Life Ain't Always Beautiful

Chapter Six: "To Good Health an' Good Times"

Back to school, back to "business". Back to pretty preppy chicks with pigtails and mini-skirts. Back to guys that are perverted beyond reason. Back to Mr. McNeil's English class. Have ya ever met Mr. McNeil? I don't think ya have, so lemme tell ya somethin'. This man eats nails for breakfast, he's so tough.

Terrence McNeil, sixty-five years of age with a full head of thick gray hair, eyes that shined with mischief when he called on an unsuspecting student for the answer to a question that nobody knew the answer to and turned all little children and grown adults into a block of ice with his stare, walked into the noisy classroom at precisely seven o'clock and fifty-nine minutes and thirty-six seconds in the morning. The minute his shadow was seen on the adjacent wall by the door, the entire classroom turned as silent as a grave. The only noise made during this heart-stopping moment in time was the sound of the squeaky rolling chair that Mr. McNeil moved back from the desk so he could have a seat. Then the sound of his briefcase opening bounced off the walls and rang in the students' ears.

"How was Labor Day?" he asked in a monotone voice, not looking up at the students.

Somebody coughed in the back of the room and that was the only reply he got.

Mr. McNeil cleared his throat. "My, aren't y'all talkative this mornin'. Cat must've gotten all y'alls tongues."

I don't know 'bout everybody else, but my cat sure got Shannon Cooper's.

"Since no one wants to talk about their thrillin' weekend, I guess I'll just have to throw an assignment at y'all."

An almost synchronized "AWWW!" filled the room. Everyone dreaded the words "assignment" coming out of that man's mouth. Pop quizzes were another hated word in the class.

"Don't get your tails knotted, it's a semester-long project. I want y'all to write me an essay--"

What . . . a . . . surprise. Every English teacher we've had so far has made us write an essay. Of course, we've never had Mr. McNeil for English before, so I got a feelin' that he's gonna make it as hard a topic as he can.

"I expect this essay have intelligent vocabulary, words that ninth-graders should know and understand. I don't want baby talk, you're all in high school now an' I want y'all to write like you're in high school. I want a minimum of three pages, typed and double spaced using twelve inch font and one inch margins on all sides. I want y'all to write me about life lessons that you learn throughout the course of the semester."

Life lessons? What the heck does that mean?

"Any questions before we continue on with our lecture?"

Nobody dared raised their hands, out of fear of being mocked or yelled out.

Like I said, he's got to eat nails for breakfast.

Ali had been unusually quiet at the dinner table the past few times the family sat down to dinner. Jesse had been silent himself, though he tried to hide it. What he and Rachel had seen yesterday confused him and he didn't quite know what to think about it. Lizzy, oblivious to everything going on, jabbered on about her day at school to everybody that was there.

Luke cleared his throat, the silence from the other members of the family beginning to drive him crazy. "Hon, ya gone to see your sister yet?"

"I saw her a little yesterday when I dropped Lizzy off," she said bluntly, stirring her fork in her steamed greens. She wondered if cancer looked like that. "Y'know she retired?"

"Kinda young for all that ain't she?"

"Somethin' happened yesterday at Uncle Bo's house but Chelsea wouldn't tell me what it was," Lizzy stated matter-of-factly. "Somethin' to do with Uncle Rosco I think, but I don't know."

"Well, he's kinda old, sweetie," Luke told her. "When ya get older, ya tend to have more problems."

Ali couldn't help but think about how she had something wrong with her and she wasn't even forty yet. Her chest started hurting at the thought and the need to cough felt immediately. Luke noticed that she had grown pale and looked a little confused when she excused herself rather quickly.

"She did that at Uncle Bo's the other day," Jesse said quietly, not looking his father in the eye when he said so.

"Did what?" Lizzy asked.

The sound of coughing entered everybody's ears. Luke got up to go and check on her and knocked quietly on the door. "Ali, honey, you all right in there?"

"I'm fine!" she said aggravatedly before another fit of coughing took over.

