A Study In Grief

She was not sure what she had expected. Kind words, hugs, warmth of some kind? If there was ever a moment when family should come together, would this not be it? Or maybe she had fallen for the lies that permeated the movies and TV. The lie that family is stronger than anything else and will always come together in the end. Instead, the air was fraught with a palpable pressure. She felt suffocated in the humid waves of stares and whispers, the silence and the coldness. But what else could she have expected?

Her father lay in the casket, cold and made up. There was too much make-up. They were trying to cover the spots that aged his skin and betrayed his illness. They should have just left it. In anticipation of this day, she had been afraid that she would not be able to look at him there. That when she thought of him, this would be the only image she would be able to conjure. But then, standing there, she knew deep down that she would never forgive herself if she did not. She had to look, to say something to the stillness between her and what should have been his breath. She touched his arm and the cold beneath his sleeve sent a shock that rippled through her spine and into her chest. He was so cold. “This is not my father”, she thought. This is a wax sculpture. He looks too made up. Too old. He was never this old, was he?

The last time they spoke was almost four years ago. He had stomach ulcers then, and ate a lot of yogurt and kefir, trying to stave off the pains. He was a little overweight, with a type of jolly rotundity that, when he grew his beard, could make you think of Santa. He was perpetually in overalls, always in the midst of some project, half-way through a beer and looking for his can of dip. His prominent, roman nose was flanked by cheeks that were always high, pulled into rosy grins and smirks from some joke that he may or may not share with you. She could not remember a time when his eyes did not twinkle. Life was one joke after another. If you weren’t laughing, you were doing it wrong. It seemed wrong that he was not smiling now. It seemed wrong that his face was clean-shaven and too thin. There was extra skin from rapid weight loss that lay on the pillow on either side of his cheekbones like deflated balloons. It was wrong. This could not be her father.

Daisy pulled herself out of her thoughts and returned to her seat, two rows behind her sisters, Violet and Rose, and their husbands. Rose’s daughter, Ava, played in the pew behind her mother with one of the cousins who was near her age. Daisy watched them, her heart aching with longing for her own children. She could not bring them with her and their absence gnawed at her. She needed to be near them, to see them laughing and playing with their cousins, to see that life really did go on. And she needed also to lean on her husband, who had stayed behind to watch them. But it was not safe here, in the South, where the virus surged with a voracious appetite. So she left her family in New York and drove to Mississippi alone. And now here, on this pew, on the third row back, she sat alone.

When they closed the casket lid, finally sealing her father away from the world forever, she thought she heard a dull drum clang from somewhere far away. Her sister, Rose, had held tight to their elder sister, Violet, before the lid was closed. She ran her hands over his shirt and put her head to his chest as if listening for a heartbeat. She blinked away the thought that Rose was being melodramatic. She was allowed, right?

The preacher droned on. He quoted some scripture that someone chose, that was familiar but had no relevance to her father. She really wasn’t sure if there was any scripture that would have been appropriate. Her father had no relationship with the church, with God or Jesus anymore, and the insistence to have his funeral in a church was just wrong, somehow. It was all wrong. He had wanted to be cremated. Someone had decided against that. He wanted to have everything done outdoors. Someone had decided against that. What, really, was left of her father here, besides that cold wax statue and some pictures?

There were pictures all around, showing some moments of life, a few smiles, and the children he had given to the world. Well, most of the children were there. Rose, the favorite, was everywhere on the photo boards. In some pictures, it seemed it was just her, posing, with their father somewhere in an obscure background. Daisy had to squint to see her own face in one or two of the pictures. She was not totally left out. Just almost. But, then, what could she expect? It had been almost four years. She thought at least there might have been pictures of her children with their grandfather. Rose’s daughter was represented, but Daisy’s two children, both older than Rose’s daughter, were nowhere to be seen.

The preacher finally stepped down and some older lady with a hairstyle from thirty years ago began to sing a hymn that Daisy was sure her father had never sung. Something about an old, faded, worn out cross being her favorite…what did that even mean? When her soulful, high pitched crooning came to a long held out ending, Rose stood and made her way to the podium. She began to talk about their father, telling stories and attempting to sum up his character in words that they all knew would never be enough. It was a beautiful eulogy, well written and finished with one of their father’s own jokes. Then his song played, the song he loved because it reminded him of his late brother. He would have liked that eulogy and that song. Daisy felt hot tears running down her cheeks and she could not make them stop. And then, as the pall bearers moved down the aisle, a bag-piper piped a Scottish lullaby and Daisy thought her heart might explode.

