“Hey, is anyone else hungry?” Dennis asked the group. “I am, like, ravenous.”
Howls of laughter erupted from Tommy and Mike in the midst of a chorus of ‘me too.’ “The stoned munchies have hit! Come on, Dennis, we’ll help you raid the galley.”
“You really want her dead, Marvin?” Nancy asked.
The question made Marvin sober up a bit and he thought for a minute before he answered. His eyes lowered and the words came out in a whisper, “I do. I miss her something awful.” Then he looked up. “Come on, who’s next? I’m not going to be the only schlemiel to fess up.”
One by one, while they chowed down on the fruit and bag of shrimp the foragers brought back, they swapped anecdotes about the things they’d done to the living: stolen items, things moved, the usual bag of tricks to mess with people. After a while they began to sober up and the stories didn’t have the same sense of hilarity.
Dennis yawned and stood. “I’m tired. I need to hit the rack.” He pulled his dry clothes down from the rail, slung them over a shoulder and went below deck.
Mel and Connie went next. Tommy left to find his perch in the hammock at the bow; Mike followed soon after. And Nancy chose to make her move on Marvin as he helped her up from the deck.
Marv placed a hand on top of hers. “I’m not so sure that’s a good idea.”
She ran finger down his bare chest. “So, get sure.”
Marvin studied her. He tried to deal with the conflict of thoughts: one part of him wanted to throw all caution to the wind, as it were, the other longed for the day he’d be with Jenna. In his college years he wouldn’t have hesitated at all but, he told himself, I’m not a college kid, I’m a grown man. He wondered if it would be fair to this woman who seemed…nice but, he thought, she isn’t Jen. “It’s just that… I mean, you’re gorgeous and all, but when we get back to port…”
“I have no delusions, Marvin.” Nancy took his hand.
“Still…”
Nancy gazed into Marvin’s eyes and the kindness behind his gruff exterior became evident and told her almost everything she needed to know about him, but not quite enough to be able to answer every question her mentor would ask when she returned. “It’s obvious you really do care for her.”
Marv nodded. “I do. Well, truth be known, I love her like crazy. I miss her even more than that. And I want us to be together again. I can’t help it. Is that stupid?”
“Look at me, Marvin.”
When he looked into her eyes, he saw a familiar, deep intelligence. He knew he’d seen someone with similar features, but for the life of him he couldn’t remember where, and he fought against a sense of falling, slipping from reality.
Nancy smiled. “It’s okay. Let’s just go…we’ll talk. There’re…things I’d like to know.”
They pulled their clothes from the ship’s rail and she led him to her cabin.
Up at the bow of the schooner, Mike shook Tommy. “Slide over, man.”
“Mmm. No prob, dude. Where’s Marvin? I thought he’d be up here to stand at the bow like some honorary masthead.”
Mike raised his brows suggestively and jerked a thumb over his shoulder.
“You’re joking. He didn’t!”
“He did.”
“Wow…”
After a short silence Mike snickered and asked in a low voice, “Hey Tommy, if we’re dead and we have sex — what do you think, does that make us necrophiliacs?”
-30-
“You seem preoccupied, Jen. You’ve made some stupid mistakes this week. What’s going on?” JoAnne looked across her desk at a silent Jenna. “Come on. The last couple weeks you were finally showing some life. Now all of a sudden, you’re nothing but gloom again.” When Jenna still didn’t respond, JoAnne leaned across the desk and fixed her with an intense stare. “Did something happen with Larry?”
“What?” Jen looked confused. “No. No! We’ve been having a good time. Dinners out, a couple of movies. And Saturday morning we’re gonna go golfing.” She gave a weak smile. “Well, he’s golfing; I’ve never been.”
“Okay. Then why the long face? What’s distracting you?”
“Look, I’m sorry… I don’t know. I’ll…I’ll pick it up. It’s nothing.” Jenna straightened in her chair and put a forced smile on her face.
“I can’t give you any major time off, not with the Pratt case in our laps. But, look, if you need a couple hours to shake this thing so you can concentrate, go for it. Walk over to the café and get your game on. This case is too big; a lot is riding on it and Robb will have our asses on platters if we screw up. And any thought of that promotion gets flushed.”
