Mother’s Day, Part One of Two
From, "Pacific Review" (Volume 20, 2002)
Jeff’s mom looks peaceful in her coffin. Her eyes are open and Jeff looks deep into them.[1] Lightly, he glides his hand on the coffin’s edges; it’s a Kingsley model.[2]
He hears a car door slam shut, and he draws the curtains above the coffin and looks down the street where No Doubt once filmed a music video;[3] a beat-up mustang is pulling away from the curb and a tall Hindi woman is cursing at the driver.
The hour beeps on Jeff’s watch, and Jeff sighs and silently says, “We’re going to miss breakfast.” He watches her stomach rise and fall, then leans over the coffin and shakes her gently. “Come on Mom, Wake-up.”
She looks at him and smiles. “Good morning Jeffery.”
Jeff doesn’t smile back. “You overslept—we’re going to be late”
She yawns then holds her hand towards him. “Help me out of this coffin?”
He hesitates but helps her.[4]
She stretches, walks to her closet and puts on pink bunny slippers, then turns to Jeff, who is tapping impatiently on the coffin, and says, “I’m going to shower and put my face on. There’s fish sticks in the freezer if you’re hungry.”
“A shower!? They stop serving the Egg McMuffins after 10:30. We barely have enough time as it is.”
“I’m not going out ‘til I’m decent. Go have a fish stick to hold you over. We’ll decide where to go when I’m done.”
Jeff begins to protest, but stops when she starts pulling off her nightgown. He quickly leaves the room; in the hall he hears the water turn on, and his mom begins to sing “My Jesus, I Love Thee” in the wrong key.
He goes downstairs, quietly swearing, then apologizing when he passes the painting of Jesus in the hall entry. He goes outside, picks up the O.C. Register, pulls out Sports and leaves the rest on the porch, then goes to the breakfast nook, where he reads the top headlines while waiting; the Ducks have traded their top player for four third-round draft picks to, as the GM said, “assure we do not make it into the playoffs”—adding they had created a new marketing strategy which was, “The world’s full of losers—at least we’re honest.” A related story rumored that Disney was considering selling the Angels to Rhode Island because T-shirt sales had not done as well as expected. “Money happy bastards,” he says to himself, tossing the paper across the nook.
The grandfather clock chimes ten minutes late in the living room, and Jeff leaves the nook to fix it. A vase with an assortment of roses on the center of the coffee table distracts him and he forgets about the clock. A card is hanging out and he picks it out; it has a black and white photo of a birthday cake and plays happy birthday when it opens; “Happy Birthday, Mom. Love, John, Amie, Peter, Phoebe, & Paul,” the inside says (Paul signed his name in Greek). It’s in Amie’s, John’s wife, handwriting and two weeks late.
He puts the card down and walks to the mantel; John and Amie’s wedding picture is in the center. Jeff likes to stare at the picture because he is entranced by the fear in their eyes.[5]
To the left of the wedding picture is Jeff’s graduation photo from UCI and to the right is his sister, Jennifer’s, graduation photo from Biola (each are framed in a Winnie the Pooh picture frame)[6]; “Poor Jen,” Jeff says picking up the frame and rubbing his index finger on the glass.[7]
Jeff’s stomach growls, and he goes to the kitchen and gets a banana from the refrigerator, then takes it to the couch to eat. He pulls a piece of paper from his back pocket and writes ideas for the novella he’s working on while he eats[8] It’s about a gay cowboy who is lonesome. He (the lonesome gay cowboy) lives alone on a small ranch, spending his lonesome hours watching cows have sex and collecting Garfield memorabilia he finds at flea markets. And he goes to church every Sunday. He’s struggled with who he is sexually for several years. He thinks it’s not normal for a cowboy to be a homosexual, so he convinces himself he likes women, he just hasn’t found any that arouse him in a sexual kind of way.
“What’s that you’re working on?” Asks his mom, walking down the stairs in a long tie-dyed dress and holding purple sneakers with her hair still wet.
Jeff hides the paper quickly in his pocket and says, “It’s a new story I’ve been toying with.”
“You’re writing again, then?”
He nods. “It’s actually a novella. My agent says I’m crazy—‘no one sells novellas anymore,’ he keeps saying.”
She sits next to him on the couch and starts putting on her shoes. “Is this the Jefferson Forster masterpiece everyone has been waiting for?”
Jeff shrugs.
“Tell me about it.”
“I’ll tell you later. It’s complicated.” He changes the subject, “I talked to John on the phone last night.”
“Did you?”
He nods. “They seem to be doing okay. Amie’s teaching a night class for people trying to get their GED. And Peter’s writing a editorial on new age religious movements in Orange County for the Register.”
“Did you call him?”
“Yeah.”
She looks disappointed.
“I had these baseball tickets that I wanted to give away.”[9] Jeff explains, “I thought John might want to take Paul—you know how much he likes baseball.”
“Did you ask him to call me?” John doesn’t call his mom anymore (she’s left messages but he won’t return them), and she doesn’t know why. The last time they spoke was at Christmas when she went to his Methodist church in Anaheim for the candlelight service.[10]
Jeff shakes his head no. “So where do you want to go?” Jeff asks, “IHOP has breakfast all day.”
“I don’t feel like that.”
“You pick then.”
“There’s this thing at church—a brunch.”
Jeff sighs, “So that’s what this ‘come have breakfast with mom’ is about?”
She shrugs, “I knew you wouldn’t have come if I said it was at church.”
Jeff starts to say something but shakes his head instead. “Let’s just go.”
She smiles, “I’ll get my purse.”
The drive through downtown Anaheim makes Jeff see his childhood—the old train tracks (where Jeff, Jennifer, and John ran to as a kid to see the Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey Circus come to town for the convention center shows) that ran down Santa Ana street—the Anaheim police station (where he once got thumb printed as a kid during a tour with Franklin elementary) and main branch library (where he went for story time with Jennifer as a kid and “Buck-a-bag” book sales in high school). Then, just past city hall, is his mom’s Baptist church.
