At two o’clock in the afternoon, approximately twelve hours after Em’s death, Solitaire and her stepson Zach drive to the Heavenly Heights Mortuary and Old Pueblo Crematorium. It is in the center of town, a modest, Spanish-style building set back from the street with a bit of grass and geraniums and three sago palms guarding the entry.
“I think we should shop around a bit,” Zach says as they pull up in front. “I know a guy who says he can do it for half-price.”
Zach always knows “a guy”—usually it’s a chap named Lester -- who knows another guy who’ll do it for half price. “It,” which Solitaire had formerly regarded as an inherently innocuous two-letter objective pronoun, has evolved into a kind of “Lester’s List” of cosmic proportions that encompasses anything life can conceivably throw your way: cut-rate circumcisions, bank heists, church socials, Mexican dentures, bar-mitzvahs, refrigerator repairs, revolutions, firing squads, tuxedo rentals,
gun-running, body-part implants and/or reductions, fake passports
(ditto visas and green cards), prom parties, quinceañeras (with or without mariachis), prayer retreats (with or without fasting), matricides, hot watches, nose jobs, Jimmy Choo knock-offs and – it should go without saying – burials and cremations.
"Did Lester pick up a cheap crematorium at a yard sale," Solitaire asks, "or did it fall off the back of a truck?'
“He knows a guy who’s a major share-holder in an international chain of funeral homes. They deal in quantity so they can afford –“
“He knows a guy who’s a major share-holder in an international chain of funeral homes. They deal in quantity so they can afford –“
“International? You mean like… across the line?”
“Well, yeah… I guess so. They’ve also got a fleet of hearses, so transport’s not a problem.”
“I don’t think your Dad wants to be cremated in Ciudad Juarez. The Department of State has it on their no-go list. Besides, we don’t even know what the price is yet.”
“Lester says he can beat any price.”
“I’ll keep it in mind,” says Solitaire.
“I just don’t want to see you get manipulated or pushed around by one of these slick Six-Feet-Under types. Obviously they’ve got some kind of deal going with that hospice outfit.”
“That’s possible,” Solitaire concedes. “On the other hand, they’re providing a service that’s a convenience to all parties. I mean, where would we stow your Dad while we’re – quote -- shopping around? “
“Don’t you have an extra fridge in the store room?”
“It’s a side-by-side.”
“We can stand him up. It’s only for a day or so.”
Solitaire rests her head against the seat-back. Somehow, she’s wound up in a David Lynch movie and she’s wondering when it will end.
“Kidding,” Zach grins. He pats her on the shoulder, “Just trying to make you laugh.”
“I know,” she sighs. “It’s okay.”
“Remember,” Zach says as they walk from the car, “these guys are piranhas -- they’ll nibble you to death – five hundred here, five thousand there -- before you know it you’ve bought Dad a marble mausoleum for a hundred thou. So my advice is –- keep your business wits about you.”
“My what?” Solitaire, who on her best day has less business sense than her Shih-Tzus, has been suffering severe sleep deprivation for weeks and now has a bad case of brain-fog.
“Maybe I could offer him a few poker lessons in exchange for –“
“Oh, please …”
A professional poker player, Zach plays mainly online, but also teaches classes and gives private tutorials. His nom de jeu is “Poker Moses.” His business card, recently designed, shows a stone tablet with the Ten Commandments of Poker (each one bulleted) and a long, gnarled finger sternly pointing at one of the bullets.
His brother Benjamin, who deals poker at a casino near Three Points, closely scrutinizes the card. “Is that meant to be an index finger or a middle finger?”
“That’s the stupidest question I ever heard,” Zack replies.
“Not at all. It’s basic Byzantine iconography – if it’s the index finger, Moses is pointing the way, saying ‘Thou shalt raise!’ If it’s the middle finger, he’s flipping the bird, ie, ‘Thou shalt not!’ A huge difference, injunction-wise.”
Solitaire, herself, thinks it looks as though Moses is pressing an elevator button.
THE MOM-AND-POP MORTUARY
Entering the den of piranhas, Zach and Solitaire are immediately set upon by a cocker spaniel so brimming with the joy of puppyhood that he just can’t stop wriggling.
“Wriggles!” From somewhere within, the voice of God (a female here) commands, “Sit!” The dog tries desperately to obey but can’t quite manage it and his bottom goes on wagging in a kind of rear windshield-wiper action.
Mrs Wriggles, a handsome streaky-blonde woman in a tailored V-necked dress, proffers her condolences and informs them that her husband, Wally, will appear momentarily. She then offers them a seat, a cup of coffee, and a spectacular glimpse of alpine cleavage as she scoops up the still-undulating “Wriggles,” tucks him under her arm, and disappears into an office.
“Well,” says Zach judiciously, his eyes tracking the disappearing backsides of Wriggles and his mistress, “this seems like an okay sort of place.”
“I thought you wanted to shop around,” Solitaire says.
“I’ve got a gut instinct for these things,” Zach says, his hands tracing mystical circles in the air, “and the fong shoo is right. Besides,” he smiles, “a good pair beats a couple of ducks almost any day.”
Solitaire, a pushover for dogs, agrees that the fung shwei feels right, and that so far she likes the Wriggles family.
And so this decision, like so many of life’s major decisions, is arrived at in the usual objectively analytical, rational and businesslike fashion.
