The celebration of life was not held in a funeral parlor or church but rather in a fancy clubhouse in an upscale Mill Valley community. It was furnished with comfortable sofas, chairs, small round accent tables, thick carpet and carefully chosen art. Its primary purpose was for hosting parties. Residents in the community could rent it for events, which Anna had done. There was a huge viewing screen upon which the pictures of Chad’s life played, a hundred and fifty of them, carefully and lovingly chosen by Anna with a little help from the kids. Every picture had Chad in it, starting from old childhood prints she’d inherited from Chad’s mother years ago. She’d glance up to see one of him in a high school football uniform looking the worse for wear with a big grin on his dirty face; she caught a huge blowup of their wedding picture; there was one soon after of him with baby Jessie asleep on his chest. There were many pictures of Chad alone, a few of Chad and Anna, one of a young Anna gazing lovingly up into Chad’s face, several family groupings. The focus was Chad, his life, his accomplishments, his achievements, his happiness, a few of the important people in his life. Chad, Chad, Chad. Just like before he died.
Things had been tense lately, but she remembered those younger years fondly because, although it hadn’t been easy, they had been deeply in love. They met through what can only be described as fate, as destiny. In fact, their meeting was a legendary family story. Anna had been in San Francisco, shopping on her lunch hour down at Fisherman’s Wharf. Shopping but not buying, which was typical for her as she had been and still was very frugal. She loved the sea lions, enjoyed watching tourists, sometimes found bargains at Pier 1, enjoyed the occasional meal on the pier.
On that day, something strange happened. She heard a panicked cry rise from the crowd of tourists on the pier, saw a food truck trundling across the pier without a driver, picking up speed. A man in work clothes and an apron was chasing the truck. She only had seconds to take it in. It seemed the food truck, its awning out and moving fast, was headed toward a group of people. Right before her eyes the truck knocked a man off the pier before the truck was stopped by a barricade. The man, completely unaware, flew off the dock and into the water below, startling a large number of fat sea lions who had been sunning themselves nearby.
The sea lions scrambled into the water and the man was flailing around in a panic. Someone yelled, “He can’t swim!” Hardly giving it a thought, Anna dropped her purse, kicked off her shoes and jumped off the pier, swimming to the man. Getting to him was no challenge; she practically landed on top of him. But he was hysterical and splashing, kicking and sputtering. “You’re okay, come on,” she said, grabbing his shirt by the collar. But he fought harder and sank, nearly pulling her under with him.
She slapped him in the face and that startled him enough he could let himself be rescued. She slid her arm around his neck and began pulling him to the dock where a couple of men seemed to be standing by to pull him in.
There was a lot of commotion, not to mention honking noises from sea lions. Anna was shivering in her wet clothes and all she could think at the time was how was she going to locate a change of clothes for her afternoon at work. Then there were emergency vehicles and a handsome young police officer draped a blanket around her shoulders and took a report. The near drowning victim was taken away in an ambulance and Anna was given a ride to her apartment by the cute policeman. She was delighted and surprised when the police officer called her a week later. She almost hyperventilated in hope that he’d ask her out.
“The man you pulled out of the water has been in touch. He wants your name,” the officer said.
“He isn’t going to sue me, is he?” she asked.
“I don’t think so,” he said with a laugh. “He seems very grateful. He won’t have any trouble tracking you down but I said I’d ask. He probably wants to thank you.”
The man’s name was Chad. He was finishing up his PhD at Berkeley while she was working in a law office in the Bay Area. She was twenty-three and he was twenty-seven and she was not prepared for how handsome he was and of course much better put together than when he was dragged out of the water.
He took her to dinner and, as she recalled, their first date was almost like an interview. He wanted to know everything about her and was utterly amazed to learn she’d had a job as a lifeguard in a community pool for exactly one summer when she was a teenager and yet jumped in to save him with total confidence. They fell in love almost instantly. The first time they made love, he asked her to marry him. She didn’t say yes right away, but they knew from the start they were made for each other. What they didn’t know was how many fights they’d have. Very few big fights but many small ones; she thought of them as bickering. They fought about what was on the pizza; a scrape on the side of the car that was not her fault, not even remotely; what kind of vacation they should have and where they should go. As Anna recalled, they always went where Chad wanted to go. They fought about what movie to see, where to eat, what was grumbled under his or her breath.
