Chapter Forty-One

“We need to get up, OLeif…”

“Yeah…”

The Bear was snoring again in four seconds. And then I heard… a rumble. One of those beautiful rumbles we Snicketts family can’t help but be inspired by…

“Thunder…!”

I was up immediately. Unfortunately, there were only a few more, a few flashes of lightening. Done.

“Happy Chinese New Year!” I told Puck at breakfast.

He didn’t know what that meant of course. Crab rangoon. That’s what that meant. Puck was more interested in singing “Silver and Gold” – as remembered, by myself, from Burl Ives – just that one line, though, over and over and over…

The wind was up and high. We passed the pale green house with the beehives and pink, yellow, and orange garden zinnias in the summer, up for sale by the highway as we listened to traditional Ukrainian music. The wind pushed us.

Puck, in red collared shirt, jeans, tie, and yellow boots, was once again singing for the service with friends. As the music started, he sent a wave out to Anneliese and Mr. and Mrs. Knotts. [Mr. Knotts, who handed over another Bed Bath & Beyond sack of baseballs cleaned up from the neighborhood field. “Tell Puck I think about him all the time,” he said with a grin. They’re good pals.] As the song progressed, some parents were taking photos, apparently. Finally, Puck put both fists on his hips and said something I couldn’t hear. Later he told me…

“I just said, ‘Seriously? You have to fry our eyeballs?’”

So… seventeen point five months after Sinai left, the search committee announced a potential substitute. As predicted – the gent from New Mexico – St.-Louis-raised, Covenant-Seminary-bred, and fluent in Portuguese. There was a lot of un-Presbyterian applause throughout the service. A “love feast” of Italian pasta, salad, and rolls was offered after Sunday School. “Sunday School” for me was forty-five minutes in the nursery. I was tackled off and on by two small boys who thought the whole thing was ridiculously hilarious, of course. I guess it was a little surreal when I realized that the other kid in the sweater vest I was helping put together the train puzzle on the foam mat… was actually the nephew of the boy from Kirk of the Hills I had a crush on for five years back in grade school… Funny the circles life makes. So for the meal, I offered my finely crafted two dozen Hawai’ian rolls. Grocery store purchases at their best. And we shared a table with the Oaks family. By the time Puck and Kirk began tossing the small shiny red plates through the air like flying saucers, it was about time to go.

“I think someone’s been eating my plant…”

Mom eyed the greenery in the corner of the dining room.

“It wasn’t me!” Joe said quickly.

Dad carried out the nibbled green things into the kitchen for water…

“This thing is dying, Adel.”

“That plant was from my dad’s funeral. And it’s been doing great for nine years.”

The plant stayed.

“I have to say,” I told Rose, huddled by another wing of computers on the table, “you look really good in pearl earrings. Most people don’t, but you do.”

“Yeah, like me,” added The Bear. “She was just telling me today I couldn’t pull it off.”

Puck found a bar of blue soap in the Puck and Grandma box, with a plastic bug in the middle of it. It smelled like a Jolly Rancher. Carrie recounted her difficult night with Earnest, who had suddenly become sick, refusing food. She worked with him over various remedies until the danger had passed, but not before she lost a decent night of sleep. Puck got us going with piles of baseballs, golfballs, and birdies as the sun began to dip…

“Everyone, come out to play games for the birthday boy! Fun! Games! Excitement!”

“Aren’t you going to play?” I asked him.

“Nope,” he said with importance. “I’m the director.”

Dad continued soaking the steaks in marinade on the patio grill while The Bear and Francis took turns batting baseballs back and forth to each other across the yard. One of these balls came very close to taking out Mom’s kitchen window, landing just shy with a thud in a mud puddle under the persimmon tree.

“Hey,” said Francis, walking into the kitchen patting his stomach. “I need to test the pork steaks to make sure they’re up to parr.”

“No.”

“No.”

Mom and Dad had spoken. Everyone did seem particularly starved though. Slabs of pork steak and homemade creamy macaroni and cheese, broccoli in cheese sauce – the only vegetable Francis would eat – were ready as Grandma Combs arrived. Snuggles trotted inside right in front of her.

“Well look what the cat drug in,” Dad teased her.

“Snicketts! Why, I tell you!”

The cats were happy.

“Here comes the tank,” Francis grinned, as El Monstruo, Pumpkin, arrived for her treat.

“I’ll tell you what,” Grandma was saying. “With the rain and then the wind and no rain… I changed clothes about four different times today.”

“She should have changed five times,” Dad said with a grin to the side, probably pretty proud of himself for that one.

Joe had returned with sodas and ice, and the party could begin.

“Tell you what, Adel. We’re gonna wipe that silly grin off his face!” Grandma said about Dad some time later around the box of chicken-based gags for Francis as revenge for him eating four boxes of Costco chicken bakes originally reserved for Grandma.

Dad just giggled. Francis received piles of cash and checks to purchase an iPod Touch. Rose requested information online for an Argentina-Chile-Bolivia tour for later in the month. Ice cream cake, art-directed by Joe at Dairy Queen…

We drove home under wind and stars. Puck down all cozy in his bed…

“Mom? Could you turn on the light out there? Crackers’ eyes don’t like it when they don’t reflect light.”

This same cat went spastic as the evening progressed.