Dead
By Mary C. Paul
Jerricaangel@yahoo.com
Pretend you're me. Your girlfriend dumped you, you tried to blow up your
school, and you decided faking your own death was the only way to go. You needed
an exit, so you made one-literally. You're successful in tricking the only
eyewitness, who happened to be the girlfriend who wanted nothing to do with you.
She thinks you're dead, and in a few hours, everyone else will too. You don't
exist anymore. You don't physically belong. You didn't toss yourself into the
abyss, but for all intensive purposes, you might as well have. So here it is,
the question to end all questions. Now that you're dead, what are you going to
do with your life?
"Pretend I did blow up the school, all the schools." Veronica smiled at
me, like she knew I was writing the easy-out clause. "Now that you're dead, what
are you going to do with your life?" I wanted an actual answer, but instead I
got a gesture. She pulled out a cigarette and placed it in her mouth...Great.
How very. I couldn't do nothing but smoke for the rest of my life! I was trying
to get her honest opinion here. Not that I wasn't amused by her answer to my own
pet lunchtime poll topic, but she wasn't much help. Why was I surprised.
I stretched my arms out and thought I'd seem quite the martyr posing like
Jesus. The beauty of it is He really didn't die, and I wouldn't either. Maybe
Veronica would see some foreshadowing in it, after all she has the grand IQ,
which she now uses to decide what color gloss to wear. I figured I was safe
though, since she couldn't figure out that raspberry pink wasn't her color.
Veronica would never appreciate my symbolism-not even if she handed me a veil so
I could wipe my face and the cloth retained the image forever and ever. I'm not
saying I thought I was Jesus, but I died better than He did.
It was over in a flash, it was painless, and it was messy, but not as messy as
it would have been had there been blood and intestines splattered everywhere. I
should've set it up so there would at least be some blood here and there. Next
time I do this, I should plan ahead. Problem with that is you can only do
something like this once. Twice is happenstance. Three times is suspicious. The
safest way to play it was to actually die, to really go through with it, but if
different social types truly get along in Heaven, when I get there, I'll have no
purpose.
Veronica probably thought I was going straight to hell. I've never believed in
hell. I have always thought that to people who belong in a hell, having to spend
eternity in Heaven is hell.
Over the next few days, Sherwood became a tomb, a teeny-bopper purgatory. I was
waiting for my window to open so I could make my escape to the west for a whole
other life. I had time to kill. I had nothing but time on my hands. The chance
to slip away from this village of the damned would present itself after the
macabre teen frenzy wave broke and swept back as fast as it came. Drunken,
testosterone-brazen swine and barbie-doll teenqueens were buying more yearbooks
featuring the Manson family suicides yearbook spread than Kirk Cameron and
Andrew McCarthy pin-ups combined. Ah, the incessant inanity that is fandomonium.
These counterculture conformists lapped up the bloodshed on their hands and
knees. I saw the dark pleasure that had enshrouded Miss Chandler's funeral and
Kurt Kelley and Ram Sweeney's funeral. I started to wonder what it would be like
at mine.
Something Jack shined in me at the idea. It was the most incredible stroke of
genius next to offing myself. I was going to attend my own funeral. I don't know
why I hadn't thought of it before. Probably because if I had, I'd have killed
myself just to see it! The very concept was ludicrous and appalling which made
this unique opportunity irresistible. After all, how often do you get to go to
your own memorial services? No one is certain what people really think of them,
and it's because people only talk about you when you're not around. The next
day, I was going to be everywhere all at once.
I didn't do much in the way of precautions. I walked into the church after
everyone had piled inside. I didn't have any of my staples, no bike, no trench,
not even my cigs. I had sunglasses, and I never wore sunglasses. This pair I
bought for seven bucks at Snappy's. They were cheap and tacky, but they were
dark and impossible to see past. If the eyes are the windows to the soul, I
would be perfectly safe wearing these. I needed a hat, but I refused to adhere
to the hypocritical, socialite mantra where baseball caps are the youth-
achievement crowns. Besides, donning the cap with sunglasses is too obvious and
has the exact opposite effect. It's the evasive movie star approach, which is
not inconspicuous at all.
