Simon Sort of Says: Chapters 23–29

“And,” I say, “shellac is made from insect secretions. Jelly beans are covered with bug juice.”

So, when me and two of the officers scuttled out the back door with somebody’s body-armor heavy and flapping around me, the media was already there.

There was this one reporter, Kathy Catchpole from KNUB (Nebraska’s News Source!) who kept filming at the front door of the funeral home, until Mom got so angry that she put on her best Professional Face and granted Kathy an exclusive and hauled her away from her camera and into the basement to show her what exactly was involved in an open-casket prep following an incident with a high-powered rifle.

Just as he does it, some sleazy brass music slides under the scene, and it’s like the real world has developed a sound track.

The first year after Eagle Crest was pretty rough, but I discovered that what I liked about Lego before, I still liked about Lego after, only more. The pieces laid out in their trays, rustling through them to find exactly what I need, the plastic click-clack of the pieces moving against each other, the keen edges and slick sides of the bricks under my fingers, the press and click of setting the right piece in the right place.

“Something’s gone wrong here somewhere, Simon.”
“Understatement of the century, Dad.”

She tucks her hair behind her ears, assuming the persona. “Slaughter and Sons regrets this terrible incident and asks for privacy for the bereaved family.”

“From the name on the Slaughter incorporation papers? From the pamphlet she lifted from the crematorium? It wouldn’t be hard. KNUB has already officially requested a family interview with us.”

“I love a Boss Battle,” she says. “So cathartic.”

My dad buys artisanal cheese.

The coffee machine sighs, and I pass Mom her tiny cup of magic morning elixir.

“Anyway. I’ll be delivering a statement at three. Along with June Snodgrass and Connie Semple and the lawyer for their family.”
“Okay,” I say warily.

“You’re not going to have to get on camera, Simon. Okay? Your dad and I have got this. And it’s PBS. It will be so tasteful that no one will watch it.”

No one is caught in an avalanche of embalming fluid, but I do have to pull my puppy away from a partially disassembled vintage tractor.

Kevin starts trying to blow up the air mattress with the foot pump while Agate checks the alignment of the theodolite.

“Science fairs box natural curiosity and exploration into an artificial rubric,” says Agate.

After a while cars start pulling up—their headlights bumping down the dirt road to the telescope, their engines just barely audible over the night boom of emus and the crickets.

The birds are making a radio-astronomer-like ruckus.

My parents—ironed and starched, with a level of makeup that my mom usually reserves for corpses—leave in a bustle.

At home he’s not allowed on the beds, and since he’s a guide-dog-in-training, we’ve been super consistent about the rules.

The article is called “Pastoring Without Platitudes.”

It starts with the Jesus Squirrel, absolves Dad of starting a squirrel cult, drives by “the role of deacons in the rural church,” and then—it’s basically my dad’s view about the downsides of things like miracles and providence.

It starts with the Jesus Squirrel, absolves Dad of starting a squirrel cult, drives by “the role of deacons in the rural church,” and then—it’s basically my dad’s view about the downsides of things like miracles and providence.

TV is just launching into something called Mummies Unwrapped and is promising to tell me all about bog burials.

Dr. Matapang’s exasperation overflows for a second, but then she starts mopping it up.

The radio astronomers were very excited at first. We went into town yesterday and there were many rumors. But now Kevin’s mom seems very testy.

“They’re like giant demented attack chickens.”

“You, go to the barn, get a feed trough.”

We believe that Saint Barbara can wield lightning and Saint Anthony can find things and Saint Joseph can sell houses.

The blue uniform guy wheels me up to the triage nurse, a woman with lavender scrubs and things hanging on cords around her neck: her hospital badges, her glasses, a little rubber dachshund wedged between halves of a rubber hot-dog bun.

“Concussion protocols, right, Dad?”
The Viking raises a red folder with a sticker of a brain on the front of it. “Got them right here. Though keeping this one down and quiet for a week is gonna be—”
“No screen time, no reading,” says the doctor. “No sports.”

I’m a long-haul trucker, but I call home every night to talk to the brood.

I’ve just been on the horn with the sheriff’s office: turns out that you can get a ticket for pointing a microwave at a radio telescope—Agate’s going to have her egg money docked until doomsday.

“Todd makes beautiful puppies,” rumbles the Viking. “But we might have to stop breeding from such a strong-willed sire.”

“Herc’s perfect,” I say, indignant for my pup.