Jeff opens his mom’s door; she wraps her arm around his and walks with him proudly. She introduces him to everyone she sees. He recognizes some from years back when he attended as a kid (there was Louise, whose son worked for In ‘N’ Out in high school and used to give him free french-fries; Janice, whose husband committed suicide when Jeff was little and caused a big scandal[11] [Jeff later dated one of their daughters]; and Elaine, who his mom had said for several months was having an affair with the pastor until she got to know her better). They all have daughters and Jeff is curious about this.
“Lot of woman are coming to this thing.” He says as they walk into the fellowship hall where the tables are set up for breakfast.
“It’s a mother-daughter brunch,” she says brightly, waving at a friend.
Jeff laughs, then looks around for another man. There are none. “You’re joking, right?”
“I asked if it would be okay since Jennifer was working and I didn’t have anyone to come with. It’s no big deal.”
“Everyone will be staring.”
“No one’s going to be staring—stop acting paranoid. There’ll be plenty of men. They’re cooking and serving.”
“Can I join them?”
She pushes him towards the table, “Just sit down and don’t make a scene.”
“I already have,” he mumbles as he sits at the table, which is lopsided and cracked on one side.
She does not hear his comment; one of her friends sits down at their table with her two pale-faced daughters (one is in college, and the other is Jeff’s age (she’s carrying a Bible in a Veggie Tales bag)) and she is anxiously waiting to introduce him. “Everyone knows my youngest son Jeffery, right?”
“You were just out of college the last time I saw you.” Her friend says, patting his hand.
“He’s single,” his mom announces to the two daughters. “He’s my writer son.”
They both smile shyly, and she quickly pulls his book jacket photo from her purse.
“Where do you fellowship, Jeffery?” Her friend asks, as his mom teases the daughters with the photo.
“I’m not really into the church thing anymore.”
“Oh.” Her friend says. The two daughters suddenly become disappointed.
“He’s just trying to figure some things out.” His mom says hopefully.[12] She turns to Jeff, “I’m thirsty—get me some coffee.”
Jeff obediently stands, “Anyone else want a drink?”
The two girls nervously say no, as does their mother.
A girl in her twenties wearing a Festival Con Dios t-shirt flirts a little with Jeff while he pours coffee. “I think it’s really cool that you can do this for your Mom,” she says.
Jeff smiles but says nothing back.
“I’m Sarah.” She extends her hand.
“Jeff.”
“Your sister was my Sunday school teacher when I was a kid.”
“Really?”
She nods yes. “You’re her writer son, aren’t you?”
He nods.
“I remember. You published a book a few years ago. What was it called?”
“Women I Have Slept With.”
“That’s right. Your mom sure was proud when it came out. I checked it out from the library a few years ago. It was pretty good.”
“Yeah? Most people don’t really remember it.”
“Are you working on anything new?”
“Off and on. I have a hard time finishing things though. I guess I was young with all kinds of energy the last time I published—kind of worn off.”
“Sometimes you’re hottest when you’re young. Have you read Zadie Smith? She’s good.”
“Yeah—I like her.”
“I like Neal Pollack too. And he’s cute, don’t you think?”
Jeff nods. “It’s no wonder he’s had sex with so many women. His mere name gives me a stiffy.”
This makes her nervous.
Jeff apologizes, “I guess I forgot where I was.”
“Yeah—well I better get back to my table…I smell breakfast.”
“Nice meeting you.” Jeff starts walking back to the table, but an arm stops him. He turns.
A tall man with a beard and crooked nose carrying a platter with breakfast for the women, whispers, “Careful around that one—she’s the church slut.” He winks, then chuckles and goes to the one of the tables to serve breakfast.
Jeff nods and goes back to the table where he does his best to make conversation with the girls. The oldest starts telling him about the Left Behind series, and Jeff pretends to listen as he stares blankly at the wall.[13] “I was like, these books should win the Pulitzer,” she explains of the series as she eats her eggs, “They were the best, most inspiring, awesome, books I’ve ever read.”
“Wow,” Jeff says continuing to stare at the wall.
At this, the girl pulls out a copy from her purse, “Want me to read you some of my favorite passages?”[14]
“That’s okay—I think I’d rather rush out and buy the books so I can discover them for myself.”
She smiles and nods, proud she has made a difference.
Jeff eats quickly as the youngest tells him about the series the pastor has been doing on the parable of the lost sheep. “He’s given some powerful examples,” she explains, “But his point is that all of us have struggled—been lost and questioned, but Christ will bring you home.”
“That’s really great,” Jeff says finishing, then turns to his mom, “We need to get going—I don’t want to be late for my appointment.”
She looks at him oddly, but goes with it and nods. “Just let me finish my bacon.”
“I have to meet with one of my students.” Jeff explains.
In the parking lot his mom pokes him in the ribs. “Appointments? That was embarrassing.”
“What?”
She shakes her head.
“Come on Mom—those girls were driving me nuts.”
“Let’s go, you’re in such a hurry.” He opens her door and she slams it before he can close it.
She sighs as Jeff gets in, “Was it really so awful to spend time with me?”
“Let’s go do something just you and me. That movie about the kid hacker who tries to start a war with Cuba is out now. It looks kind of good. There’s an exclusive screening at Downtown Disney.”
“I’m not really in the mood for a movie.”
“You said you wanted to spend the day together. How about the Bowers museum? The Dead Sea Scrolls are on exhibit. No church—just you and me.”
“Fine,” she says, still unhappy.
They’re both silent as Jeff heads for the 5 freeway.
Jeff brings up John’s kids as he merges onto the freeway, which always makes her happy. Peter, thirteen, is the first of them.[15] Phoebe, nine, comes next.[16] Paul, five, is last and Jeff’s favorite.[17]
The white top of Matterhorn Mountain can be seen and Jeff starts to make a comment about the California Adventure, but stops when a black object falls from the overpass and smashes through the front window. His mom screams and Jeff slams on his breaks. He looks at his mom, who is crying. A bowling ball has landed on her lap. “Dear God!,” he says.
“Do something,” his mom cries.