"Ya don't sound fine," he insisted, opening the door and walking in to see his wife nearly gagging on herself from coughing so much. "Ali?" he asked, sincerely worried about her condition which was heighened when he realized that there was blood on the toilet paper that she was coughing into. "Ali!"

"I said I'm fine, Luke," she continued to tell him, although she knew he wouldn't buy it.

"Baby, you're sick, you need to see a doctor!" he exclaimed in a low voice, not wanting to upset the kids. "How long has this been goin' on?"

"I don't know, the blood didn't start comin' 'til the other day," she told him, turning on the faucet to scoop water into her hand and rinse her mouth out.

"How can not tell me about this? You're obviously sick, how can you act like nothin's wrong?"

"Because nothing is wrong! It's just stress," she told him stubbornly.

"Everybody gets stressed out at times, but not everybody coughs up blood," Luke stated. "You're seeing a doctor."

She rested her palms against the counter and sighed. She supposed she would have to tell him. "I already did."

"What?" he asked, shocked that she hadn't told him. "An' ya didn't tell me? When?"

"Yesterday, when I dropped Lizzy off. The doctor said . . . he said . . ." Her face crinkled up and she started to softly cry. "He said I have lung cancer, Luke."

Luke was paralyzed with shock for a moment. Lung cancer? Didn't people die from that? "Oh, honey," he said softly, taking her into his arms so she could cry on his shoulder. "Ya should've told me sooner . . ."

"I know," she sobbed quietly. "But I didn't want to believe that it was true, that it could happen to me. I'm scared, Luke. He said I needed surgery. And maybe even chemotherapy or somethin'. I'm so scared."

"Me too, honey, me too . . ."

The Boar's Nest was pretty busy for a Tuesday night. The adults were all crowded at one table while the kids occupied another one, playing a game of Uno that Rachel had gotten for her birthday that year.

I can't wait 'til I get to sit with the adults. I wish they would let me right now. I'm gettin' tired of Rachel's theory on the BMW lady "Isabella", Lizzy mouthin' off about whatever comes to mind, an' I don't even know what's botherin' Jesse. I've never seen him so quiet before.

"Guys, I think my mom's sick," Jesse finally admitted to the girls once Lizzy excused herself to the bathroom. "Her and Dad were talkin' real quiet an' serious last night at dinner, an' I think it had to do with her coughin' all the time."

Ha, I knew somethin' was wrong with her!

"How do ya know they weren't discussin' what we saw yesterday?" Rachel spat out.

"What are you talkin' about?" Chelsea asked confusedly.

"That BMW lady gave Luke a big wet one."

"Rachel!" Jesse hissed, which was very unlike him.

Chelsea's jaw dropped. "WHAT?"

Uncle Luke is one of the most serious, dedicated, non-spontaneous guy I know an' he let some random chick come up an' kiss him? What in heaven's name is goin' on with this family. Aunt Ali's sick, Uncle Rosco's sick, Uncle Luke's gone AWOL, Aunt Evie's trying to keep the stress of Uncle Rosco bein' sick to herself, Jesse's actin' depressed, Rachel's lost her mind, an' the only people that are still normal are me, Daddy, an' Lizzy. Well, Daisy an' Enos might still be normal hopefully but I don't see how when they got Rachel for a daughter.

"We saw them yesterday out in the parkin' lot," Rachel continued.

"No way, I don't believe it," Chelsea said truthfully, all though her mind was racing at the very thought. "Did he kiss her back?"

"Hey, quit talkin' about my dad, guys!" Jesse pleaded. "I can't hardly look at him as it is."

"No," Rachel answered Chelsea' question. "Shh, Lizzy's comin'."

"What were y'all talkin' about?" Lizzy asked upon returning to her seat.

If there's one thing you should know about Lizzy, it's that she can't keep secrets. Well, neither can Rachel but she will if ya make her swear on an oath. Lizzy would tell anyways.

"Nothin'," Chelsea told her.

Adults are funny people. They get into the biggest messes with each other. Makes my life seem a lot simpler, minus the McNeil essay. Life lessons, huh? Maybe I oughta write on how I learned that adults are the most bizarre creatures I have ever come into contact with. What, that would fall under biology, huh?

