Guest's First

 

            Above the McReynolds fake fireplace (which Patrick, when he was three, tried to light a cheap firework in and nearly got all of us killed, as Warren iterates to neighbors or guests as he shows them the fake, itinerant fireplace—which is portable and good for any occasion—especially cheap Motel 8 rooms used to add a slice of needed nuptial romantic ambiance) Warren has hung the sign he had Ceramic in neon limerick green when he was participating in the typical Irish Curse, out of both cash and work and living on Cooper, entertaining potential employers with one of his wife’s damn fine home cooked meals hoping that Patrick, his eldest son, wasn’t doing anything completely embarrassing, such as playing with the Bunser Burner Warren fetched from a high school garbage receptacle and which Patrick and his younger sibling Allan used to use to torture their pocket sized Cobra GI Joes with, holding them with pair of bearded rusty tongs over the flame and telling them to die. Die. Warren lost a potential big time paying job as a computer analyst at Caterpillar because after he had poured the executive his third cognac and even allowed him to fire up a Cuban in the living room as the executive reviewed Warren’s inventions/technical innovations cutting-edge shit portfolio and wipes his brow and mentioned how Warren could possibly be an invaluable asset to the Global Caterpillar community with his unparalleled insight into modern technology (Helen, in the kitchen, holding the top of her blouse into her neck, flabbergasted that the executive, who told them before the meal to no, please call him Prescott, or P-daddy, please, I insist, that’s just the type of guy I am— said the word ‘Global’ which made Helen think about moving to the lush Irish country and having a farm and sending her three precocious angels to private  internationally renowned prep schools along the Swiss boarders-as Social Worker Kennedy had suggested on numerous occasions was the only possible methodology of redemption for her eldest son) and upstairs, Patrick and Allan kind of got carried away with the Bunsen burner and forgot it was running and seething through burnt plastic Cobra affiliates and leaving a foul odor as they went over to the side of the house and Patrick was trying to teach his brother and protégé, Allan, how to rappel down the side of the house without Mama or Papa bear spotting you, using the Christmas lights left over form last August when Warren claimed for once he was going to get an early head start this year and relax god damnit during neon blitz commerce whirl of the holiday vortex—Patrick, telling  Allan to pretend he is Tarzan and  swing from his glen and yawp out like Tarzan Yawps out loud, Allan, getting prematurely excited (as, his brother will claim, is a tendency still to this day) and Allan took his long-johns underwear top and wrapped it around his torso like a loin cloth before he grabbed hold of the Christmas lights. When Downstairs, simultaneously, Prescott was showing Warren the secret handshaking and talking seriously about cooperate golf outings and company paid Holidays and telling Misses McReynolds what a damn fine host she was and what a beautiful woman outside of the kitchen she was and if he wasn’t just so happily married with children and with step-children form his third previous marriage than maybe he just might have to employ Helen to be his personal secretary and get her to drop the note cards and that as long as he has a face Misses McReyolds has a place to sit down any time her husband is out of town, which, with the new job, would be often and bend over and laughs were heard. Warren, being handed a fountain pen and a cigar and having a slap on the back as Prescott invites Warren out to Big Als in the company car to meet his fellow co-workers, suddenly, without a known forecast, the sprinkler system, which Warren devised and tested out on his own room last week, begins to let off a defrost drizzle-which immediately puzzles Warren who had the Sprinkler system set on cigar friendly (the system, capable of being programmed secretly, on ASH TRAY level) to keep Patrick and Allan from firing up inside the house, which Mama McReynolds discerned last week that must be what happens when her Benson and Hedges grow fairy feet with footprints leading upstairs. Suddenly the drizzle begins to turn into an all out tempest, which douses Prescott so hard on his head that his toupee slips off and saddles the back of his neck; a mock Esau genuflecting ersatz  fur in front of his father. Misses McReynolds runs to the umbrella case and flaps open a broilli over Prescott’s head just as Warren runs into his master bedroom, fingers up the remote control to damn near everything in the house and begins to thumb the code for the indoor sprinkler system which for some reason, does not halt,which means that there must be a fire lurking somewhere on the premises,then fire Marshal Mitch showing up outside, telling everyone to get the hell out, there is an inferno blazing upstairs. Prescott, saying that now he is going to have to have his custom fitted emporio Armani suit laundered and dry cleaned while the four of them are escorted out at the same moment Allan McReynolds is heard yelling Geronimo and crashed through the downstairs window, holding onto the Christmas lights like a glen, commenting on how much fun that was and trying to escape Warren’s vicious grapple and run upstairs and rappel, once again, through the downstairs Window.

