by Dave Daren
“Well,” I said. “The ‘formal will reading,’ as you see in movies, is not actually mandated by law, but Alister wanted it that way.”
Shannon rolled her eyes. “Of course he would. Such a fucking drama queen.”
I raised my eyebrows at her. Her father hadn’t even been dead twenty-four hours. Even she seemed to catch her own insensitivity.
“I’m sorry, it’s just been so hard on me, I don’t even know what I’m saying,” she said. “I’ve been in a state of shock.”
I somehow doubted that was true.
Gareth walked in at that point. He was roughly about the height of Shannon, and what he wore was technically a suit. Technically. It was a black sport jacket and black trousers. But, the whole thing was made of black sequins. Every movement he made, caught the light and reflected like he was in a Las Vegas showroom.
Underneath the suit, he wore a white ruffled shirt. He topped it off with a black fedora hat, with tufts of brown hair sticking out around his ears. He had striking blue eyes, and a dimpled smile that moved quickly, as if he were used to redeeming it for favors. Although he wasn’t smiling much today.
He joined the crowd around my desk. “What did I miss?”
“Columbo here doesn’t know anything,” Shannon gestured toward me, pursing her lips.
“Columbo, huh?” I raised an eyebrow and sighed. Columbo was a detective, not a lawyer, but you can’t help stupid. I mainly tried not to laugh at the suit.
“Look, here.” Gareth leaned over my desk and looked me in the eye as if he meant to intimidate me. “My father died two days ago. Like, died. Like, you know, dead. Never coming back.”
“My condolences,” I said. “Although, I was there when it happened, so I am aware of the situation.”
“Exactly,” he said and then banged his palms on my desk for emphasis. “Now we are going to need the will, and the money to help us get through this difficult time. Is that too difficult for you to understand?”
“I understand,” I said. “But unfortunately, I can’t do it that way.” “What does that even mean?” Gareth asked. “Look, here pencil pusher man, I am the eldest son, and my father is deceased. Thereby ergo facto sum, I am the heir apparent to his estate effectively concurrently on the aforementioned date.”
I kept back a laugh. Aside from the fact that he had just called me a pencil pusher, I was genuinely impressed at how well he delivered fake Latin and legal jargon in perfect nonsense.
“Alister wanted the family to gather to hear the reading, which we will arrange at time after the funeral tomorrow,” I said. “Then, once the will is read, there is a waiting period.”
“A waiting period?” he spat.
“A waiting period?” Shannon asked.
“Like how long?” Gareth asked. “Like a week?”
“Like a day?” Shannon asked.
“By law, it’s six months before you can collect,” I said.
They looked at me incredulously, and then looked at each other, and then back at me.
“Six months?” Shannon asked. “You know what? Like where’s Thomas?”
She was referring to Thomas Earhardt, the attorney who was unfortunate enough to have represented Alister before me. She looked around the room.
“Like, I want Thomas,” Gareth insisted. “Like, you’re fired.”
“Yeah,” Shannon said. “You’re fired. We’re getting Thomas back.”
I laughed. “Unfortunately, it doesn’t work that way either. Alister signed over the responsibilities to me, so I will be the one handling the will.”
“We’ll just see about that!” Gareth said.
“Yeah, pencil pusher man,” Shannon said. “We’ll see about that.”
Shannon and Gareth turned to leave in a huff. But not before Shannon marched back over to my desk and grabbed my ampersand paperweight and flipped it upside down. She looked me in the eye, as if she had shown me a thing or two, and then turned around and continued her march out of the building. Daphne stood and followed them.
“Umm…what happened?” she asked them as they filed out the door. “Was that good?”
As soon as our office door closed behind them, Vicki and I burst into laughter.
“Well, that just happened,” I said and straightened my paperweight.
“Yeah, pencil pusher,” she said, and I laughed.
“Do we even know what’s in that will?” she asked.