Jeff calls the police on his cell phone and heads towards the UCI Medical Center; the dispatcher laughs at first, then tells him to remain calm and doctors will be waiting at the hospital when they get there.
“I’m going to miss the hallmark movie tonight,” his mom says.
“I’ll tape it.”
“The quality’s not the same.”
“Well do you want to go home and watch it?”
She thinks for a moment. “No—no that would be silly.” She pauses. “Do you have to drive so fast?”
He slows down.
Whimpering more, she says “thank you” then, “You’ll have to call the minister at my church. He’ll know what to do. The number’s in purse—under the ball.”
“I’ll get it when we’re there.”
They pass the Crystal Cathedral and his mom tells him softly about when she went to Schuller’s church when it was still a drive-in and he wasn’t a Dr.—“Me and your father use to take the pickup every Sunday when we were first married—he was a good preacher then.”
They get off the freeway at State College and his mom asks if he remembers riding on the bike trail behind the hospital.
“Doesn’t it hurt to talk?”
She says yes.
“Then stop.” But he did remember the trail.[18]
They get to the hospital and a fat doctor and two male nurses pull her from the car and put her on a stretcher. “Don’t forget the minister,” she says as they push her into the ER.
end of part I of II
[1] Jeff’s mom has kept her eyes open while she slept since he was little and a teacher, who was madly in love with his older brother John, had broke into their house and tried to steal his Mighty Mouse underwear.
[2] The Kingsley casket was bought wholesale from the web – www.northerncasket.com.
[3] The video was supposed to make people believe that the band had not abandoned their Orange County roots
[4] Jeff’s mom bought the coffin the year previous after she was almost killed by a lion that escaped from the Arrowhead Pond when the circus was in town; she was prepared for death spiritually, but the encounter made her want to prepare physically; she gave her daughter power of attorney, then bought a plot and the coffin. “It’s outrageous that people pay for something they don’t use until after their dead,” she said to anyone who wanted to know.
[5] John and Amie met awkwardly. Amie’s dad ordered her mom from a Yugoslavian wife catalog; twenty years after this, his wife sought counseling because she found, hidden in his sock drawer, a mail order bride catalog from Thailand and she was concerned he might be shopping for a new wife; John was their family counselor. Amie was seventeen then and working on her associates degree in wood technology at Fullerton College; she also worked part-time shelving books at the school library. John was instantly attracted to her and called her up at home to ask her out (he told her it was for the good of her family). They did. Amie and John had sex after dating a week; she got pregnant, and they got married. Somewhere before all this, John made Amie become a Christian (she was a Scientologist (John condemned Scientology for charging money to get out repressed thoughts)), Amie’s parents got a divorce, and Amie’s dad ordered a bride from Jordan who was deported a year later for being involved in a conspiracy to blow up Big Thunder Mountain at Disneyland. Her dad is single now. A year after marrying Amie, John opened up a Christian Family Counseling office next door to Chuck Smith’s (John met Chuck Smith at the Quizno’s on Baker and offered him ten percent off his counseling services) Calvary Chapel church in Costa Mesa. They bought a nice house in Orange that is built on top of a former Orange Grove (his mom says she used to go and buy produce from the Spanish family who owed the land (Julio Santiago was the father; he had worked the land since he was eight. The former owner became rich on real estate investments he had made in Huntington Beach and sold Julio and his family the land in the early fifties)).
[6] Jeff’s mom bought them as a set on clearance at the Disney Store in Brea.
[7] Jeff pities Jennifer’s life. She is the middle child and also a conservative Christian lesbian. She and her lover, Catherine, live in a studio apartment in Cypress (Catherine is a dental hygienist in Garden Grove, three blocks from where she grew up and her parents still live (Her family doesn’t mind that she’s a homosexual, they’re embarrassed that she’s not a Buddhist. She’s the only one in the family who has abandoned the Buddhist tradition. Her brother is Muslim (by marriage), but he is secretly Buddhist, so nobody cares). Catherine became a Christian in high school when her best friend invited her to a youth group at a Presbyterian church to see a concert by a group of five high school kids that went by the name Former Lost Sheep; Catherine became a Christian that night). Jennifer and Catherine met after college at a Bible study for career aged singles; they became accountability partners and started sharing their sexual frustrations. One month later they realized they had fallen in love and became lovers. They have been living together for a year in the studio (their first home as a couple). They’re a spiritual couple (they pray together; have a daily Bible study together; volunteer on weekends together doing community service in downtown Santa Ana; and go to Mexico four times a year to build houses). They both struggle with their gayness; some weeks they feel down because they each feel they’re living a life of sin. Because they still don’t know if it was okay with God to be gay they only hug and sleep in the same bed but have no sexual intercourse. Jennifer is a social worker. She goes to graduate school part-time at Vanguard in Costa Mesa where she is working on a theology degree; she wants the degree for spiritual growth, she does not want to preach (she believes that only men should preach).
[8] Jeff started writing at UCI. He was on Ecstasy watching Fantasia with a friend in his dorm; his friend said they could probably write some pretty whacked-up stuff on drugs. Jeff gave it a try and thought he was the next Kerouac until the next morning. He kept writing after college but he wasn’t sure why (part of it was John; when John was a senior in High School he wrote a short story about a minister’s daughter who murders her boyfriend because she feels guilty for having sex with him; it was published in The Bellingham Review. It’s the only story he ever wrote because he claims to have writer’s block (it’s actually because his mom said she thought it was too graphic and didn’t like it (John wanted to make her happy, so he stopped writing). Jeff knew John would be mad at him if he said he wanted to be a writer, so he wrote). He worked odd jobs (he picked up horse crap on Main Street at Disneyland, edited a literary journal that failed before going to print, sold flowers on a freeway off ramp, was a janitor for the AMC 10 movie theater in Fullerton (before it became the AMC 20), and drove the car ferry at Balboa island) after college for two years while continuing to write, then applied to the MFA program at the University of Phoenix and was accepted. During his two years, he was published in the Missouri, Santa Monica, and Paris Review, and started building a decent portfolio (he had since been forgotten because a fat, black, troubled girl also in the writing program had her first novel picked as an Oprah Book selection a few years later). His last year at Phoenix an agent helped him get a publisher to put out a story collection that he titledWomen I Have Slept With. Five thousand copies were printed (his mom bought twenty). He began writing a novel after that, but never finished it and took part-time jobs teaching creative writing at the Fullerton and Golden West community college. He likes Fullerton more. On the weekend, he sells stereos at the Cypress swap meet for an Asian guy named Vince who gives him a good commission and free donuts (his mom owns a donut shop in Buena Park).
