The Undertaking of Tess

by Lesley Kagen

  Birdie says, “Tessie?”

  “Yeah?”

  “I know ya keep telling me that I gotta stop being so weird or I’ll end up in a snake pit, but when that golden light came outta Daddy’s grave tonight—”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Did it feel to you like one of his hugs that he’d give us before he tucked us in and said, ‘I love you two as much as the stars and the moon?’”

  I was about to ask her the same thing, but wasn’t sure if I should. What if she hadn’t felt it? That would’ve hurt her delicate feelings. “Yeah, Bird. It felt exactly like one of his hugs.”

  “Okay. Night, Tessie.”

  “Night, Bird. Night Bee.”

  After she falls asleep faster than usual, which I didn’t think was possible, I take our flashlight, the ballpoint pen, and my list out from under my pillow, and cross out #3:

  TO-DO LIST

  Talk Mom into letting Birdie and me go to Daddy’s pretend funeral.

  Convince Birdie that Daddy is really dead so Mom doesn’t send her to the county insane asylum.

  3. If #1 and #2 don’t work out, find Daddy’s pretend grave in the cemetery when Mom isn’t around so Birdie can say goodbye to him once and for all because seeing really is believing. P.S. The resurrecting idea is a good one. Don’t forget to tell her that.

  Decide if I should confess to the cops about murdering Daddy.

  Even though tonight was really something, when I get the chance, I might eventually tell Birdie about the other idea I had, because if she can have an imaginary friend who can call a million fireflies to light up a pretend grave with golden light, and if Daddy can reach down from Heaven to give us a hug that is making his two girls feel cherished forever … I guess resurrecting would be possible too.

  I crumple up my old list and get busy on my new one. I can never be without one. That’d make me feel too much like Birdie, like a drifting love boat. Someone’s got to be the captain of our ship.

  TO-DO LIST

  Pick up the Freaks of Nature and the new Nancy Drew at the Finney Library.

  Think faster.

  Steal a sun lamp from Dalinsky’s Drugs to use for grilling people.

  Sell more potholders to make money for the binoculars from the Superman comic, or blackmail someone.

  Tell Father Ted in confession that you murdered Daddy, but use Mrs. Klement’s voice because her artery hardening is taking too long.

  After her grandmother gets sent to the Big House, set Lily up on a date with Mr. McGinty.

  Ride the Schwinn to Meurer’s Bakery after school tomorrow and buy three cupcakes that Birdie and me can take over to the cemetery and eat with Daddy on his birthday on Saturday. Get his favorite, yellow with chocolate frosting.

  Practice for Miss America.

  I slide the new list under my pillow, switch off the flashlight, and sing My Favorite Things, until I remember that I gotta set the alarm for 5 a.m. in case I have to take our sheet down to the washing machine. But just when I’m bending over her to do that, I stop. I bet none of those people in the Bible that were lost but got found wet their beds, so now that we found Daddy, Birdie probably won’t either.

  As long as Louise doesn’t end up accidentally marrying “The Peeker.” If she does, then all bets are off.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  To the generous souls who shared their love, support, and expertise—thank you, thank you, thank you.

  My family: My eternally loved son, Riley, whose kindred spirit never leaves my side. Casey, my best friend, daughter, and hero. Our all-around good egg, John-Michael. Heaven-sent little ones, Charlie William and Hadley Ann Orion, who inspire us with their joie de vivre and flat-out hilariousness.

  Crystal Patriarche, and the entire team at SparkPress: Many thanks for making publishing a truly exciting, respectful, and cooperative effort.

  Editor, Wayne Parrish, who is brilliant and gentle, and shared wonderful insights.

  My literary agent, Kim Witherspoon: Your belief in me never ceases to amaze. I’m honored to be represented by Inkwell Management.

  The James E. and Rebecca Winner Foundation for the Arts that so graciously supports my efforts.

