Alma's Will (2 page)

Baron

"What was that all about, Liv?
Where
are we going?" Eric asked his wife when she'd hung up. She was already on the phone when he'd come home from work, and he had no idea whom she'd been speaking to. She seemed so calm, yet it had sounded serious: "Oh my God… No, I'll be all right. I just didn't expect… When did it happen? … That long ago… I see. … Yes, of course we'll come."

Livia Redding looked somewhat bewildered, as if she hadn't entirely processed whatever it was she'd been told. "There was a message on the machine for me to call," she explained. "A 478 number."

478 was the area code for Macon. "It was about Alma, wasn't it?" Eric said.

"Mama died, almost two weeks ago," she answered matter-of-factly. "The police found her body. The neighbors hadn't seen her in a few days, so they called them." It hadn't taken her long to find her bearings.

"I'm so sorry, Liv. What did she die of?"

"Natural causes, they say. Anyway, we'll have to go to Macon. Good thing it's June and we don't have to pull the children out of school. Who knows how long we'll be there."

"Not too long, I hope." Then he added, "School may be out, but we still have our jobs." He knew it rubbed Liv the wrong way that he "didn't like the South." According to her, that is. In fact, he didn't
dis
like it; he merely felt out of place there.

"A few days at most," Liv assured him. "We need to make arrangements for the funeral, and then there's her will."

"I suppose her wishes are in it. About the funeral, I mean."

"I assume so, but we'll have the funeral first anyway. They're anxious to bury her as soon as possible. I can understand why, her being dead over a week. The cemetery plot's already been bought—next to Daddy, you know—so what she wanted is pretty clear."

"I'll see about reserving a flight for tomorrow morning. And I think it'd be better if
you
broke it to the kids. You're sure you're all right, now?" he asked, reaching to pat her upper arm.

Liv smiled at him. "Yes, yes, I'm fine. Don't worry about me."

* * * *

They rented a car at the airport and stopped by the attorney's office for the house key. Marker was in court, so they got it from his secretary, who at the same time made an appointment for them to read the will three days later, the day after the funeral, as it turned out. From there they drove to the house. Liv had expected to see the lawn and garden untended and overgrown with weeds and the letter box full of junk mail, but everything looked just as it had when her mother was alive. No one would have suspected the house was empty.

The inside, however, was not fit to live in. Dust lay thick on the furniture and carpeting, and the air was rank with the smell of decay and cat urine.

Patty said, "It stinks in here, Mommy. Can't we go outside?"

"Okay, you and Clara wait for us in front with Li'l Eric, but stay close to the house and don't go anywhere. We won't be long." Then she said to her husband, "We can't stay here, at least not until I've cleaned up and aired the place out. We'd better find a hotel."

"I'll call the attorney to see about having someone at his office look into a room for us. Marker must not have realized what shape the house was in. Let's hope the phone's still connected."

It was. While Eric called, Liv went outside to stay with the children. They walked around the outside of the house. The lawns were neatly mowed. Large, round clusters of tiny, pale blue blossoms lay thick on the hydrangeas lined up along the front of the house, a bed of pink and white impatiens at their foot. In back, the bright yellow blooms and dark green leaves of the allamanda almost hid the fence, but the hedge of spiraea in front of them had lost many of its snow-white clusters, and the magnolia tree in the center of the yard was also approaching the end of its season, its flowers open wide and a scattering of petals on the grass below. She imagined them blanketing her mother's body as she lay peacefully in an open casket. Alma had put in a smaller vegetable garden this year; more than half the plot lay covered with straw. What she had planted, however, appeared well tended and was thriving.

How Mama loved her garden
, Liv thought,
and what care she lavished on it!
She herself had no patience for yard work. They had a few shrubs in front of the house and some perennials along the fence in back, but most of the yard was a playground for the children—sandbox, swing set, climbing equipment, and the like.

A nice-looking colored man stepped out of the house next door and said, "You must be Alma's daughter."

"Yes. Liv."

"Baron. Baron Christ."

Liv could visualize how the name was spelled, though the man pronounced it with a short
i
. She couldn't imagine how her father would have felt living next door to a Negro. It must have unsettled her mother as well. But perhaps she'd gotten over those stale prejudices the family had had when she was little.

