Castle Juliet

by Brandon Berntson

  “I wonder if there’s anything your mother can’t do, Alice,” Phillip said. “She is a marvel of a woman.”

  “We’re definitely making it all cheery and new, Alice,” Jack said. “Come on, Alice. You can help me dig the trenches.”

  “I got an extra pair of gloves over here in the truck, Alice,” Phillip said.

  “It’s gonna be a fabulous summer, Alice,” Jane said. The phrase made the gooseflesh stand out on Alice’s forearms. May did not feel like spring at all. It felt like summer already. Maybe that was why spring seemed strange to her this year.

  “Fred and Emily are supposed to stop by, too,” Jane said. “They’re bringing the potato salad.”

  “Fred and…Emily?” Alice said, looking over at her mother.

  “Shoot, Alice,” Jack said. “Ever since you mentioned the horses and Fred to Emily, they’ve been hanging out every day since. I think I hear wedding bells.”

  “The two are inseparable, Alice,” Phillip said. “Having tea with Emily must’ve been some kind of fateful moment. You should be proud. You have another aunt, it looks like.”

  “I think I’m getting dizzy,” Alice said. “How come I’m the last to know about this?”

  “I think they wanted to surprise you, dear,” Jane said.

  “Alice.” Jack said. “You are quite the match maker. Like your mom, I wonder if there’s anything you can’t do.”

  Alice didn’t know what to make of all this. She felt she’d gone through a time warp, like Jack being gone all this time, she too, felt she’d gone away, at least mentally. Maybe she’d been riding Sue more than she’d thought.

  “You mean…?” she began, and wasn’t sure what her question was. She stepped through the gate, which was already open, and looked at Boxer. Even Boxer looked odd, cocking his head, wondering where she’d been all this time.

  “Since you talked about Fred so much, she wanted to meet him and see his horses,” Jane said, driving the small spade into the earth and planting another geranium. “She just got to talking about things, and they hit it off right away. And she loves horses. You’re not jealous, are you?”

  “What?”

  Jack smiled at her.

  “Jealous?” Alice said, frowning and blushing at the same time. “Of course, I’m not jealous. I’m happy for Fred, for Emily. I just…wow…everything’s happened so fast…”

  “You should hang out in town more often,” Jack said. “Maybe you can find someone for Dad.”

  Phillip looked up in his defense. “I’m fine the way I am, Miss Alice. Jack and I have a good life.”

  Hadn’t Jack mentioned Phillip had been seeing someone? Maybe Jack hadn’t been sure, either. Maybe Jack had just been telling a little white lie.

  Alice looked at Jack. A hummingbird whizzed by, startling her. It hovered in the air, then darted off.

  “Is there something you aren’t telling me?” Alice asked.

  “All in good time, Alice,” Jack said. “All in good time. Let’s just enjoy the day, and savor the time we have now. Come on and help me dig this trench. Instead of treasures, I keep thinking it’s full of water. See, you can see all the boats and carriers moving in both directions down the waterway, ships waging war at each other across the flagstones. The flowers are bulbs of magical fantasy worlds. Nothing can destroy them. It gets brighter as it goes!”

  Resigning herself, Alice helped Jack anyway. She was still confused, but the more she said, the more confused she became.

  Gerald pulled up later that afternoon, and soon afterwards, Fred and Emily stopped by. Emily wasn’t as fashionably dressed as when Alice saw her in town. She almost didn’t recognize her. She wore simple jeans and a button up shirt with long sleeves.

  “We brought sodas, potato chips, and Popsicles,” Emily exclaimed.

  “She’s a treat,” Fred said, stepping out of the truck. “She wanted to go to Kentucky Fried Chicken, because she likes the coleslaw. But I persuaded her it was going to be a great barbecue.”

  Alice felt like she was on a roller coaster, bombarded with surprise and thrills. This was just a spring day like any other, but it felt like Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas all rolled into one. She didn’t have an explanation for it, but she loved it just the same.

  Here was Sue and Boxer, Jack and Phillip, her mother and father, and now Fred and Emily.

  Trying not to question it, Alice tipped her hat in everyone’s direction. She resolved herself to the evening, a perfect barbecue, and a holiday she had yet to find a name for.

