The Funeral

               You check the time on your cell phone. It is almost 6:30 PM. Perfect. You will arrive fashionably late, just like you planned. Afterall, who wants to arrive on time to their own funeral?

               As you walk down the hallway leading to the sitting room, you take a moment to pause in front of a mirror and admire your stylish outfit. You haven’t seen yourself look this stunning in a long time. You really have pulled out all the stops for this event, and the night is going to be memorable. A few steps before the extravagant double-doors, the butler approaches you and smiles warmly.

               “Good evening! You are right on time, as we planned. And, if I may add, you look quite magnificent! The other guests have been given their initial instructions and have been chatting for the last few minutes. No one is expecting your arrival. After you go inside and greet everyone, we can move to the dining room and serve dinner.”

               “Thank you, Charles,” you reply, and pause to take a deep breath before pushing the doors open wide and strutting inside. An audible gasp from your six guests interrupts all other conversations, and Mrs. Parker drops her glass of water onto the plush carpet. One of the drink servers in the room quietly goes to clean up the mess, reassuring Mrs. Parker that it is totally fine, while you throw your hands wide and proudly welcome everyone to your funeral.

               You tactfully dodge questions as you suggest that everyone join you in the dining room for dinner, where more information will be shared. You lead the six guests into the dining room, which has been prepared by the kitchen staff to be the most elegant feast you have ever beheld. You find yourself impressed as the butler welcomes each guest by name, gestures to their name placard at their seat, and assigns a waiter or waitress to see them comfortably seated and promptly served. You are seated at the head of the table, with three guests on each side, leaving the foot of the table empty. As everyone is seated, the food starts to arrive, with mouth-watering aromas and delightful colors. Everyone starts to eat, some less delicately than others, and the first few minutes of delectable foods keep everyone contentedly quiet.

               At 7:00, the butler discreetly gives each guest an envelope and asks them to find time in the next thirty minutes to open it and read the contents alone. He then comes to whisper in your ear. “I trust the dinner is up to your expectations. Each guest was briefed before you arrived about how the evening is expected to go, and I have just delivered their instructions for part one. After the main course, we will retire back to the sitting room, and you will explain why you brought them each here tonight. Then each guest will have a chance to explain why they are not your murderer. After that, I expect at about 8:30, we will begin part two in the ballroom, where your casket is waiting. We will have time to mingle and share dessert, allowing the guests to speak with each other in a little more intimate setting as they flesh out their stories. They will have about 45 minutes before we enter part three, where we will come back to the sitting room, no later than 9:20. Here you all will discuss the newest evidence that everyone found and you will decide who you think tried to murder you. The police inspector will arrive at 10:00 sharp and hear your explanation. Then everyone is welcome to stay and mingle and enjoy more of any of the food we’ve had tonight until 11:00. We ask that the party be over by that time so we can clean the facilities before the staff is allowed to leave. Do you have any questions?”

               You smile at the butler. The itinerary sounds wonderful and you are more excited than ever for the murder mystery party. “No, thank you, Charles. Everything sounds wonderful. Thank you for all the organization you did to pull this together.”

               “Oh, it is what I do,” the butler replies with a grin. “I wouldn’t be a very good murder mystery party planner and host if I couldn’t put the plan together, now would I? Here is your envelope. You have about twenty minutes to find time to read it before we move to the sitting room.”

               You take a break from your scrumptious salad to step away from the table and open your envelope. The letter inside, addressed to your character of the Host, gives you a brief overview of the story as you know it: Your character is the victim of an attempted murder. You were able to foil the attempt and the manner led you to suspect six of your friends. You arranged to have them all invited to your fake funeral, which is secretly a trap to have them all in one location. Your goal throughout the evening is to enlist the five innocent friends to help you flush out the murderer.

               Then the letter adds details that you didn’t know. It tells you about each of the six guests, what they do as a career, some of their interests and hobbies, your history with each, and why you suspect each one could be the murderer. This tells you what to watch out for as you move forward into part one of the game. As you go back to your salad, you ponder about what you read and decide that, during part one, you want to listen with an open mind, but watch for anyone stumbling over their story and for any inconsistencies between stories, anything to indicate that someone is lying. This will help you find your murderer.

               At 7:30 on the dot, the butler escorts the party into the sitting room. He smiles at you as he locks the door from the outside, leaving you and your six guests inside. You take a deep breath and start to speak.