[9] A writing student who never wrote a story because he didn’t know how to write gave Jeff Angel tickets in return for a C-.
[10] John enjoys church but also believes it’s a good opportunity to advertise; he always carries a handful of business cards when he’s at church and always keeps an open ear for who’s having marital problems. He sings in the choir, is head of the men’s club, reads weekly announcements in front of the congregation, and believes he is the most popular person at church (John confessed to Jeff last week that Amie wanted another baby. John told her no—three’s a better number (Amie is lonely and empty. She is having cyber-sex on a computer she uses at the library with a minister she met in a Christian parenting chat room. The minister wants to meet her but she refuses because she believes this would make it too real and scandalous. In the afternoon, after she drops Paul off at Kindergarten, she does the dishes naked. She secretly writes poems under the alias Penelope Peach and has three printed in a little literary journal. She’s still close to her dad who now lives back east; she calls him once a week. She hates her mom who she feels abandoned her after she married John (her mom has called and wrote several times but John screens the calls and mail to prevent Amie from falling into any temptation and he refuses to give her the messages because he fears the influence she might have on Amie))).
[11] This is the same year Jeff’s mom began to play the organ for the church.
[12] Jeff stopped going to church after high school but remains spiritual. He was into Taoism for about a year after taking an Eastern religion course; did tapes with MSIA for two months, but stopped because it seemed too Mormon; fell for a Jewish girl four years ago and went to membership classes at a temple to impress her; they were engaged for two weeks. He proposed at the Irvine Spectrum (they saw the critically acclaimed film about a lesbian who joins a convent to meet women then falls in love with the priest, who is gay, and kills him then herself—parts of the movie were filmed at Main Place mall in Santa Ana); the girl told Jeff yes, then dumped him at a seder.
[13] They use to have lock-in nights in the room when Jeff was kid, and he’d stay up half the night playing nation ball. He used to be active in church when he was a kid (he went through several phases religiously; when he was seven he was afraid for several months that the antichrist was coming and he wouldn’t get into heaven because he would be deceived by his powers; when he was nine he went through a preaching phase—he use to stand in front of the TV while everyone was watching and say things like, “We are all sinners, but through the glory and grace of God we can have salvation.” John and Jennifer would tell him to sit down and shut-up, but his mom would tell him to continue and he’d give a five minute mini sermon. His mom would tell all her church friends that he was going to be an evangelist as great as Billy Sunday and Mordechai Ham. In junior high he forgot he was supposed to believe. In high school he came closest to God in the “personal” sense. One night the youth pastor pulled him aside and said that he deceived himself if he thought he was a Christian just because he went to church—“Christianity is a relationship, not a religion,” the pastor told him. He accepted Christ that night, was baptized at the Baptist church, and claimed to have a relationship with God for a few months. His first year at college he fell away from church, then accepted Christ again at the ’85 Billy Graham Crusade in Anaheim, but he fell away one final time and now identified himself as “spiritual non-religiously”).
[14] The copy is worn and heavily marked with yellow post-it notes.
[15] Peter takes physics courses at the Rancho Santiago college and will finish high school next year. He plays senior league baseball for the Doves (he came up with the name (from the Bible) and everyone agreed to it because he is the most popular and best player on the team (even the coach does what he says)). The year before, when he was 12, he gave a sermon on the Fruit of the Spirit for the church’s annual Youth Sunday [his grandma, uncle, and aunt did not come because they weren’t told until after it was over). Often he brags about his first memory being his grandma cradling in him in her arms singing “What A Friend We Have In Jesus” when he was six months old.
[16] Phoebe is the child most into arts (her dad says she gets that from him, but he isn’t artistic). She is a prodigy piano player and has performed four piano solos in front of the church. She also likes to write stories and has secretly won a creative writing contest at the library; her dad discourages her from writing (he tells her, “Grandma wouldn’t like it.”) and would not have approved of the story (it was about a rebellious daughter who runs away from home when she is sixteen and becomes a traveling evangelist). The past summer she won the blue ribbon at the county fair for wielding a replica of the first church in Orange County out of old metal coat hangers.
[17] Paul is bilingual in French and has a tutor teaching him Biblical Greek; he likes watching Spanish cartoons, but he’s not fluent yet; he also loves to read Victor Hugo in the original French.
A month ago John had Jeff and a bunch of people over for a BBQ to celebrate ascension day, and Paul, who was standing in front of the screen door with a little navy blue suit and his left shoe untied, said, “Uncle Jeff, what’s the meaning of life?”
“That’s a pretty serious question for someone your age.”
He shrugged his shoulders. “Mother and Father say I’m very advanced for my age.”
“Well, to tell you the truth I don’t know. But that’s one of the mysteries that makes life so exciting—you never know what to make of it.”
“That’s an interesting theory. The French writer Sébastien-Roch Nicolas de Chamfort says that living is a sickness that sleep provides relief to every sixteen hours. It’s a palliative. The remedy is death.”
“Well Mark Twain said whoever has lived long enough to find out what life is, knows how deep a debt of gratitude we owe to Adam, because he brought death into the world.”
“I’m not familiar with this Mark Twain fellow.”
[18] All four of them (their dad was gone by then) would load their bikes up in the car, somehow always getting them to fit, and they’d get on the trail at Angel stadium. Jeff would usually complain about being tired after a mile or two and him and John would stay back (they’d hunt for water snakes and John would tease about tossing him in) while their mom and Jennifer would go for a few more miles; sometimes he’d make it past Santa Ana and once he got all the way to the beach.