  *

  The grave of Jack’s mother and Phillip’s wife was well cared for. Two roses—one from each of them—rested at the foot of the marker, which read, Jezebel Davies Bristol. Loving Wife and Mother. Davies, though a man’s name, was her great great grandfather, who her mother’s mother insisted she be named after.

  “You know, Dad,” Jack said. “This is the first time I’ve been here and have been happy, and not sad at all.”

  Phillip put a hand on Jack’s shoulder. “Me, too, Jacky-boy. Funny, huh?”

  Clouds parted, came and went, shading the area, then lighting it again. A huge elm tree in full bloom provided shade over several respectful graves around the area. Storyville’s cemetery was a quaint, small, fenced-in area atop a slight hill under several elm trees. The fence was only three feet high, made of wrought-iron. Bouquets, roses, even several toys and balloons adorned several of the graves. A strong breeze briskly moved over the cemetery, blowing the leaves of the trees.

  “She’s proud of us, Jacky-boy,” Phillip said.

  “You think so, Dad?”

  “Shoot!” Phillip said. “I know it, son. We’ve come a long way since she’s been gone, and we’ve done her proud. It was hard for a while, but it’s not like that now. We have plenty to look forward to, a whole imaginative summer ahead of us, and new adventures to create. Why shouldn’t she be proud of us?”

  Jack smiled. He looked out over the valley, the mountains in the distance. The way the sun brightened the roses by the marker reminded him of the Christmas lights in winter.

  “How’s your project coming, Jack?”

  “Almost done,” Jack said. “I’ve been working on it for over a year now. I think I’ll be ready to show her soon. I just can’t believe she hasn’t discovered it with how many times she’s been out riding.”

  Phillip, again, squeezed his son’s shoulder. “She’ll love it,” he said.

  “I hope so,” Jack said.

  They stood for a while, staring down at the grave, sometimes looking out over the valley below, the surrounding countryside that made Storyville what it was. They’d been here for a while. It had been a long time coming. They would come more often now, Phillip told his son.

  “I never knew you guys were in the theater,” Jack said. “How come you never told me?”

  Phillip shrugged. “I don’t know. We did a lot of plays together. I guess a lot of it, just playing and pretending reminded me of her. But now it’s not bad, thinking of her acting, and me, too. I like it, and I’m glad you like it, too, Jacky-boy.”

  Jack smiled and nodded. “I bet she was great,” he said.

  “That she was. Pretty, too. She’d have the boys swooning. Many callers, but I was the lucky one.”

  “I can see that.”

  “I’ll pull out the photo albums with her. I had them hid away since she died.”

  Jack nodded, and looked around, feeling the warm breeze of late May.

  “Ready yet, my boy?” Phillip said.

  “Sure,” Jack said. “You want to play American Rebels on the way home?”

  “Guns or light sabers?”

  “Light sabers today, Dad. We’ll travel through space. Like Alice said, they’ll look cool, being kinda like lasers and all. I’ll even take the pink one.”

  “You can have a head start.”

  “All right,” Jack said. He didn’t start running until he was actually out of the cemetery. Something didn’t feel right ab
out playing in a spot where his mom was buried; though, in all honesty, Jack didn’t think she’d mind.

  Once he made it to the edge of the hill, however, he turned and said: “The ships are coming, pa! The ships are coming! Big Stealth Destroyers, too!”

  Phillip stood for a second or two longer, looking down at the grave of his wife. He was smiling. “You helped raise him, too, you know?” he said. “He wouldn’t be nearly as imaginative without you, hon, but the boy is calling.”

  Phillip stood a while longer and placed a pocket-watch at the foot of the grave beside the roses. He’d made it just for the occasion. “Because time is eternal,” he said. “And sometimes meaningless at the same time.” He kissed two of his fingers and placed them on the engravings of his wife’s name. “I know you—of all people—will understand what that means.”

  He was a clockmaker after all. If he needed more time with her, he could pull it out of his pocket. There, they would have it forever to play with, forever to hold, to do with as they liked. That was not a bad philosophy to raise a little boy on, was it? And, if he needed to stop time, to relive it all again, he could do that, too. Being a clockmaker had its advantages. For now, the ironic thing, Phillip thought, was how he seemed to have all the time in the world. He had Jacky-boy, and he would make the best of that.

