Darryl, Dean, Gene, Harlan, Josh, Priscilla, Ward

by serialjones | February 10, 2012

Forbidden Truth #160: Enough Chairs

Darryl’s assessment of Dean was reasoned and detached, as objective in observing his own family as one could hope from a man whose adult life has been devoted to the scientific method.

He watched as Dean moved between kitchen and dining room with a delighted buoyancy. He brought platter after platter, bowls and baskets out to the dining room table, now positioned against a wall to serve as the buffet. And to a side table, a full punch bowl and a tin tub from Mexico filled with bottles of beer and sparkling cider, nestled into party ice. Then several bottles of wine.

Scilla had told Darryl that they chose to put out paper plates for the food, but that they had rented glass stemware for the wine. Every three-piece set of flatware they owned, stainless and silver, the kids had bundled with a paper napkin and put in a wide basket. It was as if the event were catered. Dean and Scilla told Darryl that if all worked out, they would not have to hustle into a fork-washing chore in mid-party.

“Well, leave that to me. As the grandfather, I should have the clout to set the two kids at work on that task if a need arises.”

Yes, Dad, we will see.

Before he had delivered everything to the table, Dean brought a scotch on the rocks for Darryl, perfect, exactly the way the older man prefered it. No mulled wine, no punch, no bottled beer for Darryl.

When Dean was finished with the dining room, he brought five CDs to the stereo. He told Darryl he had burned them with Christmas music he had found online, obscure pieces like Spike Jones’ “Barnyard Christmas,” with some oldies grooved so deep in the collective memory that they would never again sound fresh, like “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree” and “Jingle Bell Rock.” The Jackson Five’s “I Saw Mama Kissing Santa Claus” was bundled with scores of other tunes Dean had found, all of them secular Christmas songs. In a quiet voice, he told Darryl that the only condition Scilla had insisted upon when Dean proposed the mix was that none of the songs be religious.

He threw all five in the CD changer and pressed shuffle.

“We’ll let that robot be our deejay for the party.”

Dean was having a fine time. He liked the way his father-in looked at him as he tipped his scotch in a toast to the newly cherished son-in-law.

Soon the place was filling up. His own dad and Dolores were settled in, Scott and Hazel had just arrived. This was all going to be great fun.

As he moved about in his bustle of obligations, he saw that Flo and Darryl avoided eye contact and had selected chairs as far from each other as they could be. Dean enjoyed playing with the trope that he was the conductor for his wife’s magnum opus. In this role, he was confident that he had the power to mix Darryl and Flo together, to generate interaction between them, if he manipulated things only slightly. But he decided to leave them alone. Small steps.

The initial reunion had gone splendidly. Tears, hugs, some reconciling efforts, but in the ebbing of those emotional waters, the old faultlines were once again exposed.

Just as well to leave them apart.

Scilla pulled him into the kitchen at one point. She was quite troubled. She liked the party, but it had evolved in ways that she had not planned for. Dean told her not to worry, to surrender to it if she could. She gave him one of her impassive expressions, the lifeless face dumbed into a blank stare. He gently repeated his suggestion. His own conducting was going well, but the composer was not pleased with her creation. Someone had snuck into her study and messed with the composition.

“What is the problem, Scilla, other than that the party does not have the shape that you expected it to?”

Scilla shuffled deeper into her dumbfounded state. Dean pitied her. She wanted to complain about something but could find nothing till she came up with: ”There won’t be enough chairs. Or paper plates.”

Dean countered her. “Mitchell and Artis are running late. He just called, mostly wanting to know if Dewey and Josh and Josefina were here. I told him they were, not to worry, no underage drinking and all that. His uncle still needed to shower. Barry and Shiloh just told me that they’re heading out soon, going to their friends Mark and Chet’s place in the Castro for a drink before it gets too late. That frees up a few chairs. Even if the neighbors are still here when Mitchell and Artis and the uncle arrive, it’s only, let me see, seven, nine…”

“Dean, what good does it do to have a place for someone to sit if there’s no food for them to eat?”

“There’s plenty of food. And not everyone’s here for dinner.”

“And what if the Cassidys come? How many will that add?”

“Scilla, calm down, OK? It’s a wonderful party. Open your eyes. You’ve pulled off a miracle. The Reunion. I did not believe it was a good idea. But it was a wonderful idea. It is a wonderful party. All you need to do is get out of your own way with all this pessimism and let it happen.”

