Snowflakes began to drift down towards the ground as Charlie and his relatives shuffled towards the Church of St. Julian. He kept his eyes on the building ahead of him: this was the first time he'd been inside a cemetery in all the sixteen years of his life, and the occasion - his uncle's funeral - did nothing to alleviate his lingering fear of the place. Not only that, but an obscuring mist had pervaded the air in the city of Brahms for the past three days. The day was certainly fit for a memorial service. Despite the chill in the atmosphere, Charlie shuddered as a hot sensation creeped down his neck, and a flush burned onto his cheeks; he doubled his pace and walked up beside his mother. She turned to look at him, and gave him a smile - a smile, he thought, that would have been more reassuring if it weren't for the tears in her eyes. He took her left hand in reciprocation; her skin felt warm and his fear temporarily subsided.
The church that stood before them was built out of a featureless grey stone that would have made the building seem more boring than sinister, were it not for the thick mist that coalesced over it, like ghosts clinging to a lifeless body. The weathervane at the very peak of the church's clocktower was almost invisible. The cemetery, too, was just as murky - it was impossible to see the walls surrounding the area because of the mist, so it seemed as though the entire churchground was suspended in an otherworld housing nothing more than rows of headstones. The dirt path through the cemetery led up to a black door atop a set of stairs, flanked by two aged statues of a man in robes looking towards the sky with outstretched arms: one of the statues was missing its hands. The entire church had a very hazy feel to it, as though it had been constructed out of the penumbra of dreams which could fade away at any moment, if one were to just acknowledge that they were dreaming.
The priest pushed open the black door and gestured across a candle-lit foyer towards the main service hall directly opposite. The draft from opening the door caused the candles in the foyer to gutter, and as Charlie walked into the church, he saw the shadows thrown by the flames creep and crawl over the ceiling and down the stone archway in front of him. He frowned a little, and continued to walk alongside his mother towards the next room.
The tapping from his mother's red heeled shoes on the stone ceased as she strode on to the plush red carpet in the service hall. It was much lighter in there: braziers hung burning from the pillars that held up the upper gallery, and candlestands not unlike the ones in the foyer flushed either side of the room. Charlie's eyes, however, were centered on the fixture at the opposite end of the room: lined with cold white fabric and stone-like violets lay a dark mahogany casket, holding the body of his uncle, Jared Tricht. The hot feeling ran down his back once more, and he felt an agonising abundance of air in his chest. Every step on the red carpet was a step towards the terrifying reality of his uncle's death. He bowed his head a little, not wanting to his mother to catch sight of the tears that threatened to burn through his eyes. His mother must have noticed his rigid, forced breathing, as she whispered, "We're almost there", and squeezed his hand once again. Just before they reached the front pew, he caught a sight of his uncle's pale, lifeless face: his mother made an audible whimper, and Charlie bit his bottom lip to prevent any kind of utterance that may betray him. They sat down in the pew together, and Charlie's mother stared at the candles at the very front of the room, rather obviously trying not to look at the casket. Charlie wiped his eyes as quickly as he could, and glanced over at his mother.
Diane Tricht's dark clothing did not mesh with her physical features: Charlie was used to seeing his mother dressed in bright colours, and even now he noticed how restrained her vibrant, long blond hair was with the dark alice band on top of it. Diane's blue eyes did not seem accustomed to having to mourn either, as they had turned too red too fast, and her slender hands gripped one another so fiercely that lines appeared on them for the very first time. Despite the gloominess of her dress, Diane managed to wear in it in such a way as to show she had dressed to honour Jared's life, rather than merely wear the customary costume of seeming sadness.
The organ began to sound as the rest of the attendants stepped into the room. Despite the size of the pipes, the song played was a meek requiem that did not intrude on the grief of each of the attendants. Charlie bowed his head once again, and listened to the organ's song. He had expected it to be showy and pretentious, the way people make a parade of their sadness to "prove" to whomever is watching that they care oh-so-much. But each of the notes of the melody was soft, consoling and understanding. Charlie was sure the organ player was not seeming to be mournful, as he expected of the rest of the procession - no, he was experiencing his own personal world of despair. Even he must have known uncle Jared - the notes he played could not be played at.
Almost all of the attendants had taken their seats in the pews by now. Charlie turned around just in time to see his aunt Pelafina, Jared's widow, take long, slow strides down to one of the front pews. Just before she turned to select a seat, Charlie could have sworn she had shot a grimace his way. The hot feeling returned for a split-second, before he justified it as his misunderstanding of a mournful face.
