There is a special kind of detachment that can only be associated with a funeral. Whether held in temple, field or out there in the wild; all funerals attract that alienation from the moment, an insincerity of reality that holds grief away from the soul.
And in my young mind I did not spare thoughts for the lost, for whom we were gathered there. I had been told that there were instructions, passed down by letter from afar, as to how today was to transpire. Such a command might have been met with anger and dissent, if they had not been sent, belatedly, on the request of he for whom we were gathered.
Odder still than that detachment is the odd reverence given to the family. For many, in truth almost all grown out of their childhood, it is not the family that know the lost the best; though perhaps that is merely my experience. Regardless, to me it was a stranger we were gathered to mourn.
We stood on the lip of the falls, watching the water cascade over the worn rock and into the pool beneath. It struck me as odd that this man, this stranger, would choose this site to be passed into, to rest forever. The shaman stood before us, the family, and chanted. Behind us the other villagers, standing on either side of the creek, swayed in synchronicity, an undulating crowd. The chanting was not even comprised of words, or at least none that held or hold any meaning to me, it was a rhythmic pulsation, a vibration
“Cael?” asked two voices. One was my mother’s, the other was one I could not recognise. It was one long since lost to my child’s memory.
I looked up, my mother stood beside the shaman, holding a clay urn. I did not reply, but a child’s incomprehension is seldom well masked.
“Come over here, to the edge.” The command came without the teasing echo; it was my mother’s alone.
I went blindly to the edge. Her eyes were red and her hair possessed the quality of the unkept chartered rapidly into the respectable. She held out the urn, a foreign object, as if expecting me to take it.
Beside us the shaman chanted, unflaggingingly; behind us the crowd moved in unison though I could not see them. I did not need to.
I stood there, unsure of what I was meant to do but knowing that all eyes were on me. I took the urn, and was surprised by its slight weight. I looked again to my mother, who returned my look. Her eyes were bloodshot and imploring. I can still remember that look, and my own realisation that she was asking for a boon with those eyes, and asking it desperately.
The urn sat poorly in my hands as I walked to the edge.
“Cael.” A simple naming of names can hold so much weight. To me it was a double blow.
I did not turn around.
“Cael, do it.” The second voice was becoming clearing, breaking through an obscuring loathing.
“Jump Cael!” I started in shock, but it was only the second voice that had said this.
I saw him now, in the pool beneath me, a translucent figure egging me on with the sheer charisma of an elder speaking to the approval-seeking young. It was a memory I had not welcomed in a very long time.
“Jump Cael,” he shouted up to me, “you aren’t a coward are you?” the taunt had carried no sting when spoken, but it did then, when I stood on the lip carrying the clay-bulk.
You are the coward! I wanted to shout, you are the coward who left us here, alone.
But I could not, because these were memories and memories are not tales to be rewritten on a whim.
A figure fell into the pool. They had not rushed passed me and over the lip, but they had fallen nevertheless, and from height by the sound of the splash. I did not see.
I did not see the crowd break from their swaying. I did not see the warriors and hunters jostle amongst themselves as they sought to rescue the endangered. I saw no-one but he, with that confidant smirk and that playful laughter. I had done more than forget, I had exorcised him from my memory and now he had taken possession of me again.
I did not see the crowd break up, the shaman tending to the injured faller. I heard, but did not listen to, the exclamations of her odd appearance, her alien nature. I did not see the last of the mourners, my mother, depart long minutes later. Leaving me, solitary but not alone.
I stood there and I wept. Eventually I poured the ashes into the pool and was surprised by their scarcity. A body, in life so vibrant and strong; reduced to so little black dirt. A thin stream of it poured into the pool.
And I realised why he had chosen here to be laid to rest. Unlike me, he had remembered, and treasured those memories. I felt the traitor.
“Goodbye brother.”
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