She held out her hand. "Pleased to meet you. These are my children—Patty, Clara, Li'l Eric."

The kids looked down and shuffled their feet, embarrassed. Then Eric arrived and said that Marker's secretary would be booking them a two-room suite in a hotel downtown. She introduced him to Baron.

"So you've come for the funeral," Baron said.

"Yes. So much to take care of—funeral home, service, having the grave dug, and all the rest. It's overwhelming."

"I'm sure her pastor will help you make the arrangements. You know what church she attended?"

Liv nodded. "I'm sure it's the same one we went to when I was little." Then, speaking to herself, she asked, "Where
is
Mama?"

"Still at the morgue," Eric said. In answer to his wife's "How do you know?" look, he explained, "I just heard it from the lawyer. They're waiting for your call to release the body."

Liv nodded absently and returned to her musings. "I'm amazed how good the garden looks," she said. "Everything so well cared for, the flowers watered. I thought it would have gone all to seed."

"My friend Jay and I have been taking care of the place," Baron said. "Alma loved her flowers. Such a nice lady! It seemed the least we could do. And I admit we
have
been picking her vegetables."

"Oh, but you're more than welcome to them!"

"We'd have cleaned up inside, but they wouldn't let us have a key."

"That's very kind of you," Eric said. "We appreciate it."

"Here, write down my number at least. You'll let me know when and where the funeral will be?"

Liv nodded. "I mean to arrange for it to take place as quickly as possible. My husband can't take more than a week off from work."

"Such a nice man, that Baron!" she said when they were back in the car. "He was obviously very good to Mama, very attentive. I wonder why she never mentioned him." In the back of her mind she had a feeling it might have been on account of his race.

She turned her head to the children in the back seat. "Wasn't he a nice man, kids?" She wanted them to grow up free of the stupid prejudices that had burdened her younger years. It embarrassed her to remember them.

The twins nodded gravely. "I liked him," Patty said.

Reverend Jenkins

Baron came to the funeral, and with him the friend Jay he had mentioned, a white man. It seemed he had also known her mother. They brought a small bouquet of freshly cut flowers. "From her garden," Baron explained. "We thought she'd like that."

If they hadn't come, only she, Eric and the grandchildren would have been present at Mama's burial, and, of course, the clergyman who officiated, Reverend Jenkins. Only then did Liv realize what a lonely life her mother must have led since she'd been widowed. She had no one except a couple of neighbors and a house full of cats.

She had evidently stopped going to church, because the new pastor at her old church didn't know her. She might have attended services somewhere else, but Liv didn't have time to start calling all the churches in town to find out, so she asked Reverend Jenkins if he would be willing to deliver the eulogy. He agreed, but it meant taking time from all the other things she had to do to talk to him about her mother so he'd have something to say. She didn't have much to tell him because she'd seen so little of her mother since she'd married Eric and moved to Idaho, so she resurrected some childhood memories out of which he could piece together a short but adequate eulogy to be delivered at the gravesite.

Only Liv wore black, but the others had crêpe armbands. The children had asked for one when they saw Eric's. She was glad the service would be brief. It was a beautiful day in its own way, with a bright sun in a cloudless blue sky and very peaceful, but hot and muggy. The children had started to complain almost as soon as they got out of the car. They didn't like having to dress up and weren't accustomed to this kind of weather.

The twins fidgeted constantly and Li'l Eric couldn't stop playing with his armband, so while they waited for Reverend Jenkins, Eric took them on a little walk in the cemetery so they could read the headstones and see if they knew the names of all the different flowers. Though he barely remembered her, Li'l Eric had wanted to know why they weren't allowed to see Grandma before they put her in the ground. Liv was afraid he'd get upset if she told him that dead people rot and couldn't think what to tell him instead, so she had avoided his question.

When the Reverend arrived for the ceremony Liv got the impression that seeing a colored man there made him uncomfortable, because he looked disapprovingly at Baron and his friend and greeted them coldly. Maybe he found it odd that one of the two people there who weren't family should be a Negro. She hoped Baron wasn't too offended by how Reverend Jenkins distanced himself from him. He took it well, though. She supposed he was used to it, living in the South. She wondered if that was why her mother had left the church. She remembered that most of the people in the congregation had been racist. Had Mama broken with them because that man Baron was so nice to her? It made sense.

