Tales of the City 07 - Michael Tolliver Lives

perfect, but it has been my life, tailored to my dreams and safely beyond the reach of God’s terrible swift sword.
    My brother can’t say that. Never could.

    Irwin’s wife, Lenore, was at Children’s Bible Study, he told us, doing her puppet ministry with one of the grandkids. He expected her back by four o’clock, at which point we could discuss where to go for dinner. There were several malls nearby, offering a plenitude of choices, including an Outback whose steaks, Irwin assured me, were far superior to the Outback steaks on the West Coast. Except, of course, Irwin said Left Coast, since that’s been his favorite zinger ever since he learned it on Rush Limbaugh .
    “So y’all had a good flight?” Irwin was already running out of conversation, but I liked the sound of that second-person plural, since y’all, in its way, implies a couple, and Irwin, of course, knew that I knew that. It sort of sanctified our union. Sort of.
    “It was okay,” Ben answered. “Lousy legroom, but…you just have to deal.”
    “Oh, man, you got that right! I fly business or first these days, but I know what you mean.” He banged his palm rhythmically against the leather of that giant catcher’s mitt as he scrambled for something to say. “So…where are y’all staying?”
    “Just a little B&B,” I replied. “It’s basic, but it’s all we need.”
    It was, to be more specific, a little gay B&B we’d found in the Spartacus Guide . We’d been attracted to the name—Inn Among the Flowers—but the flowers had proven to be everywhere but in the garden. The owners, a pair of retired Italian queens from Queens, had lovingly floralized every surface: from the sheets to the upholstery to the toilet paper.
    “You shoulda checked with me,” said Irwin. “I coulda got you a discount at the Ramada. Many Mansions meets there every Monday.”
    I translated for Ben. “That’s his Christian realtors group.”
    “Ah.”
    I couldn’t resist the urge to elaborate. “The name comes from the Bible. You know…‘In my father’s house are many mansions.’”
    Ben nodded. “Right.”
    My brother chuckled. “Some people think it’s because we sell mansions. We do sell a few…some of us…but that’s not what it means.”
    Ben smiled back. “It means the different races, right?”
    “Well, not so much races as…it just means rooms, really…that there’s plenty of room for everybody in God’s house.”
    “And you wouldn’t believe the low low down payment,” I said.
    Ben shot me a chastising look.
    “It’s okay,” Irwin told Ben. “He’s always been a smart-mouth.”

    Lenore arrived home on schedule, a whirling dervish in a pink tracksuit and careful hair. Well into her fifties, she had remained girlish and petite, a feat made all the more dramatic by the presence of her grandson, a delicate doe-eyed seven-year-old named Sumter who had volunteered to help with her burgeoning puppet ministry. As I watched from the porch, they emerged from Lenore’s Chevy Tahoe and began pulling plastic poles from the rear door like a team of well-seasoned roustabouts. It was curiously touching.
    I hollered at her. “Need a hand with that?”
    She looked up with a start. “Oh, Mikey, you’re here! I wondered whose pretty car that was. Come gimme a hug, but don’t look, I’m a mess. Shoot, I was gonna change for you. I hate lookin’ this way. Sumter, you remember your Great-Uncle Michael.”
    It was more of a command than a question, so the boy issued a dutiful “Yes, ma’am,” but there’s no way he could have remembered. I hadn’t seen him in at least four years, when his mother (my niece Kimberly, divorced last year from her meth-addicted husband) spent the night with her family at Fisherman’s Wharf on their way to a Pleasant Hawaiian Holiday. Sumter shook my hand with somber courtesy and began to tug folds of blue fabric from the back of the SUV.
    My sister-in-law embraced me fragrantly. “You look so good, Mikey!”
    “Thanks, Lenore. You too.”
    “I mean, you really do. You’ve got some nice ruddy color in your cheeks.”
    Yep, some of those meds have lovely side effects.
    “Where’s Ben?” Lenore asked, looking around.
    “Inside,” I said, pleased that she’d remembered his name. “With Irwin.”
    “Oh, no. Gettin’ an ear fulla boat, I bet.”
    I laughed. “I think that’s over with now.”
    Sumter was almost staggering under the weight of that bunched blue curtain. “Just leave that,