Jenna stood and smiled. “You know what, Jo? I think I just need an hour or so to catch my breath. You want me to get you something?”
“The only thing I want you to bring me is a good brief at the end of the day. Deal?”
“Deal. Thanks, Jo.” Jenna left her boss’s office and headed straight to the Dayton Coffee Mill café across the street from the law firm.
That night, when Jenna and Mrs. McClaskey sat in Applebee’s for their weekly outing, Jen hoped her friend could help figure out what might have thrown her off keel.
“I just don’t know why, but it’s felt…” Jenna shrugged, “odd in the house for the last week.”
“Odd how, dear?”
“Quiet. Too quiet. Like there’s something…missing.” Jen shook her head. “I just don’t know how to explain it. I can’t quite put my finger on it.”
“Is work going well? What about this young man of yours, this Larry? Perhaps your interest is waning?”
“We’re very busy at the firm. I’m on a huge case and a few weeks ago JoAnne hinted if I do my usual miracles, as she put it, they might bump me up to paralegal without the two-year degree. The days fly by.” Jenna laughed. “If Thursday wasn’t our date night, I’d forget what day it was!”
“Well, that’s positive.” Mrs. McClaskey paused for a sip of her iced tea. “I don’t mean to make you feel badly but, do you think it’s the date?”
Jenna looked at her dinner partner, confused. “Why? What would the date have to do with anything?”
“It is around the time Marvin passed, isn’t it? Why, after my Patrick passed each month I would feel a bit down for a while.”
Jenna sat stunned. “Oh, my God! It’s May 13th, isn’t it?”
“It is. I thought perhaps it was the date that had you down, but perhaps not.” Mrs McClaskey straightened in her chair, a bit put-off; not because she could be wrong — that thought wouldn’t have entered her mind — but that Jenna wasn’t affected by what she considered a sensitive time.
“Oh, Mrs. McClaskey…of course, you’re right! That’s got to be why I’ve been in such a funk. But, it’s gotten worse the last few days and I think that might only be a part of it.”
“Well, for goodness sake, what else could there be?”
“Saturday is Marvin’s birthday,” Jen uttered in a soft voice. “He’d be 29 if...” her voice trailed off but, once again, sadness produced no tears.
“Oh, Jenna…I apologize, dear.” Mrs. McClaskey signaled the waiter for the check. “We’ll go home. Let me fix you a nice cup of chamomile tea. It’ll soothe you.”
Jenna looked up, annoyed. “Is that your remedy for everything? A cup of tea?” Mrs. McClaskey stammered, but said nothing coherent, which made Jenna immediately regret the outburst and she reached a hand across the table. “I’m sorry, that was stupid of me.”
The two grasped hands and Mrs. McClaskey managed a smile. “Not at all. I suppose I resort to it for lack of anything else. What if… Now, feel free to say no, or to tell me I’m just a foolish old woman. But, what if we celebrated his day with a dinner? You bring this new young man of yours; I’d like to meet him. I’ll cook up a nice meal and the three of us can raise a toast to Marvin’s memory. How does that sound?”
Jenna mulled it over for a moment and then smiled brightly. “I think it’s a capital idea! I
’ll call Larry tonight. I’d love you to meet him. He’s a nice guy, I think you’d like him.” They walked to the cashier where Jenna insisted it had to be her turn to pay. “Besides, if you’re going to trouble yourself with making a birthday dinner for Marvin on Saturday, this will even things out.”
Mrs. McClaskey laughed. “I didn’t know we were keeping score! Now, what was his favorite? What should I make?”
“Well…Marvin said when he lived at home his mother always made a nice corned beef brisket and potato latkes. But when he moved here he resorted to knishes because he said there was no such thing as a decent latke in Dayton. I have to confess, I’m not much of a cook. I cheated.” Jen laughed. “I always bought it all at Epstein’s Deli.”
“I’ll see what I can do. I know I can get a good Jewish corned beef. Patrick loved it; in fact it was his favorite, too. Except he always wanted the standard Irish boiled potatoes, cabbage and green beans. But if Marvin liked potato latkes, that’s what we should have.”
“If memory serves me right, I tried making them. Once.” Jenna rolled her eyes and chuckled. “If you’ll pardon the language of a young person, they’re a pain in the ass. All that peeling and grating and frying. It took hours.”