  My fellow writers, early readers, and wonderful hand-holders: Sandy Kring, Bonnie Shimko, Beth Hoffman, and Dr. Meagan Harris.

  And to you, dear reader: I can only hope that the Finley sisters touch your hearts as much as your continued support and encouragement throughout the years has touched mine.

  Coming soon

  from New York Times bestselling author Lesley Kagen

  The Resurrection of Tess Blessing

  The continuing story of the Finley Sisters

  Read an excerpt now!

  My Tess is a sly one. Quite the little actress. When called upon to do so, she can appear to be a concerned citizen … a capable mother … the confident wife of the president of the Chamber of Commerce. Appearing ordinary is one of her best talents. As long as nothing unexpected blows up in her face, which, of course, life being the minefield that it is, is about to.

  Morning winter sun is streaming through the four-paned kitchen windows that overlook the white picket-fenced backyard of the darling red brick colonial in Ruby Falls, Wisconsin, population, 5,623. There are three of us gathered around the distressed pine kitchen table that’s been passed down through the Blessing family for generations. Forty-nine-year-old, Tess, her lovely eighteen-year-old daughter, Haddie, who has returned to the roost to spend the Christmas holiday, and me, who has always been and always will be, but remains unnamed, for the time being. The man of the house, Will, has already left for the day. He’s busy seating the breakfast bunch at Count Your Blessings, the popular Main Street fifties-style diner that he inherited from his father upon his passing. Tess’s other child, Henry, a junior in high school, remains upstairs wrapped in his Star Wars sheets. Like most fifteen-year-olds, the boy believes the world revolves around him.

  “Just a nibble?” Tess asks her daughter.

  When the gifted photographer struggling through her first year at Savannah College of Art and Design turns her nose up at the French toast her desperate mother prepared with her secret ingredient—tears, Tess can barely keep herself from pounding the top of the pine table and asking yet again, “What did I do wrong? How can I make this better? Please…please let me in.” She swallows the questions back because she knows from experience that Haddie’ll only change the subject, at best. Worse, she’ll get angrier than she already is.

  Tess sets her gaze out of one of the kitchen windows and locks on the solitary snow angel I watched her create last night while her family remained snug in their beds. Others may leave her side, but I never have, and never will. We are bound together not only in this life, but for all time.

  Most of what you think you know about “imaginary friends” is probably inaccurate. We’re a much more complicated lot than the way we’re often portrayed in books, movies, psychological articles, and such. For instance, not once have I heard it mentioned what an important part readiness plays in our relationship. Nor have I seen it noted how we are imbued with whatever qualities our friend needs the most, which depends upon at what point in their lives we are called into what is known on our side as, “Service.” The profound spiritual component in our friendship has never been touched on either. Even the term, “imaginary friend,” is nothing more than a handy phrase a psychiatrist came up with to describe the indescribable and put the inexplicable in its place.

  Since Tess has had quite a bit of experience with an IF in the past, I’m not anticipating that she’ll put up much of a fuss when the time comes for us to connect again. (At last.) While I can’t know exactly when that momentous occasion will occur—that’s entirely up to her—I can feel it drawing nearer. Hoped it might happen last night when I was perched on the faded green Adirondack chair under the weeping willow tree in the Blessings’ backyard watching her swish her arms and legs in the snow. (I would’ve pointed out that she was underdressed
for the occasion. Wearing her ancient cows sipping café au lait on the Champs-Élysée nightie on the chilliest night yet this winter only goes to show how close she is to unraveling.)

  Because I know every thought and feeling she’s ever had, as Tess sets the rejected French toast on the floor next to the family’s beloved golden retriever, Garbo, I can hear her telling herself—I’m gonna do it again tonight. Not just once, I’ll make a dozen angels.

