Final Arrangements (5 page)

Aside from the occasional stares Stretch got
for his size, nobody was watching them, per se. Shannon watched the
patrons of Gelson's move about the store as if in a dream with
their carts, selecting carefully from this or that assortment of
foodstuffs far beyond those required for mere subsistence of life.
If you were into generic, you didn't shop at Gelson's where
labeling definitely mattered.

To a Gelsonite, labeling was everything, from
the cars they drove to the designer labels covering their hides.
Gelson's was a place which offered a taste of the good life to the
denizens of the Encino Hills, where upscale, modernistic hedonism,
and various divisions of the entertainment industry were happily
married together in a socioeconomic pastiche which powered the
dream machine of the world's imagination.

"Nobody shops here, Stretch," she said.

"Come again?"

"Nobody really shops here. They come in for
something special they can't get anywhere else. But you don't see
carts full of the stuff ordinary people buy. Like, how many bags of
beans and rice do you think they sell in a week? Three?"

"Because they aren't ordinary people like us.
They're movie people."

Shannon nodded. She thought of her father, a
plain but moral man who never shopped at Gelson's, and felt the
loss of him, a loss which grew heavier at her own inner fatigue and
helplessness to complete the final arrangements on her own. And at
the thought of the arrangements left undone, she thought of the
fall of her brother. His collapse in the wake of the pain from his
father's death.

"Stretch, my brother Phil is an alcoholic.
He's been clean and sober for four years. Last night, he drank. His
wife--"

"--Minda?"

"--Minda. Stretch, do you know everything
about my family?"

"Your dad talked a lot about Minda when we
played chess. He loved her a lot. Minda is Philippino. It's a
nickname which means jewel. Your brother met her when he was
stationed over there in the Navy as part of his job as a SEAL."

"Did Dad tell you Phil was dishonorably
discharged?"

"No. No, he didn't."

"For fighting. And drinking. And other
things." Shannon sighed. This perfect stranger, it seemed, knew
everything about her, but not about Phil. "Anyway, Minda called me
this morning. Phil came home this morning and started acting wild
and scared his children. He's passed out on the couch at their
condo about a mile from here. I was on my way over there when I
realized I just couldn't face it. That's why I called you. This
whole thing has put me at wit's end. My brother is a loser. He
doesn't even work full-time. They live on Minda's earnings. She's
an RN at Encino Hospital."

"He doesn't work at all?"

"Just seasonal construction jobs. He claims
it's because he doesn't have his driver's license. But the truth
is, all he does is hang out at AA meetings and play pinball at the
Alano club. He doesn't even help all that much with the kids.
They're in daycare and school while he's at his meetings."

"I don't feel comfortable criticizing your
brother," Stretch said. "It sounds like he needs a job, though. Do
you want me to give him a job in my warehouse or something?"

"Where's the warehouse?"

"Out on San Fernando Road near Paxton. But
it's a straight shot on the bus so he wouldn't have to worry about
driving. Can he operate a forklift?"

This guy's smart
, she thought.
His
story is flawless. Except for the part about the hippo.
"No,
don't help him. He needs to help himself. He's had enough handouts.
He won't appreciate the job if he doesn't have to work to get
it."

"Shall I order us something else?"

"No. And don't avoid what I'm saying. Will
you go with me to my brother's place? That's why I called you in
the first place."

"No."

"No?"

"No."

"But that's why I called you. To go with me
to my brother's condo."

"And do what once we get there?" he
asked.

"His wife is in hysterics. She needs someone
to comfort her. To protect her, even."

"Then she'll have to call on the police and
then get her family involved."

"I'm her family," Shannon said. "She can't
call the police. They'll violate his parole and then he'll go to
prison."

"You're too busy grieving to comfort anybody
else. I meant her other family. She'll have to call on them for
support."

"But they're all in the Philippines."

"It's a small world nowadays," Stretch
replied. "They have this new thing they call an airplane. She'll
have to fly home and take the children with her."