Waiting for Wally, Solitaire thinks back some twenty years, when she attended to the crematory arrangements of a much-loved great Aunt in Carmel-by-the-Sea. The mortuary, in Monterey, was dark in décor, heavy on crucifixes, somber in tone, and Victorian in its implicit threat of a hideous Hereafter: were you really going to Heaven, or might you be cast out --and down – into That Other Place? Might you be impaled for Eternity on the devil’s toasting fork? Might you, at the very least, find yourself lingering overlong in that dreary old holding pattern called Purgatory? The undertaker himself, gloomy and cadaverous (what else) in a three-piece black suit, was straight out of Dickens. Emerging shakily from the shadows into the sunlight, Solitaire shuddered, as, presumably, she was meant to do.
Goodbye to all that!
The Heavenly Heights Mortuary and Old Pueblo Crematorium is propelled by an entirely different philosophy, one that is essentially secular and christian with a small “c,” and anyone who books passage to the Next World through their good offices need have no fears about the fires of Hell, not if the Ullmers, which turns out to be their family name, have anything to say about it.
Their gentle, cheerful optimism about your Loved One’s long range future is clearly reflected in their pristine pastel decorating scheme: the cherry-pink and Wedgewood blue paintings of sylvan landscapes, the baby blue brocade wing back chairs, the blue and white cabbage-rose slipcovered sofa, the vases of fabricated pink roses and blue hydrangeas, the little porcelaine dishes of cellophane-wrapped peppermint candies, the hint of rose-scented freshener in the air-conditioned room. The sole concession made to an unpredictable and potentially uncontrollable grief is the bouquet of pastel boutique Kleenex boxes reassuringly placed on every shining, dust-free surface.
When Wally appears, Solitaire, who had paid scant attention to him earlier that morning, observes that he, like his establishment, is freshly-scented and dust-free. Trim, fit and boyish in a light blue polo shirt and crisply pressed chinos, he leads them down the hall to the conference room. Along the way, he tells them a bit about himself – that his family is from the Midwest, that they moved to Arizona to escape the harsh winters and to indulge their love of the outdoors … hiking, swimming, tennis … and that his two girls are heavily into gymnastics.
“How did you get into the mortuary business?” Zach asks.
“Purely by accident. When I was in college I took a summer job as an apprentice at a mortuary and I liked it. I thought, ‘Hey, this is something I can really do!’ I’ve been doing it ever since and it’s given me a great sense of satisfaction to make a fair living and help people, too. "
“I guess the work’s steady,” Zach says.
Wally smiles. “Yeah … death and taxes." He shrugs. "Steady, not too stressful. I like to hold cremations to about four a week.” He turns quickly to Solitaire. “Sorry, didn’t mean to be insensitive.”
“No problem.” She smiles. She’s back in that David Lynch movie, wondering how to get out.
The conference room is the business heart of the establishment. The lighting is subdued and the items on display are spotlighted. One wall is lined with casket samples, just the ends, which stick out of the wall like ornate, brass-handled filing cabinets. The samples are offered in a prism of muted colours from dove grey and azure to oxblood and malachite, and range in price from $385 to $13,000. They look built-to last, able to withstand every underground assault from earthworms to earthquakes, and every test of time right up to, and possibly through, the Resurrection. A claustrophobe’s ultimate nightmare.
Two other walls are lined with urns of every shape, size and price ($40 to $3,000) for containing the ashes, or what are referred to in the trade as “cremains:” memorial boxes of carved wood or etched bronze, cloisonne and celadon ginger jars, brass bookends for couples. On the bottom shelf, not illuminated, is a sturdy rectangular box in basic black plastic, standing upright; this is the box in which Em, unless Solitaire orders something different, will be returned to her.
They sit down at the conference table. Wally hands them each a manila folder with price sheets and information about assorted funeral and cremation packages, as well as official state permits and death certificates. He tells Solitaire that he can’t cremate her husband until he has an official permit, which he doesn’t expect to come through until Friday – this is now Monday – and therefore her husband will probably not be cremated until sometime over the weekend.
“Where is he?” Solitaire asks.
“What? Well, he’s here,” Wally says, “under refrigeration.”
“Is he in one of those pull-out steel drawers?”
“You mean like those morgue shots they show on TV? No, we don’t use those anymore. It’s more like a refrigerated …um…”
Solitaire glances at Zach; he looks stricken, as though his father’s death has only just hit home. She realizes suddenly how selfish she has been, how her relentless need-to-know, her desire to immerse herself in Em’s body and soul before he goes up in smoke has desensitized her to the pain of his children, especially Zach who has tried so hard, in his quirky way, to help her.
“Zach,” she says, and he starts, “perhaps you and Wally could discuss the various options.”
“The basic cremation package,” Wally says to Zach, “is $1495, which includes transport of the remains, refrigeration, obituary notices, guest registry, acknowledgment cards, services of the staff, cremation with a memorial service in our chapel, plus an optional $150 honorarium for clergy and $150 for a reception with cookies and –“
"Wally," Zach interrupts him, “we've pretty much decided to have our own memorial service and reception at home.”
In the end, they order the “Direct Cremation” package ($800), which includes transport, five days refrigeration, on-site cremation, basic particle-board container and plastic urn, plus $25 for the permit and ten copies of the death certificate at $15 per copy. The total comes to $975 plus 8.1% state sales tax. Solitaire hands over her American Express card and hopes it won’t be rejected.
“I think that’s a fair price,” Zach says when Wally leaves the room, “I doubt Lester could have done much better, frankly.”
"Probably not," Solitaire agrees.
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