Characters in The Life of Chuck

… after the death of his son, daughter-in-law, and granddaughter-to-be (Alyssa, sounds like rain), Albie Krantz drank a great deal. He should have bought stock in Anheuser-Busch, that was how much he drank. He could do it because he was retired, and …

The name had already been picked out: Alyssa. When Chuck said that sounded to him like rain, his mother had laughed and cried at the same time. He never forgot that. He knew his other grandparents of course, there were visits every summer, but they were basically strangers to him.

Marty thought her name was Andrea something, lived a street or two over. Hadn’t Felicia told him she worked at Midwest Trust? “And the bees,” Gus continued. “They were in trouble even ten years ago, but now they’re completely gone, except for a few hives down in South America.

Most of the machinery has been turned off. “Unc?” Doug turns to see Brian in the doorway, still wearing his letter jacket and backpack. “You left school early?” Doug asks. “With permission. Mom texted me that she was going to let them turn off the machines. Did they?” “Yes.” “When?”

Near the end of their forty-five minutes, however, the dance-monster would show mercy and pair him with Cat McCoy, who was an eighth-grader and the best dancer of the girls.

Perhaps ever again. “I don’t know Charles Krantz from Adam. He must have worked in the Omaha headquarters. Although from what I understand, Omaha is just a great big ashtray these days.”

The only time she’d asked about it (it really was a very small scar), he told her that he had gotten it from a boy named Doug Wentworth, who was pissed about him cavorting with his girlfriend at a middle school dance and pushed him into a chainlink fence outside …

2 Douglas Beaton, associate professor of philosophy in Ithaca College’s Department of Philosophy and Religion, sits in a hospital room, waiting for his brother-in-law to die.

Miss Rohrbacher had a go, then all of the others were moonwalking like crazy. Even Dylan Masterson, the clumsiest of them, got into it. Twirlers and Spinners let out half an hour later than usual that day. Chuck and Cat walked out together.

Marty understood; there were plenty of loosely wrapped people around these days. He stopped five feet away. “I’m Felicia Anderson’s husband.” Ex, actually, but husband sounded less potentially dangerous. “I think you and Fel know each other.” “We do. I was on the Neighborhood Watch Committee with her.

Star light, star bright, last stars I see tonight. Marty took her hand. “I am, too.” 4 Ginny, Brian, and Doug stand beside Chuck Krantz’s bed, their hands joined. They wait as Chuck—husband, father, accountant, dancer, fan of TV crime shows—takes his last two or three breaths.

The second thing he noticed was Gus Wilfong trudging up the street with his oversized lunchbox banging against his thigh. Gus was wearing khakis, but with a tie. He was a supervisor at the city’s public works department.

“Thank God for that!” “Yes,” Chuck agreed. Having given, he now felt entitled to get. “He was talking with Grandma about someone named Henry Peterson. I guess he’s dead.” He was prepared for disappointment; she might have never heard of Henry Peterson.

Like anticipating the joys of an autumn weekend in Boston, finding the in is half the fun. Maybe even most of it. Janice Halliday is on her way home from seven hours at Paper and Page, trudging down Boylston with her head lowered and her purse clasped close.

… his friend Mac, who has an old van, Jared Franck sets up his drumkit in his favored spot on Boylston Street between Walgreens and the Apple Store. He has a good feeling about today. It’s Thursday afternoon, the weather is fucking gorgeous, and the streets are thronged with people looking …

Sit down for a minute? I’m pooped, and Jenny will have gone back to bed. I don’t want to wake her up, especially with bad news.” “Sure.” Gus got in the car. “This is bad, my friend.” “It sucks,” Marty agreed. It was what he’d said to Felicia last night.

… II: Buskers With the help of his friend Mac, who has an old van, Jared Franck sets up his drumkit in his favored spot on Boylston Street between Walgreens and the Apple Store. He has a good feeling about today. It’s Thursday afternoon, the weather is fucking gorgeous, and the …

1 The day Marty Anderson saw the billboard was just before the Internet finally went down for good. It had been wobbling for eight months since the first short interruptions.

She’s not down to work at P&P on Saturday, but maybe she’ll call Maybelline and see if she can pick up Saturday morning, at least. Sunday the store is closed. Sunday best not considered, at least for now. “Friends forever my ass.”

Chuck was the same, happy to throw spitballs or give Mike Enderby the finger when Miss Richards was looking down at her book, but one line clanged in his head and made him sit up straight. When the class was finally over and the kids set free, he lingered.

5 On the last day of sixth grade, Miss Richards—a sweet, hippy-dippyish young woman who had no command of discipline and would probably not last long in the public education system—tried to read Chuck’s class some verses of Walt Whitman’s “Song of Myself.” It didn’t go well.

That afternoon he went down to the gymnasium, where he and nine hesitant others were greeted enthusiastically by Miss Rohrbacher, the girls’ phys ed teacher. Chuck was one of three boys. There were seven girls. All the girls were taller.

Grandma was plump (and getting plumper), but Mrs. Stanley was twice her size, a widow who wheezed like a leaky tire when she walked and always seemed to be dressed in the same pink silk wrapper.

All the girls were taller. One of the boys, Paul Mulford, tried to creep out as soon as he realized he was the smallest kid there, coming in at five-feet-nothing. Miss Rohrbacher chased him down and hauled him back, laughing cheerfully. “No-no-no,” said she, “you’re mine now.” So he was.

“We used to. We get along better now that we’re exes.” “Miz Gordon gives us ginger snap cookies sometimes. Me and my little brother, Ronnie. I like Oreos better, but . . .” “But that’s the way the cookie crumbles, right?” Marty said. “Nah, ginger snaps don’t crumble.

“Sucks,” Marty said. “You set the pace.” The old guy did. It was a slow one. His name was Samuel Yarbrough. He was owner and chief undertaker of the Yarbrough Funeral Home. “But my real interest is meteorology,” he said.

Albie and Sarah Krantz lived just a mile down the road, and it was natural enough for them to raise him after the accident when he became what he first believed to be an orphant. He was seven.

“You put scratches on that floor, the janitors will beat your butt,” Tammy Underwood said. She was probably right, but there were no scratches. He was too light on his feet to leave any.

“Bubbie, who was the Jefferies boy?” She sighed. “That was a very sad thing, boychuck.” (This was her little joke.) “He lived on the next block over and got hit by a drunk driver when he chased a ball into the street. It happened a long time ago.