Scilla sighed and turned to leave the kitchen when she nearly bumped into Scott, who carried an unopened bottle of beer.

“Hey, oops! Sorry. You got an opener, man?” he asked Dean.

“There should be a church key tied to the tub handle where you got that beer. But here.” Dean handed him a corkscrew with a bottle opener in the handle. Pfft.

Scilla took her worried face out of the kitchen and back into the party. Dean was leaving to join her when the phone rang.

“Dean, man!”

“Hey, Gene, Merry Christmas!”

“And to you.”

“Yes, indeed.”

“So, hey, guess what? We’re on 19th Avenue and Jerry just checked his flight. It’s delayed, they think about two hours, so we’ve got some time to kill. Could we take you up on that offer and swing by?”

“Uh, yeah, hey, love to have you. You guys hungry?”

“Naw. We been eating leftovers since we got up. But I will have a glass with you if you’re in. We got a crowd here, though. Is that still OK?”

“Yeah, sure, of course. So who’s with you?”

“My two brothers, my mom, Maggie, her mom. Enough for a basketball team plus a sub.”

“Parking is pretty sucky. You may have to do Sanchez.”

“No prob. We’ll figure it out. It’s a holy day. Hail Mary, full of Grace, help us find a parking place. Uh-oh, scowls from my mother and my mother-in-law for that one. Still, I betcha it works. See ya soon.”

Dean took one of the tall IPAs and the corkscrew with the church key in the handle and popped the top. It was the first alcohol, other than a few tasting-sips of mulled wine, that he had consumed that day. There had been no need. He was buzzed enough on the house full of people that he had not thought of alcohol.

But now he had to tell Scilla that the party was about to grow by another half dozen, and with the Cassidys, some of her least favorite people in their social world.

He found her in the dining room and gently led her back toward the kitchen, murmuring the news of the impending arrival. When he told her, she stopped in her tracks and gave him a look he had never seen in her before. It was surrender, that which he had urged her to adopt just moments before in the kitchen, but it was not the go-with-the-day’s-happenstances surrender that he had intended.

It was more like a capitulation to a bitter fact about her husband’s machinations that, if Dean could articulate it, would go something like I knew that you were going to ruin my Christmas party. I knew there was no way I could stop you. You have been out to defeat the whole project from the moment I proposed it last summer.

“Scilla. Stop. It’s going to be OK. Gene’s brother’s flight is late. They’ve already eaten, they’ll come by for an hour or so and be on their way. Please don’t give me that look.”

“What look is that, Dean? What look do you think you see?”

He did not answer her.

Dean was surprised then, with how gracious she appeared when Gene’s family arrived. She had never met his two brothers, and she had only seen Mary and Paula, his mother and mother-in-law, in passing, perhaps two or three times. Scilla welcomed them at the door, took their coats, led them to the living room.

There were plenty of chairs. Josh and Dewey and Josefina had joined Harlan and Candice and their guests downstairs in the garage, where they were playing table tennis and listening to non-Christmas music on the family’s portable CD player. There were enough chairs upstairs for the Cassidy clan. In fact, all the chairs between Flo and Darryl had been empty until the Cassidys came in and filled them.

Dean took requests and returned presently with glasses of wine, bottles of beer and mineral water. The Cassidy invasion had been absorbed. All was well.

Flo and Gene found themselves sitting next to one another.

“Excuse me, your name is…?” she asked him.

“Gene. Gene Cassidy.”

A look of recognition flashed over her face. “Oh, you’re supposed to be… I’m supposed to have… some things in common with you?”

“Really? Are you a textbook editor, too?”

“No, oh, no.”

“Didn’t think so; kidding you.”

Flo chuckled. “Scilla says…” She made a point of not getting eye contact with her father. She lowered her voice and tilted her head closer to Gene’s ear. “Scilla says you have… shall we say, an open mind about some things… like 9/11?”

“Yup. I can definitely go on that jag.”

Dean had just handed out the last glass of wine when the doorbell rang.

When he opened it, Mitchell and Artis, in unison, cried out, “Merry Christmas!”

Then Mitchell stepped into the house and gestured behind him to a figure on the porch. ”Dean, this is my uncle, Burton Cartfaler.”