  And on January 17, 1999, after the dawn smudges peach and blue across tomorrow’s horizon, she’ll rise from her bed, slip on her worn-to-the-nub green chenille robe, and pad downstairs to get things going in the kitchen like her world hasn’t cracked wide open and the contents spilled. And before Haddie takes off for an eight-mile run, she’ll wish her a perky good morning, offer her a cup of freshly squeezed orange juice, and not mention the life-shattering news she’s about to receive. My friend will put on the smile she keeps close at hand, point out this very kitchen window at her newly created flock, and say, “Look, Haddie! Angels have come by to say halo!” with the hope that her daughter will be tickled by the corny joke she’d thought was hilarious when was she was ten ’cause Tess would do and say just about anything to recapture the closeness of those days.

  Angel shmangels. How many times did I tell you not to have children, Theresa? Yours barely speak to you and look what they’d done to your figure and….

  If you’re thinking that’s me talking mean like that to Tess, well, you’d be wrong.

  That there is the unrelenting voice of her mother that she hears in her head even though she is dead.

  When Louise Mary Fitzgerald Finley Gallagher passed on last year, instead of leaving her eldest daughter a 1940s bureau with a couple of missing porcelain handles or linen hankies with swirling lavender initials, she left Tess her remains, a heart full of pain, and her head full of criticism.

  I’m not sure where Louise is in her celestial education at the current time—upon the death of her body, her soul moved from the living room to the school room where she will be held accountable for her actions and be given the opportunity to learn from her mistakes—but while she was on Earth that self-centered woman did indelible damage to my friend that I hope to heal when she allows me in. I have a couple of ideas on how to remove Tessie’s thorny mother from her side, but have yet to come up with anything to stick in the hole to staunch the bleeding. (Not yet, anyway.)

  Tess sets the washed fry pan on the yellow-and-blue kitchen counter, wipes her hands dry on the seat of her bulky gray sweat pants that she wears to conceal the blubber she’s put on in her efforts to show Haddie how much fun eating can be, checks the clock above the stove, and looks for the lucky black purse that holds her good luck totems—a hanging-by-a-thread copy of To Kill a Mockingbird, remnants of her childrens’ baby blankets, and her daddy’s Swiss Army knife that fell out of his pocket that fateful day on the boat. She doesn’t go anywhere without that lucky purse.

  “I’ve got an appointment this morning,” she tells the girl whose photographs are so remarkable for one so young that National Geographic has shown interest in hiring her as an intern next summer. “Why don’t you call me when you’re done shooting at the Nature Center? Maybe we could—”

  “What kind of appointment?” Haddie asks.

  “No big deal. Just my yearly mammogram.”

  “Does it hurt?”

  Tess lays her cheek atop her daughter’s head and breathes deeply. Haddie’s natural aroma has always been earthy. Like she’d grown the child not in her womb, but her garden. Her hair is really something too. Not a deep red like her mother’s, but a daisy yellow like Will’s used to be, and she was blessed with eyes that are a paler shade of blue than her mother’s that were almost navy. “Nothin’ to worry about, honey,” she reassures. “Cancer doesn’t run in the family. Mammograms are just part of the program when you get to be—”

  “Uh-huh,” her daughter says as she ducks away from her mother’s lips.

  Tess has been raked over these coals so often that she’s grown used to and accepts Haddie’s rejection, but that doesn’t mean she doesn’t try everything she can to change it. She’s sure that if she could only figure out why Haddie is so angry with her, she would get better and they could go back to the way they used to be. Inseparable.

  Tess wonders if it’s because of the way she reacted when her daughter first informed her that she planned to attend college at the Savannah School of Art and Design? Was that it?

  She can’t deny that she was far from thrilled that Haddie meant to fly off and leave her mother in her contrail. When her daughter waved the acceptance letter in her face, Tess freely admits she said, “Georgia?” like it was the one on the Black Sea, failing to hide the excruciating ripping sensation she was feeling.