To show Baron that she didn't share those prejudices, Liv made some light conversation with him while the Reverend was getting ready. Because the smell of cats that permeated the house was on her mind, she said, "I'd have asked you to the reception, but we aren't having one. The house is unlivable. That's why we're staying at a hotel."

"That's all right, we couldn't have gone anyway. We have to get back to work."

"I suppose they took her cats to the shelter. How many did she have?"

"Eight, I think. They all went to the shelter except the one she called Ronnie, the black one. She was her favorite, so we adopted her. Alma would have been crushed if they'd put Ronnie down."

"Thank you for that too. The ceremony won't last long. A hymn or two, a short prayer, Psalm 23, a word or two from the pastor, then we say goodbye to her. Would you believe that Reverend Jenkins didn't know her? It seems she didn't go to his church anymore."

She was about to ask why his wife hadn't come—he'd said "we"—but the funeral service was about to start. No doubt she had stayed home with their children.

Reverend Jenkins' eulogy described Alma as a decent Christian woman who had brought up her daughter to fear God, and a loving grandmother, who would now rest beside the man with whom she had lived as a faithful wife for the many years of their marriage. Then he asked them to join him in a hymn. That only he, Liv and the colored man knew the words—the children didn't even know the tune—must have made him realize that Alma had not raised her daughter to be as God-fearing a woman as he had claimed.

* * * *

"Did you like Mama's eulogy?" Liv asked on the way back to the hotel.

Eric gave the most noncommittal answer he could think of. "I suppose it was all right, considering he didn't know her."

"I thought it had some lovely turns of phrase."

"No surprise there—eulogies are his job. But the whole thing was somehow generic; Alma didn't come across as a unique individual. I don't think those neighbors of hers recognized her in it either."

"You're right. I thought about asking Baron—Mr. Christ—to tell me something about what her life was like now. I just didn't have the time."

"The pastor didn't even mention her cats. Except for her name and ours, that little speech would have done as well for almost anybody. And why didn't he say anything about your brother? That was a serious omission on his part."

"I didn't tell him about Ronnie. What could I have said about him, really? I was so young when he died. I don't even know where he's buried."

Eric was shocked. "You don't?"

It suddenly hit him that there had been no headstone for her brother. Before he could ask about it, she went on: "Besides, that was a tragic moment in her life. I wanted the eulogy to tell about the good things."

Eric felt he ought to say something. "It was very wrong of you to leave him out like that. I'm sure Alma would have wanted him to be remembered."

"You're right, and I'm sorry for it now. But what's done is done, and we can't do it over, can we?" she said, smiling, and patted his thigh.

Evan Marker

Alma's attorney, Evan Marker, had expected that reading the will would go without a hitch. Her daughter might expect to inherit everything as sole surviving heir, and the house did make up about one third the value of the estate, but the remaining assets all went to her—its contents, the car, stocks, savings, etc. As he understood it, she and her husband were fairly well off, and he doubted she would make a fuss over a charitable contribution, even one as sizable as her mother's house. It was a touching gesture on the old woman's part, really.

The meeting started off well enough. The only possible annoyance he foresaw was that Mrs. Enslik's daughter and her husband had brought the grandchildren with them, as was only natural under the circumstances Their grandmother's funeral must have been hard on them, and it wouldn't be a good idea to leave them in a strange place with a babysitter they didn't know. Still, they looked very young—the boy couldn't have been much more than kindergarten age—and Marker feared they'd get bored listening to the will and become fidgety.

"You're Mrs. Livia Redding, I assume?" he asked.

"Liv, please." She introduced her husband and the children.

Marker had his secretary bring some paper and colored pens to keep the youngsters amused and sat them on the floor by the coffee table. "We'll have to wait for two other people who're mentioned in the will," he explained. "They should arrive any minute."

It seemed they'd already met Mr. Christ, which was hardly surprising, considering the two lived right next door to her mother. Liv beamed with pleasure when she saw him, and said, "I'm so glad Mama thought to remember you in her will. You've been so good to her. Do you know what Mr. Christ has done?" she added, turning to Marker, and went on to gush about what wonderful care he'd been taking of her mother's garden.

