We wait until the hearse pulls out and then follow the long black car. Police sirens squeal as we drive. They have started to drive in front of the black car. We drive absent mindedly through red lights cops have been stationed to direct traffic. It is like this all the way to the Hallowed Hall Cemetery.
The drive snakes around the entire cemetery, a one way road. We drive past every grave until we are back near the entrance where my mother’s grave will be. I have no choice but to get out and follow my family to the freshly dug grave that will hold my mother’s body.
A rig of sorts hangs over the open grave. I watch as a group of men carry the casket and place it on the metal. They heave it noiselessly to the rig. A hundred pounds of dead weight plus the wooden casket must be pretty heavy; but none of the six men seem to mind.
I watch as they unpin the white lilies that are on their tuxedos and place them gently onto the white wood of the coffin. Slowly everyone walks up and places a lily on it; I eye a basket that lies on the ground near the swarm of people. I walk toward it and grab the rough handle. Splinters dig into my palm as I close my fingers tightly around the braided wood.
Around me there is silence. The horde of people stand motionless around me, their eyes filled with tears, blurring as they stare at me. My body tilts forward until the fabric of my dress is the only thing between me and the cold place that my mother is being held prisoner. My hands shake and I sigh inwardly, grateful for the box that I am balancing against. Knuckles white with the pressure from holding the basket too tightly, my right hand struggles to lift the basket so that it is on top of the casket. I tilt the bottom up and raise my arm.
I can feel eyes on my back as the lilies rain down, some falling into the moist dirt. It is what she would have wanted. To be showered with love once before the end.
A hand rests gently on my shoulder. Before my eyes can adjust, someone guides me back to the chairs that have been set up in the front of the tent. It is Uncle Collin. I can feel myself trembling under his big hands. I am still shaking as I am lowered into a hard chair. It feels like the ground is rumbling under me. The pastor has begun to talk again, I hear my name once but the rumbling is so powerful I can’t make out anything amidst his mumbling.
Tissue paper thin bible pages crackle and threaten to tear; he pauses to smooth them down, pushing the words back on the page. The air is silent for once today; the wind ceasing around us. Aunt Jessa is crying beside me. The pastor’s words fall out of his dementia coated lips, tripping over each other on their way to our ears.
The bible verse that he recites is said eloquently, like it’s the only thing he remembers. It echoes in my head, the words sinking into my brain. They are words that Mom used to tell me, that she believed in even though she didn’t go to church.
The tent rustles; the pastor is silent. I can hear the pads of shoes and the brushing of the grass as people move out from under the blue tent. Oh God, I think. They are about to bury her. I close my eyes and breathe in the cold air, my racing heart makes it hard to take deep breaths. Light trickles into my eyes as I hesitate to open them. The only people left in the tent are my family.
I stand. I want to touch the casket, feel the smooth wood under my finger tips and pray for her one last time.
“Sweetheart, you need to move,” the pastor tells me politely. His voice is calm but he seems tired, like he doesn’t want to have to deal with me. The veins stick out of his hands as they hold the wire rimmed glasses and clean them with a blue handkerchief that he has pulled out of his pocket.
I nod, but something catches my eyes as I back up. From where I stand it seems as if the lilies are curling in on themselves, making little tubes of petals, like rolls of paper. Something glints and a red spot devours the first petal, a spark of fire charring the creamy white tubes of flowers. I back away, taking a big step backward. Sophia is behind me. When my heel clamps down on her toe she lets out a cry and shoves me forward, closer to the edge, to the sparks and dying flowers.
Something creaks in front of me and the casket moves. The silver clasps on the side shoot sunlight into my eyes. When I blink, the afterimages create tiny black and green dots spotting my field of vision. The clasps seemed to be unhooked, popping open. I blink again but the spots seem to get bigger. There is another creak and the lid of the casket moves open.
I scream and turn away, the body inside looking at my back. It feels like there is a fragile hand on my shoulder, threatening to crumble into pieces. I shriek again. I don’t turn back, or try to fight the feeling on my shoulder. I just sit. My knees slide down into the soft grass, the black dress offering only a small amount of protection against the cold ground. My head rests in my palms, my nails pushing crescents into my forehead. I flinch from the pain, but it is better than what I almost had to witness. Around me I can smell the flowers, rancid and rotting with smoke.
“Alyce,” some one behind me cries out, “please stop.” It isn’t a request, it is a plea. I pull my hands away from my face, unfolding my body. I feel terrible, guilty and sick, but it wasn’t my fault.
“Oh my God, Alyce, your face.” I reach up to where my forehead is throbbing. I can feel ten crescent moons, five on each side of my forehead near my temples. The headache pounds against my skull. I don’t move to talk; any movement will make it worse. I don’t blink, or I try not to, I don’t want to see the flowers or the sparks. I don’t want to see anything ever again. But I don’t say that, I am silent, trying not to breathe. If I can just stop breathing the smell won’t be able to find me. The smoke won’t kill me too. I let other people do the talking, even if it is about me
“She did that this morning, too, in the car before the funeral,” I hear Sophia say. I try to listen to every word they say, but my head is likely to float off of my shoulders. Dots flicker in my vision, the threat of passing out looming over me like a cloud. I let out the stale air and wait for the smoke to fill my lungs as I inhale.
“Some sort of post traumatic fit, maybe,” Aunt Jessa suggests. I think she is talking to the pastor but her words might be directed at Uncle Collin there is no way to know. I am sitting up now but I think they made sure to begin there conversation where my back would be toward them. I stare off into the distance, outside of the tent there are at least seventy graves stretching from here to the small patch of woods before you hit the main road. The wind is blowing again whistling as it hits the tombstones and as it races through the trees.
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