It had been a little over eleven years since Martha had left us. I'd promised her that we'd retire on my fifty-fifth birthday and we'd travel the world. Unfortunately, she didn't lived to see it. Back then, I was a mechanic, working on other people's cars and, at the age of twenty-three, I bought a broken down car for twenty bucks, fixed it and sold it for two-hundred and haven't looked back since. By thirty-five, I owned five used car dealerships and had hit the magic number - three million dollars. That's what I'd told Martha we'd likely need to travel and live decently the rest of our lives. Everything I made after that was gravy. Then, a little over a year and a half from my magic fifty-five, she died and took away my reason for living... and working, I guess. She contracted a virulent form of uterine cancer and neither of us realized how bad off she was until it was too late to do much more than say goodbye.
At the time she got sick, I was very busy with the business and she never complained about any pain. A couple or times I had noticed that she held her belly, but she only waved it off saying that it was only her stomach bothering her. The problem was masked by the ulcers she was taking medications for, so we just chalked it up to that. By the time we got around to going to see a doctor, the cancer had spread to most of her vital organs, including her brain and it was too late to do anything about it. Within three months, she was gone. All I was left with was a ceramic jar with her cremated remains. I damn near gave it all up and followed her into eternity, but she'd said that if I did, she'd never speak to me again... life goes on.
Linda and Charlie, my youngest daughter and her husband as well as their six kids were at my house so much for the first few months after Martha's departure, that it almost seemed as if they'd moved in with me, but their active lives kept me sane and whole while I recovered.
Oscar, my only son, came home from Iraq on emergency leave. Rima and Rose, his wife and one daughter, flew in from Germany mostly to be with him. He'd met and married her when he'd been stationed at Flint Kasern in Bad Tölz, Germany. From what I understand, Karl, their next child, was conceived while they were here. The only people that didn't come were from Opal's family, my only other daughter, and that was Frank, Sr, and Frank, Jr, her husband and son. She and her two youngest came, Calvin and Eva. Frank, Jr was in the Marine Corps. He was some sort of DI or TAC at Camp Pendleton. He was pretty much like his father, a real asshole, so the Marine Corps suited him just fine. Frank had kicked Junior and Eva out of the house when they'd turned eighteen and, as soon as Calvin was eighteen, he'd be out on his ass as well - or so he'd stated.
I don't know why I'm telling you all this, but... I guess I might as well finish it up. Martha and I only had the three kids, Opal the oldest who, at the time of this telling, was forty and settled in her role as timid, well-cowed housewife. Oscar was thirty-eight and a field grade officer in the US Army and Linda was thirty-seven. By then, Linda and Charlie had produced another four kids and they'd both had their tubes tied. Charlie smilingly told me in an aside that they both loved to screw and neither liked using any form of birth control. Charlie's folks were well-off and, at that point, Charlie was doing pretty well in the family construction equipment repair and rental business, so they could afford all those kids.
Close to Thanksgiving day, I was feeling pretty bad. I don't mean sick bad, but down in the dumps bad. Martha had loved to set out a good spread during the holidays, and I couldn't think of how to survive through without her. We had a lot of grandkids, maybe not as many as some, but I think seventeen is quite a haul. Consequently, Oscar had tinkered around and built a removable wall between the dining room and living room and designed another table that he and I built. It was a damn good table... let me tell you about it!
Like I said, Oscar designed it. That boy always had a pair of marbles rolling around in his head, not like his old man who could only think of business. Anyway Oscar designed this oak table so that it hung on the false wall like a huge wall decoration. The legs were removable and stowed under it along with an extra wide leaf. We would collapse the false wall which would leave the table hanging from the rafters by a chain and pulley system Oscar had found somewhere ready made. After installing and clamping in the legs, we'd lower the table and set it up next to the other table, insert the leaves in both tables and we were ready to set out the food. The kid was - is - a genius... and he's my son! I told him he ought to patent it, but he just shrugged and said that somebody probably already had and left it at that. But enough about the table.