Dean stepped back. He had to get his bearings. For a moment, he thought some aberrant neural current was distorting his perceptions of Mitchell’s uncle. Had he drunk that IPA too quickly? Then he realized his perceptions were sound, knew this by the look of recognition in the uncle’s eyes as he reached out his hand to shake Dean’s extended palm, with a greeting of “Merry Christmas.”

It was a shared recognition. Dean knew this man. He wanted to retreat but there was no place to go. He dropped his hand. His back banged up against the wall.

“Blake!”

Mitchell turned to his uncle. “You know my brother-in-law? And I thought you stopped using that name years ago? Or is that just what you told us? What’s going on here?”

From the far-flung corners of the intricate Web, items of interest and intrigue (some even stranger than fiction):

Design the Perfect Party Space

Exhibition Table Tennis

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Tagged as Artis, Blake, Darryl, Dean, Flo, Gene, Mary, Mitchell, Paula, Priscilla

by serialjones | February 9, 2012

Forbidden Truth #159: God Particle

Darryl was in his element. He had been given, due to some unknown process — the logic of which eluded him — the place at the head of the long table at the Irons’ Christmas brunch. Sid had insisted, as if Darryl were a visiting dignitary.

From tasting the first few morsels, Darryl understood that the lunch Beryl had prepared for them the day before had been merely an opening act for the featured show. This was that show. From flakey butter biscuits with both a tangy and sweet aftertaste, served with homemade huckleberry jam, and wild salmon mousse with fresh bagels, to huevos Benedict, melon squares wrapped in prosciutto, kiwi and grapefruit slices with a drizzle of grenadine. Mexican hot chocolate, and mimosas, for those who might want to start their celebration with a taste of champagne and fresh-squeezed orange juice.

Every bite was worthy of comment. Around the banquet table, the Emperor Norton’s guests oohed and aahed so much that soon the repetition set off ripples of giggling. At last one man, faking orneriness, said, “Come on, folks, nothing’s that good,” to which a woman retorted, “Oh, yes it is,” this joined by other laughing protests till he recanted his remark.

Another of the male guests had, while awaiting the first course, asked Darryl what his line of work was.

“I’m an astrophysicist.” His usual answer to this question did its predictable alchemy on the crowd, for the most part shaming the men into deferring to this intellectual alpha-dog among them.

But the man sitting to Darryl’s right, not too young but a long way from retirement, maybe mid- to late-40s, could not have been any more inward. He had been looking down at his shiny, empty plate, contributing nothing to the weather and traffic and sports discussions that buzzed above the crowd as their morning coffee took effect. But Darryl’s answer to the question drew him away from his introversion.

The younger man, Duane, began to ask the semi-celebrity, semi-retired professor a series of thoughtful questions. Darryl learned that Duane taught philosophy at a middling community college somewhere in Montana, near the Idaho border. (Or was it somewhere in Idaho, near the Montana border?)

His mind was incisive and his curiosity that of someone from a more elevated academic stratum. He had two PhDs. The first, in philosophy, was earned with a dissertation on the nature of certain plant-induced hallucinations that, under certain circumstances, expose the subject’s perception of society as a constructed reality. His subsequent doctorate was in literature. That dissertation was a study of the work of the author Philip K. Dick.

The younger professor projected enormous confidence, but he did not pontificate. Rather, he essentially invited Darryl to expound on his own views of the so-called “God Particle” supposedly “glimpsed” earlier that month at the Large Hadron Collider. Then he asked Darryl about parallel universes, the multiverse, the billions of earth-like planets in the Milky Way, the extraterrestrial hypothesis. What did Darryl think of people like Bernard Haisch, and proto-science in general?

At one point, Darryl realized that he had, in answering the man’s questions, perhaps talked a good deal too much. His food had gone cold. To catch a break, Darryl asked Duane about his own areas of knowledge. Was there something that he might find interesting from Duane’s own research?

In response, Duane told Darryl about the Sami, a semi-nomadic tribe of the Norwegian Arctic Circle, who had a shamanic tradition built around the fly agaric mushroom, a hallucinogen also known as amanita muscaria. In that culture, using this psychoactive fungus, practitioners had traditionally reported visions of a figure in a sleigh that, pulled by magical reindeer, rose up off the earth to travel through the winter sky.

Having overheard this, the man to Darryl’s left, he who had joked that nothing was as good as all the oohs and aahs warranted, raised his mimosa glass and said to Duane, “Well, that’s a helluva Christmas tale, if ever I heard one. Meet Old St. Nick, just a fantasy of some guy named Sammy stoned on ‘shrooms. What the hell. I’ll drink to that.” It was hard to tell if the man was drunk, stupid or both.