“Then perhaps I could try my hand with the knish?”
“I highly recommend against it. I think they’re even worse to make. How about this: How about I buy them from the Deli? It’ll be my contribution to the dinner.”
They hooked arms and strolled toward the parking lot where they’d left the fifteen-year-old Buick Patrick had doted over and Mrs. McClaskey rarely drove but kept maintained.
“I wonder if we shouldn’t be discreet about the real purpose of dinner.”
“Why would we do that, Jenna?”
“Well, what if Larry — I mean, don’t you think Larry might get upset we’ve invited him for a dinner to celebrate Marvin’s birthday?”
“If you’ll pardon my asking, if he gets upset is he worth keeping? He should understand you were with Marvin for a long time and, just because someone passes, it doesn’t mean we forget about them.”
“I know, but… men can be so — what’s the right word — I don’t know,” Jenna tilted her head to think, “silly, childish, about these things.”
“Competitive, perhaps?”
“I think you’ve hit it. I would hate Larry to think he’s competing with a dead man.”
“I think I see what you mean, dear. Even in my day a girl needed to be quite demure in these kinds of affairs. It’s a deal. Now, what kind of wine did your Marvin like?”
“Wine? Nope. He wasn’t a wine drinker. Marvin’s choice of poison was scotch. I can ask Larry to pick up a bottle if we’d like to raise a glass to Marv.”
“Oh. No need for that, dear.”
“Mrs. McClaskey!” Jen turned and gave her companion a big smile. “And here I thought nothing stronger than tea ever passed those sweet old lips.”
They stopped, looked at one another, waved a hand at the other, and laughed. “Oh, go on!”
-31-
“Brody, you’re looking jaunty this morning. Any interesting, uh…news…you’d like to share?”
“Mike, a gentleman never kisses and tells.”
“That leaves you out, dude.” Tommy laughed at the middle finger Marvin showed him.
“Like we don’t know anyway.” Mike nudged an elbow into Tommy’s side.
“Yeah, well…” Marv scowled and moved to the bow of the ship. He tried hard to remember exactly what had transpired during the course of the night. But, for some odd reason he couldn’t fathom, all his memory recalled was looking into her eyes. Those deep, amber eyes held something he couldn’t quite grasp and bring to the front of his brain.
Tommy rolled off the hammock. “I’m starved. Marvin, did you notice if breakfast had been laid out on deck yet?”
“I think so.”
“Anybody else hungry?”
“Come on, I’ll go with you.” Mike jabbed a thumb over his shoulder. “He’s surly again this morning.”
“Yeah, a little.”
“Maybe last night didn’t go as well as we thought.”
“Nah, I know he spent the whole night.” Tommy lowered his voice. “I think I know what the problem is though.”
Tommy and Mike made their way to the bar area where a crew member was serving an assortment of morning libations. Dennis, leaning against the far corner, smiled and hoisted his cup in greeting when he saw them emerge from around the deck cabins.
“Hey, morning, Dennis. How are you?”
“I’m good, Tommy. A little groggy from last night, but I’m good.”
“You want coffee, Mike?” Tommy waited for Mike’s nod, then bellied up to the edge of the bar and smiled big. “I’ll have a double-mocha-venti-leaded-with-a-shot, hold the sprinkles, and one large leaded-no-frills.”
Dennis laughed. “What the hell is that?”
Tommy chuckled. “I have no idea, dude.” The guy behind the bar stood there and stared vacantly out at the wake of the ship. “Guess it must be self-serve.” Tommy walked behind the bar, grabbed a cup, filled it from the large urn and held it out. “Here ya go, Mike. Should we take one up to Marvin? Maybe the caffeine would put him in a better frame of mind.”
“There’s nothing wrong with my frame of mind,” Marv said as he rounded the corner. “But I’ll take some anyway.”
“Then what’s wrong? The look on your face…dude, you don’t seem happy.” Tommy came out from behind the bar with two cups of coffee and turned to Marvin, arms outstretched. “I think someone needs another hug. Dude, do you need a hug?”
Marvin managed a brief smile. “If I need a hug, I’ll let you know.” He took the coffee from Tommy and walked back to the bow of the ship.