"It came as a total surprise," the man answered. "We just got Mr. Marker's call last night. You remember my friend Jay?"

"Of course. How nice to see you again."

Jay shook hands with her. Without the black hat and veil, dressed casually in a blouse and slacks, one could see she was a good-looking woman, about thirty, with soft features and short dark hair. She had a pleasant smile, the only thing about her that reminded Marker of her mother. Her demeanor was appropriately grave for a lawyer's office and reading a last will and testament, but something about her struck him as carefree—too carefree, he thought, for someone who had just lost her mother. Her husband, on the other hand, looked bored and anxious to get it over with.

They sat down. Marker opened the envelope and took out the will. Just then the little boy came over to show his mother the picture he'd drawn.

"That's beautiful," she told him, "but Mommy and Daddy are very busy right now. You save up all your pictures and show them to us when we've finished, okay?"

Li'l Eric nodded gravely and went back to the coffee table.

"Cute kid," Jay said.

All these good feelings didn't last long. Liv did a double take when she heard "except the house", and when he read on "which is to be used as a safe home for gay teenagers who've been rejected by their families", her face froze.

She turned her fury on Marker. "You knew this," she said, "and still you went ahead and read her will with my children right here!"

"Calm yourself, Liv," her husband said. "I don't think they heard a thing. They weren't paying us any attention… until now."

The children had heard the tone of their mother's voice and were staring at them, troubled and confused.

"I'll have my secretary watch them," Marker said. He pushed the button on his intercom. "Carole, could you please bring the children to the outer office while we finish up in here?"

The children safely out of the way, Marker returned to the will. Since she knew of no local organizations that helped gay teenagers, Mrs. Enslik had designated Messrs. Franklin and Christ to choose one and to oversee the transfer. She had reserved a thousand dollars to cover whatever expenses they might incur.

"We won't take the money," Franklin said. "That goes to the safe home too."

He seemed perfectly unaware of the daughter's hostility, though her anger hung so heavily in the air one could have cut it with a knife. Not so the black man, Mr. Christ. He'd fixed a stony gaze on Mrs. Redding and braced himself for an onslaught. Perhaps he picked up on the cues more easily, being from the South, or perhaps Franklin had his mind on something else.

"Those homes do so much good," Franklin went on. "The one that took me in saved my life."

If she hasn't yet realized that the men are gay, she's certain to catch on now
, Marker thought, but Liv took no notice of what had just been said. For a second he wondered if she was just uptight about her kids hearing anything having to do with sex, then dismissed the possibility out of hand. The woman was definitely homophobic, rabidly so. He could read her like a book. Well, better to get it over with. It was none of his business, really.

"Do you know a suitable organization to donate the house to?" he asked the men.

"Not here in Georgia," Franklin said, "but the home I lived in in Boston can put us in touch with one."

"What home in Boston?" Liv began. Then it hit her. Instantly, her good looks vanished. Her features hardened and her mouth twisted into a grimace. "Oh, Jesus!" she exclaimed.

The intensity of her reaction seemed to bewilder her husband. Since he must have known what she thought of homosexuals, Marker concluded he must have understood all along that Christ and Franklin were a gay couple and only now realized that his wife had not.

"I won't allow it!" Liv finally found her voice. "Couldn't she have left it to a Christian group that works on curing these youngsters?"

Christ put a hand on his partner's wrist and clenched it tightly. "Steady, Jay."

"Then you're contesting the will?" Marker asked.

"Of course I am! What do you think?"

"Are you sure, Liv?" her husband asked. "Do you think you should?"

"I've never been surer of anything in my life. It's my decision. I'm her daughter."

"I only want to spare you what could be a very unpleasant business in the long haul. Do you think it's worth it?"

She turned to Marker. "Are these men willing to give up their claim?" She wouldn't speak to them, wouldn't look at them.

"It isn't their claim," he reminded her. "They're only acting as representatives."

"And we're not willing," Christ said in an icy voice.

Liv glared at them. "I'll fight it tooth and nail."

"Then I advise you all to get yourselves a lawyer," Marker said.