This is kind of sad. I'm sorry.
Inspired by the song The Funeral by Band of Horse.
Gilbert had always been there for Erzsébet and Roderich.
He had been there when Roderich hesitantly asked Erzsébet if she wanted to grab a coffee.
He had been there when Roderich and Erzsébet had baked cookies in the late summer after their first date, when they looked painfully comfortable being domestic.
He had been there when Erzsébet announced that she and Roderich were getting married.
He had been there with Roderich as he nervously picked out a wedding ring.
He had been there to walk his childhood best friend down the aisle on her wedding day.
He had been there a few months later when Erzsébet told him that she and Roderich wanted a child.
He had been there through years of Erzsébet's struggles to get pregnant.
He had been there on Roderich and Erzsébet's third wedding anniversary when Erzsébet announced that she was pregnant.
And he had been there on that horrible October morning.
Gilbert jolted awake when he felt the vibrations of his phone against his chest. He squinted at the screen, trying to see the time. It was almost two in the morning.
"Hello?" he mumbled groggily.
"Gilbert!" Erzsébet exclaimed. She sounded utterly heartbroken.
"Erzsébet? What's wrong?" he asked. Erzsébet broke into loud, tortured sobs. After several minutes she had calmed down enough to try talking to Gilbert.
"There was an accident," she whispered between gasps.
"Oh, my god. I'll be there in ten minutes," Gilbert assured her. He hurriedly tied the laces on his worn sneakers and grabbed the keys to his old pickup.
Ten minutes later, he was sitting in front of Erzsébet and Roderich's suburban home. There was a police car parked in the driveway, the officer leaning against the hood.
Gilbert gripped the steering wheel so hard that his knuckles turned white and braced himself for what was to come. Moments later, he slowly withdrew the keys from the ignition and made his way out of the truck and toward the officer.
"Good evening, sir," the officer greeted solemnly, pushing himself off of the hood of the car.
"What happened?" Gilbert asked desperately.
"I'm so sorry. There was a drunk driver. He veered into oncoming traffic. There was nothing we could do. Mr. Edelstein was killed on impact," the officer informed him.
Gilbert felt as if his heart had stopped. He had always been there for Roderich. Always. And Roderich had always been there for him. He couldn't imagine living without his pretentious best friend.
"Oh, my god. Erzsé..." Gilbert whispered. He then remembered that Roderich's pregnant widowed wife, Gilbert's only living friend, was sitting inside mourning the loss of her husband. Gilbert quickly spun on his heel and nearly ran into the house.
Erzsébet was sitting on the couch, sobbing in her bathrobe. She held a box of tissues in one hand and a picture of her and Roderich on their wedding day. Gilbert felt his heart break all over again.
"Oh, Erzsé," he said quietly. Erzsébet slowly turned around to face him. Her face was swollen and red, her eyes were bloodshot and glassy, and her overly-pregnant stomach poked out of her bathrobe. She looked at Gilbert for a few seconds before her sobbing started anew.
"Oh, god," Gilbert lamented, rushing to Erzsébet's side. He wrapped his arms around her shoulders and pulled her to his side. She cried on his chest and cried into her hair.
Hours later, once they had no more tears, Erzsébet finally spoke.
"What do I do now, Gilbert?" she asked brokenly.
"I don't know Erzsé, but I'll be here for everything. I'll always be here," he assured her, squeezing her shoulders tighter and kissing the crown of her head.
"The baby will be here in three weeks. I don't think I can plan a funeral and a birth at the same time," Erzsébet whispered.
"Don't worry about the funeral. I'll take care of that. You just take care of the baby," Gilbert said sternly.
Gilbert had been there the night that Roderich had died.
Gilbert had been there six days later when Erzsébet broke into sobs in the middle of delivering Roderich's eulogy. He had been there as Erzsébet had made her way to her late husband's casket and slowly slid a copy of her last sonogram into his the inside of the suit Roderich was wearing. He had been there when Erzsébet delivered one last goodbye to Roderich in whispered Hungarian and gently kissed his pale forehead.
Gilbert had been there when Erzsébet gave birth less than two weeks later.
"Mr. Edelstein?" a kind-looking nurse had encountered Gilbert in the waiting room of the maternity ward. Gilbert flinched at the name of his recently passed friend.