"She can't do that. They might let a
terrorist with bombs in his shoes get on board. And she'd miss the
funeral. She and my father were very close. And the grandkids will
need to say good-bye to their grandpa."

"The grandkids don't need to see your
father's body lying in it's coffin. No child needs to. Neither does
your brother's wife. She'll have to miss the funeral. I'm sure your
father won't mind."

Shannon sipped her coffee, washing down
another bite of chocolate and candied apricots. She was eating the
stuff mechanically, now, the exotic flavors no longer able to
excite her fatigued taste buds. She might as well have been chewing
cardboard for all it mattered. It was almost like the way her life
had gone. From exciting and full of life to dull and dusty as death
in only a few bites. "What was that?" she said.

"What was what?"

She noticed up close Stretch had a few crow's
feet appearing around his eyes. Putting him at somewhere around 30
years old. Which made him about the same age as herself, which
happened to be the near side of 28. "You know what. That little
verbal tennis match we just had. What was that? And how old are
you?" She really wanted to know. And wondered how a guy who
invented stories the way he did could be so extremely quick
verbally and logically.

"I'm sorry," he said. "I treated you like a
child. I guess I've spent too much time working with the youth at
church. I work with the High School Seniors who have short
attention spans and need simple directions to help them find their
way out of the immature little mazes they so uncannily construct.
And I'm almost 30. Okay, I am 30."

"Uncannily construct? Are you saying that's
what I've just done? Acted immaturely?"

He smiled ruefully. "Not exactly. Your
situation is not something you've constructed. It's more something
you've been thrust into against your will. You couldn't control
your dad's passing, and you couldn't control your brother's
response to it. Which is why I suggested you leave your brother
alone. Messing with his head right now is a trip you aren't
prepared to take. What you need to do is keep things simple. Take
simple baby steps. And you can't save Minda, either. Right now,
everybody is down for the count."

"You're a paragon of wisdom, aren't you? Did
you learn all that from cleaning pools?"

"The Bible," he replied. "Solomon said,
Get wisdom
. Well, I read it and I got it."

"How much of the Bible have you read?"

"All of it. Cover to cover. Four times."

"Quote me something. But make it something
not everybody knows."

"
Remember now thy creator in the days of
thy youth,"
he said
, "while the evil days come not, or the
years draw nigh when thou shalt say, I have no pleasure in
them.
Ecclesiastes 12, verse 1. I always quote that one to my
young people. Solomon also warns young men against joining gangs,
you know."

She pointed to the cell phone clipped to his
belt. "Call Forest Lawn."

"Beg your pardon?"

"Call Forest Lawn. I realized you're right.
If I'm going to get through this, I've got to take simple baby
steps. So my first step is to have you call Forest Lawn and make us
an appointment. Once you do this, I'm going to let you take me back
to the house and keep me company while I search through my dad's
papers. We'll have to see if we can find a copy of his will."

"No need. He keeps it at his lawyer's office.
But he does have a safe deposit box you should open."

"He told you that?"

Stretch nodded.

Shannon knew about the box. Dad had made her
a signatory. "Could you please make the call I asked you to? And I
still need to go to Dad's and look through his things."

"Forest Lawn it is, then."

"Meanwhile, I'll call Minda. She was
expecting me over an hour ago."

Minda answered on the third ring. "Shannon,
he's up. He went out for more booze. I tried to stop him and he
cursed me. I'm afraid of what he might do when he gets back. When
are you coming?"

"I'm not coming over, Minda."

"Shannon!"

"Minda, listen to me carefully. Grab your
purse and passports and any money or credit cards you have and get
in your car and get out of the house. Get your kids from the
sitter's and go straight to the Philippines."

"Shannon?"

"Minda. You are in danger. Leave the house
now. I'll stay on the phone with you while you grab your stuff and
get in the car."

"Shannon ... I ... I'm scared."

"Of course you are. But you've got to think
of the kids. This is no time for personal feelings."