Her sisters had not even told her not to wear black. She had packed a beautiful black dress that she had never worn because she had been too fat to fit it. It had been in storage for ten years until she pulled it out this summer after having lost 70 pounds. It looked stunning on her newly thinned, still curvy shape. She looked stunning at the funeral; that knowledge was almost the only thing that kept her from curling into a ball or running away from everyone. She may have been shunned by her sisters and mother, but she looked fabulous. And her father had loved pretty things. Her appearance was a tribute. But her sisters and mother wore colors. Rose wore a bright red dress, Violet wore blue, and their mother wore a flowing dress with watercolor flowers of every shade. They had decided to be non-traditional, which was great. He would have appreciated that. But they didn’t share any of that with Daisy. So she wore her black dress and she looked fabulous.

When the service was over, everyone slowly filed out. It had been so long since Daisy had seen any of her father’s family that she wondered if they recognized her. Could she have changed that much? She hesitated outside the door, watching as the groups of mourners gathered in tight circles, hands on shoulders, their masks hiding everything but their eyes. She heard someone whisper something about New York and her head swiveled instinctively toward the speaker. But it was a whisper, not an invitation.

She had listened to the news on her road trip down to the small town in Mississippi where she had grown up. Switching between stations as one faded away and another came in clearer, she discovered the duplicity in COVID-19 reporting between the northern states and the southern. The farther south she drove, the more conservative became the news. The more supportive of President Trump, the more distrustful of the science. She should not be surprised that no one wanted to come near her. Even though she was the one in danger here, not them. Even though her city had listened to the science. They wore their masks, they limited their shopping trips and stayed at home as much as possible. The numbers reflected their determination and positive virus cases had remained at below 1% for weeks. This place, on the other hand, followed every ridiculous word that came from the president’s mouth and they scoffed at science and evidence. And their numbers reflected that. She was not the danger here; they were.

But a funeral is not the place for political discussion, or even scientific, though the two topics were hardly distinct anymore. So she backed away and turned to look at the hearse that was being readied to make the half mile drive to the grave site. The discussions at a funeral are always hushed, she guessed. But the whispers seemed more so this time. Though she made a conscious effort to not make eye contact with anyone, she caught several eyes that glanced her way and then darted in an opposite direction. They did recognize her. The family knew who she was, even with half of her face hidden behind her mask. The isolation was intentional.

Were they distant because they feared that she carried the virus from New York to their little town? That was possible, as all the news outlets here seemed intent on vilifying New York as a plague-ridden state full of dirty city buildings and smog. Or maybe they had spoken to her sisters and mother. Daisy was aware that people will take the side of the person they speak to. She had not spoken to anyone in years, definitely not since she had gotten married. Her mother and sisters were in constant contact with the extended family and had no doubt shared their feelings about Daisy with them.

Her father once warned her and her sisters that certain extended family members would not “take kindly” to one of their own getting into a relationship with a black person. Daisy thought that certainly they would have grown out of that. Apparently not. Although her husband was not black, he was of Puerto Rican and Cuban descent, born in Brooklyn, and had dared to defend her in an argument with her mother. He was close enough to everything that her white, southern extended family despised and feared and so he had broken three rules for dating and marrying a southern woman. He and Daisy had been shunned by her immediate family ever since she chose to be with him. She could only assume the news had reached the rest of her father’s family.

Whatever the motivation, Daisy felt, all of a sudden, the weight of the whispers and the glances, the grief that she knew would gnaw at her forever, and the chill of imposed distance. She realized in that moment that her mother had not spoken to her at all. She had not even said hello. She began to walk slowly to her car. If there was no hello, why should there be a goodbye? No one spoke to her as she walked away. No one stopped her. So she kept going. 

When she reached the safety of her car, she ripped off her mask and breathed deeply. She wiped away the remaining tears from her eyes and put on her sunglasses. She took another deep breath and spoke to herself out loud. "It's time to go home."