               You start by introducing each character to the others: Mrs. Parker is the mother of one of your childhood friends, and you suspect her because believes you corrupted her child; Mr. Hunter is a former coworker from one of your first jobs, and you suspect him because he has never forgiven you for a mean prank you were involved in; Dr. Coach lives in your neighborhood, and you suspect her because she believes a treasure is buried in your backyard and she wants to steal it; Sir Compo is an old college friend, and you suspect him because of some suspicious disappearances of other mutual friends who knew him when he was a rebellious college student; Miss Zelma is a former coworker from a job you held at college, and you suspect her because you believe she is training to be a professional hitman; Mr. Ray is a childhood friend of yours, and you suspect him because he recently started believing in a conspiracy theory about murder as a method to prevent the zombie apocalypse.

               You then let each guest explain why they couldn’t be your murderer. Everyone is having a great time and really embodying their character’s quirks. Mrs. Parker, in her quiet way, points out mannerisms of the other guests and why that should throw suspicion on them instead. Dr. Coach uses her big gestures to exaggerate stories that have everyone laughing. Mr. Ray makes many conspiracy theory connections and doesn’t even deny the coming zombie apocalypse. And Sir Compo overturns the furniture in his retelling of a war story that, in an exceptionally round-about way, connects to his declaration of innocence. Everyone is enjoying the game and getting really involved.

               Shortly before 8:30, after the last person has had a chance to speak, the butler enters and tells the gathering that dessert is ready in the ballroom. He motions towards one of the kitchen staff who will lead the way while he hands another envelope to each guest as they leave the sitting room. You are last out of the sitting room, and the butler asks about the evening so far as he hands you your envelope. You express your satisfaction so far and then open your envelope. Inside you find another letter with specific conversation topics to bring up with each character, including special instructions such as make sure that one character is not in the conversation for a particular topic or bring up another topic with only two characters. You start to decide the order that you want to try to have the conversations when you walk into the ballroom and stop dead in your tracks.

               The dessert layout is astounding. Not only do the treats look delicious, the presentation looks like a work of art highlighting your prop casket. You feel almost guilty taking a small cupcake, as it ruins the artistry, but all the guilt is swept away by the delectable flavors. It takes you several minutes to remember the game and your planned conversations.

               The next forty minutes pass rather quickly, and you hardly realize that the time is up when the butler enters again and asks everyone to please move to the sitting room again for part three of the game. You notice that four of the guests sneak one last dessert before following the butler, and you are tempted to do the same. During the walk to the sitting room, you think about what you’ve learned beyond the fun time you had. There isn’t much, but you think that Mrs. Parker and Sir Compo are both innocent. Mr. Hunter looks like the most likely culprit, as his story seems to be the most inconsistent. He keeps doubling back and correcting his alibi.

               As everyone gathers back in the sitting room, the butler explains that this is everyone’s last chance to pitch their innocence and point to the guilty party, with you being the final judge. He then says that at exactly 10:00, a police inspector will come in and a decision must be made at that time. He then leaves and closes the doors behind him.

               Everyone takes their turn explaining what they’ve learned in their private conversations and who they think is responsible for trying to murder you. You mentally compile what they say with what you’ve found out and everything keeps pointing to Mr. Hunter as the guilty party. Oddly enough, he waits to go last to tell you about what he learned.

               Just as Mr. Hunter stands up to start speaking, a police officer shoves the doors open and rushes into the room. The sudden movement and noise startles everyone, and Mrs. Parker drops another glass of water onto the carpet. There are no serving staff around to help clean it up this time, however. The officer looks at the gathering and demands to know what is going on. You then notice the time, and it is 9:45. The police officer is early. You start to explain that he is too early, that you have one more guest to hear from, while the other guests make various explanations about what is going on. Two even break character and try to explain that you are all playing a murder mystery dinner game.

               The officer yells for everyone to quiet down and demands to speak to the person in charge. You start to get an uneasy feeling that this isn’t the police inspector that the butler is expecting. You tell the officer that the butler is the actual host of the party and offer to go find him. The officer looks at you sternly and declares that no one is allowed to leave the room. He then starts to interview each person, getting their real name, their reason for coming, and what they’ve been doing for the last hour. Mr. Ray leans over to you and mentions how the inspector is completely breaking the immersion of the game.

               “I don’t think this is part of the game,” you respond. “I think this may be real.”

               Your hunch is confirmed a few minutes later when the officer’s partner calls from the hallway. “Officer Card, it’s in here. It doesn’t look pretty.”

               The officer in the room with you, presumably Officer Card, leaves his interrogation with a half-asked question floating in the air and hurries toward his partner, who is standing just outside the ballroom. Everyone else follows, unsure of what is happening. As Officer Card gets close, his partner points at the casket, which is now sitting alone in the middle of the empty room.

               As you peek in, you are startled by what you see: The casket lid is open, and lying inside is the butler, obviously not there by choice. You check the time on the wall clock, and it is 9:52 PM. You will probably be late getting home. That wasn’t part of the plan, but neither was having the party end with a need for an actual funeral.