The way a simple article of clothing is identified with an entire
lifestyle and behavior transcends fashion statement to the point where it
becomes a fascist statement. To redefine myself to fit into this nonsense, I was
going to be an outcast, but not a rebellious one. For this dress-up charade, I
chose the classic gray fedora, which is something right off Bogey's head, but
had made a comeback as part of the trendsetting, glitzy, mix-and-match nightlife
scene that plagued 80's youth. It was the cheap imitation, knock-off version of
the classic hat with the brim and crease on the top, which was also resurrected
by Hollywood-as most trends are-in movies like "Pretty in Pink". That's the one
with the girl who was famous for her bee-stung lips. If she knew that most hard-
up, shit-faced, teenaged masturbators painted her as the girl with "great dick-
sucking lips" she'd be a lot redder in the face, and probably never show that
face in public again. Anyway, this was my part-the geek who was going for the
already passé, retro-nerd, Jon Cryer look from the movie-and I was going to play
it. I wasn't going to take it too far, because there's a level to which even I
won't sink.
I walked along the side corridor to the baptismal basin that was full of
holy water. The crowd took a while to settle, and the fact that there was a
crowd was surprising at first, but then I remembered how you had to sign-in at
the funerals to be excused from class for the services. They came for the
truancy, they stayed for the gossip. These funerals were just assemblies with
mourning coffee. Before the actual memorial service started, there was constant
jabbering that blended together into a low hum of whispers.
Enter Heather the Bitch. Less than a week ago she was Heather the Nobody,
Heather the Weak, Heather the Lackie. Now, she's morphed into Heather the Duke,
or Heather the Duchess if you want to leap into the pc 90's. Anyway you put it,
she's Heather the Chandler reborn, the queen of the damned, bringing herpes and
hearsay to the masses. She was infectious and she spread it around, like the
hatred she cultivated knowing it would be contagious, letting it grow just so
everyone else would catch it. She was the last bitch standing.
I watched her. I followed her. I overheard her. The last thing I heard
before the service started was some Heather the Cheerleader remark "He blew
himself up" as if the idea was cool and unsavory at the same time, then the
Duchess of Fuck smirked and added, "Good!"
I knew why she was so proud and full of her flaming shit. I was gone and
there would be no more favors, no more pressure, no more blackmail, and no more
worries. I had the entire hour they devoted to pitying my wayward soul and
pondering my misled end to seethe and stew amidst the enemy's hypocrisy of a
memorial ceremony. The pot was bubbling and boiling over, but I had to maintain
a low profile. I was thinking and thinking without listening to a word that was
being said, but then I heard an all too recognizable voice. I glanced up at the
podium from behind my black sunglasses and found Veronica awkwardly standing in
front of everyone and clearing her throat to speak.
Would you believe I had almost forgotten about Veronica? Well, I had. As
soon as my hold on her slipped, I lost interest. She was fun when she was under
control, but who needs a loose cannon around if it looks better than it handles.
I couldn't wait to hear what she was going to say, and from the look on her
face, neither could she. Silence. Silence. Silence. Come on, Veronica, while the
body is still warm! That's another thing. There was no body, but there was a
coffin. I picked up a program-I love it, I'm taking away a program from my own
funeral, like this is a black-tie gala, and I want something to remember it by.
I went to the London Symphony Orchestra and all I got was this recycled paper.
Anyway, the program actually said that there would be "a closed casket due to
the fact that the remains are unsuitable for viewing." I stifled a laugh. The
coffin would be closed because there were no remains! Apparently though, no one
knew that except the police and undertaker.
