A Life Badly Lived

I stand at the doorway of the funeral home, hesitant to go in for reasons both obvious and hard to articulate. The person they are supposed to be honouring today was not a good person, despite all the fine stories that will be told. Perhaps people will laugh when the story of how they ruined their third-favourite shirt is told. Perhaps that story won’t be told at all. It depends on if Jack turns up. He’s the only one who can tell that story properly.

People walk past me to take their seats, looking strangely at me as I lean on the doorpost. I suppose it is a little unusual to be standing here, but I can’t go in. Not just yet. And maybe it’s less to do with my position and more to do with my appearance. There’s plenty of people at this funeral who would not be happy to see me here, and so I’ve had to take precautions. I doubt even my own mother would recognise me. I hope my mother won’t recognise me. She is supposed to be here too, although her health isn’t the best and it wouldn’t surprise me if she stayed home and watched the livestream instead. We all know who she chose to be the golden child, and it wasn’t the person whose face is plastered around the room.

No body to look at, of course. The manner of death precluded an open casket, not that it would have happened anyway. The people around here are far too proper to gawk at a corpse, and it is rare for a family to allow a viewing. I never figured out if it was religion, or culture, or something else entirely, but today it is something to be grateful for. Less complications with a tradition of closed caskets.

It wouldn’t have been a pleasant way to go, either. Far too painful, and too prolonged. I shudder to think of it, glad I didn’t have to go through it. Of course, a little imagination goes a long way, and I feel like I actually did, sometimes. Then I wake up, and if I’m very lucky, I’ve woken before I start screaming. Mrs Nobel is far too nice an elderly lady to be woken up in the middle of the night more than twice though. She was very kind when it happened though, insisting on giving me a cup of tea to calm down before she would leave me alone. I was glad she left when she did. I was trained in a lot of things, but not how to withstand the kindly interrogation of a grandmotherly neighbour. Five more minutes, and I think I would have told her everything.

That, of course, would have been a disaster. After today it might have been all right, but as of now, the less people that know the truth, the better. Besides, right before all this, I saw first-hand the results of trusting the wrong person, the only one you thought you could trust. That was why we were all here today. Why I stood in this doorway, scanning each person as they entered, while having trouble entering myself. I was looking for one person, the one I hoped would come to see the results of their handiwork. It was a long shot, but after what happened, it was my only chance at redemption.

I smiled as I saw that Jack had come. Perhaps the shirt story would be told after all. Then my smile dropped as I saw who Jack was talking to. Somehow Renee had snuck in without my noticing her arrival. Frantically, I looked around for the funeral director. Looking behind me into the foyer, I spotted him. I quick-stepped as quietly as I could over to where he stood, chatting with someone I didn’t recognise. The logo on her pocket gave her away as another employee of the funeral home. The pair stopped chatting and looked at me as I approached. I put on my most serious face and looked at the director. “I’m sorry, but I have an urgent request for you. I need you to clear everyone out of the room and not ask any questions.”

The director gave me an odd look. “Everyone out? Why? How? We are just about ready to begin the service.”

I sighed. “Tell everyone there will be a delay in the service, and you are offering tea and coffee out on the lawn or something. It doesn’t matter what you tell them. Just get them out. For their own safety. Please.”

I turned back to the doorway where I had been standing and looked for Renee. She had left Jack and was standing at the coffin. Good. If she stared long enough, she might not notice the evacuation. I snuck a glance back at the funeral director and sighed. He hadn’t moved. Great. Of course he wasn’t going to act without a decent explanation. One that I couldn’t provide. Not without putting more people in danger. I sighed again and looked around. Time for the less-than-subtle approach. I moved down the hallway and found a smoke detector. Good thing I hadn’t lost the habit of keeping a lighter in my pocket. Pulling the funeral program from my other pocket, I lit the corner and waved it above my head. A horrendous beeping filled the air and I crept back to see everyone exiting the building.

Well, almost everyone. The director was standing next to the coffin, obviously trying to convince Renee to leave. She was shaking her head as he gestured to the door, but she must have lost her patience, as she turned around and decked him. He fell to the ground and she stepped over him, hands on the coffin as if about to lift the lid. I stepped into the room.

“You won’t find anything in there.” I spoke in a low voice, careful not to sound anything like myself.

Renee spun around, a carefully blank look on her face. “And why should I care about anything some strange person has to say?”

“Because I’m not a strange person. Well, not a stranger anyway.”

I started removing the different parts of my disguise as Renee’s eyes roamed over my face. As I pulled off the wig, her eyes widened and she looked over at the photo resting on the coffin, then back at me.

“Owen. You’re alive.”