From, "Pacific Review" (Volume 20, 2002)
Jeff’s mom looks peaceful in her coffin. Her eyes are open and Jeff looks deep into them.[1] Lightly, he glides his hand on the coffin’s edges; it’s a Kingsley model.[2]
He hears a car door slam shut, and he draws the curtains above the coffin and looks down the street where No Doubt once filmed a music video;[3] a beat-up mustang is pulling away from the curb and a tall Hindi woman is cursing at the driver.
The hour beeps on Jeff’s watch, and Jeff sighs and silently says, “We’re going to miss breakfast.” He watches her stomach rise and fall, then leans over the coffin and shakes her gently. “Come on Mom, Wake-up.”
She looks at him and smiles. “Good morning Jeffery.”
Jeff doesn’t smile back. “You overslept—we’re going to be late”
She yawns then holds her hand towards him. “Help me out of this coffin?”
He hesitates but helps her.[4]
She stretches, walks to her closet and puts on pink bunny slippers, then turns to Jeff, who is tapping impatiently on the coffin, and says, “I’m going to shower and put my face on. There’s fish sticks in the freezer if you’re hungry.”
“A shower!? They stop serving the Egg McMuffins after 10:30. We barely have enough time as it is.”
“I’m not going out ‘til I’m decent. Go have a fish stick to hold you over. We’ll decide where to go when I’m done.”
Jeff begins to protest, but stops when she starts pulling off her nightgown. He quickly leaves the room; in the hall he hears the water turn on, and his mom begins to sing “My Jesus, I Love Thee” in the wrong key.
He goes downstairs, quietly swearing, then apologizing when he passes the painting of Jesus in the hall entry. He goes outside, picks up the O.C. Register, pulls out Sports and leaves the rest on the porch, then goes to the breakfast nook, where he reads the top headlines while waiting; the Ducks have traded their top player for four third-round draft picks to, as the GM said, “assure we do not make it into the playoffs”—adding they had created a new marketing strategy which was, “The world’s full of losers—at least we’re honest.” A related story rumored that Disney was considering selling the Angels to Rhode Island because T-shirt sales had not done as well as expected. “Money happy bastards,” he says to himself, tossing the paper across the nook.
The grandfather clock chimes ten minutes late in the living room, and Jeff leaves the nook to fix it. A vase with an assortment of roses on the center of the coffee table distracts him and he forgets about the clock. A card is hanging out and he picks it out; it has a black and white photo of a birthday cake and plays happy birthday when it opens; “Happy Birthday, Mom. Love, John, Amie, Peter, Phoebe, & Paul,” the inside says (Paul signed his name in Greek). It’s in Amie’s, John’s wife, handwriting and two weeks late.
He puts the card down and walks to the mantel; John and Amie’s wedding picture is in the center. Jeff likes to stare at the picture because he is entranced by the fear in their eyes.[5]
To the left of the wedding picture is Jeff’s graduation photo from UCI and to the right is his sister, Jennifer’s, graduation photo from Biola (each are framed in a Winnie the Pooh picture frame)[6]; “Poor Jen,” Jeff says picking up the frame and rubbing his index finger on the glass.[7]
Jeff’s stomach growls, and he goes to the kitchen and gets a banana from the refrigerator, then takes it to the couch to eat. He pulls a piece of paper from his back pocket and writes ideas for the novella he’s working on while he eats[8] It’s about a gay cowboy who is lonesome. He (the lonesome gay cowboy) lives alone on a small ranch, spending his lonesome hours watching cows have sex and collecting Garfield memorabilia he finds at flea markets. And he goes to church every Sunday. He’s struggled with who he is sexually for several years. He thinks it’s not normal for a cowboy to be a homosexual, so he convinces himself he likes women, he just hasn’t found any that arouse him in a sexual kind of way.
“What’s that you’re working on?” Asks his mom, walking down the stairs in a long tie-dyed dress and holding purple sneakers with her hair still wet.
Jeff hides the paper quickly in his pocket and says, “It’s a new story I’ve been toying with.”
“You’re writing again, then?”
He nods. “It’s actually a novella. My agent says I’m crazy—‘no one sells novellas anymore,’ he keeps saying.”
She sits next to him on the couch and starts putting on her shoes. “Is this the Jefferson Forster masterpiece everyone has been waiting for?”
Jeff shrugs.
“Tell me about it.”
“I’ll tell you later. It’s complicated.” He changes the subject, “I talked to John on the phone last night.”
“Did you?”
He nods. “They seem to be doing okay. Amie’s teaching a night class for people trying to get their GED. And Peter’s writing a editorial on new age religious movements in Orange County for the Register.”
“Did you call him?”
“Yeah.”
She looks disappointed.
“I had these baseball tickets that I wanted to give away.”[9] Jeff explains, “I thought John might want to take Paul—you know how much he likes baseball.”
“Did you ask him to call me?” John doesn’t call his mom anymore (she’s left messages but he won’t return them), and she doesn’t know why. The last time they spoke was at Christmas when she went to his Methodist church in Anaheim for the candlelight service.[10]
Jeff shakes his head no. “So where do you want to go?” Jeff asks, “IHOP has breakfast all day.”
“I don’t feel like that.”
“You pick then.”
“There’s this thing at church—a brunch.”
Jeff sighs, “So that’s what this ‘come have breakfast with mom’ is about?”
She shrugs, “I knew you wouldn’t have come if I said it was at church.”
Jeff starts to say something but shakes his head instead. “Let’s just go.”
She smiles, “I’ll get my purse.”
The drive through downtown Anaheim makes Jeff see his childhood—the old train tracks (where Jeff, Jennifer, and John ran to as a kid to see the Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey Circus come to town for the convention center shows) that ran down Santa Ana street—the Anaheim police station (where he once got thumb printed as a kid during a tour with Franklin elementary) and main branch library (where he went for story time with Jennifer as a kid and “Buck-a-bag” book sales in high school). Then, just past city hall, is his mom’s Baptist church.