Silence. Silence. Jesus, Veronica! When we were killing people, you
couldn't shut up, but put you on the spot at my funeral and you don't know what
to say. You can't think of anything to sing the praise of your homicidal ex-
boyfriend? I'll help you. Dearly beloathed, we are gathered here today to get
out of school. Oh, and to honor the memory of J.D.-I forget what J.D. stands
for, but he was loved as much as he loved. He was kind to bunny rabbits and
helped me kill and mourn my more popular peers. How's that for humanity? Her
lips trembled and...yes, here we go.
"I didn't know J.D. very well, but I know he wanted everyone to be happy
and not at war with each other." She couldn't have gotten it more wrong, but
color me impressed. She didn't plan to piss all over my grave, but she probably
couldn't have done it in good conscience, knowing she had blood on her hands
too. I took comfort in the fact that she would probably die of guilt, whereas I
planned to live with mine. "J.D. didn't have all the answers, and that's why
this tragedy came about. I just hope he has those answers now, and that he
realizes where he went wrong trying to get them." On that one-sided note, she
glanced around the crowd with that solemn pout on her face and stepped down from
the podium. Short, bittersweet, to the left of the point, and not a single ounce
of truth or relevancy to any of it.
The hushed menace of snickering diverted my attention off Veronica and
back to the megabitch in front of me. Yes, I had made sure to snag the seat
behind Heather the Duke, who gave me a disgusted, dismissive roll of the eyes
when I sat down before the priest had started the service. She took me for some
wretched geek who had plotted out a seat near the most sought after piece of
pussy at Westerberg, and was thus ignoring me with all the powers of her
jockocracy surrounding her. My disguise was a completely perfecto success. Her
snide comment was something to the effect of "How deep for someone who went
crazy after her boyfriend offed himself. Imagine the nerve of her to treat me
like that in the hallway. She's lost her fucking mind. Poor little Veronica."
While she and her shadow were laughing it up, I got an idea, quite possibly one
of my best ideas ever. I carefully slid my foot under the pew in front of me,
moved around a bit, and then I felt it. Right underneath her lay her snazzy,
highly-personalized bag, undoubtedly full of condoms she never used and tokens
of affection from friends and fucks she never liked. I used my foot to pull the
bag to me and I eased it underneath the pew I was sitting in. All I had to do
now was be patient and wait. This venture would prove worthwhile after all. When
the funeral was over, she forgot it, as I saw her do with the same damn bag on a
myriad of occasions. She never even reached for it.
It didn't take long for the congregation to clear out and disappear from
the church grounds. This was more an obligation than an act of deep-rooted
sorrow. I was kinda disappointed that more wasn't said about me, both good and
bad, but more than half those people didn't even know who I was until I blew
myself to kingdom come, so no one really did a lot of conversing about little
old me.
The details of the funeral itself were negligible and monotonous just like
the classic black mourning wardrobe almost everyone wore. Little things such as
Pauline the Phlegm in the front row with her own boxes of Kleenexes, one for
herself, another for the grieving public seated close by her. Veronica was in
the first row, Pauline's arm around her like she needed to be squeezed for a
show of support and that would make her seem strong at this time of loss and
need. Psychobabble bullshit in perpetual motion.
I sat quietly until the last people were finally getting up and leaving,
then I knelt down and bowed my head. To everyone remaining, it seemed I was
paying last respects and holding my reverential prayers for more quiet
circumstances. In fact, I was covertly sliding Heather the Duke's bag out from
under my pew and into my bookbag. Finally, the church was empty. No one was
around, not even out front, and the doors were closed when it was down to the
last handful of people. I was safe inside, and no one had any clue I had been
there.
I walked up the center aisle, eyeing my coffin like a hawk, completely
fixated on the golden brown shine to the wood. I was alone with my own coffin in
the church after memorial services for my death, a surreal twist Norman Rockwell
wouldn't have seen coming. I let my fingers glide along the polished surface and
then I lifted the lid. There was nothing inside, me or the coffin. We were both
empty at this point. Where was I going to go as a dead man? What could I do?