“Whoa, he is grumpy. Not even a thank you.” Tommy yelled out, “Not even a thank you to your Uncle Tommy?”
Marv’s voice drifted over the breeze. “Sorry. Thanks.”
“I heard someone say we pull into the final port today. Maybe he’s bummed out over that,” Dennis offered as a reason.
Mel, Connie and Nancy all surfaced from below-deck at the same time. Mel walked around the bar and poured three cups of coffee and passed two over the counter to Connie and Nancy. “Who’s bummed out?”
“Brody, who else? I thought this trip would get him to lighten up, but… Tommy, got any theories on this we can explore?”
“No exploration needed, man. It’s his birthday.”
“He’s bummed about a birthday? Why? They don’t mean diddly-squat to us.”
“Maybe not to us, Dennis. But it’s his first since he ‘joined the club,’ so to speak.”
Nancy shifted to head toward the bow. “Well, let me go see what we can do to cheer him up.”
Tommy stopped her. “Got it covered already, Nancy.”
Mike threw an arm around Tommy’s shoulder. “You are an amazing friend, you know that Tommy?”
“Yeah, Mike, I am, aren’t I?” Tommy broke into a wide smile.
“So what’s your plan?”
Tommy peered around to make sure Marv wasn’t lurking about within hearing distance. “Just before we pull into port…”
Within sight of Bluebeard’s Castle, the schooner dropped her sails in the middle of Magens Bay. A crew member walked around the deck of the ship banging a wooden spoon on a metal pot. The noise was enough to rouse anyone. “Listen up mates! Gathering on the aft deck! Gathering on the aft deck!”
The passengers and crew looked on as the captain stood on a crate and led everyone in an off-key rendition of Happy Birthday. Marvin poked his face around the corner of the cabin in time to hear crew members and his newly acquired friends. “…happy birthday, dear Marvin, happy birthday to you…” and a big cheer went up from the crowd.
The captain yelled over the heads of the small crowd. “Come on up, Marvin! Blow out your candles!”
No one moved.
The captain looked around at the face
s. “Where are you Marvin? Come on — you can own up to this. Twenty-nine isn’t that old!” Everyone laughed but stood waiting, looking from one to another.
A bewildered group looked around waiting for the birthday boy to come forward and claim his cake. A beaming Tommy waved Marvin forward. “Well, go on, Marvin!”
“You mean to tell me this whole thing is for me?” Marv shook his head, but the smile that spread over his face told the true tale. Without the slightest bit of breeze in the air, the passengers stood in wonder when the little flames of the candles flickered and went out. Marvin took a bow to the applause of the deadheads. “Did you do this, hippie?”
“Did you really think I’d forget, Marvin?”
“How did you pull this one off? Wait a minute, I don’t care how!” Marvin threw his arms wide. “Come here, ya schmuck! I think I need a hug.”
“Well, go ahead, be shy,” the captain called over the heads of the crowd. “We’ll divvy it up and enjoy it anyway!”
The deadheads expressed their good wishes and Nancy gave Marvin a quick kiss as the crew handed small plates around. None of their fellow passengers took notice or mentioned the seven plates of cake that winked out of sight and didn’t get passed on.
Marvin slung an arm around Tommy’s shoulder. “This was nice. Thank you. In fact the whole idea was terrific. It’s been a great week. I’m sorry to see it end.”
“Dude, it doesn’t have to, ya know. We can stay for a while.”
Mike shuffled his feet and his gaze swept along the calm water and pristine beach. “This may surprise you two. It’s been a blast, but I’m ready for home.”
Marvin was torn. He wanted to stay, but his mind continued to wander back to Dayton and Jenna. “You know every year Jen’d have dinner ready for me. I wonder if she remembered…” His voice trailed off.
Nancy nudged him. “From a woman’s perspective, Marvin, let me promise you: a husband’s birthday is not something we tend to forget.”
“Oh, no. We hadn’t gotten married yet.”
Connie collected their plates and plastic forks to toss them out. “You sure made it seem that way, Marvin. Pardon me if I come off sounding… bitchy, I guess, but your constant moaning over this woman certainly made one think you’d been married for quite a long time.”
[Marvin's] World of Deadheads Page 16