  “You’d better run fast, Jacky-boy!” Phillip turned and called to his son. He hurried out of the cemetery and started after Jack, who was a ways down the hill already and running fast. “I’m in the ship now, Jacky-boy, and I’m going at light speed! Watch out for meteors!”

  “Way ahead of you, Dad!” Jack called in return. He laughed and hollered in the light of the sun because to Jacky-boy, time was malleable, too…

  CHAPTER XVI

  A THRONE FOR A QUEEN

  Jack walked from his house, a stick in his hands, chopping at the grass he pretended was higher than it actually was. He was on the prowl, looking for lions, tigers, bears, spaceships, monsters, and whatever else lurked in the high grass. He was going to Alice’s house, and he was wearing the cardboard top hat his father had made. It was a special occasion. The hat was weathered from the time it had been in the snow on top of Frosty, but Jack had grown attached to it—weathered or not—and like Alice’s cowboy hat, he wore it all the time.

  “Move out! Move out!” he called, and giggled to himself. He imagined black panthers in the high grass, circling him, licking their lips, but once he called, Move out!—they did as instructed. If they were smart, they obeyed Jack, because he was a dangerous boy. Jack had the panthers hypnotized. They would do whatever he wanted. This probably didn’t make sense to anyone but Jack, but that was okay; on his adventures, they never had to. He liked being alone for this reason because he never had to explain why his adventures meant one thing or another. He knew what they were about, and that was all that mattered.

  It was the tail end of spring, and Jack was very excited today. School had ended days ago, and he’d passed all his classes. His lowest grade had been a B- in History, and he could live with that. His dad was very proud of him. Alice, too, was proud. Her lowest grade was a B+—ironically—in the same class. Jack and Alice’s imagination must’ve wondered a bit more in History. Jack thought it nothing more than the horses, cannons, ships, and all that cool stuff that made history so distracting and fascinating. If they were going to provide the adventure, what was he supposed to do?

  Jack supposed he might be changing in some way, but scoffed at the idea. Changing into what, he thought? A more imaginative boy? Just because he was doing better in school didn’t mean he was changing. If anything, Jack did what he could to stay the child he was. No amount of study was going to get in the way of that, he thought.

  Clouds fleeced a bright blue sky as he walked through the high grass. It was a beautiful spring day at the beginning of June, and summer was right around the corner. It had been a busy spring. Putting the finishing touches on the project he’d been working on had taken some time. “Yeah!” he said, aloud, and pretended the stick was now a sword. He jumped, held the sword out, and parried with the black panthers, who screamed like little girls, and ran away. Jack giggled as he watched the panthers disappearing into the jungle.

  Fred and Emily had announced a wedding date for the first of August. Jack couldn’t take his eyes off Emily when everybody had arrived for the barbecue that day. Like Alice having a crush on Fred, Jack thought Emily was mesmerizing. He had never seen anyone so beautiful. All that mesmeric dark hair and fair skin sent him into a trance. During the barbecue, Emily and Fred caught Jack staring.

  “Hello, handsome,” Emily had said.

  She smiled so wide, Jack about fell out of his seat. He took a gulp and widened his eyes.

  “She’s pretty, isn’t she, Jack?” Fred said.

  Jack turned beet red. “I didn’t mean nothing by it, Mr. Fred, sir. But boy, Emily, you really are pretty. Ain’t she pretty, Mr. Fred, sir?”

  All Fred could do was shake his head and whistle.

  Emily blushed; Fred laughed, and Jack had never been more embarrassed in his life.

  Jack thought about the past year, everything in it, and wondered what the summer would bring. More adventures, no doubt, and different angles on life he’d never imagined before. At least, that’s what he thought.

  Jack, swiping at the grass again with his stick, his top hat somewhat shading his eyes, walked on through the grass under the warm sun. Every living thing was full and brimming with life around him. He rounded a small hill, and Alice’s house came into view. Intense colors from what seemed hundreds of flowers met his eye. They were on the porch, along the walkway, and under the window. He could already smell them. A large bumblebee whizzed by his head, startling him, then took off. His brow broke out in sweat.