"Okay. But don't hang up until I'm in the
car."

She waited for what seemed like an eternity,
while Minda scurried around, grabbing this and grabbing that and
finally made it to the safety of the car.

"Okay," Minda said. "I left him a note
telling what I'm doing. I'm out of the house. I'm going for the
kids."

"No. Don't leave a note. Call me when you're
on the plane," Shannon said.

"We won't be at the funeral."

"I know."

"Good-bye, Shannon. Pray for me."

"I will."

There. A mountain moved. On simple advice
from The Pool Guy. A high school dropout with the debating skills
of a congressman, who was 30 years old but still wanted to tell
people he was 29. She watched the people shopping some more. The
movie people, he called them.

"Forest Lawn's a go at 2 o'clock," he
said.

"What's it all about, Stretch?"

"What do you mean?"

"Minda's flying to the Philippines. My
brother's broken his sobriety pledge. My father's gone. We're
sitting with a bunch of movie people. What's going on?"

"It's almost the end of time," he said.

"That's your explanation? It's the end of
time?"

"Sure. You don't agree?"

"Hardly. No man knows when the end of time
will be, not the day or the hour."

"Look around you, Shannon. It's right in
front of your face. You're in a market filled with movie people.
These are the people who appear among us right at the end of
time."

"A funny way of looking at it."

"Is it? It's a sign of the end. Jude wrote
about the people he called the dreamers.

"It's all passing away? Like in a dream?"

"You're laughing at me."

"No. I just couldn't resist the pun. But
surely you don't think these movie people are going to bring about
the end of the world. Surely you don't see them that way."

"I see them as a gaggle of conspiritants
joined together only by a desire to see just how far down their
concoctions of the darkest possible turnings and shadows can take
us."

There it is,
she thought. Now she
understood his power. He was a genius, not with numbers, but with
words. "Whew. You better go ahead and become a pastor, Stretch. In
fact, a preacher, or a prophet. Because what just came out of your
mouth wasn't human."

"Don't you agree with what I just said?"

"Maybe. No. I don't mean no. I mean, yes.
You're right. What's happening is evil. Yes. But people should be
worrying about their own personal dying day instead of the end of
the world. Because once you die, that's the end of time for you.
Look at my Dad. He was here one day, gone the next."

"Well said."

"Why are we talking about this?"

"Because you thought of your father," he
said. "And what a good, sweet man he was. And how you will miss him
and what he stood for. How the world is a lesser place without
him."

"And to avoid thinking about him, I asked you
your opinion of the movie industry."

"Yes. You asked me. And it helped you. For
the brief instant we were talking, your pain was gone. For that
brief instant. We took it away."

"Keep talking like that," she said, "And I
might marry you at that. But we'd better get going."

"I know. I'm dawdling. I liked what you just
said. Can I hold out some hope?"

"Why not, Stretch? And I'm dawdling, too. The
thought of going back to Dad's isn't one I'm looking forward
to."

"I'll help you," he said. "You're not
alone."

"Right. God is with us."

He took her by the elbow, his hand rough and
warm.

"And I'm with you."

In spite of herself, and how wrong she knew
it was, she had to admit he was a comfort.

Chapter 5

"This is your car?" she said.

"Yes."

"A Mercedes?"

It was magnificent, silver, and a convertible
to boot, with red and black leather upholstery. She wondered where
he'd gotten it from. Not the small convertible, but the big one,
which she knew from her past dealings with a wealthy client to have
a 12-cylinder motor and cost somewhere in the neighborhood of
160,000 dollars. Hopefully it wasn't stolen. The car was the
priciest machine at the moment to grace the Gelson's lot. Not an
easy achievement in this neighborhood, an honor he wouldn't hold
all day. Not considering the odds that at any moment his position
could be usurped by a big fat Bentley, like the red one driven by
Fabio, or a Maserati, of the kind favored by Rod Stewart, which
would exude, even while parked, a sort of fierce, decadent
ferility. There was a paper bag on the passenger seat.