The Bucket List

“Jordan, it’s March 20th. You know what that means.”

I sigh inwardly. I had been expecting this ever since the schedule came out.

“It’s the first day of spring, and that means Spring cleaning,” says Hank, my middle-aged-overweight-but-not-usually-a-total-jerk boss relates. “This year you’ve been upgraded! You get the Dungeon.”

I work at an Office Hub at Roosevelt Mall, so we get a lot of people coming in through our store. This generates an unholy number of lost items. Store Legend says the Lost and Found started off as a drawer for random items found around the store. A glove. A phone. Someone’s Keys. Soon it became a monster, growing to a file cabinet and eventually a broom closet as people refused to empty it out. Thus, the Dungeon was born. A pit of despair where cast off items go to die, only to be cleaned out once a year.

The only good thing about cleaning it out, is you can keep what you want. Two years ago, Matt in sales got the job, and he found a fanny pack with forty dollars and some Xanax. Cindy, as old as dirt was hired at the store when it opened claims that she found a Victoria Secret bag containing the very lingerie she used to seduce the poor sap that became her husband. I shudder thinking about it. On the other hand, last year it fell to Murphy, a tiny teen that always looked sickly. She shook out a coat from the Dungeon and choked on the cloud of dust it generated and had to go home early. Some say it was anthrax. Some say a hallucinogen. Whatever it was, she was never seen again.

As I open the Dungeon door, a pile of haphazardly stacked hats, gloves and scarves avalanche around my feet. After about an hour and I’ve made a tiny dent in the random mall flotsam, Hank comes back with a new hire in tow.

“Jordan this is Cady. She’s new here. I’m going to have her help you out while it’s slow. Get a move on!”

I stare up at Cady from the pile detritus. She must have seen my life ebbing away, as she leaves off the pleasantries and says “Sup. I’m Cady. This blows.”

“So hard,” I reply getting up. I stick out my hand to shake. “I’m Jory, and I’ll be your guide on this tour of the undead items,” I deadpan.

She snorts, and we get to work. In the end, we come out with some choice items amid all the trash. A cane with a golden fist as the grip, a brown fedora with a peacock feather that Cady immediately puts on, and a vintage bomber jacket. As we shove the items into my hatchback, a worn looking little black book falls out of the jacket. I stoop to pick it up, and Cady and I leaf thru it.

On the inside page is a name and phone number, with an inscription above it: ‘To Bill – May our life be filled with adventure. 1-15-42’. Cady and I lock eyes. “Wow, this is super old,” I say, looking at the scrawl on the pages. On the back page is a list, titled My Local Bucket List. Looking down the list, it is filled with touristy things to do around town.

After some discussion, I pull out my cell and call the number of the owner: William Marshall. An older woman’s voice comes on the line. “Hello, and thank you for calling my Bill’s phone. If you haven’t heard,” she pauses, and voice cracking continues “Bill passed in February. If you’d like to get in touch with me, my number is…”

Cady looks up in horror. “We’ve been looking thru a dead guy’s book?” she gasps out.

We debate calling the woman and giving the jacket and book back, but then Cady has an idea.

“What if we do the bucket list. You know, as like a memorial to Bill. Then we can film it and give it to her!”

“Film it… why?” I ask, genuinely curious.

Cady seems unwilling to answer at first, but then explains that she’s in college for a film degree, and has a project coming up to make a tribute film. “We could act out all the things on his list. That way, I could use it for class, and Bill’s wife would have something to remember him with. It’s a win-win!”

I page thru the little book again, trying to look like I’m thinking it over. The truth is, I’m warming to the idea. I had a great time hanging out with Cady in the Dungeon. Plus, she’s cute. I’ve never had much luck with girls - maybe this is my in.

“Alright,” I agree. “There are only a few things on the list. We could probably get it done in a day. You know, I’m off tomorrow. Why don’t we meet here in the morning?”

“Yeah, I’m game! Say ten?”

“It’s a date.” I roll my eyes at myself… could I be any lamer?

She narrows her eyes at me with a coy smile. “Yeah, riiight.” She gives me a finger wave and sets off for her car.

The next day is tailor made for our adventure, sunny and warm. “Okay,” starts Cady, “first stop. I say we start at the Bunker Hill Obstacle course.”

I groan. “What, too much action for you right away?” Cady teases.

“I am, what you may call awkward. In fact, I have a total lack of coordination. If stumbling around was in the Olympics, I’d be a Gold Medalist.”

It takes her a few minutes to stop laughing. As she slows, she points out “Alright, Mr. Superstar. You may not be smooth, but I’m fairly sure you can take on an obstacle course made for preschoolers.”

