Chapter 3 #3
“I’m sure you’re working on some very important piece of legislation right now.”
He glanced out to where Lila and Jonas were huddled over a three-foot poster with a picture of Leo on it, using glitter stickers to make a border.
“Uh, yeah. Important stuff, Mom. What’s going on?”
“It’s your father.”
Cold dread poured through him. Dean and Deanna Luview ran a tree company inherited from Dean’s father, and his dad still insisted on doing some of the tree work the old-fashioned way: with ropes and his own arms and legs. Cherry-pickers were for big jobs, he always said.
Dean was a tree climber. It was in his blood, and he’d given that skill to all four of his kids, though Dennis was the star. Kell could climb and cut, sure, and he was good at it, but everyone knew his dad planned for Dennis to be the one to take over.
“Is he hurt? What happened?”
“Hurt? Oh, no, sweetie. Only his feelings. Dad’s fine.”
A whoosh of relief poured out of him.
“Good.”
“Did I scare you? I’m sorry. I need to learn to have these calls with you and not do that. Dennis is the only one who ever left home before, but he was in Portsmouth for so long, we got spoiled.”
Dennis was in the army, in a job he wouldn’t talk about. For fifteen years, he’d been stateside, but now he was stationed in Germany. Dad had been grousing for years about needing Dennis back home, and how he should get out of the military. He couldn’t accept what Kell, Luke, and Colleen knew:
Dennis didn’t want to take over the family business.
“It’s fine. What’s this about Dad’s feelings?”
“Dennis finally did it.”
“Did what, Mom?”
“Told your dad he doesn’t want the family business.”
“Oh. Wow.”
“Yeah.”
“How’d Dad take that?”
“Not well. He’s hiding in a tree.”
“Well, that’s how Dad copes with stuff. He goes and works.”
“No, honey. He’s not working. He’s literally hiding in a tree. In your old treehouse. He was out there all night.”
“What?”
“It’s been fourteen hours now. The man has a cast-iron bladder. Or he’s peeing from the little deck when I’m not looking.”
“Mom!”
“What? You boys did it all the time when you were little.”
“Back up. Back the story up. Why did Den tell Dad he wasn’t joining him?”
“Dennis had a choice to leave the army or stay. He stayed. Said this is his true career, and eventually he’ll retire, but he doesn’t want to run the business.”
Dennis enlisted fresh out of high school, one week after turning eighteen. No one saw this coming, and Mom had cried for months. Kell was nine years younger than Dennis, and it had sucked having a weepy mom during summer camp and soccer.
Dad had bounced between being proud and crushed.
“I see. Dad expected Dennis to come home this year.”
“Yes.”
“Dennis has the right to live his life his way,” Kell said, the conversation’s implications sinking in. If Dennis turned Dad down, this could only mean one thing for Kell: The pressure on him to come home and take over the family business was about to increase.
A lot.
“He does,” his mom said firmly. “And so do you. That’s why I’m calling.”
“Let me guess. Dad’s already muttering about making me take over.”
“No one would ever try to make you take over.”
Kell snorted. “For someone who’s been married to Dad for thirty-five years, you sure don’t know him very well.”
“I have known Dean for a long time, you whippersnapper, and he’s a fair man. But he’s a hurt man right now, so I’m calling to–”
“Warn me?”
“Give you a heads up.”
“Same thing.”
Her voice went soft. “It would be nice to have you back home, Kell. Have you ever thought about working for the state? Like Uncle Ted?”
“Mom,” he replied in a low growl. “I’m doing intellectually fulfilling work here that protects the whole planet.”
Another glance at his co-workers showed them around the coffin, John having shoved his hands into the main part of the costume, re-animating Leo as someone played the old Michael Jackson song, Thriller, on their phone.
Lila and Jonas were backup dancers, hands up in claws, swaying left and right like lurching zombies.
“Your work is so important to humanity.”
Kell closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose.
“Uh, right.”
“No pressure.”
“If there weren’t any pressure, you wouldn’t be making this phone call.”
“Fair enough. I back down quickly, though. I just want all my children to be happy.”
“But Dad wants one of his kids to take the business he spent all these years building.”
His mom’s pause made him frown. There was something more to this phone call, and he didn’t like the creepy feeling running through him as her silence continued.
“Mom?”
“Your dad isn’t getting any younger.”
“You guys are fifty-eight. That’s young.” He was lying, but whatever.
