Page 24 of Mourner for Hire
I meditate through the remainder of the funeral, willing myself not to have a full-blown panic attack. There are prayers said and memories exchanged. The next hour is excruciatingly long. I’d rather have all of the hairs on my head individually tweezed from my scalp than crash a funeral and know someone here.
Bloody hell.
Then, as Dominic—Dunner—or whatever the hell I’m supposed to call him walks back down the aisle, I turn away, ensuring he can’t see me. Even still, I sneak a glance at him over the teased blond hair sitting to my right.
His hair is a little longer, and while the lines of his suit jacket are in extreme contrast to the soft T-shirt I gripped in my hands just ten months ago, the memory of the skin underneath makes me feel intrinsically attached to him.
I recite my duties assigned to the funeral.
Attend funeral—you won’t need to introduce yourself. But if the need arises, just say you’re an old family friend.
See? It’s fine. I can do this. I’ll hang in the back as they move the coffin out to her burial spot.
I’ll have to find a way to make the fact that I’m stayingat his mother’s beach cottage make sense, but that is tomorrow’s problem, and I refuse to worry about that right now when they’re lowering sweet Annabelle into her final resting place and her son just made eye contact with me.
Fuck.
It was as if the crowds parted at the most imperfect time. When I was trying to sneak a glance of him and he had just looked up from the six-foot hole in the ground.
At first, his expression is soft—tender gratitude swelling in his honey-colored irises. I attempt a small smile, acknowledging his thankfulness, but as soon as I do, his expression snaps, and his jaw tightens. And I’m certain his light brown eyes turned to midnight like a hungry vampire who smells blood.
My cheeks burn, and breathing ceases in my lungs. Fear of his retaliation makes me feel extra self-conscious about every movement I make.
The burial only lasts forty-five minutes, but I’ve already pitted out in this black pencil dress four times over. I’ve had to use the complimentary tissues to dab at my face to collect the sweat from nerves. The gentleman next to me thinks I’m crying because he’s hummed and hawed and patted my shoulder in two instances. To be honest, I do want to cry… just of humiliation and not grief.
Don’t get me wrong. Annabelle was lovely. I am not heartless by any means. I’m just unattached. That is how I successfully do this job.
As soon as the pastor says amen, I stand from my white folding chair and slink farther and farther back until I’m halfway behind a giant oak tree, the leaves just beginning to turn amber for fall.
“Lovely service, wasn’t it?” the gentleman who sat next to me says. He looks to be about seventy years old with scrawny limbs on a six-foot frame. He is a walking scarecrow if I ever saw one.
I nod politely, not wanting to draw attention either way. “It was,” I agree, ducking my head and praying I dissolve into this tree trunk. The woman with him says something about needing tomeet up with Marylou and Bernie because they need help getting the centerpieces back to Annabelle’s for Dominic to deal with.
As they walk away chatting, I take the opportunity to step back, and as I do, my heel sinks into the soft earth, making me fall backwards into the tree. I brace myself and catch the trunk with my hands as the small of my back grates against the tree bark. I close my eyes, grip the bark, and pray no one saw.
I peek one eye open. It would seem the only person that is even remotely aware of my presence is Dunner or Dominic or… whoever the hell he is… storming toward me with rage burning in his eyes.
“Why the hell are you at my mom’s funeral? Tell me the truth,” he hisses, his face inches from mine as he towers over me.
I adjust my footing and stand, brushing the bark from my dress.
“I-I-I—” I stammer.
“You-you-you-you—” he mocks me, not at all tactfully. “This is so inappropriate, Vada. You have no right coming here and crashing my mom’sfuneral!”
“I was invited,” I answer, my voice small.
“That’s what you want to call this?” he accuses, inching closer.
“Your mom. She…” My voice trails as I attempt to explain.
Out of all the years I’ve done this, I haven’t had to explain why I came to relatives. I’ve never even known anyone in attendance. I know what I do is questionable at best and desperate at worst in the eyes of many if they knew who I was and why I went to so many funerals. I’ve always believed it’s okay to be the worst person in the room if no one knows.
But here, right now, with my heels sinking in the grass covering the gravesites of many,manyloved ones while staring at the man I almost had a wild night with, makes me feel like I’m strapped to a lie detector as all my secrets are read aloud. I keep my gaze fixed on his. This man, who let me cry into his T-shirt and sleep on his naked chest and called me Hot Pocket. This man whotakes his coffee just like me, with a hard jaw and eyes that remind me of the warmth of sunshine.