I shook my head. “We’ve got a letter and a video that were filed with the court. But the contents are sealed. We can’t open them until the formal reading. So, I guess a detailed list of the assets are with Thomas?”
“Geez,” Vicki said. “This guy didn’t make anything easy.”
“Yeah,” I said. “Imagine being raised by him. I sort of feel sorry for those yahoos.”
“Please,” she said. “I don’t. They have had everything handed to them on a silver platter, and they still can’t put one foot in front of the other.”
“True,” I laughed. “After the funeral, we will make arrangements to have the will read. We’ll have to get everyone together, which may take some time.”
“Geez. That whole family was a piece of work,” she said. “Where is the mother?”
“Long dead, I think,” I said. “I think I remember him saying something that she was in Africa, doing some kind of humanitarian work for clean water or something, and terrorists came through the village and shot it up, and she got caught in the crossfire.”
“At least she sounded like she had herself together,” Vicki said.
“Eh,” I said. “I wouldn’t have bet on it.”
“Have you heard from AJ?” I asked. “Did they get to Chicago okay?”
“She texted me this morning,” she said. “Landon’s new roommate had volunteered for Hillary Clinton’s campaign.”
I laughed hysterically. “That should be an interesting mix.”
“No doubt,” she said. “Landon apparently said something about serving the Illuminati around him as a test.”
“Art school may not last long for Landon,” I remarked.
With just Vicki and me, the day in our office was even more chill and relaxed than usual. I wasn’t going to arrange the will reading until after the funeral, and we had a few other odds and ends on our plates, but it was a slow time. Jasmine sent me her revised tour rider to look over, and so I downloaded it. I enjoyed the slow pace, because the last few months, Vicki and I had been almost working around the clock.
“Are we still going to dinner with your family tonight?” Vicki asked.
“Yep,” I said. “Should be a real hoot.”
Vicki laughed as she picked up the slight note of sarcasm in my tone. “You secretly enjoy that. You know you do.”
“I think this one’s a big one,” I said. “Phoenix is leaving, I think.”
“Awww,” Vicki said. “Baby Phoenix. I’ll miss him.”
My nineteen-year-old brother was going overseas on some sort of vision quest. I wasn’t sure all the details. The dinner tonight was largely a goodbye to him. I knew it was petty, but I couldn’t help but notice the difference in the way I left home and the way he was leaving. When I left for my undergraduate to study pre-law, there were the appropriate amount of tearful goodbyes.
But, the entire departure was tinged with an undercurrent of disapproval. It seemed to me they hoped I would come to my senses any minute and call Julliard and beg for my spot back. Even when I came back for Thanksgiving break during my freshman year, my mother mentioned that she still had my enrollment packet for Julliard.
“It’s not too late,” she said. “I’m sure they’ll still take you for the spring semester.”
Now Phoenix was taking a second year off, to “find himself,” and they were throwing him a massive party? I had nothing against the trip itself, gap year trips can be significant and meaningful. My parents’ reaction to it just felt a little hypocritical, especially since this was his second or third gap year.
But I had to let it go. I had a great childhood, better than many people. I had two great, loving parents that stayed together, and we never lacked for anything. So, they had some wacky ideas about success. I was grown and out of the house now, so whatever happened then, was irrelevant to my life now.
By the end of the day, my brain was exhausted, and the last thing I wanted to do was spend the evening at a complicated dinner with my family. But it was upon us, so we went.
Big family dinners at the Irving house are no small affair. There are technically only five of us, my parents, my sister Harmony, myself, and my brother Phoenix. But, we have an extended range of family that all live within driving distance, so from time to time, they come in for a party. Phoenix’s going away seemed as worthy as anything to justify a big gathering. On top of that, my parents know everyone in this town. When the Irvings want to throw a party, it’s a party.
My dad, Moondust, is a musician, and has been in and out of bands my whole life. There is not a musician within a fifty-mile radius my dad has not played with. He’s mainly a guitarist, but he plays a little of everything. My mother, Saffron, does every granola activity there is, from teaching yoga, to holding spiritual cleansing classes, to crafting workshops. They are busy bees, and popular ones too. We arrived at the house, and the driveway was so full, we had to park three houses down.
