"Mom, tell Elizabeth to get away from my fish!"
"I'm nowhere near his fish!"
"She's poking it with a fork!"
Brushing her hair out of her face, Mattie Brooks ignored her children's arguing and turned up the radio. Total Eclipse of the Heart was playing. She began to sing along as she searched through the cupboards for something easy to make for breakfast. They were all out of cereal.
"Honey, are you going to do something about the fish?" her husband, Mark, asked conversationally, coming into the kitchen, wrestling with his tie. "I think Elizabeth might shishkabob it."
Smiling, she went over to him and helped him tame the tie. "Great. Maybe we could fry it up for breakfast."
"No cereal?"
"There's Raisin Bran. But no one eats healthy cereal except for Rachel and me. And Rachel's not up yet."
"She's a teenager now, my dear. She only awakens when it starts to get dark."
"Are you saying my thirteen-year-old daughter is a vampire?"
Two screaming children raced into the kitchen, looped around the table and then ran back into the living room. They were in the room for a total of about three seconds, but they managed to knock the calendar off the wall and overturn a chair.
"May I ask why Riley was bouncing?" Mark asked.
"You could ask that, but first you'd have to ask where the Sugar Bombs went."
"Ah. I understand." He kissed her cheek. "I'll pick something up on the way to work. I'm running late. Don't let the kids tie you up or anything. How's Rachel getting to gymnastics today?"
"Her friend April's giving her a ride. Have a good day, Mark."
When he was gone, she continued on her search for food. Eventually, she decided she'd be able to think better if she wasn't working on an empty stomach, so she got out the box of Raisin Bran. Peering into the box, she jumped, startled. "Elizabeth!" she yelled. "Get in here!"
Elizabeth, the equivalent of a tornado or hurricane or some other natural disaster once you got sugar in her, appeared in the kitchen, with her younger brother Riley at her side. "Yeah?" she chirped.
"Why is Barbie's head in the box of Raisin Bran?"
"She and Ken had a fight over who should get the microwave. They had a bitter divorce." She smiled proudly. "Ken got mad. You should see where her other body parts are hidden."
"Have you and Daddy been watching late night horror movies again?" Mattie asked pleasantly.
"Yep! Have you ever seen Invasion of the Body Snatchers?"
"No." She tossed the doll head to her daughter. "Let's try to keep the murdering of our toys down to a minimum, shall we?"
"Well, I'll see what I can do. But once Ken gets out of jail…" Elizabeth raised her eyebrows at her mother. "You know. Things could get ugly."
While Mattie stood, wondering if eight-year-old Elizabeth was reading True Crime magazines for fun, Riley sneezed violently.
"Gross, Mom, Riley didn't cover his mouth," Elizabeth whined.
"Wanna hear a joke, Mom?" Riley asked, wiping his nose with his sleeve.
"Use a Kleenex next time," Mattie said. "Please tell me your joke, Riley. I would be delighted."
"What do a Rubik's cube and a wienie have in common?" Riley waited for a moment, figuring he had stumped his mother, when really she was just in awe. He started to laugh. "The more you play with them, the harder they get!"
Mattie's mouth gaped open. "Who told you that?" she demanded.
"Uncle Will. I don't really get it but it's funny anyway!"
"I may have to have a talk with your uncle about telling body part jokes to my six-year-old son."
He'd been missing her lately. He had a wife and three kids now, but every once in awhile, his thoughts turned to his old girlfriend, and he wondered about how she was doing. He hadn't talked to her in twenty years, but sometimes he still kind of kept in contact with her older brother.
Right now though, he needed to talk to her.
The evening before when Toby had called him with the news, Gordie had phoned up Sam McRoyan. It had been about six months or so since they'd talked, and it had been nice to hear his voice. Sam had been pretty upset with what he had had to tell him, but he had told Gordie that there was another old friend that he ought to phone. He gave him his sister's phone number in Salem.
Gordie had been sitting in the room he did his writing in, looking from the phone to the slip of paper he'd written the phone number on, for over an hour. He heard his wife call to him that she was taking the kids clothes shopping. Finally, he picked up the phone.
"Every now and then I know you'll never be the boy you always wanted to be," Mattie gently sang to herself. Her kids hated it when she sang, but she didn't much care. "But every now and then I know you'll always be the only boy who wanted me the way that I am."
"Mom, knock it off!" Riley cried irritably. "I'm trying to watch TV!"
"It's too early for TV!" Mattie called back. "Turn it off and read a book!"
"I can't read!"
