The League of Berries & Laurels - Ch. 6 (Pt. II)

** To Be Decommissioned on 5/1/24 **

Ulie tries, when he can sneak off, to discover every likely place that Francis’ popper might have been placed.

“How about a whiskey,” his grandfather asks, and near the cabinet that displays the antique bottles is Ulie. “Ulie, you are much too young to take too keen an interest in old whiskeys.” Ulie, in a green paper crown, his grandfather in red, holds the door open for his elder. “Do you think of your grandfather old as all that?” Here he laughs. “Old in bones, and young at heart, I think that about sums it up.” Ulie’s father enters the alcove, upon sight of whom, his grandfather explains, “No whiskey without a crown now, son.” A hand encourages Ulie to step down, and then to return to the festivities, while Ulie’s father and grandfather go through the ritual, opening the whiskey with a drip of water from a spigot built into the cabinetry, and speak apart from the party on matters the party could not sustain.

Ulie’s mother tells a story, and it, as always bestows accolades on one of her children, but only at the expense of another, and in this way none of them can gain on the other for long in her rubric. How else was she to maintain an orderly house when her husband was away?