What good is a coffin without a body? I suddenly got a very devilish smirk on my
lips, an evil grin that spread right across my face-you know the one I'm talking
about. I ripped the sunglasses off my face and tore the hat off my head as well
as the stupid cloth jacket I had been wearing to match the geeky hat, and along
with my bookbag, stuffed them all into the top half of the casket. Then I opened
the bottom and climbed in.
It was unsettling at first, but once I closed both sections of the lid, it
felt a little more like sleeping on a park bench. I guess they figured the
casket would stay closed so why pay for padding for a body that wouldn't need
it. The wood was bare on the inside and I felt like I was already being buried
alive, but there was something morbidly fascinating about it. How many people
can say they know what it feels like to lay in their own coffin? I think I broke
through a lot of barriers the ordinary man never even sees. I laid there
perfectly still, wondering how far from sanity I had to be to do this. I wasn't
sure, but I didn't care either. All I could do was wait and that was exactly
what I did. I thought about giving up and getting out. It felt uncomfortable,
vacuous, and the thrill was wearing thin on me after a while. Finally, finally!
I heard the creak of the heavy church doors, and footsteps rush up the aisle.
"Shit!" She was there.
I heard the steps come closer, then run back down the aisle. The bitch
couldn't even remember where she sat, or thought that by some unlikely magical
force her bag got up and walked away for a cute game of hide and seek. She kept
rushing back in forth in those damned high-heels that were worn with every
fucking outfit imaginable. She seemed sure she left it here. She'd probably
searched her car, asked everyone she knew and traced it back to this point after
what felt like twenty minutes to a half hour. This was it. The second I'd been
waiting for in the way that you wait for something you don't know what, but
you're sure something's coming, and this was it. I had known it since I snatched
her bag, and best of all, I'd improved upon the idea since it's conception. I
wouldn't rather be anywhere, but where I was right at that moment.
I very slowly pushed the top half of the lid up and I watched her from in
the darkness of my coffin. She heard the creaking of the hinges and was turning
to stare in my direction. I shifted speeds and flung the entire lid open with a
shove and a kick. I grandly stood up inside the coffin, seeming ten feet tall as
this fright and confusion wrought into her porcelain-doll, powder-puffed face. I
wasn't wearing any part of my disguise, and I was entirely recognizable as me,
and no one else. True terror filled her eyes and her mouth dropped as the
reality of what she had just witnessed sank past that cold exterior. She had
seen me rise out of my coffin, and now I was giving her the same demonic smile I
had when I came up with this idea. I stood still, grinning my ass off, anxiously
awaiting a full-scale reaction, and I saw it start in her and build like an
orgasm, which is how I would describe watching her do it.
"AAAAAAAAAAaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhh!!!" Her high-pitch squeal of a scream
reverberated through the whole church and pierced my ears to the point of
deafness, but I didn't flinch in the slightest. I stood fast, then jumped down
to the floor as I watched her hyperventilate. I started my approach, very
gently, very gradually. Maybe if I were eloquent enough, she'd believe I rose
from the dead as a ghost to extract my debt from her. I reached around to my
side very swiftly and whipped out my six-shooter. She made a pathetic whimper
having a firm grasp of my intentions. "No." I shook my head rather sadly at her,
my eyes burning for the same taste of my type of justice that Heather, Kurt and
Ram got.
"You know," I cocked my gun, "the second time you read Moby Dick, Ahab and
the whale become good friends." BANG. One shot right into her. It only took one.
I realized the err of my way in taking life in God's humble abode, and spoke
aloud to no one in particular, "Dreadful etiquette, I apologize."
So much for white whales and their plankton. There's a fine line between
judge-jury-executioner and killer, and I know I tap-dance over that line while
standing over people's graves, but this was the closest I had ever come to
setting up shop on the other side of the line. Evil is the absence of empathy,
and I'm not apathetic. Well, so what if I am. Just because I don't care, doesn't
mean I don't understand.
There was no way to make this look like a suicide. This is an obvious
murder, and that's a crime-you know, suicide is a crime too, actually-but this
murder doesn't have a murderer. I'm not a killer. I'm dead.