The phone rang, and she crossed the small kitchen to answer. "Please try not to scream too much while I'm on the phone, okay?"
"Why?" Elizabeth, who was helping her mother make oatmeal, asked.
"Because it could be someone important."
"Like who?"
"Like God," Mattie answered hastily. "Go play." She picked up the receiver and said, "Hello?"
"Yes, is Mattie McRoyan available?"
It never ceased to annoy her when people called her by her maiden name. Resting against the counter, she replied, "This is she. And it's not McRoyan."
"Sorry, Mattie. This is Gordie Lachance."
"Gordie?" she gasped.
"Do you remember me?"
"Gordie! Of course I do!" A smile grew widely on her face. "How are you?" she asked eagerly.
"I'm doing good. Making it in the writing world."
"I always knew you would!" she said. "I'm proud of you, Gordie."
Suddenly, Mattie felt guilty. She was happily married now, and she had three beautiful kids with this man, even though two of the kids were sugar demons, and the oldest slept when she wasn't busy being perfect in all of her extracurricular activities. She loved her family, no matter how much they pushed her buttons sometimes. Yet, when she heard Gordie's voice, she was strongly attracted to him. Twenty years later and he still turned her into silly putty.
"Thanks," he said. "What about you? Your brother told me you've got the whole white picket fence thing happening."
She laughed. "Far from it. But yeah…I've got a great family now."
Someone screamed shrilly in one of the far bedrooms. "Get that the HELL away from me! MOM!"
"Is that your family screaming?" Gordie asked nonchalantly, but Mattie could tell that he was smiling.
"I think my children are attempting fratricide." She held the phone away from her mouth and yelled, "Riley! What are you doing?"
"I'm watching TV!" Riley yelled back from the living room.
"I told you to turn that off!"
Rachel, a tall, wispy girl, stormed down the hallway, clutching Elizabeth by the hair. "Mother, your daughter put a fish on my face!"
"Elizabeth!" Mattie cried, shocked. "Is the fish okay?"
"I hated that fish," Elizabeth said, a triumphant smile on her face. "Can we get a cat now?"
"You killed your brother's fish?"
"You killed Goldie?" Riley screamed. He stampeded into the kitchen and lunged at Elizabeth.
"Watch the dishwasher!" Mattie ordered. "Rachel, will you flush the fish down the toilet for me? And maybe herd these two into another room? I'm on the phone."
"My BRAIN! You loosened my BRAIN!" Elizabeth was groaning. "It's oozing! It's OOZING!"
"Go fight in the bathroom! And close the door behind you! And don't split your heads open on the bathtub! Or swallow any pills!" Mattie sighed as Rachel ushered Elizabeth and Riley down the hallway. "Hello," she said to Gordie.
"What lovely children you produced," Gordie laughed.
"Thanks, I tried," she replied. "Anyway, what have you been up to in the last twenty years?"
He paused. "Umm…I'm sorry, Mattie, but I didn't really call to catch up or reminisce."
"Well good," she said. "That would take a while."
"I'm just phoning to tell you…there's a funeral in Portland…and I think you should come."
"A funeral?" Mattie ran a hand through her hair. She hadn't talked to any of her friends from her "Gordie Days," as she called them, in two decades, but the news caught her off guard and sunk her stomach.
"Chris died last week," he said quietly.
"Chris? What happened?"
"He was trying to settle an argument between two guys in a restaurant, and one of them stabbed him."
"Oh my God," she breathed. For a moment, all she could think of was his bravely weathered smile and how he always tried to mend the rifts between people. He'd been a peacemaker till the very end. How could she have let such an amazing person leave her life? The last time she'd ever talked to him, they had a fight, when all he did was try to help her remain friends with Gordie.
"Mattie?" he asked. She'd gone quiet for too long. "You still there?"
"I'm still here," she replied. "I'm so sorry, Gordie. I know how good of friends you guys were and how much he meant to you."
"Actually--I, um, actually hadn't talked to him in close to ten years. I read about it in the paper." His voice was growing thick. Mattie could tell he was close to tears. "But the funeral is this weekend in Portland, and I think you should come."
"Of course I will," she said, but then stopped. "But my kids, Gordie. I can't leave them here alone, and I think my husband works so he won't be able to take care of them."
"Bring them. They can stay with my wife and kids at the hotel." He cleared his throat. "And I really want to see you, Mattie. And I'm sure Toby will, too. Sam will be there…it's going to all our old friends, you have to come."
"But Chris won't be there," she said.
"Sure he will."