"I'm not Mr. Edelstein. Just a close friend," Gilbert replied in a melancholy tone.
"Oh. I apologise. Mrs. Edelstein is ready to receive guests now," she informed him with a shy smile.
"Um. Okay. Yeah," Gilbert mumbled and allowed the nurse to lead him to Erzsébet's room.
Erzsébet was still disheveled and sweaty from her recent labour, but in Gilbert's eyes she was absolutely stunning. In her arms she held a tiny blanketed bundle. She turned to look at him as he entered the room. She looked both radiant and devastated. There were tears shining in her eyes.
Gilbert knelt at her bedside and looked at the baby in her arms.
"My god, Erzsébet," Gilbert breathed, gently touching the forehead and cheeks of the baby. "He's beautiful." Erzsébet smiled.
"He is. But his father should be here to see him," she whispered. A tear rolled down her cheek. Erzsébet suddenly looked up at Gilbert.
"I'm so glad that you're here, Gil," she said. Gilbert smiled and kissed her cheek.
"I'll always be here," he assured her and the baby.
Gilbert had been there month later when Erzsébet conceded defeat and asked him to move in with her and baby Roderich.
He had been there for every milestone of Roderich's young life. He had been there for the tediousness of potty training. He had been there when Roderich took his first step. He had been there when he had said his first word.
He had been there the first time that baby Roderich called him 'daddy.' He had been there to see Erzsébet's tears.
Gilbert had been there on Roderich's fourth birthday when Erzsébet gave him his father's violin as a gift.
He had been there as Roderich practiced his violin religiously.
He had been there when Roderich learned that Gilbert wasn't really his father. He had been there when some unknown connection between Roderich and his deceased father formed. he had been there when Roderich began to practice his violin even more fanatically.
He had been there on Roderich's twelfth birthday, when Gilbert looked up and suddenly realized that his kid looked just like his best friend.
"He looks just like him, Erzsébet," Gilbert said quietly, as he and Erzsébet sat on the couch watching Roderich play his violin in the next room. Erzsébet inhaled sharply.
"Yes, he does," she agreed, just as quietly. There was a brief pause. "I miss him every day, Gilbert. It's been twelve years and I still miss him every day. I thought that it wouldn't so much after time had gone by, but it hurts worse. And every time I look at my son, I see him, and it hurts me all over again. It's so unfair that Roderich never got to see his son, that he never got to raise this child that we tried so hard to make," Erzsébet lamented.
"I'm so glad that I have you, Gilbert. You stayed, even after Roderich was gone. You stayed and you became his surrogate father. And you've done a damn good job at raising him, too. Just look at the kid. He's perfect. Thank you so much, Gilbert. Thank you for being here for us," Erzsébet said, grabbing Gilbert's hand.
"I'll always be here, Erzsébet," Gilbert replied quietly.
The sound of Roderich's violin filled the room.
Gilbert had been there to guide his best friends' son through childhood.
He had been there to coach Roderich in the art of shaving.
He had been there to teach Roderich to drive, in the same old pickup truck that he had driven Erzsébet and Roderich home from the hospital in fifteen years before.
He had been there give Roderich dating advice.
He had been there on that day.
Gilbert and Erzsébet had been watching a corny Lifetime movie that evening in early May. Roderich had gone out a few hours before to run some errands, and was expected back at any moment.
Gilbert heard a car pull into the driveway, and he got up so that he could help Roderich unload the groceries. When he opened the door, however, it wasn't Roderich's car in the driveway. It was a police car.
"Oh no," Gilbert said. Erzsébet muted the television.
"What is it, Gil?" she asked.
"No. No, no, no, no, no," Gilbert insisted. Erzsébet was suddenly standing beside him. She saw the squad car in the driveway and clapped her hand over mouth.
"No. Not again," she whispered, tears already leaking down her face.
Gilbert had been there on the night that his best friend had died all those years ago.
Gilbert had been there on the night that the child he had raised from infancy died in the exact same way by some cruel twist of fate.
And Gilbert was here now, at another funeral, as Erzsébet cried and kissed her son goodbye. He wrapped his arm around her, and whispered into her hair.
"I'm still here."
I'm really sorry that this is sad. And that it's so fragmented. Don't hate me.