Easter Saturday

Collette had been surprised at the number of TFC people at the funeral that morning, people she hadn’t seen in a long time: Marigold Avonlea and her mom, the Sages, the Friendlys, Northcutts, Samantha Bee, even Eutychus Ski and his wife, Eugenia. Collette had also seen the Owen’s other grandsons (one of them anyway), the brothers whom the Owens had sometimes brought to K-Group, in the good old days. They would play after the Bible study. One time, Carrie-Bri had brought out her two big rubber snakes: a cobra and a black python. Somehow, a tug-of-war match had ensued between Carrie and the older brother. In the end, no one had won, and the brother had snapped off the python’s tail. Carrie wasn’t happy about it, but things must have been resolved, because, as Carrie recalled:
“For some reason, every time they left, we would call out to each other as they were driving away: ‘Remember the Alamo!’”
After the service, OLeif and Collette drove Dad home (as Mom and Carrie had to leave early). They had failed, however, to tell Dad that they had left. Fortunately, they were able to contact OLeif and Collette before they had left the church.
“Yeah, I saw you walk around the church looking for them, Dad,” said Collette.
“And it was freezing cold. There was a lady who even asked me, (and I had never seen her before in my life), ‘Oh, Luther, are you looking for Linda? Do you need a ride home?’ I had no idea who she was.”
“Sorry, Luther,” Mom laughed.
Inside, to change clothes before leaving again, Carrie’s job hunt was brought up.
“So how much money do you need to earn?” OLeif was asking her.
“Just enough to go out to coffee with Lucia, and stuff like that. I just really want to work at Border’s. Why won’t they hire me?”
“You’re over-qualified,” said Collette.
“That’s what I’ve told her,” Dad said. “Why don’t you go into the medical field.”
“Dad, you know I almost passed out at the optometrist that one time…”
“Nothing like digging around in eye jelly,” said OLeif.
“Stop!” Carrie laughed.
“How about a dental assistant,” said Mom.
“You can have this exciting career…” said OLeif.
“In only six months…” said Carrie.
“Night classes are forming now,” Mom finished.
For the rest of the day, while Puck was over at the Silverspoon’s watching his papa and the boys tear up both layers of the old linoleum kitchen floor (the first layer which they discovered was originally green), OLeif and Collette hit the St. Louis Bread Company, and then Parfenov’s violin shop off Brown Road.
“He’s Russian,” OLeif was saying. “He moved here, I think, about a year before he opened his shop, which was when I was in YPCO.”
“Ten years, then,” said Collette. “He hasn’t been here very long.”
It was cold, gray. Collette forgot that it was almost Easter until she saw a person with a full fuzzy bunny head walking down the sidewalk, waving to traffic.
By the time OLeif and Collette had returned to the Silverspoon’s, Theodore and the boys were preparing to lay down the new floor. The refrigerator sat in the front hall. The stove had also been moved. And the kitchen table sat in the middle of the living room.
“Sorry for the chaos,” Denae apologized, like most moms did when their homes weren’t sparkling clean.
Since Collette had been married, she also found herself embarrassed if someone dropped by and all of the dishes weren’t washed, or the rug wasn’t vacuumed, etc. The curse of owning property…
Meanwhile, OLeif had found Sonic the Hedgehog on Denae’s computer, and played a few levels before sidetracking himself with Google Earth.
That evening, Collette half-watched a movie about an angry rock.