As Darryl sipped his half-decaf, half high-tech coffee, as the guests leaned back in their chairs, pleasantly defeated by the rich indulgences, he felt a pull.

On one end was the fact that this was fun. Not one of his daughters’ men knew enough to ask him the kinds of questions that came out of Duane, as fluidly as if he were talking about some recently invincible championship team that had fallen from glory. None of those men would have so relished Darryl’s reasoned, deliberate arguments in support of, or in challenge to, these hypotheses.

Darryl was also charged up by his foresight in having read that article about the “God Particle” during the trip north. That was fortuitous.

The pull, then, was that he was torn between staying at the Emperor Norton for another hour or two, dropping in on the Colfaxes when he was good and ready, and, on the other pole, that practical but crucial factor: San Francisco parking.

Scilla had told Francesca that they were expecting a crowd. There would likely be parking on Sanchez or Jersey. But on Regan Street? And close to the house? No guarantees.

The second spot in the garage already housed Flo and Hank’s van. Darryl had grooved the parking problem into his thinking from the moment he heard it from his wife.

He knew Dean and Scilla’s neighborhood, had been there often. He’d practically bought them the damned house. Regan was steeper than Jersey, though not as steep as Clipper. Did he want to walk up the hill toting two shopping bags, one holding bottles of wine and a dessert and the other heavy with gifts? Did he want to arrive in a sweat, red-faced, heart pounding?

Imagining this settled the debate for him. He caught Francesca’s eye, and they both rose from the table.

They hugged the Irons, with a special beam of affection directed to their daughter for the opus she had created, a handshake and a business card exchange with the community college philosopher, and Happy Holidays extended to the guests still seated at the table.

Then out to the rental car. It was 3:00 straight up. Sluggish from the satisfaction of having just consumed a rich meal, they stepped out the door and took in the cool fresh air. It was a lovely day. No rain in sight.

Darryl and Francesca arrived early enough to get a place just a few doors down from 667 Regan. Up the stairs. Doorbell. The greeting by Dean, then Scilla.

And there, standing in the hall, was the renegade daughter, looking, well, many things, all at once. Certainly nervous and shy, her eyes blinking. Maybe a look of contrition on her face. Maybe.

Dean led them in. He and Scilla took their shopping bags and listened to their explanations of the contents. Coats and scarves were shed, given to Dean to hang in the hall closet.

There she was, Flo, his second-born. Her hair was no longer in cornrows, nor in the dreadlocks that Francesca had described, when recently she told Darryl the details of the clandestine lunch they shared in Santa Rosa while he was recuperating from hernia surgery. Her nappy, reddish-brown bush was pulled back from her face and trimmed, sensibly, thought Darryl. He opened his arms. She stepped into the embrace.

“Oh, Daddy.”

Her use of this childhood term of affection for him, and the tone of her voice, regressed nearly to a whimper, caught him off guard and softened him in ways that surprised him.

This unexpected softness empowered him to say, his mouth against her ear as they embraced, “It’s OK, Flo, it’s OK. We’re all just human beings and it’s a tough game, a tough, tough game to be a good human. Aren’t we all trying?”

He felt tears threatening to run down his cheeks. He desperately needed to excuse himself. “Go on, give your mom a hug.”

He broke the embrace, stepped back and stood flat against the wall in the narrow hall. He smiled. Triumph fed his joy, a triumph piled up in several layers. One, he had not wept. Two, he had said something conciliatory, though it was not what Flo would have preferred, which he suspected would have been something like, Yes, damn me, Daughter, I went over to the dark side. I believed that Dick Cheney and Richard Perle were gods incarnate, and now I have seen my wicked ways. Please forgive me, for all that I have done to you and the other good people of our excellent republic.

Francesca did enough weeping for the two of them. As did Flo, once she got locked up with her mother, their arms petting each other’s backs while they sobbed. Even Dean had to turn away, blinking.

“I’m sorry, Mom.”

“It’s OK, it’s OK.”

After a few moments, Francesca held her daughter at arm’s length and said, “You look well.”

“Yeah, well. I have a man who’s deep into health maintenance.” She gestured toward Hank, waiting nearby.