Jeff opens his mom’s door; she wraps her arm around his and walks with him proudly. She introduces him to everyone she sees. He recognizes some from years back when he attended as a kid (there was Louise, whose son worked for In ‘N’ Out in high school and used to give him free french-fries; Janice, whose husband committed suicide when Jeff was little and caused a big scandal[11] [Jeff later dated one of their daughters]; and Elaine, who his mom had said for several months was having an affair with the pastor until she got to know her better). They all have daughters and Jeff is curious about this.
“Lot of woman are coming to this thing.” He says as they walk into the fellowship hall where the tables are set up for breakfast.
“It’s a mother-daughter brunch,” she says brightly, waving at a friend.
Jeff laughs, then looks around for another man. There are none. “You’re joking, right?”
“I asked if it would be okay since Jennifer was working and I didn’t have anyone to come with. It’s no big deal.”
“Everyone will be staring.”
“No one’s going to be staring—stop acting paranoid. There’ll be plenty of men. They’re cooking and serving.”
“Can I join them?”
She pushes him towards the table, “Just sit down and don’t make a scene.”
“I already have,” he mumbles as he sits at the table, which is lopsided and cracked on one side.
She does not hear his comment; one of her friends sits down at their table with her two pale-faced daughters (one is in college, and the other is Jeff’s age (she’s carrying a Bible in a Veggie Tales bag)) and she is anxiously waiting to introduce him. “Everyone knows my youngest son Jeffery, right?”
“You were just out of college the last time I saw you.” Her friend says, patting his hand.
“He’s single,” his mom announces to the two daughters. “He’s my writer son.”
They both smile shyly, and she quickly pulls his book jacket photo from her purse.
“Where do you fellowship, Jeffery?” Her friend asks, as his mom teases the daughters with the photo.
“I’m not really into the church thing anymore.”
“Oh.” Her friend says. The two daughters suddenly become disappointed.
“He’s just trying to figure some things out.” His mom says hopefully.[12] She turns to Jeff, “I’m thirsty—get me some coffee.”
Jeff obediently stands, “Anyone else want a drink?”
The two girls nervously say no, as does their mother.
A girl in her twenties wearing a Festival Con Dios t-shirt flirts a little with Jeff while he pours coffee. “I think it’s really cool that you can do this for your Mom,” she says.
Jeff smiles but says nothing back.
“I’m Sarah.” She extends her hand.
“Jeff.”
“Your sister was my Sunday school teacher when I was a kid.”
“Really?”
She nods yes. “You’re her writer son, aren’t you?”
He nods.
“I remember. You published a book a few years ago. What was it called?”
“Women I Have Slept With.”
“That’s right. Your mom sure was proud when it came out. I checked it out from the library a few years ago. It was pretty good.”
“Yeah? Most people don’t really remember it.”
“Are you working on anything new?”
“Off and on. I have a hard time finishing things though. I guess I was young with all kinds of energy the last time I published—kind of worn off.”
“Sometimes you’re hottest when you’re young. Have you read Zadie Smith? She’s good.”
“Yeah—I like her.”
“I like Neal Pollack too. And he’s cute, don’t you think?”
Jeff nods. “It’s no wonder he’s had sex with so many women. His mere name gives me a stiffy.”
This makes her nervous.
Jeff apologizes, “I guess I forgot where I was.”
“Yeah—well I better get back to my table…I smell breakfast.”
“Nice meeting you.” Jeff starts walking back to the table, but an arm stops him. He turns.
A tall man with a beard and crooked nose carrying a platter with breakfast for the women, whispers, “Careful around that one—she’s the church slut.” He winks, then chuckles and goes to the one of the tables to serve breakfast.
Jeff nods and goes back to the table where he does his best to make conversation with the girls. The oldest starts telling him about the Left Behind series, and Jeff pretends to listen as he stares blankly at the wall.[13] “I was like, these books should win the Pulitzer,” she explains of the series as she eats her eggs, “They were the best, most inspiring, awesome, books I’ve ever read.”
“Wow,” Jeff says continuing to stare at the wall.
At this, the girl pulls out a copy from her purse, “Want me to read you some of my favorite passages?”[14]
“That’s okay—I think I’d rather rush out and buy the books so I can discover them for myself.”
She smiles and nods, proud she has made a difference.
Jeff eats quickly as the youngest tells him about the series the pastor has been doing on the parable of the lost sheep. “He’s given some powerful examples,” she explains, “But his point is that all of us have struggled—been lost and questioned, but Christ will bring you home.”
“That’s really great,” Jeff says finishing, then turns to his mom, “We need to get going—I don’t want to be late for my appointment.”
She looks at him oddly, but goes with it and nods. “Just let me finish my bacon.”
“I have to meet with one of my students.” Jeff explains.
In the parking lot his mom pokes him in the ribs. “Appointments? That was embarrassing.”
“What?”
She shakes her head.
“Come on Mom—those girls were driving me nuts.”
“Let’s go, you’re in such a hurry.” He opens her door and she slams it before he can close it.
She sighs as Jeff gets in, “Was it really so awful to spend time with me?”
“Let’s go do something just you and me. That movie about the kid hacker who tries to start a war with Cuba is out now. It looks kind of good. There’s an exclusive screening at Downtown Disney.”
“I’m not really in the mood for a movie.”
“You said you wanted to spend the day together. How about the Bowers museum? The Dead Sea Scrolls are on exhibit. No church—just you and me.”
“Fine,” she says, still unhappy.
They’re both silent as Jeff heads for the 5 freeway.
Jeff brings up John’s kids as he merges onto the freeway, which always makes her happy. Peter, thirteen, is the first of them.[15] Phoebe, nine, comes next.[16] Paul, five, is last and Jeff’s favorite.[17]
The white top of Matterhorn Mountain can be seen and Jeff starts to make a comment about the California Adventure, but stops when a black object falls from the overpass and smashes through the front window. His mom screams and Jeff slams on his breaks. He looks at his mom, who is crying. A bowling ball has landed on her lap. “Dear God!,” he says.
“Do something,” his mom cries.