 

As Allan opens the door leading to the upstairs a boll of smoke shimmies out and he stops drops and rolls and runs outside. The Bunsen Burner slash Cobra torch (Torture) device apparently caught Patrick's mattress on fire and Patrick scaled down the rain gutter and is safe. The blaze turned out to be mostly smoked, but left a serious dent in the upstairs bedroom, over the oak Stork Warren had made when Patrick had to wear a Bowling Ball in his underwear at school to see what it was like to be pregnant for a week, an exercise exacted by school Social Worker Dr. Kennedy Marshal. The miffed, irate Caterpillar associate simply looked at Warren and told him that he and his prestigious company could never in this lifetime even remotely consider hiring a CEO/system analyst who, although his hacker skills were quite formidable—could never even govern his own family-how was he suppose to govern over his employers and competitors-and what about the country Club outings-would his kids set the Country Club on fire too?

 

Call me Prescott left uttering out the words I never at the top of his lungs, enunciating them very clearly so that even Rose, the deaf ninety year old that VonBehren is purported to have a crush on down the street, could read his lips. He kindly kissed Helen’s hand and took home the leftover Chicken teriyaki-thanking her once again-imploring her to reconsider his secretarial offer. Patrick was ordered to go to his room and clean up the ashes young man and Allan, once Warren and Helen reentered their house and mopped up the living room, continues to sway into the broken living room window three more consecutive times, calling himself Mouglai and pounding on his bear chest in his loin cloth and yelling out Geronimo, after every solitary leap.

 

After the Cooperate executive fiasco outing Warren reasserted his ceramic base GUESTS FIRST sign, above the fake fireplace. Warren even rigged it with a state-of-the art sensory detector, so that whenever a McReynolds, or a guest just so happen to point at he GUEST FIRST slogan, it will light up with Light BRIGHTS, a gift Patrick got three Christmases ago and decided never to use.

 

“GUESTS FIRST,” Warren iterates using his drill sergeant outdoor voice, indoors, “Means that our company, be it feline, furball, or Wall Street executive has the right to feel at Home in this here house. If we are serving Chicken for dinner the guest is served the first drumstick as well as the final breast. If you kids are playing Nintendo and our guests wishes to have a turn he may play first and as long as he or she likes. If our guest wishes to walk around wearing my pajama’s and slippers and nightcap, asking if he can make long distance phone calls to some remote villa in the South Pacific-all you guys have to look and point to find out what the proper and correct response will in fact be.”

 

Warren turns and points. By reflex the lights blink on as if from a Pinball machine. The McReynolds clan, in unison, reads the sign like they are driving past a newly reopened Restaurant they have never heard of before.”

 

“GUESTS FIRST,”

 

“First” says five finger old Sarah, who finishes just a second behind the choral of voices.

 

“Damn straight. Now, I want you kids to invite all of your friends over to Casa McReynolds and give them the royal treatment.  And remember, in the immortal words of my grandfather Graham McReynolds (god bless his Irish heart), “You can learn a lot from a McReynolds…”

 

In unison the family responds. “Shut the fuck up,”

 

 

“The fuck up!” Mutters Sarah, the caboose, slightly miming the lips of her progenitors and fellow siblings.

 

 

After Sarah offers the last ‘Fuck up,” and errant bowling pin, a botched spare, hammers through the window nearest Warren, slamming into his temple. Before Warren marches over to the corner Knight, alighting the sword both Patrick and Allan have monikered Excalibur and declare all out household war against the circus tent next door, Patrick can swear he sees a little cartoon carousel of birds, stars and seahorses orbiting around Warren’s head. Helen, trying to be rational, pointing to the flickering Neon of the Guest’s first sign, but Warren now has the sword brandished high above his shoulders, as if he is supplicating to Grayskull for power, ordering his troops to destroy the protestant three-ring next door in the name of Saint Patrick, not you, son.