Copyright Mary C. Paul
February 2001
By Mary C. Paul
Jerricaangel@yahoo.com
Pretend you're me. Your girlfriend dumped you, you tried to blow up your
school, and you decided faking your own death was the only way to go. You needed
an exit, so you made one-literally. You're successful in tricking the only
eyewitness, who happened to be the girlfriend who wanted nothing to do with you.
She thinks you're dead, and in a few hours, everyone else will too. You don't
exist anymore. You don't physically belong. You didn't toss yourself into the
abyss, but for all intensive purposes, you might as well have. So here it is,
the question to end all questions. Now that you're dead, what are you going to
do with your life?
"Pretend I did blow up the school, all the schools." Veronica smiled at
me, like she knew I was writing the easy-out clause. "Now that you're dead, what
are you going to do with your life?" I wanted an actual answer, but instead I
got a gesture. She pulled out a cigarette and placed it in her mouth...Great.
How very. I couldn't do nothing but smoke for the rest of my life! I was trying
to get her honest opinion here. Not that I wasn't amused by her answer to my own
pet lunchtime poll topic, but she wasn't much help. Why was I surprised.
I stretched my arms out and thought I'd seem quite the martyr posing like
Jesus. The beauty of it is He really didn't die, and I wouldn't either. Maybe
Veronica would see some foreshadowing in it, after all she has the grand IQ,
which she now uses to decide what color gloss to wear. I figured I was safe
though, since she couldn't figure out that raspberry pink wasn't her color.
Veronica would never appreciate my symbolism-not even if she handed me a veil so
I could wipe my face and the cloth retained the image forever and ever. I'm not
saying I thought I was Jesus, but I died better than He did.
It was over in a flash, it was painless, and it was messy, but not as messy as
it would have been had there been blood and intestines splattered everywhere. I
should've set it up so there would at least be some blood here and there. Next
time I do this, I should plan ahead. Problem with that is you can only do
something like this once. Twice is happenstance. Three times is suspicious. The
safest way to play it was to actually die, to really go through with it, but if
different social types truly get along in Heaven, when I get there, I'll have no
purpose.
Veronica probably thought I was going straight to hell. I've never believed in
hell. I have always thought that to people who belong in a hell, having to spend
eternity in Heaven is hell.
Over the next few days, Sherwood became a tomb, a teeny-bopper purgatory. I was
waiting for my window to open so I could make my escape to the west for a whole
other life. I had time to kill. I had nothing but time on my hands. The chance
to slip away from this village of the damned would present itself after the
macabre teen frenzy wave broke and swept back as fast as it came. Drunken,
testosterone-brazen swine and barbie-doll teenqueens were buying more yearbooks
featuring the Manson family suicides yearbook spread than Kirk Cameron and
Andrew McCarthy pin-ups combined. Ah, the incessant inanity that is fandomonium.
These counterculture conformists lapped up the bloodshed on their hands and
knees. I saw the dark pleasure that had enshrouded Miss Chandler's funeral and
Kurt Kelley and Ram Sweeney's funeral. I started to wonder what it would be like
at mine.
Something Jack shined in me at the idea. It was the most incredible stroke of
genius next to offing myself. I was going to attend my own funeral. I don't know
why I hadn't thought of it before. Probably because if I had, I'd have killed
myself just to see it! The very concept was ludicrous and appalling which made
this unique opportunity irresistible. After all, how often do you get to go to
your own memorial services? No one is certain what people really think of them,
and it's because people only talk about you when you're not around. The next
day, I was going to be everywhere all at once.
I didn't do much in the way of precautions. I walked into the church after
everyone had piled inside. I didn't have any of my staples, no bike, no trench,
not even my cigs. I had sunglasses, and I never wore sunglasses. This pair I
bought for seven bucks at Snappy's. They were cheap and tacky, but they were
dark and impossible to see past. If the eyes are the windows to the soul, I
would be perfectly safe wearing these. I needed a hat, but I refused to adhere
to the hypocritical, socialite mantra where baseball caps are the youth-
achievement crowns. Besides, donning the cap with sunglasses is too obvious and
has the exact opposite effect. It's the evasive movie star approach, which is
not inconspicuous at all.
