were scuffling sounds, muted voices, then Dad. “I followed your instruction sheet, but it didn’t work, and now I can’t get the regular TV stations, either. I think the remote’s batteries need to be changed.”
I stifled a sigh. How could a man who could spot the first faint signs of dry rot and tell the exact remaining life span of a roof be stymied by a couple of black buttons?
“Get the biggest remote…” I said, and within half a minute I heard the static disappear from the background, and the voice of a newscaster caught mid-drone.
“Thanks! I think I can remember how to do that,” Dad said, and then Mom was on the phone again.
“He’s rented some awful gangster movie. He knows I don’t like those.”
“What is it?”
“Analyze This.”
“You might like it. It’s a comedy.”
“I don’t know how gangsters can be funny.”
“I gotta go, Mom, or I’ll be late.”
“Okay. When are you coming down for dinner?”
“I’ll call from home. I really have to go.”
“They’ve seen bears in the park, coming out to go through the garbage. The salmon berries are late in coming out this year.”
“I gotta go, Mom!”
“Love you.”
“Love you, too.”
I hung up, feeling the mix of guilt and love and worry that I usually did after talking to my parents. In the back of my mind sat the realization that death or accident or illness was not just a possibility, but an inevitability. What would happen to one, when the other died?
What would happen to me?
I picked up the instructions to Ms. DeFrang’s house, looked again at the address, and coasted down the street, trying not to think of the future.
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