Francesca hugged Hank, briefly. It was not nearly as emotional as her embrace of Flo, even bordered on business-like. All that hugging and stroking had redeemed Flo from the perp class. So it must have been Hank behind all of this ridiculous separation, was a thought that seemed to hover above their heads as they stood in the Colfax’s hall.

This was about as far from the truth as they could get, but Hank did not seem too worried about the tepid response from his woman’s mother.

The women went, then, one to each bathroom to tidy up from their tearful reunion.

Dean led the visitors to the living room, then circulated with a tray of glass mugs of mulled wine, passing them around to whomever wanted one. Harlan took one.

“Whoa. Not yet. A bit too young for that. Wait a year, till you’re 16 — you can have your first sip then.”

“So, uh, Dad, you think I have never had any alcohol?” Harlan’s face spread open with an impish grin as he returned the mug to the tray.

“Not in our house, you haven’t. Not with my knowledge, at any rate.”

Everyone who heard this father-son exchange laughed. Including Dean.

Now, look at that guy’s face, thought Darryl, while he studied Dean. He is one happy guy. He looks like the rare man who could stand happily mute if you were to ask him to name one thing in his life that is not working out to his total satisfaction.

From the far-flung corners of the intricate Web, items of interest and intrigue (some even stranger than fiction):

BBC: Magic Mushrooms & Reindeer

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Tagged as Darryl, Dean, Flo, Francesca, Hank, Harlan, Priscilla

by serialjones | February 8, 2012

Forbidden Truth #158: Old Affection

Dean had the center griddle of the stove sizzling with breakfast. The stove was ablaze with brunch preparations. A cast-iron griddle was on the right front burner, and a big cast-iron skillet behind it. Several dozen little turkey sausages were browning in a pan. When the electric teakettle whistled, most of its contents were poured into the big, drip coffee maker, and the rest into a china tea pot. Jams and syrups, honey, butter and a bowl of tangerines were already on the dining room table.

Scilla’s creation, the stuffed and stitched-up turkey, was ready to go into the oven once the breakfast platters of French toast and sausages had been removed and transported to the dining room.

The doorbell rang and the door opened a moment later.

“Hiiii…” Flo stood with the door open, her eyes on the kitchen at the end of the hall.

Scilla wiped her hands on a towel and headed down the hall toward her sister.

“I didn’t know whether to ring and wait or just walk in. So I did both, rang and then just walked in. Hi, Sis.”

They pecked each other’s cheeks, just warm enough and just cool enough to be inconspicuous. Scilla stepped aside to receive the guests who followed behind her sister: Hank, with his Howdy, a scout-like salute, and then a handshake, to cover all the expediencies. Behind Hank there entered Barry and Shiloh.

“Here. We brought something for brunch. Barry made sticky buns.”

Shiloh handed Scilla a square, clear plastic container darkened by the baked goods within.

“Well, we do have plenty of food… but… OK, thanks a bunch.” The hint of a scowl flickered across Scilla’s forehead but was quickly suppressed.

Scilla, we do give you a heap of credit for trying so hard.

“Mom and Dad here yet?”

“No. They can’t make brunch. They’ll be over later. Sid and Ann, remember the Irons? They own that B&B not far from here?”

“Still? That was ages ago when they moved up here. I was a senior in high school.”

“Beryl, their daughter? They had her after they moved up here? She’s in her 20s now, if you can believe it. And apparently she cooks up a storm. She’s doing a big breakfast today, so they’re over there.”

“So, they’re staying there?”

“No. The Fairmont.”

“Oh.”

“Long story.”

“But –“

Hank and the other two men passed by and moved toward the dining room while the sisters hung wraps.

“Come,” Scilla interrupted Flo. “Breakfast is served. Barry, Shiloh, you can sit here, on this side. And, Hank, why don’t you sit over here, near Dean’s place. I’ll go get the kids.”

The reunion was moving quickly beyond its initial awkwardness. Flo had called Scilla Sis when they were in their early teen years. To address her that way again was a nice gesture on Flo’s part. Scilla had given a tiny wrinkle of a smile that accepted this old affection as an expression of her sister’s good will.

Throughout the breakfast, the conversation was lively and the compliments to the chef, generous. The spirit of the gathering was elevated by a few moments of riotous laughter, such as when Flo said, “Barry, I just love your sticky buns.” Without missing a beat, Shiloh raised his orange juice glass and said, “I’ll drink to that.”