The way a simple article of clothing is identified with an entire
lifestyle and behavior transcends fashion statement to the point where it
becomes a fascist statement. To redefine myself to fit into this nonsense, I was
going to be an outcast, but not a rebellious one. For this dress-up charade, I
chose the classic gray fedora, which is something right off Bogey's head, but
had made a comeback as part of the trendsetting, glitzy, mix-and-match nightlife
scene that plagued 80's youth. It was the cheap imitation, knock-off version of
the classic hat with the brim and crease on the top, which was also resurrected
by Hollywood-as most trends are-in movies like "Pretty in Pink". That's the one
with the girl who was famous for her bee-stung lips. If she knew that most hard-
up, shit-faced, teenaged masturbators painted her as the girl with "great dick-
sucking lips" she'd be a lot redder in the face, and probably never show that
face in public again. Anyway, this was my part-the geek who was going for the
already passé, retro-nerd, Jon Cryer look from the movie-and I was going to play
it. I wasn't going to take it too far, because there's a level to which even I
won't sink.
I walked along the side corridor to the baptismal basin that was full of
holy water. The crowd took a while to settle, and the fact that there was a
crowd was surprising at first, but then I remembered how you had to sign-in at
the funerals to be excused from class for the services. They came for the
truancy, they stayed for the gossip. These funerals were just assemblies with
mourning coffee. Before the actual memorial service started, there was constant
jabbering that blended together into a low hum of whispers.
Enter Heather the Bitch. Less than a week ago she was Heather the Nobody,
Heather the Weak, Heather the Lackie. Now, she's morphed into Heather the Duke,
or Heather the Duchess if you want to leap into the pc 90's. Anyway you put it,
she's Heather the Chandler reborn, the queen of the damned, bringing herpes and
hearsay to the masses. She was infectious and she spread it around, like the
hatred she cultivated knowing it would be contagious, letting it grow just so
everyone else would catch it. She was the last bitch standing.
I watched her. I followed her. I overheard her. The last thing I heard
before the service started was some Heather the Cheerleader remark "He blew
himself up" as if the idea was cool and unsavory at the same time, then the
Duchess of Fuck smirked and added, "Good!"
I knew why she was so proud and full of her flaming shit. I was gone and
there would be no more favors, no more pressure, no more blackmail, and no more
worries. I had the entire hour they devoted to pitying my wayward soul and
pondering my misled end to seethe and stew amidst the enemy's hypocrisy of a
memorial ceremony. The pot was bubbling and boiling over, but I had to maintain
a low profile. I was thinking and thinking without listening to a word that was
being said, but then I heard an all too recognizable voice. I glanced up at the
podium from behind my black sunglasses and found Veronica awkwardly standing in
front of everyone and clearing her throat to speak.
Would you believe I had almost forgotten about Veronica? Well, I had. As
soon as my hold on her slipped, I lost interest. She was fun when she was under
control, but who needs a loose cannon around if it looks better than it handles.
I couldn't wait to hear what she was going to say, and from the look on her
face, neither could she. Silence. Silence. Silence. Come on, Veronica, while the
body is still warm! That's another thing. There was no body, but there was a
coffin. I picked up a program-I love it, I'm taking away a program from my own
funeral, like this is a black-tie gala, and I want something to remember it by.
I went to the London Symphony Orchestra and all I got was this recycled paper.
Anyway, the program actually said that there would be "a closed casket due to
the fact that the remains are unsuitable for viewing." I stifled a laugh. The
coffin would be closed because there were no remains! Apparently though, no one
knew that except the police and undertaker.