"Hey, Chels, come over here," Bo invited his daughter, waving her over to sit with the other adults.

Thank you, Daddy.

"You're so lucky," Rachel said enviously. "I'd love to get an earful of what adults think are so important to talk about."

Chelsea rolled her eyes and hopped over to sit next to Bo who wrapped his arm around her. "What's the honor of my joinin' y'all?" she asked everybody.

"Well, you're fourteen an' we figured you're old enough to sit with the big dogs now," Bo picked at her.

"We even held an election. We all voted yay if ya couldn' tell," Luke grinned.

"It's about time, that's all I can say," Chelsea told them.

It is so weird seein' Uncle Luke right now. Amazin' how one comment by one person can make your outlook on them change. Okay, I'll give him the benefit of the doubt, I'm sure he didn't intentionally lead this Isabella chick on.

"Come on, Chels, enlighten us," Eve said. "Remind us what high school's like."

"Yeah, I skipped the last two years, I need a refresher course," Ali laughed along with everyone else.

Just lookin' at them now, all happy an' smilin', you'd never know anything was wrong with all of them. It's kinda depressin'.

"I have this stupid essay to write by the end of the semester," Chelsea told them. "About lessons in life that I learn during this half of the year."

"UGH!" everybody let out, except Enos who said, "Hey, I enjoyed doing those."

"You always were a dipstick, Enos," Rosco said good-naturedly, getting a laugh outta everyone.

"Have ya thought about what ya want to do when ya graduate?" Daisy asked Chelsea.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA, that's a good one, Daisy.

Chelsea shrugged. "Not really. I hate school as it is, why torment myself with more of it?"

"She sounds like you, Ali," Eve noted.

"Take from me, kiddo, go to college," Ali told her niece. "I wish I had. I coulda been a nurse or somethin' if I'd really wanted to."

The word "nurse" made her think about her health problem, which brought a lump to her throat but she decided to keep it in. She didn't everyone else to become stressed out over her. Eve thought about her own job as a "nurse" and intertwined her fingers through her husband's.

"Uncle Rosco didn't go an' he did just fine," Chelsea pointed out.

"Sweetie, cops don't make that much money," Rosco told her, remembering his piddly paychecks that he had back when he was Hazzard County Sheriff. He also remembered how those tiny paychecks got him involved with J.D. "Boss" Hogg and got him down the crooked path of life, which he tried hard to forget day after day. "Take it from one who knows."

"I wanted to go to college myself," Daisy inputted. "That's one reason why I started workin' here in the first place, but now I just stay at home and sew."

I forgot to tell y'all that Daisy sews dresses an' such for the ladies here in town. She works at her house an' uses her own equipment an' everything. She's made me some curtains an' pillows for me before and a few shirts as well.

"Am I the only one that went?" Eve asked, looking at everybody at the table.

"Yes," everyone said at the same time then laughing again.

"You're the ugly ducklin' of the family," Bo joked, everybody still laughing.

"I think you're a swan, dear," Rosco told her, patting her hand softly.

"Awww!" everyone said simultaneously.

"Oh shut up," Eve grinned, blushing now.

"Hey, what does everyone say to a toast?" Luke asked, raising his beer glass.

What's up with adults bein' random all the time?

"What on earth for?" Bo chuckled.

Luke shrugged. "Good health an' good times," he said. He was thinkin' of Ali when he said it but he also generically wished everybody the same.

Eve squeezed Rosco's hand. "Sounds good," she agreed, everybody else mumbling their approval and raising whatever drink they had in their hand.

"To good health an' good times," Luke said in a sincere voice, looking around at everybody.

"Cheers!" Bo said, everybody clanging their glasses together, sloshing beverages on the table, and then taking a sip of their respective drinks.

Y'know, kids an' adults are pretty different an' I don't mean just in ages and sizes. Kids speak their minds, they say whatever they want when they want. Adults . . . they tend to keep things to themselves. Ya either have to pry it outta them or just read between the lines to find out what's goin' on. Boy, bein' an adult sounds tough don't it?