James Halperin - The First Immortal

Today’s meal would no doubt be the clan’s last in the Chestnut Street brownstone before it was sold. Thus their Christmas dinner took on the added aura of ceremony, not only commemorating the life of Benjamin Smith, but also marking the passage of an era in Smith family history.

The dining room table was a Queen Anne antique that Alice had given Ben in 1960, just a few months after Sam’s death. It normally seated eight, but the ends pulled out and two center extenders could be added, allowing cramped accommodations for twelve. The three daughters of Ben and Marge Smith, along with their husbands, five children, Alice, and Gary, packed themselves around it on six dining room chairs, two stools, three armchairs borrowed from the den, Alice’s wheelchair, and two-year-old Michael Banks’s high chair.

Rebecca recited a short prayer before dinner, then Maxine offered a toast composed for the occasion:

“To our mother and father, who raised and protected, nurtured and loved us in this house of warm memories. And now, may Benjamin and Margaret Smith together find their eternal peace.”

Nearly all the adults raised their wineglasses, and most intoned a heartfelt “Amen.”

But eighty-four-year-old Alice Franklin Smith bit her tongue. Eternal peace together? What rubbish!

Alice had known of her son’s decision to have himself frozen; she was the only family member to learn of it before the day of his death; long before. In fact he’d told her prior to mailing the papers, and she’d encouraged him. She did not pretend to understand the science, but to Alice a tomb or a funeral pyre was a manifestation of cold surrender, while the freezer offered the warmth of hope.

She also knew of her granddaughters’ opinions on the subject; all three had shared their feelings with her, and she’d listened sympathetically, never betraying prior knowledge of—or her true conviction about—her son’s decision. While Alice would resist ever lying to her progeny, her love for them certainly did not preclude withholding information. Long a student of human nature, she perceived no advantage in tipping her hand prematurely.

While Alice’s mind had remained inequitably shrewd and acute, her body had decayed with more than enough enthusiasm to atone for the injustice. Arthritis throbbed through every joint, and osteoporosis had hobbled her frame into a painful, almost paralyzed twist of loose, wrinkled flesh on brittle bone. Worse yet, her eyes were failing. She could no longer read newspapers or her beloved books, and could barely decipher the extra-large-print magazines to which she subscribed.

Recently she’d learned that an inoperable malignancy, which had begun in her lower intestine three years earlier, had metastasized to her liver. At her age, the cancer would spread slowly, affording perhaps another year or two of life. Many in Alice’s condition would have considered the remaining time a curse, but she deemed every day a bonus.

As Alice sat in the wheelchair, her body adopted a near-fetal contour, forcing her to stare at the floor. To see above the table’s edge, she was forced to wrench back her head, curving her spine into a recumbent S. Doing just that to watch Katie haul the twenty-one-pound Christmas turkey to the table on a tray, Alice exclaimed with a genuine childlike grin, “That is simply the most beautiful bird I’ve seen in years.”

Everyone applauded, and Katie’s ten-year-old face lit up. Soft brown hair outlined her lively eyes—blue-green, like Ben’s—and radiant smile. Katie placed the tray carefully at the center of the table. Today’s gobbler was almost entirely her handiwork.

The early conversation centered around the meal and, naturally, basketball; the four men and George—my sixteen-year-old future-father—had carefully selected their dining-table seats on the basis of line-of-vision to the television screen in the adjoining den.

But the mood unmistakably changed during the break before dessert. The game now over, all five children had assembled in the den to watch the end of It’s a Wonderful Life. Rebecca knew no sound could penetrate their concentration on the tube; especially George, who practically became the television set whenever he watched it.

A few weeks before his death, Ben had told her, “George is so damn bright; we just can’t let him waste his mind like that.” Rebecca had agreed and was still waiting for the right moment to have a chat with her son about it; maybe even limit his viewing hours. But today she was actually thankful for this preoccupation with the narcotic medium. With the youngsters safely distracted, she could finally ask Noah Banks for the latest news on the lawsuit he had persuaded her to join against the Smith Family Cryonic Trust.

“It took long enough, but Brandon Butters finally obtained our court order,” Noah answered.

“Court order?” Rebecca asked. “What for?”

“Didn’t you know? To perform an autopsy on your father’s body.”

“Isn’t Dad in Arizona?”

“Yes,” Jan said. “But Brandon got a writ of habeas corpus. They’ll have to surrender the body.”

“Why would we care about that now?” Rebecca asked.

“First of all, if your father’s no longer frozen, we’ll have a much easier time challenging the Trust,” Noah explained. “Besides, it’s the only way to prove Tobias Fiske killed him. Otherwise he gets away with murder.”

“Murder?” Max interjected. “Because he administered morphine to a dying man? I’m no fan of Dr. Fiske, especially after he gave Dad over to those cryonics people, but he didn’t murder anyone.”

“Are you absolutely sure Ben was dying?” Noah asked, suddenly transmogrified into outright lawyer mode. “Isn’t there some chance he might have survived if Fiske hadn’t given him morphine?”

“There’s almost no chance he’d’ve seen the next morning, no matter what anyone did.”

“I sure hope Webster doesn’t—”

“You sure hope Webster doesn’t what?” she shot back. “Doesn’t depose me?”

“Well,” he said, “it’ll be a moot point after the autopsy.”

“If he asks me,” Max said, her defiance conspicuous, “I’ll tell the truth.”

“I know that,” Noah said condescendingly.

“No you don’t,” she said. “You lawyers always recommend telling the truth; but you don’t mean it. You really mean: ‘Don’t tell any lies if you might get caught.’ I wouldn’t be surprised if you’re all given a secret course in Articulate Sophistry. Tobias Fiske loved Dad as much as we do, and was only trying to do what Dad wanted him to do. You know it and I know it.”

“Whoa!” Noah said, holding his palms toward her, part conciliation, part mockery. “We’re on the same side. Somebody conned your father. He paid those lunatics $75,000 to freeze his body, and then put millions into that ridiculous Cryonic Trust. That’s money he would’ve otherwise left to you and your kids. I’m trying to help you get it back.”

“Yeah,” Max said, “that’s what it’s really about. Money. Well, maybe Dad got conned, or maybe those people believe their own fraud. Either way, it was his money and I don’t want any more of it than he decided to give me.”

“Nothing can bring Ben back,” Noah said, his voice calm. “But at least we can still help ensure our children’s futures.”

Rebecca decided she could no longer listen in silence. “When I first learned that Dad was having himself frozen, I felt betrayed. I wondered what I’d tell Katie and George; whether their Grampa was in heaven or in limbo. I certainly don’t know. But mostly, I couldn’t understand why he never told me. Why’d he let me learn of his plans only on the day he died? But now, listening to you and Jan talk about dissecting his body when you know full well that isn’t what he would’ve wanted, well, at least I’m starting to understand.”