The funeral home’s viewing rooms had been named according to some of the fruits of the spirit. During recent upgrades to the services the funeral home provided, James decided it would be a nice idea to compose for the families a photo DVD that would commemorate the lives of the deceased. After a tug of war between James and his father, Hunter had finally given in, and James proudly added flat screen televisions to each viewing room. And Kendrick and Amber were enjoying the feature. In the company of a deceased body.
“I’ll go and get them,” Dara volunteered.
India stood up. Dara knew India couldn’t wait to see her youngest cousins in the family. It had been Christmas since she’d been to Augusta because her mother, Dara’s Aunt Latrice, found an excuse to travel to Atlanta frequently. She’d come more often if India could tolerate her in larger doses.
“You might want to wait here,” Dara informed India with a knowing chuckle.
India plopped back down in the seat and crossed her legs. “I don’t know why, but I’ll take your word for it.”
“Smart decision,” Dara said.
She walked out of the administrative offices and turned down the first hall on the left. She could hear the animated music for the kids’ movie immediately. It was loud enough to drown out that horribly depressing music that her father insisted be played at all times on the surround sound stereo system.
Sure enough, Kendrick and Amber had company in the room with them. From the name placard on the outside of the door, it was Mr. Lloyd Persimmons.
Dara stood back from the door and watched them. Kendrick looked up periodically between the movie and his handheld video game, pausing occasionally so he could recite the lines from the movie verbatim.
He’s seen this movie way too many times, Dara thought, wondering what creative mastermind had come up with the personalities of the sarcastic and sometimes crude talking donkey and his best friend, the green ogre.
Dara looked at her niece. Amber looked like her parents had given her the liberty to style her own hair that morning. When given the choice, she liked it to fly free instead of being tamed in ponytails. And fly it did. Some sandy brown tresses in one direction and some in another. Her creative expression would last only until it was time for the party. Dara’s sister-in-law, Demetris, would make sure of that.
“Is somebody in here having a birthday?”
Amber jumped to her bare feet and seemed to go airborne as she flew into Dara’s arms and latched her arms around Dara’s neck.
Dara stumbled backward a few steps, surprised at how much force a forty-something pounder could muster. “You know you’re getting too old to do that, right?”
“Auntie Dara, you’re too funny.” Amber’s feet dangled a few inches from the floor.
Dara eased her niece to the floor and kissed her on the forehead. She took her hand and smoothed down the bang that was standing at attention in the middle of her niece’s head. Dara could tell she was spending a lot of time outside, because the sun had already kissed her usually pale skin to warm bronze.
“Uh. Excuse me?” Dara said to Kendrick.
“Hold on for a second, Auntie. I want to get to the end of this level. I’ve never gotten this far before,” Kendrick said. He chewed on his bottom lip in concentration.
Dara looked down and noticed that Amber’s toenails were painted bubble gum pink. Dara was relieved James wasn’t as conservative as her father. Dara was thirteen before she’d been allowed to paint her nails, and even then it had to be clear or a very sheer color.
“Where are your shoes, little lady?”
“Over there,” Amber said, then skipped over to get her sparkly pink jelly shoes from the corner near the casket. “Aunt Dara,” she said, casually, “did you know that man’s not even sleeping? He’s dead.”
“As a matter of fact he is,” Dara said, figuring that Amber was finally maturing to the age that she could define death, even if she didn’t completely understand it. Kendrick had been around the same age when he realized the bodies he sometimes saw in the embalming room weren’t asleep, either.
“Aww, man,” Kendrick howled. She sprawled out on his back on the floor, making an X with his husky limbs. He let his handheld game fall to his side, then slapped his hands over his eyes.
“That was the debacle of the decade.”
Dara shook her head, wondering what other nine-yearold tossed around vocabulary words like that.
Once Kendrick’s short-lived disappointment was over, he came to hug Dara, and she walked back to the office sandwiched between her niece and nephew. Her father and brother were there to welcome her.
“What’s up with you sneaking up here, Cookie?” her dad said.
“She came for my birthday party,” Amber proudly announced.
“I don’t blame her,” Hunter, Sr. said, picking up his granddaughter as if she were still in diapers. “It’s the event of the century.”
Amber scratched her temple.
“Duh,” Kendrick said. “A century is the same as a hundred years.”
James slipped his daughter’s sandals on her feet. “It’s a very long time,” he said to Amber. “It’s how long your mama is going to be mad at me if I don’t get home and start getting you ready for your party.”
Hunter, Sr. passed his granddaughter off to his son. In their minds, Amber was still a baby, and it wasn’t anything to see them haul her around while she sat in the crook of their forearms like it was her personal cushioned throne.
“And please make sure she looks like she was born into the Knight family and not into a flock of roosters,” Thelma said, using her hands to brush back the hair budding out like weeds around Amber’s hairline.
“That’s your aunt,” Dara said to India.
“But it’s your mama,” India said.
James picked up his keys and waited for his kids to round up their stray belongings. “Do me a favor on the way to the house,” he told Dara. “Stop by that convenience store that’s across the street from the BP gas station and get a salted pickle. Don’t ask me why, but Demetris loves those things from there.”
Hunter, Sr. looked at his watch. “You better hurry up and get in there before the gamblers get off work. They’ll have the line so backed up spending their money on lottery tickets that you can’t half get in the door.”
India cleared her throat and cut her eyes at Dara. She placed her hands where no one could see and ran one index finger on top of the other. Shame, shame, her fingers signaled.
By the mischievous look on India’s face Dara knew her cousin was about to stir up some trouble.