Jeff calls the police on his cell phone and heads towards the UCI Medical Center; the dispatcher laughs at first, then tells him to remain calm and doctors will be waiting at the hospital when they get there.
“I’m going to miss the hallmark movie tonight,” his mom says.
“I’ll tape it.”
“The quality’s not the same.”
“Well do you want to go home and watch it?”
She thinks for a moment. “No—no that would be silly.” She pauses. “Do you have to drive so fast?”
He slows down.
Whimpering more, she says “thank you” then, “You’ll have to call the minister at my church. He’ll know what to do. The number’s in purse—under the ball.”
“I’ll get it when we’re there.”
They pass the Crystal Cathedral and his mom tells him softly about when she went to Schuller’s church when it was still a drive-in and he wasn’t a Dr.—“Me and your father use to take the pickup every Sunday when we were first married—he was a good preacher then.”
They get off the freeway at State College and his mom asks if he remembers riding on the bike trail behind the hospital.
“Doesn’t it hurt to talk?”
She says yes.
“Then stop.” But he did remember the trail.[18]
They get to the hospital and a fat doctor and two male nurses pull her from the car and put her on a stretcher. “Don’t forget the minister,” she says as they push her into the ER.
end of part I of II
[1] Jeff’s mom has kept her eyes open while she slept since he was little and a teacher, who was madly in love with his older brother John, had broke into their house and tried to steal his Mighty Mouse underwear.
[2] The Kingsley casket was bought wholesale from the web – www.northerncasket.com.
[3] The video was supposed to make people believe that the band had not abandoned their Orange County roots
[4] Jeff’s mom bought the coffin the year previous after she was almost killed by a lion that escaped from the Arrowhead Pond when the circus was in town; she was prepared for death spiritually, but the encounter made her want to prepare physically; she gave her daughter power of attorney, then bought a plot and the coffin. “It’s outrageous that people pay for something they don’t use until after their dead,” she said to anyone who wanted to know.
[5] John and Amie met awkwardly. Amie’s dad ordered her mom from a Yugoslavian wife catalog; twenty years after this, his wife sought counseling because she found, hidden in his sock drawer, a mail order bride catalog from Thailand and she was concerned he might be shopping for a new wife; John was their family counselor. Amie was seventeen then and working on her associates degree in wood technology at Fullerton College; she also worked part-time shelving books at the school library. John was instantly attracted to her and called her up at home to ask her out (he told her it was for the good of her family). They did. Amie and John had sex after dating a week; she got pregnant, and they got married. Somewhere before all this, John made Amie become a Christian (she was a Scientologist (John condemned Scientology for charging money to get out repressed thoughts)), Amie’s parents got a divorce, and Amie’s dad ordered a bride from Jordan who was deported a year later for being involved in a conspiracy to blow up Big Thunder Mountain at Disneyland. Her dad is single now. A year after marrying Amie, John opened up a Christian Family Counseling office next door to Chuck Smith’s (John met Chuck Smith at the Quizno’s on Baker and offered him ten percent off his counseling services) Calvary Chapel church in Costa Mesa. They bought a nice house in Orange that is built on top of a former Orange Grove (his mom says she used to go and buy produce from the Spanish family who owed the land (Julio Santiago was the father; he had worked the land since he was eight. The former owner became rich on real estate investments he had made in Huntington Beach and sold Julio and his family the land in the early fifties)).
[6] Jeff’s mom bought them as a set on clearance at the Disney Store in Brea.
[7] Jeff pities Jennifer’s life. She is the middle child and also a conservative Christian lesbian. She and her lover, Catherine, live in a studio apartment in Cypress (Catherine is a dental hygienist in Garden Grove, three blocks from where she grew up and her parents still live (Her family doesn’t mind that she’s a homosexual, they’re embarrassed that she’s not a Buddhist. She’s the only one in the family who has abandoned the Buddhist tradition. Her brother is Muslim (by marriage), but he is secretly Buddhist, so nobody cares). Catherine became a Christian in high school when her best friend invited her to a youth group at a Presbyterian church to see a concert by a group of five high school kids that went by the name Former Lost Sheep; Catherine became a Christian that night). Jennifer and Catherine met after college at a Bible study for career aged singles; they became accountability partners and started sharing their sexual frustrations. One month later they realized they had fallen in love and became lovers. They have been living together for a year in the studio (their first home as a couple). They’re a spiritual couple (they pray together; have a daily Bible study together; volunteer on weekends together doing community service in downtown Santa Ana; and go to Mexico four times a year to build houses). They both struggle with their gayness; some weeks they feel down because they each feel they’re living a life of sin. Because they still don’t know if it was okay with God to be gay they only hug and sleep in the same bed but have no sexual intercourse. Jennifer is a social worker. She goes to graduate school part-time at Vanguard in Costa Mesa where she is working on a theology degree; she wants the degree for spiritual growth, she does not want to preach (she believes that only men should preach).
[8] Jeff started writing at UCI. He was on Ecstasy watching Fantasia with a friend in his dorm; his friend said they could probably write some pretty whacked-up stuff on drugs. Jeff gave it a try and thought he was the next Kerouac until the next morning. He kept writing after college but he wasn’t sure why (part of it was John; when John was a senior in High School he wrote a short story about a minister’s daughter who murders her boyfriend because she feels guilty for having sex with him; it was published in The Bellingham Review. It’s the only story he ever wrote because he claims to have writer’s block (it’s actually because his mom said she thought it was too graphic and didn’t like it (John wanted to make her happy, so he stopped writing). Jeff knew John would be mad at him if he said he wanted to be a writer, so he wrote). He worked odd jobs (he picked up horse crap on Main Street at Disneyland, edited a literary journal that failed before going to print, sold flowers on a freeway off ramp, was a janitor for the AMC 10 movie theater in Fullerton (before it became the AMC 20), and drove the car ferry at Balboa island) after college for two years while continuing to write, then applied to the MFA program at the University of Phoenix and was accepted. During his two years, he was published in the Missouri, Santa Monica, and Paris Review, and started building a decent portfolio (he had since been forgotten because a fat, black, troubled girl also in the writing program had her first novel picked as an Oprah Book selection a few years later). His last year at Phoenix an agent helped him get a publisher to put out a story collection that he titledWomen I Have Slept With. Five thousand copies were printed (his mom bought twenty). He began writing a novel after that, but never finished it and took part-time jobs teaching creative writing at the Fullerton and Golden West community college. He likes Fullerton more. On the weekend, he sells stereos at the Cypress swap meet for an Asian guy named Vince who gives him a good commission and free donuts (his mom owns a donut shop in Buena Park).