Silence. Silence. Jesus, Veronica! When we were killing people, you
couldn't shut up, but put you on the spot at my funeral and you don't know what
to say. You can't think of anything to sing the praise of your homicidal ex-
boyfriend? I'll help you. Dearly beloathed, we are gathered here today to get
out of school. Oh, and to honor the memory of J.D.-I forget what J.D. stands
for, but he was loved as much as he loved. He was kind to bunny rabbits and
helped me kill and mourn my more popular peers. How's that for humanity? Her
lips trembled and...yes, here we go.
"I didn't know J.D. very well, but I know he wanted everyone to be happy
and not at war with each other." She couldn't have gotten it more wrong, but
color me impressed. She didn't plan to piss all over my grave, but she probably
couldn't have done it in good conscience, knowing she had blood on her hands
too. I took comfort in the fact that she would probably die of guilt, whereas I
planned to live with mine. "J.D. didn't have all the answers, and that's why
this tragedy came about. I just hope he has those answers now, and that he
realizes where he went wrong trying to get them." On that one-sided note, she
glanced around the crowd with that solemn pout on her face and stepped down from
the podium. Short, bittersweet, to the left of the point, and not a single ounce
of truth or relevancy to any of it.
The hushed menace of snickering diverted my attention off Veronica and
back to the megabitch in front of me. Yes, I had made sure to snag the seat
behind Heather the Duke, who gave me a disgusted, dismissive roll of the eyes
when I sat down before the priest had started the service. She took me for some
wretched geek who had plotted out a seat near the most sought after piece of
pussy at Westerberg, and was thus ignoring me with all the powers of her
jockocracy surrounding her. My disguise was a completely perfecto success. Her
snide comment was something to the effect of "How deep for someone who went
crazy after her boyfriend offed himself. Imagine the nerve of her to treat me
like that in the hallway. She's lost her fucking mind. Poor little Veronica."
While she and her shadow were laughing it up, I got an idea, quite possibly one
of my best ideas ever. I carefully slid my foot under the pew in front of me,
moved around a bit, and then I felt it. Right underneath her lay her snazzy,
highly-personalized bag, undoubtedly full of condoms she never used and tokens
of affection from friends and fucks she never liked. I used my foot to pull the
bag to me and I eased it underneath the pew I was sitting in. All I had to do
now was be patient and wait. This venture would prove worthwhile after all. When
the funeral was over, she forgot it, as I saw her do with the same damn bag on a
myriad of occasions. She never even reached for it.
It didn't take long for the congregation to clear out and disappear from
the church grounds. This was more an obligation than an act of deep-rooted
sorrow. I was kinda disappointed that more wasn't said about me, both good and
bad, but more than half those people didn't even know who I was until I blew
myself to kingdom come, so no one really did a lot of conversing about little
old me.
The details of the funeral itself were negligible and monotonous just like
the classic black mourning wardrobe almost everyone wore. Little things such as
Pauline the Phlegm in the front row with her own boxes of Kleenexes, one for
herself, another for the grieving public seated close by her. Veronica was in
the first row, Pauline's arm around her like she needed to be squeezed for a
show of support and that would make her seem strong at this time of loss and
need. Psychobabble bullshit in perpetual motion.
I sat quietly until the last people were finally getting up and leaving,
then I knelt down and bowed my head. To everyone remaining, it seemed I was
paying last respects and holding my reverential prayers for more quiet
circumstances. In fact, I was covertly sliding Heather the Duke's bag out from
under my pew and into my bookbag. Finally, the church was empty. No one was
around, not even out front, and the doors were closed when it was down to the
last handful of people. I was safe inside, and no one had any clue I had been
there.
I walked up the center aisle, eyeing my coffin like a hawk, completely
fixated on the golden brown shine to the wood. I was alone with my own coffin in
the church after memorial services for my death, a surreal twist Norman Rockwell
wouldn't have seen coming. I let my fingers glide along the polished surface and
then I lifted the lid. There was nothing inside, me or the coffin. We were both
empty at this point. Where was I going to go as a dead man? What could I do?