The table exploded with laughter from everyone, including Candice and Harlan and Ward, the three of whom had trouble coaxing their laughing selves back inside after the adults had moved on to a new topic. Dean had to frown at them to restore order at that end of the table.

More coffee and tea were served to those who wanted more, after the brunch party moved to the living room. During the post-prandial conversation, Dean and Harlan moved the newly-cleared dining room table against one of the walls, ready to receive the offerings of the buffet.

Hank and Flo seemed to show genuine interest in the three young people. And the kids seemed to like the attention. They were having their first encounter with close relatives, in their parents’ generation, who had no children. It is likely the kids were not aware that this fact made them particularly curious about the visitors from the north. They would, though, internalize this experience, and draw from it later, in their adult lives, to build out perceptions and assumptions that were already forming from their observations of other child-free couples like the Cassidys.

Before long, the doctor and his partner were exchanging contact information with all three kids, to maintain digital connections after the holidays. Candice had proposed this. She wanted her two newest fans to be able to see the video of her performance on Facebook, and to be able to read the review from the Chronicle.

Harlan and Ward were, at first, a little more restrained with the two visitors, but Harlan soon asked Hank if he could get a bibliography, maybe some websites for alternative medicine theory and practice? He smelled an extra credit research report for Aldhouse. Ward elbowed in then, with his own request: ”Could you copy me on that?”

Outside of the leisure season of summer, the GPA race was never totally suspended, not even for Christmas Day.

In the kitchen, Scilla tended to the turkey and prepared the roast beef and side dishes. She asked again, for perhaps the fourth time, on the verge of being accused of not paying attention to her husband, Did Dean really think they had enough food?

He smiled at her and said, “Yes. And, if not, ‘family holds back’ and we make do. It’s too late, Honey. Everything’s closed and we’re having Christmas! And it’s going to be a good one. I can feel it.”

Scilla went a bit dark and seemed to struggle with what she wanted to say. Dean saw this in her face and he smiled. For him, they had nearly pulled off a miracle. When he thought about it, it made a beautiful narrative.

It was a Christmas party that had started with Scilla in charge, over her head, full of delusory confidence, then foundering under the burden she had assumed. And now, laughter shook the house. They had succeeded in feeding a crowd for Christmas Eve, their brunch for nine had gone along without a hitch, and now there remained only this last event, the open-house party. If it went OK, the whole holiday weekend would be remembered as an unqualified success.

But this last event would be the hardest. The confrontation between the father and his rebellious daughter. No weasling out of it, for either of them.

Scilla’s mom had called her from the Emperor Norton. They were having a very nice time. Beryl had just knocked herself out making this meal. It was like eating at the finest restaurant. But they were about done there, and planned to get to the Colfaxes around 3:00.

“And how are things going on Regan Street?”

“Fine, just fine. Dean made brunch. His French toast. We had nine. And it happened on time. No problem.”

Dean’s holiday transformation was nearly complete. He had started in early fall, when he had hoped to teach his obdurate wife the essentials of civil discourse by letting her rise or tumble (the smart money said ‘tumble’) from her inflated sense of her party-planning abilities. Later he jumped in out of pure householder pride. Now lately, toward the end, he had rolled up his sleeves and plunged in because he, too, wanted a great party.

The holiday preparations, in addition to the heavy workload at TAC, had taken a toll on him. Now, though, he was having a splendid time. He went back into the kitchen where Scilla was basting the turkey. The post-brunch living room party had quieted down somewhat once Barry and Shiloh left to take Akiva for a walk. They said they would return for dinner.

Dean waited till Scilla closed the oven door. Then he grabbed her upper arms and pulled her close to him.

“Dean, what’re you doing?”

“I want to give you a hug.”

“There could be grease on my apron.”

He said he did not care, though he did pull back slightly, in a way that belied this cavalier attitude. He still held her with an old affection, one they had not known for some months as they reconfigured their lines of authority. He kissed her all over her mouth. She kissed him back, not out of mere obligation, not only out of surprise, but because he had delighted her with his spontaneity.

“Dean. What’s this all about?”

“Now it’s my turn to show the gratitude. I resisted this party, and now I am so happy we are having it. I am having a wonderful time. I want to thank you for your insistence. It is a beautiful thing, Scilla. I am very grateful that you pushed for this.”

What was perhaps the most beautiful part of it was that Dean was back in control of social matters. He knew what worked with people. He was good at this. He was the conductor, leading the orchestra that performed the piece Scilla had composed. He could not tell her this, of course. But his baton motioned to her when he asked her who had called.