“He fell, Kellan.”
“What?”
“He fell. He’s fine,” she rushed in to assure him, “but he fell. Caught himself after a fifteen-foot drop. He got lucky when the sole of his boot caught a lower branch just right. But he could have had a fifty-foot freefall.”
“What? Was his harness on right?”
“It was. He just… slipped.”
“Dad doesn’t slip!”
“But he did, Kellan. He did. Said he just… slipped.”
“Did he go to the doctor?”
“Of course. Colleen and I made him. No problems other than some scrapes and harness bruising. Doc said he should rest for a couple of days.”
“Which he didn’t,” Kell said with a knowing huff.
“No. He didn’t.” She sighed. “I’m worried about him.
Dad is healthy as can be, but no one can climb forever.
You’re twenty-three–you don’t know what it’s like to fast-forward thirty-five years and think you can still do everything you used to do.
And you can do maybe ninety-five percent, if you’re in great shape like your dad.
But you’re just not as strong, and your reflexes slow down. ”
“Dad must be freaking out about that.”
“Right. And Dennis’s call…”
“Has Dad in a crisis.”
“Something like that.”
A tap on the glass made him look up.
Jonas and Lila stood before him, Lila wearing a pillbox hat with black netting over her face, like in an old photo from a 1960s funeral.
Jonas pointed to the big wall clock. 11:55.
Kell nodded and shooed them away.
Once he left Luview, Maine, for college, he realized how cheesy his hometown really was.
Every building downtown was painted nothing but red, pink, and white.
His brother Luke was a town cop who wore a red uniform and drove a pink cruiser, for Pete’s sake.
The town’s only bookstore sold romance novels and nothing but romance novels. The cinema showed only love stories.
The town’s hot spring was the center of everything, with inns and B a dip in the famous waters was the original reason people came. Legend had it, if you went for a swim, you would meet your true love.
No one actually believed it, but boy, did it bring the tourists in. They came with out-of-state money to find out-of-this-world, over-the-top schmaltz.
In “Love You, Maine,” love wasn’t just a feeling. It was a way of life. Silly and light, it was all about jokes, smiles, laughter–and, yes, love.
A funeral for Leo the Lemur was pretty funny, but it certainly wasn’t what Kell had in mind when he came to D.C. to push legislation that protected people, land, and animals.
“Mom, there’s a meeting I have to go to.”
“What’s it about?”
“Uh, dying lemurs.”
“You’re working to save them?”
John had docked his phone to a speaker and organ music floated through the office. Somber and serene, it made him remember his grandfather’s funeral.
They were really doing this.
He looked at the table again, where the cake box sat.
Eh. At least there was cake.
“I am working to give them the respect they deserve,” he replied diplomatically. “Gotta go. Thanks for the warning about Dad. If he calls, I’ll know how to handle him. And Mom?”
“Yes?”
“Approach the treehouse carefully. You never know which direction Dad’ll let fly.”
“Kell!”
Laughing, he said, “Love you, Mom.”
“Always,” she replied, the ritual old and dear to them both.
A spectacle was forming around the funerary table.
He ran his hands over his head, scratching his scalp lightly, his closely cropped hair still feeling new even after a year.
He’d always had longer hair that settled past his collar, all his life.
He’d spent more time on his appearance this last year than he had in the previous twenty-two combined.
And now, his old life–the one he’d left behind–was intruding.
Dennis told Dad.
Dad was hiding in a treehouse.
And Kell was about to deliver an impromptu eulogy for an animal costume.
But then Rachel stormed over to the table and announced, “This is an environmentally unfriendly way to dispose of the deceased. Cremation is the only acceptable method.”
Karen had appeared with a cake server and her own piece of black lace on her head.
“Cremation?”
“Yes.”
Jonas craned his neck up toward the ceiling.
“If we burn him, we’ll set off the sprinklers.”
“This isn’t a ritual sacrifice,” Rachel snapped. “I’ll find a good crematorium and do this properly.”
Now it was Jonas’s turn to look at her like she was nuts.
“Crematorium?”
Alissa came rushing up, never one who enjoyed being left out. Lila unfolded a black paper cocktail napkin and daintily set it on top of Alissa’s head. The two shared an eye roll, but they smiled.
“Where were you?” Kell whispered in her ear, holding back an intimate touch on the small of her back. He wished they could spend more time together. The pressure of job applications and interviews had them out of sync.