The house was a modest wood frame that was currently painted… carnation pink.
“Wasn’t the house blue the last time we were here?” Vicki asked.
“Yeah,” I said. “That’s definitely a change.”
As we walked the short distance down the block, we could already hear the music booming down the street. People were standing out in the yard, drinking from mason jars, and I guess it was as good as an occasion as any for the neighbors to come hang out in the street. All around, people milled around and chatted, whether they were our guests or not.
About a dozen kids hung around in our yard, and they flowed out into the street where they kicked around a soccer ball. The ball rolled right at my feet.
“Sorry,” one of them yelled, and they all looked at me nervously.
I smiled and gave it a good hard kick and sent it popping about ten feet in the air. I winked at the kids who were impressed.
“Well, aren’t you David Beckham,” Vicki teased.
I laughed, winked, and then put on a British accent. “Well, Victoria, love. I guess that makes you Posh Spice then.”
Still standing in the street, she suddenly got down low, shook her hips and sang the chorus to the Spice Girl’s song Wannabe.
“I do not believe you just did that,” I laughed.
A group of guys standing around in the yard cheered and whistled.
“Oh my God, Vic, get in the damn house,” I said and laughed hysterically.
We entered the house, and I was surprised to notice the inside, that used to be a pastel orange and cream palette, was all now painted in various shades of blues and greens.
“What the hell?” I said as I looked around.
“It looks like we were having a bit of fun with the paint swatches, maybe?” Vicki laughed.
“Clearly,” I said.
My mother saw us first. Today Saffron had her long frizzy brown hair down, and it reached her mid-back. She wore a flowing ankle length patchwork skirt that genuinely looked like it was made out of quilt pieces. She paired it with a blue tank top and a long silver medallion. Bejeweled dress sandals peeked out from under the skirt when she walked. She smiled when she saw us.
“So great to see you guys,” she said.
The musicians had taken a break, so we could actually hear each other. She kissed us both on our cheeks. The first time she did that, it shocked Vicki. But I could tell she was used to it now.
“Hello mom,” I said and hugged her.
“So good to see you, Saffron,” Vicki gushed. “And I am totally loving that skirt.”
My mother smiled big, and it was clear Vicki had definitely said the right thing.
“Oh, thank you,” she said. “I sewed it myself in quilting circle. You know, you should join us sometime. We’d love to have you, meet some of the other ladies.”
Vicki nodded hesitantly. “Well, our work schedule can be demanding, but we are slow right now. Maybe sometime this month.”
“Oh, we would love that,” she said. “All the old clucking hens in there want to meet the L.A. girl that snagged Henry.”
I laughed and felt my face blush, and Vicki looked over at me and then she raised her eyebrows. “Really?”
My mother winked. “Don’t worry. It’s just a bunch of grandmas that don’t have anything better to do than to sit around and talk about their kids’ love lives. I can’t believe I’m in that demographic now. Come on, let me show you what we’ve been doing.”
With a glance back at me, she disappeared into the party. My dad found me then.
“Henry,” he said.
“Hey,” I said. “Good to see you.”
“Want a beer?” he said, as he held out an unlabeled bottle.
I smirked. This wasn’t store bought. It was home brewed from someone, and I didn’t know who.
“Sure,” I said as I took it and twisted off the top.
My dad was tall, and in his late fifties, he was fit and virile. His blue were eyes sharp and alert, although now he wore square framed glasses. His hair would be wavy, but he kept it well trimmed. When I was a kid, I remembered his hair being light brown. Over the years, the color darkened, and was now black salting with gray. Today he wore jeans and a Harley Davidson t-shirt.
“Harley Davidson?” I asked, as I took a sip from the bottle.
I grimaced. “Jesus, where did you get this stuff? This is… potent.”