  But … once she’d gotten over the shock and come to terms, hadn’t she tried her hardest to be supportive of Haddie’s desire to test her wings the year before she left? To be up! Unfortunately, due to the losses she had experienced as child, the profound sense of loss she was experiencing was almost impossible to contain. Even though she’s normally highly skilled at keeping her true emotions secret—she’s successfully hidden her severe emotional problems from her children and the rest of the world her whole life—it was pretty damn obvious that she didn’t mean it when she threw kisses and hollered, “Go get ’em, baby!” on the mid-August afternoon that her husband and daughter pulled out of the driveway in the packed-to-the-roof green Taurus her parents had given their overachieving, artistic child after she’d graduated with the highest grade-point average ever recorded at Ruby Falls High.

  So, of course, when the homesick freshman called begging to return home sixteen days after her arrival in Savannah—“Mommy, please … I made a mistake. I miss you…. I’ll eat whatever you want. Please, please come get me,” Tess didn’t think twice. She scribbled a late-night “Be Back Soon xoxo” note to Will and Henry, and off she and Garbo drove to save Haddie from her freedom.

  She made it as far as Zionsville, Indiana, when the doubts she’d been wrestling with forced her to pull into an abandoned truck stop. Under the fluorescent lights, she finally admitted to herself that as much as she wanted to bring her girl back home, if she did, she’d be acting as selfishly as her own mother had. She cried herself dry, and then called Haddie to tell her in a barely used firm voice that she was sorry, but, “You need to stick it out.”

  Is that why she’s mad? Tess wonders. She thinks I wasn’t there for her when she needed me most? She takes another stab at connecting with Haddie before she steps out the backdoor of the house. “Maybe we could get a little lunch today?” In the good old days, shrimp egg rolls followed by chicken chow mein used to be her daughter’s favorite. The number-four special was out of the question, but maybe she could talk Haddie, who appeared to know the caloric content of every food ever created, into a lettuce wrap. “Wong Fat’s?”

  On her daughter’s generous lips even disgust looks good.

  What did you expect? Louise snipes in Tess’s head. You just invited a kid with an eating disorder to lunch at a place that has FAT in its name. Theresa … Theresa … Theresa … could you be a worse mother?

  I wish Tess could shout back, Yeah, I could be you! but at the present time, she doesn’t have the confidence to speak back to her mother, or bury her neither.

  She tries again. “Do you want to …?” Tess almost asked Haddie if she’d like to go to the mall instead. That would have been another mistake. Her girl used to adore shopping, but she won’t try on flouncy dresses or frilly blouses anymore. She’d grab armfuls of pretty things off the racks, but once they hung in the dressing room, she would collapse in tears after she stripped down to her panties and saw her “grossness” reflected back in the store mirror. “What about …?” Haddie adores illness movies. If she could find one about a girl suffering with anorexia or bulimia she’d be in hog heaven and expect her mother to wallow in it with her. “We could watch a Lifetime channel movi
e tonight.”

  “Whatever.”

  Sensing that she’s hit yet another conversational dead end, Tess clears the rest of the breakfast dishes and slogs down the basement steps to turn off the TV set that Will and Henry left on last night. When she steps back into the kitchen with her arms full of their leftovers, Haddie shudders at the greasy popcorn bowl, empty pop bottles, and gooey candy wrappers.

  “Thanks for rubbing it in,” she growls as she stomps past her mother toward the staircase.

  Tess calls after her, “I’m sorry … I’m stopping at the grocery store after my appointment. Do you need anything?” but she leaves the house uncertain if Haddie heard her before she slammed shut the bathroom door behind her.

  BIOGRAPHY OF THE AUTHOR LESLEY KAGEN

  Lesley Kagen is an actress, voice-over talent, former restaurateur, sought-after speaker, and award-winning, New York Times bestselling author of five previous novels. Her work has been translated into seven languages. She’s the mother of two and grandmother of two. She lives in a hundred-year-old farmhouse in a small town in Wisconsin.

  ALSO BY LESLEY KAGEN

  Whistling in the Dark

  Land of a Hundred Wonders

  Tomorrow River

  Good Graces

  Mare’s Nest

  About SparkPress

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