[9] A writing student who never wrote a story because he didn’t know how to write gave Jeff Angel tickets in return for a C-.
[10] John enjoys church but also believes it’s a good opportunity to advertise; he always carries a handful of business cards when he’s at church and always keeps an open ear for who’s having marital problems. He sings in the choir, is head of the men’s club, reads weekly announcements in front of the congregation, and believes he is the most popular person at church (John confessed to Jeff last week that Amie wanted another baby. John told her no—three’s a better number (Amie is lonely and empty. She is having cyber-sex on a computer she uses at the library with a minister she met in a Christian parenting chat room. The minister wants to meet her but she refuses because she believes this would make it too real and scandalous. In the afternoon, after she drops Paul off at Kindergarten, she does the dishes naked. She secretly writes poems under the alias Penelope Peach and has three printed in a little literary journal. She’s still close to her dad who now lives back east; she calls him once a week. She hates her mom who she feels abandoned her after she married John (her mom has called and wrote several times but John screens the calls and mail to prevent Amie from falling into any temptation and he refuses to give her the messages because he fears the influence she might have on Amie))).
[11] This is the same year Jeff’s mom began to play the organ for the church.
[12] Jeff stopped going to church after high school but remains spiritual. He was into Taoism for about a year after taking an Eastern religion course; did tapes with MSIA for two months, but stopped because it seemed too Mormon; fell for a Jewish girl four years ago and went to membership classes at a temple to impress her; they were engaged for two weeks. He proposed at the Irvine Spectrum (they saw the critically acclaimed film about a lesbian who joins a convent to meet women then falls in love with the priest, who is gay, and kills him then herself—parts of the movie were filmed at Main Place mall in Santa Ana); the girl told Jeff yes, then dumped him at a seder.
[13] They use to have lock-in nights in the room when Jeff was kid, and he’d stay up half the night playing nation ball. He used to be active in church when he was a kid (he went through several phases religiously; when he was seven he was afraid for several months that the antichrist was coming and he wouldn’t get into heaven because he would be deceived by his powers; when he was nine he went through a preaching phase—he use to stand in front of the TV while everyone was watching and say things like, “We are all sinners, but through the glory and grace of God we can have salvation.” John and Jennifer would tell him to sit down and shut-up, but his mom would tell him to continue and he’d give a five minute mini sermon. His mom would tell all her church friends that he was going to be an evangelist as great as Billy Sunday and Mordechai Ham. In junior high he forgot he was supposed to believe. In high school he came closest to God in the “personal” sense. One night the youth pastor pulled him aside and said that he deceived himself if he thought he was a Christian just because he went to church—“Christianity is a relationship, not a religion,” the pastor told him. He accepted Christ that night, was baptized at the Baptist church, and claimed to have a relationship with God for a few months. His first year at college he fell away from church, then accepted Christ again at the ’85 Billy Graham Crusade in Anaheim, but he fell away one final time and now identified himself as “spiritual non-religiously”).
[14] The copy is worn and heavily marked with yellow post-it notes.
[15] Peter takes physics courses at the Rancho Santiago college and will finish high school next year. He plays senior league baseball for the Doves (he came up with the name (from the Bible) and everyone agreed to it because he is the most popular and best player on the team (even the coach does what he says)). The year before, when he was 12, he gave a sermon on the Fruit of the Spirit for the church’s annual Youth Sunday [his grandma, uncle, and aunt did not come because they weren’t told until after it was over). Often he brags about his first memory being his grandma cradling in him in her arms singing “What A Friend We Have In Jesus” when he was six months old.
[16] Phoebe is the child most into arts (her dad says she gets that from him, but he isn’t artistic). She is a prodigy piano player and has performed four piano solos in front of the church. She also likes to write stories and has secretly won a creative writing contest at the library; her dad discourages her from writing (he tells her, “Grandma wouldn’t like it.”) and would not have approved of the story (it was about a rebellious daughter who runs away from home when she is sixteen and becomes a traveling evangelist). The past summer she won the blue ribbon at the county fair for wielding a replica of the first church in Orange County out of old metal coat hangers.
[17] Paul is bilingual in French and has a tutor teaching him Biblical Greek; he likes watching Spanish cartoons, but he’s not fluent yet; he also loves to read Victor Hugo in the original French.
A month ago John had Jeff and a bunch of people over for a BBQ to celebrate ascension day, and Paul, who was standing in front of the screen door with a little navy blue suit and his left shoe untied, said, “Uncle Jeff, what’s the meaning of life?”
“That’s a pretty serious question for someone your age.”
He shrugged his shoulders. “Mother and Father say I’m very advanced for my age.”
“Well, to tell you the truth I don’t know. But that’s one of the mysteries that makes life so exciting—you never know what to make of it.”
“That’s an interesting theory. The French writer Sébastien-Roch Nicolas de Chamfort says that living is a sickness that sleep provides relief to every sixteen hours. It’s a palliative. The remedy is death.”
“Well Mark Twain said whoever has lived long enough to find out what life is, knows how deep a debt of gratitude we owe to Adam, because he brought death into the world.”
“I’m not familiar with this Mark Twain fellow.”
[18] All four of them (their dad was gone by then) would load their bikes up in the car, somehow always getting them to fit, and they’d get on the trail at Angel stadium. Jeff would usually complain about being tired after a mile or two and him and John would stay back (they’d hunt for water snakes and John would tease about tossing him in) while their mom and Jennifer would go for a few more miles; sometimes he’d make it past Santa Ana and once he got all the way to the beach.