My dad made a mischievous face. “You don’t know want to know, counsellor.”
I snickered. “I’ll take your word for it.”
He smiled. “Yeah, I just bought a Harley. Thought I’d try it out.”
I looked at him quizzically. “I never saw you as a biker.”
He shrugged. “I always wanted to have a motorcycle, but your mom didn’t like it. She said it was dangerous, and with you kids in the house, she didn’t want me to do anything risky. But now, with Phoenix leaving, I thought I’d start in on my bucket list.”
I shrugged. Fair enough. The music started up again, and people littered every open space. We stepped over bodies, a moved into the living room, which had become a rehearsal room of sorts. It was full of amps and guitars and random musicians and half empty beer bottles. Most of them were in their fifties, like my parents, but not all of them had aged as well. I did catch a few twenty-year-old hipsters in the mix. I perched on the side of the couch, and they all stopped to greet me.
“Play ‘Stairway to Heaven,’” I said.
From all directions, boos and crumpled up paper came flying at me, and I laughed.
“Moondust, your kid’s cheeky,” one of the guys said.
My dad just laughed. “Forgive him, for he knows not what he does.”
“Oh, I think he does,” someone else said, and I just laughed harder.
In the 1970s, my dad had been in a band, and they were really good. I’ve heard recordings, and they were as good as anyone out there at that time. They actually were offered a contract with Columbia Records and would have toured with the Creedence Clearwater Revival.
But, right before the deal was inked, the drummer got offered a job as a backup drummer for Led Zeppelin. In a move of ultimate betrayal, he took it. The guys tried to replace him, but they couldn’t find anyone that could match his talent fast enough to appease the Columbia executives. The deal was rescinded, and the band as an entity broke up. But the members as friends, made a spiritual healing pilgrimage to Sedona, where they all ended up settling down.
Less than a year later, the drummer came crawling back. The rise from obscurity to Zeppelin, had been too fast, and he couldn’t handle it. He had developed a massive dr
ug problem and gotten fired. They never forgave him and now Led Zeppelin is the most profane word they all knew. If I had ever had any inkling to listen Zeppelin growing up, it would have to have been done on the sly, as the band was verboten in the house. Fortunately, classic rock was never my thing in the first place.
Now at the party, as my Led Zeppelin requested had clearly been declined, they resumed their jam session, playing nothing in particular, just melodic electric guitar.
Phoenix showed up in the living room and smiled as soon as he saw me. Well, as much as Phoenix smiles at anyone. It was more of an upturned lip corner and a half nod. At nineteen, my brother still had one last growth spurt in his future. He was skinny with dyed black hair that he gelled to stick up in the back and to fall into his face in the front. He wore black jeans with a studded belt, and a black hooded sweatshirt, with a blue t-shirt peeking out from underneath. Everyone in the room cheered when they saw him.
“South America, huh?” Thad, one of my dad’s friend’s asked.
He nodded. “I’m going to go on a motorcycle pilgrimage with a couple of friends. We’re going to through Argentina, Columbia, and Venezuela and doing a documentary on what we find, particularly about government corruption, and global poverty and what capitalism and even the US government have done to people in other countries. We’ll do this for six months, and then we’re going to work with an organization called, Project Shelter. They build houses for people in poor countries out of bricks made from compressed plastic refuse.”
“You’re a regular Che Guevara,” Thad remarked.
Phoenix smiled and nodded. “I’ve been reading a lot of his writings and he’s been a big inspiration. That, and Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.”
Thad nodded. “Pirsig, good choice.”
Phoenix smiled and then shrugged and then silently moved to the kitchen. My brother was just a kid when I left home. He had grown into a somewhat sullen teenager, with a lot of political opinions and an aversion to tradition, “the system,” and “the man.”
He had joined in my parents’ disapproval toward my choice to become a lawyer, although I never took him seriously. I figured he was too young to have an informed opinion, and he was just parroting what he had heard.