Around late September or early October, when the leaves were turning, I began missing Martha again. Her birthday was October seventh, but as she'd grown older, she began claiming Halloween as her birthday. Anyway, I went to our favorite spot along the river's edge, a promontory we used to visit to neck and fool around at as kids and, after scattering her ashes, laid a wreath for her. I'd finally bought the spot with an acre of land around it, and gifted it to the city as a park. I could have claimed the deduction on my taxes, but it somehow didn't seem right to profit from a gift in Martha's memory. Officials turned a blind eye to my scattering her ashes down the slope - it was against city ordinances to dump body remains, ashes or not. She'd loved that spot.
After I came home, I moped around, watched some TV and thought of going on to meet Martha. I missed her so goddamn much that I actually took out my old .44 and played with it, spinning the empty cylinder and looking at the box of ammo beside me. However, Martha had believed that if a person committed suicide, they'd be stuck in hell forever and I didn't want that. Not that I believed in hell, I mean, a couple of tours in Viet Nam had been my hell, but I didn't want to chance it. I wanted to be with Martha and, just in case it was true, I kept the gun empty to avoid any impulsive action. I had no doubt that my body would be found quickly, Linda and her kids were in and out of the house as if they owned it. Which was another thing I'd been thinking about, but never mind that for now.
In mid-November, I was spending some quiet time, expecting Linda and Opal sooner or later - today, tomorrow or the day after - to begin setting up for Thanksgiving. Linda, always the take-charge girl, said she'd already ordered the majority of the food from the caterers and that she and Opal would be cooking a turkey and a ham each. Martha had always cooked a couple of turkeys and a couple of hams, but after Linda's kids began growing, she'd farmed most of the work out to a caterer. The crowd had just gotten too big. They usually delivered the food the day before and the pies and cold goodies would sit on the kitchen counter or in the refrigerator - make that refrigerators - I'd had to buy another to accommodate my growing family. I loved having all of them around me, still the whole clan could have formed a couple of baseball teams and maybe a couple of football teams, too. Anyway, about the time I managed to doze off, the kitchen door slammed open.
"Whoo-oof," a feminine voice exclaimed.
"I told you not to carry such a big load," Opal fussed, "Daddy's here, he can help, you know."
"Yeah, but he always wants to carry the biggest load and I don't think he ought to strain himself," Linda retorted.
"Well, for God's sake! He's only fifty-nine. He's not an old man yet!"
"He's still my Daddy," Linda sniffed.
"Oh for... okay, we got it all in anyway."
"What in the world are you two arguing about now," I fussed, walking into the kitchen.
"Oh, Linda wants to treat you like an old invalid."
She pulled open the big chest freezer and began stacking cartons of ice cream in it. Linda pulled open one refrigerator at a time, looking for space for the two turkeys and two hams sitting on the table. As I began handing the ice cream to Opal, the door flew open and Eva, Evie to us, shuffled in with two large paper bags full of things.
"Evie!" I smiled, rushing to her aid.
"Hi, Grampa," she smiled as I held the door open with a foot and took a bag.
"Evie, how are you? God, I haven't seen you since the dinosaurs cleared out of the back yard."
"I'm fine, Grampa," she giggled.
When she'd been very young, she'd read about dinosaurs and, turning to me and asked if I'd had any dinosaurs in the back yard when I was growing up. She knew she was too young to have seen them, but she thought I just might have been old enough. We still laughed over that. As she came in, she laid a hand on my shoulder and puckered up, leaning toward me as I presented my cheek. She pecked me drily and I, in turn gave her a gentle peck on hers.
"Anybody else out there?" I took a quick glance out.
"Nope, but you're looking slimmer, Grampa. What's the matter? Haven't Aunt Linda and Momma been feeding you?" she set her bag on the table.
"No, nothing like that - anything else out in the car?"
"Nah. Just trash from the burger joint."
"Oh. Well, I don't touch that."
"Ya hungry, Dad?" Opal called.