They fought seriously about his affair. That was in the distant past but it took a long time to get over. Years. But when they finally pledged to stay married, to do their best to make it good, they fell into bed and had the best sex of their lives. And they had Elizabeth.
That experience was how she knew that all the excuses for this current marital rift, no matter what he called it, was probably about another woman and not them growing apart or having divergent needs. He wouldn’t admit it and she had no proof, but she had better than average instincts. She believed he’d gotten all excited at the prospect of falling in love and was rewriting their history to make that acceptable. He was looking for an excuse that would make it reasonable to step outside the bonds of marriage. She could feel it; he’d been involved with someone else.
Or maybe she hoped that was the problem because another possibility was more impossible for her to fix. He had seemed very angry with Anna, and she had watched that anger slowly build for the last three years. Ever since Anna had been selected to fill a vacancy on the Superior Court bench. He had sneeringly addressed her as your honor several times. Chad, she suspected, was jealous.
There was also the fact that Anna disagreed with him on political issues. He complained she didn’t show enough respect for his opinion. She complained that he didn’t listen to what she was saying, acted secretively. He didn’t think she was trying hard enough to be attractive; she’d put on a little weight and he said that showed she didn’t care. They’d lost their sexual edge and hardly ever had sex anymore. She couldn’t do or say anything right. At least the kids were no longer living at home. Anna and Chad had been at odds for about six months.
“Admit it, we have little in common anymore,” was one of the last things he said before leaving on his trip.
“Over thirty years, three children and quite a lot of history,” she had replied. “Not much, I suppose.”
So he booked a trip he said would help him clear his head. “When I get back, we should have a serious talk about our future,” he said. “We might have a lot of past but that doesn’t mean we have to be stuck in it. I’d like to sort out a few things.”
People kept streaming into the large room, many of whom Anna didn’t know. She was acutely aware that some would be clients of his, people who would never see him outside of the office except for an occasion like this. In fact, some of his clients might find themselves in a crisis, having their counselor die suddenly.
There would be a program, of course. While the pictures were rotating on the big screen, there was soft music playing. The bar was open but the food wouldn’t be brought out until after the speaking was done. They all agreed it should be brief and not open to those who hadn’t been asked to speak. Get it over with, Anna had said, and then people will either stay, eat and mingle or bolt, as is their preference.
“Ladies and gentlemen, if you’d take just a moment to freshen your drinks or grab a cup, we’ll be toasting our departed friend one more time after a brief tribute from his family,” Joe said. “Find yourselves a comfortable place to sit. I believe I received the honor of opening this program by virtue of the fact that, other than Chad’s siblings, I’ve known him the longest. I first encountered him in the eighth grade and while months and sometimes years separated us, we’ve managed to keep up with each other ever since. It’s been such a privilege to call myself his friend.”
Anna glanced over at Max Carmichael, the doctor who was the director of the counseling practice where Chad had worked for twenty years. Max not only offered to preside over a testimonial, he had clearly expected to be the one to do so. But the truth was Chad had hated him.
It was going to be Anna and the kids and Joe. Each one of them was going to tackle an important aspect of Chad’s character, deliver a short summary of love and devotion. Of course they couldn’t decide who did what without almost coming to blows, and at the same time Jessie was the only one who actually wanted to speak. Poor Mike was really hurting and it showed; he was Chad’s only son and they were very close. And little Bess, his baby, was shattered. The subjects to choose from were fought over like two dogs and one bone. Bess didn’t have a dog in that fight; she had made up her mind on what she wanted to say.
I’ll do integrity, Jessie had said.
I thought I’d get that one, based on his coaching and sports training with me, Mike argued.
Well, if I can’t have integrity, then I should get loyalty, Jessie said.