“My mom. They’ll be here around 3:00.”

“You should tell Flo.”

“Why would I do that, Dean? Oh, OK. Sure. I’ll tell her right now.”

And so continued Christmas on Regan Street, 2011.

From the far-flung corners of the intricate Web, items of interest and intrigue (some even stranger than fiction):

Stickiest of Sticky Buns

FHB

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Tagged as Barry, Candice, Dean, Flo, Hank, Harlan, Priscilla, Shiloh, Ward

by serialjones | February 7, 2012

Forbidden Truth #157: Elasticity

Dean was in bed first, Scilla finishing the last of her preparations before joining him. He was contented. Not entirely contented, of course, with not only the Big Party the next day, but brunch as well, less than 12 hours away.

He would make French toast, a recipe that, if a few important steps were taken in the right order, produced flawless, golden-brown slices of fried bread. He would use the leftover sourdough bread and a few pre-sliced loaves they had picked up for this purpose.

In his mind, Dean worked his way through the coming holiday marathon, starting with his breakfast prep, working in tandem with Scilla who would be at the other end of the counter preparing the turkey for the oven. Brunch clean-up would segue into the roast beef prep. A big green salad and another potato salad, bean salad, yams, mashed potatoes, more dressing on the stove top, fresh cranberries, three pies, a cake. Not to mention the plates of cookies and candies that would be within arm’s reach at most of the places where people will congregate.

Dean thought, as he mentally worked through what he imagined would be the likely course of Christmas Day, that maybe he should tell Scilla about all the new people he had invited, including the Cassidys, as in super-plural Cassidys.

The crowd was growing. Harlan had asked Dean if he could invite Ward to come to brunch. Later Ward would be going over to Berkeley to have Christmas dinner with his grandparents, and his parents could come by and pick him up on the way.

“Sure, why not? It’s Christmas.”

Dean did not buy the notion that fate courses through our lives in themes or motifs that color the flow of seemingly random events. Nonetheless, he was experienced enough in life to perceive trends developing, and vigilant in looking to the likelihood that more of that trend would be displayed forthwith. This is all to say that Dean embraced the growing indications that they were, indeed, going to have one colossal Christmas party.

So he wasn’t surprised when Candice, upon overhearing Harlan’s request that Ward be included at brunch, politicked for the inclusion of Staycee Gellen, her dancer friend, whose parents — separated, fractious, dispirited by their differences and the stalled economy — had decided, “except for a few gifts for the kids, to skip Christmas this year.” She wouldn’t be joining the Colfaxes for brunch but she could come later. Dean told Candice that, yes, sure, it would be OK to invite Staycee to the afternoon open house.

It was not long after that that Mitchell Cartfaler had called. Could Josh bring his girlfriend, a college classmate? It had first appeared that they would be spending the holiday apart, she with her family in San Francisco, he with his on the Peninsula. Then Josh learned that there was this big family party at the Colfaxes’ house in San Francisco! He asked his dad to ask Uncle Dean if it would be OK to bring Josefina.

“Yeah, sure, buffet, open house, no problem at all, Mitchell.”

Mitchell and Artis had another request. An unexpected guest had shown up. Mitchell’s Uncle Burton had come up from L.A. He was mostly high-functioning, for an older guy, but he tended toward the forgetful during important times. Mitchell thought the excitement of the coming holiday had caused him to suffer a senior moment.

“Well, Uncle Burton just arrived a few hours ago. We were wondering, could we bring him along?”

“Yeah, yeah, open house, yeah, sure, the more the merrier, as they say.”

“The poor guy is really embarrassed. He forgot to tell us he had accepted our invitation to spend Christmas with us. Then he forgot that he forgot, if you know what I mean.”

“Yeah, I do, I do. No problem. Open house.”

So, yes, Scilla had to be told about all the new invitees. But how?

From his place, sitting up, leaning on his pillow against the headboard, while his wife undressed, then folded some of her clothes and hung up the others, Dean listened to her talk about the reunion with her sister. He let her run down her complaints. He had little to say.

He was alert for an opening, for the means to tell her how the original group had burgeoned today, while she had been preoccupied with relearning who her sister and Hank were. And what if the Cassidys do come? Unlikely, but a trend is a trend and this was already a far bigger crowd than they had planned for.