Its true. The Bunker Hill Obstacle Course is maybe a grandiose name for the playground the city made a couple years ago. In fact, I was surprised to see it on the list. Why would someone be interested in rope climbs, see-saws and balance beams? We manage to plot out the rest of the day with minimal ribbing from Cady.

We roll up to Bunker Hill with only a few kids and their moms around. Cady sets up her camera and tripod, and I view my opponent. It certainly looks easy enough; rope ladders, slides, tire-paths.

I think I can do this.

“Alright, Ace,” Cady calls over, “I’m all set. Whenever you would like to grace the stage…”

I walk to the start and look over at Cady. She seems really in her element, framing the shot and getting ready to keep me in focus. I love the little smirk she puts on, undoubtedly thinking about where I am going to biff it first. I refocus on the course. “Anytime your ready.” Cady calls. I start.

I open my eyes to see Cady crouching over me, her dark hair curtaining over the far side of her face. She seems torn between being worried and bursting into laughter. “You okay, Ace?”

“What? Huh? What happened?”

“I can’t even explain.” Cady says around bursts of giggles. “I rewound the tape while you were out. Take a look.”

I start off fine, smoothly running the course. Then I get to the rope ladder. I see my leg go thru the net and remember struggling to pull it free. I see my shoe come off in the video and look down. Yup. No shoe. Huh. I struggle on in the video and start pulling myself across the ladder.

Video-Me throws himself onto the platform with the slide. I am obviously winded, my hands on my knees as I throw a jaunty wave for the camera. I grab the bar above the slide and lever myself down it. I hit hard on the ground, my feel popping me off the slide with huge momentum, and I start for the tires. I get about halfway before the wheels come off. My foot still in a shoe gets caught, but apparently by other leg doesn’t know, as it keeps struggling forward. Soon, I’m stumbling, flailing my arms to keep upright. I make it to the plank, dazed, only to trip on the end, and landing on my face. I see myself slowly slide down the plank, and flop over. I look up again. Yup. Still next to the plank. I couldn’t even finish the course.

“Come on,” she hiccups, “the worst is behind us. It’ll all be smooth sailing for us from here.”

It is not. The rest of the day is a comedy of errors.

Camel-riding at the zoo. I fall off into Camel-droppings.

Mini-Golf. I slip on the backswing and fall into the moat. A very slimy, green moat.

I can’t even eat ice cream on the pier right. I get dive-bombed by seagulls (Cady later says it was the peanut topping) and almost fall off the pier, running and screaming like a little girl away from the maniac birds. It’s Hitchcockian.

At the end of the day I am defeated, but Cady is still in great spirits. In fact, her smile never faltered the entire time.

“Thanks,” she says as I pull up to her car, “I really had a great time with you today.”

I look at her like I think she’s crazy, but reply, “I had a really great time with you, too.”

She gives me a quick hug, gets her camera and equipment out of my trunk, and drives away. I look at the sun setting over the boxy silhouette of the mall and smile to myself.

At the end of the week, she shows me the edited video. She set it to Bolero and said that her class ate it up. She got the highest grade in the class for ‘her imaginative directing’. Little do they know it was just my awkwardness.

Later, we called Bill’s wife, and we explained how we found her husband’s jacket and notebook, and the tribute video. She thanked us and invited us to her house to drop the items off. Soon we arrive at an opulent estate on the outside of town, and Melony Marshall introduces herself to us. She invites us in to watch the video and I cringe inwardly, hoping I don’t insult the memory of her husband.

When the video finishes, she sits for a long time, tears in her eyes, staring at the screen. Then she bursts into laughter. Cady and I look at each other, puzzled, and join in with some forced chuckles.

“Bill would have love that,” she explains. It turns out that Bill was actually a world-traveler who had amazing adventures all across the globe, but he never made time to do anything around home. So, in between jetting off somewhere, he would always make note of the simple things he’d like to do with Melony around town. “He, too, was a bit awkward,” she tells me, “though nothing like you. You may want to get that looked at,” she smiles.

As we get up to leave, she stops us. “I really want to thank all the trouble you took. Even after the funeral and wake, this gives me the closure I was looking for. She writes out a note, puts it in an envelope and gives it to us. We walk back to the car, and Cady drives away.

“Open it,” she says around a smile, “I want to know if she gave you the name of a doctor!”

I open it… and stare at the $20,000 check that she wrote out to us.

Cady pulls over, and we flip out a bit. I tell her that we can totally split the money, but then have a better idea.

“How about we use this to go on another adventure?”

Cady looks over at me, a smile on her lips.

“It’s a date,” she says.