“Another Zoom interview,” she said with a smile, but it was more distant than normal.
“Tonight? Can you come over?” he asked softly.
With a look of sad regret, she shook her head. “I wish. Have to catch up on work. Tomorrow?”
He growled, which made her giggle.
“Fine. Tomorrow.”
John, a printout in his hand, cleared his throat with exaggerated effort. He gave them a glare, and Kell realized he was interrupting. Alissa turned away from Kell, and John began:
There once was a lemur named Leo
Whose tail got caught in a wheel-o
Poor Rachel was in hell
But along came Kell
Who unzipped her and gave us an eyeful
“That doesn’t even rhyme!” Rachel protested. “And you all saw the video, didn’t you? Every last one of you.” She turned beet red with embarrassment.
“Of course we saw, in real time. All that honking and yelling made us rush to the street,” John said, suddenly avoiding eye contact with her.
“You texted me that you didn’t!” Kell snapped at him.
John shrugged. “I lied.”
“You could have helped!” Something protective in Kell rose up, but he fought it back.
Another shrug from John, who had more on the sheet of paper. He continued:
Leo the lemur was plush
But he wasn’t killed by a bus
Instead his poor tail
Caught in pedicab fail
Caused a half-naked Rachel to cuss
“A little better, but still terrible,” Rachel groaned. Karen silently handed her a paper plate of cake in sympathy.
Jonas took a turn:
A fight with a pedicab wheel
Caused Leo the Lemur to squeal
In the road Rachel fell
But then along came Kell
Who unzipped her and gave us an eyeful
“THAT REALLY DOESN'T rhyme!” Rachel moaned.
“And the tempo is way off,” Lila pointed out.
“The limericks are the eulogy?” Alissa asked, her expression making it clear she found this all unbearably stupid. Kell agreed.
“Basically,” Karen said. “I think Jonas and John were just looking for an excuse to have cake.”
“And write really, really bad poetry,” Kell added.
“This one rhymes,” John called out, beginning to speak as Rachel interrupted him.
“LAST ONE!” she shouted.
He cleared his throat and read:
Our mascot, a lemur, was cute
But now Leo's been rendered quite moot
When – I tell you no jokes --
Got his tail in the spokes
And a bombshell popped out of his suit
“You are an ass,” Rachel said with a long sigh, eyeing the cake, seeming a bit defeated.
Karen used a plastic knife to cut into what Kell assumed was either an eyeball or a horrible hemorrhoid.
“Eat your cake and finish up this charade, then,” Rachel told them.
“But we can’t be done! We have party games,” Lila said.
“Party games?” Karen repeated. “For a funeral?”
Holding back giggles, Lila went to her desk and picked up the poster she and Jonas had been making. It featured a picture of Leo, his tail prominent in the image. Returning to the group, she handed everyone a cutout of a bike wheel and a push pin.
Everyone, including Kell, failed to control their laughter.
“Yeah. Pin the wheel on the tail,” he choked out.
“You suck,” Rachel moaned.
“You all have waaaaaay too much extra time on your hands,” Karen muttered.
“This is ridiculous, anyhow,” Alissa said in a no-nonsense voice Kell knew all too well. “If word got out that a bunch of EEC fellows were making fun of Leo the Lemur, we’d have a PR mess to deal with.”
“Thank you!” Rachel called out.
“Fun sucker,” Jonas said under his breath.
“And that cake looks like someone took a dump on it,” Alissa added.
“GROSS!” Everyone groaned. Karen and Lila, who were currently eating large gobs of brown icing, looked suddenly ill.
Leave it to Alissa, the voice of reason. His practical, pragmatic, judgmental… girlfriend.
“Too bad Kell couldn’t get us a cake from Lovetown or Swoonville or wherever he’s from,” she said with a sneer.
“Luview,” Kell corrected. “You know, my last name.”
“You mean LOVE, YOU, MAINE,” Alissa corrected, pronouncing each word with her hands held up like a movie director. “Where every day is Valentine’s Day.”
“Please stop.” His voice was quiet, so the buzz of Alissa’s phone was loud and clear. She frowned at the screen, then curled her hand inward to hide the glass from view. He caught what she was doing, and as he looked up, he noticed Rachel looking at Alissa’s phone, too.
Then she caught Kell’s eyes, brows up, her question mirroring his own.
What was Alissa being so secretive about?