“Dean,” said Scilla as she lay down beside him, sleep mask in one hand, bite guard in the other, ready to stop up the orifices after a few more minutes of conversation. “I’m thinking we rented way too many chairs. There are not going to be that many people here.”

Dean had his opening.

“Well, Scilla, as it turns out, I think we may have just enough chairs. While you were making the cole slaw tonight, Harlan asked if Ward could join us for brunch. Then Candice asked if Staycee could come to the open house. Then, remember the phone rang and you asked me to get it? It was Mitchell. They’re bringing his old uncle, and Josh is bringing his girlfriend.”

“Oh, no, Dean! It’ll be a zoo.”

“But my point is this: we have enough chairs, and, I’m sure, enough food and drink for everyone, too. Table tennis down in the garage. We’ll set up the dining room table against the wall, covered with all the offerings, folding chairs around the perimeter of the room along with the dining chairs, more in the living room.”

Scilla heaved a heavy sigh. “But, please, Dean, no more.”

“No new people will be invited.”

“Good.”

“But I need to tell you something else. There is an outside chance Gene Cassidy and Maggie are going to drop by.”

“Gene Cassidy.”

“Yeah, Gene.”

“Oh, great. That’s lovely, just what we need: Gene Cassidy.”

“Very unlikely. One of his brothers has to catch a flight. So it’s unlikely. Very unlikely.”

“We can only hope.”

Scilla’s eyes and mouth were abruptly taken off-duty by the sleep-mask and bite guard. Dean turned out the light. Heavy, somnolent breathing filled the bedroom.

Not a bad start to the Big Reunion, he thought, as sleep took him over. And we are going to have one Big-Ass party!

Christmas morning, for the Colfaxes, as it is for many families that do up this celebration, was a time for sleepy, peaceful regression. The Colfaxes had made it to the holiday. The place was pretty much ready for the party, even for the blown-up reality that had morphed out of the comparatively simple plan Scilla had hatched with her schemes of summer.

Scilla, had she not been so exhausted, might have tried to blame Dean for the elasticity in the party’s parameters. But she was too tired to attempt to rake him over for being so open to the idea of letting just anyone show up.

Yet her capitulation to him was only partly a product of her fatigue. More so, it was his recent confidence in his mind, in is reasoning powers, and with his new fearlessness in taking her on in a debate. New Husband Dean, royal pain in the derrière.

She knew how he would argue. He would ask her what she would have done differently. She knew why the kids went to him with these proposals to include their friends. She herself would have been harsh and crabby with them, especially given the haggard state she was in as she faced down the holiday weekend.

The glass, half empty. She knew this cliché and she employed it as a familiar friend, hoping it would grant her permission to put a cynical spin on matters that had evolved beyond her range of willpower. Multiple disappointments sat like fat bullies on her shoulders.

But, begrudgingly, and with the hope there would be no more requirements of forced gratitude, she admitted to herself that Dean had done the right thing. It would not have been easy to turn down any of those requests. OK, other than the Cassidys. She would have gladly turned them down, Christmas or not.

And it could have been worse. She could have been the one who was prevailed upon to open up the guest list. Now, though, if the party bombs, Dean would be culpable, and her perfect self would remain unsmirched by the debacle. So many checkmarks would cover his demerit column that he would likely never work them off.

She wanted to hate him for the shift, for the new, stretched limits to the party but she could not. Especially when she opened his present to her, a necklace of Tahitian black pearls on a gold chain, the kind Artis had suggested would bring out something in her, Scilla forgot just what, if she wore them to nice affairs.

Dean must have overheard her talk to Artis that day when they had a cup of tea after shopping. He later told her he had seen them in a jewelry store near his work, and had asked the clerk to set them aside. As soon as he knew he’d scored with the bonus, he phoned the shop and told them he’d be in to pick them up after work.

And not only his generosity and his sensitivity, but his good cheer in accepting the note in the little box she gave him: This good for an iPod, if Harry comes through with a decent bonus. He gave her a kiss and said he loved her even if Harry punished her for being an atheist on Christmas!

Such a sweet man! Drives me crazy, though.

She sat on the sofa in the living room and watched him cooking breakfast for nine. Her marrow ached with fatigue, with relentless duty executed despite the rest her body howled for.

But there he is at the stove, singing songs, flipping French toast.

Christmas to Remember, there’s no stopping you now.

From the far-flung corners of the intricate Web, items of interest and intrigue (some even stranger than fiction):

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