  “Don’t do it again, BumbleBum!” Jack shouted at the bee, pumping his fist in the air. “I know where you live!” He’d never been stung before, and he planned on keeping it that way. Those big, black, hairy bumblebees scared him. He imagined them with laser pistols, sometimes swords and shields as they flew through the air.

  He walked up to the fence, opened the gate, and Boxer met him instantly. Boxer yipped, jumped, wagged his tail, and did everything but lick Jack’s features right off his face. Jack laughed.

  “Easy there, Boxer,” Jack said, patting the dog’s head. “How come you didn’t eat the bumblebee?”

  Jack stepped along the walkway, up the porch, and knocked on the door. In seconds, Alice opened it, and beamed at Jack.

  “Jack! You’re alive!” she said, clapping her hands excitedly. “You finally came to visit me!”

  “That I have, dear Alice. And let me say, I’m pleased to be in the presence of such greatness.” Like a gentleman, Jack took his hat off, bowed to Alice, sweeping one arm dramatically behind him. Alice giggled. Boxer jumped, barked, wagged his tail, and Jack plopped his hat back on.

  “Actually, dear Alice,” Jack said. “I have a surprise for you. It hasn’t been easy keeping it a secret, but it’s finally ready. And I must say, the suspense has been killing me. Can you get away and take a little trip with me?”

  Alice’s eyes lit up. “Of course! Is that okay, Mom?”

  Jane and Gerald were both within earshot inside the house, and Jane nodded.

  “Can we bring Sue?” Alice asked.

  “I’d rather we did,” Jack said, rocking back and forth on his heels. He waved inside the door to Jane and Gerald.

  After some fumbling about in her room, putting on her cowboy boots and hat, Alice emerged and they went out back. Alice saddled Sue with the pulley, buckled the saddle into place, then climbed up. She helped Jack up, who sat behind her. Boxer, eager to see what all the fuss was all about, tagged along. Gerald poked his head out the back window and winked at Jack, who winked in return. “Have fun, kids!”

  “Be back in time for supper!” Jane called from the same window. “Fred and Emily are stopping by. They’re bringing cake! So, bring your dad, Jack
!”

  “Mmmm,” Jack said. “Who doesn’t like cake?”

  In unison, Jack and Alice tipped their hats in Jane and Gerald’s direction, and away they went. Boxer ran ahead, while Sue moved along at a steady trot. Boxer ran back, barked at Alice and Jack, ran ahead again, wanting to play tag, but Alice was insistent: “Not today, Boxer. Just run and play. We’re enjoying the scenery.”

  They trotted along for a while before Alice asked, “So, where are we going, Jack? And what is it you want to show me?”

  “I’ll tell you where, and you follow my directions. But for now, it’s a surprise, dear Alice, and you’ll just have to wait and see.”

  Alice was okay with that, but she was anxious to see what Jack’s big surprise was. She nudged Sue more often, putting some gallop in her step. As Sue trotted along, Alice hopped up and down on the saddle along with Jack, who put a hand to his top hat to keep it from falling off. Along the way, though, Jack vaguely clued her in:

  “I’ve been working on it for almost a year now, Alice. I finally finished it yesterday. Well, I guess there’s always more you could do, and I did have a little help. I was lucky.”

  “What is it, Jack?”

  “Just a little farther, Alice,” Jack said.

  A little farther turned out to be rather far. They left Storyville behind altogether and came up over several hills and down again. Finally, they descended into a vast pasture of bucolic land, copses of thick, tall trees, clear, beautiful streams, and a grove of aspens before the foothills. Alice had never been this far out. They’d been riding Sue for almost an hour now, and Alice thought they must be several miles from home.

  Sue trotted past a shallow stream and between the boles of the blooming aspens. After some time, the aspens opened into a bright, sunny glade with deeper and taller trees all around. Lush green grass spread out everywhere. Above the trees, the sky was cloudless, crisp, and blue. Alice couldn’t believe she’d never been here before. It was quiet and beautiful, like some magical setting, but…simple, too, she thought, and smiled.