What good is a coffin without a body? I suddenly got a very devilish smirk on my
lips, an evil grin that spread right across my face-you know the one I'm talking
about. I ripped the sunglasses off my face and tore the hat off my head as well
as the stupid cloth jacket I had been wearing to match the geeky hat, and along
with my bookbag, stuffed them all into the top half of the casket. Then I opened
the bottom and climbed in.
It was unsettling at first, but once I closed both sections of the lid, it
felt a little more like sleeping on a park bench. I guess they figured the
casket would stay closed so why pay for padding for a body that wouldn't need
it. The wood was bare on the inside and I felt like I was already being buried
alive, but there was something morbidly fascinating about it. How many people
can say they know what it feels like to lay in their own coffin? I think I broke
through a lot of barriers the ordinary man never even sees. I laid there
perfectly still, wondering how far from sanity I had to be to do this. I wasn't
sure, but I didn't care either. All I could do was wait and that was exactly
what I did. I thought about giving up and getting out. It felt uncomfortable,
vacuous, and the thrill was wearing thin on me after a while. Finally, finally!
I heard the creak of the heavy church doors, and footsteps rush up the aisle.
"Shit!" She was there.
I heard the steps come closer, then run back down the aisle. The bitch
couldn't even remember where she sat, or thought that by some unlikely magical
force her bag got up and walked away for a cute game of hide and seek. She kept
rushing back in forth in those damned high-heels that were worn with every
fucking outfit imaginable. She seemed sure she left it here. She'd probably
searched her car, asked everyone she knew and traced it back to this point after
what felt like twenty minutes to a half hour. This was it. The second I'd been
waiting for in the way that you wait for something you don't know what, but
you're sure something's coming, and this was it. I had known it since I snatched
her bag, and best of all, I'd improved upon the idea since it's conception. I
wouldn't rather be anywhere, but where I was right at that moment.
I very slowly pushed the top half of the lid up and I watched her from in
the darkness of my coffin. She heard the creaking of the hinges and was turning
to stare in my direction. I shifted speeds and flung the entire lid open with a
shove and a kick. I grandly stood up inside the coffin, seeming ten feet tall as
this fright and confusion wrought into her porcelain-doll, powder-puffed face. I
wasn't wearing any part of my disguise, and I was entirely recognizable as me,
and no one else. True terror filled her eyes and her mouth dropped as the
reality of what she had just witnessed sank past that cold exterior. She had
seen me rise out of my coffin, and now I was giving her the same demonic smile I
had when I came up with this idea. I stood still, grinning my ass off, anxiously
awaiting a full-scale reaction, and I saw it start in her and build like an
orgasm, which is how I would describe watching her do it.
"AAAAAAAAAAaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhh!!!" Her high-pitch squeal of a scream
reverberated through the whole church and pierced my ears to the point of
deafness, but I didn't flinch in the slightest. I stood fast, then jumped down
to the floor as I watched her hyperventilate. I started my approach, very
gently, very gradually. Maybe if I were eloquent enough, she'd believe I rose
from the dead as a ghost to extract my debt from her. I reached around to my
side very swiftly and whipped out my six-shooter. She made a pathetic whimper
having a firm grasp of my intentions. "No." I shook my head rather sadly at her,
my eyes burning for the same taste of my type of justice that Heather, Kurt and
Ram got.
"You know," I cocked my gun, "the second time you read Moby Dick, Ahab and
the whale become good friends." BANG. One shot right into her. It only took one.
I realized the err of my way in taking life in God's humble abode, and spoke
aloud to no one in particular, "Dreadful etiquette, I apologize."
So much for white whales and their plankton. There's a fine line between
judge-jury-executioner and killer, and I know I tap-dance over that line while
standing over people's graves, but this was the closest I had ever come to
setting up shop on the other side of the line. Evil is the absence of empathy,
and I'm not apathetic. Well, so what if I am. Just because I don't care, doesn't
mean I don't understand.
There was no way to make this look like a suicide. This is an obvious
murder, and that's a crime-you know, suicide is a crime too, actually-but this
murder doesn't have a murderer. I'm not a killer. I'm dead.
Copyright Mary C. Paul
February 2001