As Pelafina sat down, the priest paced up the red aisle, towards the pulpit. Behind him were two boys carrying thuribles of incense, one of whom Charlie recognised as Christopher Sippus, a student Charlie's father taught. He clenched his teeth, and willed himself not to think about his dad - especially not now.
The priest stepped up to the pulpit, and the incense-bearers hung up the thuribles on two pillars that flanked the it, then took their seats nearby. The notes from the organ faded to a numb silence, and with a nod of his head to his audience, the priest began his sermon.
"Every day should be a day of joy, but today we must grieve for a man dear to us all. It is with heavy hearts and heavy hands that we must bear the passing of Jared Tricht." He looked over into the open casket, and a practised frown came over his features, a little too easily. "He was a son, a brother, a husband, a friend, and now he moves on to become a soul in God's greatest kingdom - the kingdom of Heaven. We must accept his moving on, and we must move on as well, but before we can accept his death, we must celebrate his life. To that end, I understand some people in attendance here wanted to say a few words about Jared - may I ask Mr. Gilbert Stern to take the fore?"
From somewhere near the back of the room came a quiet rumbling, and Charlie turned around to see a gruff man dressed in a black suit with a lime green tie rise from one of the rear pews. He stumbled out to the aisle - stepping on several people's toes on his way out the pew - and shuffled down to the front of the hall. Charlie had seen him before, as one of the men that often visited his uncle. He didn't know his name until now, but had seen them playing cards before. As Mr. Stern neared the pulpit, he stopped, and peered into the casket unceremoniously. His shoulders drooped, and he made a noise reminiscent of a car backfiring. Turning from the casket, he stepped up to the pulpit - the priest made no hesitation to get out of his way. He leaned both elbows on the surface, and stared down at his feet.
"Jared," he half-shouted, "Jared Tricht. He was... a great man. He was an amazing man. He was always a happy fellow, thanks to his great wife - howdy, Pelafina, how are ya?"
Pelafina did not make any motion to indicate a reply - her stony gaze said everything.
"So yes. Me, Jared, and Ross - that's Ross Grant there, near front - and, uh... And Horance Show, who couldn't be here today, we were Silent Hill's ratpack, weren't we Ross? So many fond memories. Just, in general, you know..."
Charlie spent the next few minutes resisting the urge to yawn out of boredom as Mr. Stern rambled on in his bumbling-mumble manner of speaking.
"So... I'll miss him, old Jared. We were best pals, but now he's gone. And the guy who killed him, that basta-"
He was interrupted by a cough from one of the front pews.
"- Sorry, Pelly. Pelafina. Sorry. Uh, Old Jared. Yes. I'll miss him. I do miss him. Dearly. No, very dearly. I miss him very dearly."
Mr. Stern stared at the congregation for a few seconds, as if awaiting a reply, then shrugged towards the priest, who walked back over to the pulpit. With a last glance into the casket, Mr. Stern shuffled back over to his seat at the rear of the hall.
"Thank you, Mr. Stern. If Mr. Ross Grant could come up to deliver his eulogy, please?"
As the priest said these words, a man rose up from the second row, dressed in an immaculate suit and sporting hair that was far too neatly combed. Charlie recognised Mr. Grant as another one of the men that his uncle played cards with. Mr. Grant was always smirking, and when he talked to someone, the smirk became a wide leer that he tried to force into a friendly grin, and failed halfway. His clothes always seemed to be neatly pressed, without a single wrinkle or crease, and he carried with him a scent that was a mix of cheap cologne and something that reminded Charlie of the toilet cleaner his mother used.
Mr. Grant stepped up beside the pulpit and gave the priest a wide smile - the priest frowned in response, but stood to the side to allow him to speak. He looked over to the casket, and sighed so loud that it echoed throughout the church.
"I shall try to keep this short: I just cannot believe Jared has left us, and under such untimely circumstances." He bowed his head. "He was one in a million. Absolutely one-in-a-million. Always a go-getter type, too, eh Pelafina? He never sat around waiting for success to come to him, always ran out to catch it himself. That's the attitude of a winner, ladies and gentlemen. He was a winner, was Jared. And not only that, he had all the qualities one would expect in the very finest friend - kindness, charity, compassion..."
Another empty eulogy; Charlie sat watching Mr. Grant's crooked smile fire out staccatoes of sparse sympathies, watching the way his mouth shaped words without really listening to what he was saying: Charlie got the impression of someone trying to blow hot air through their mouths without rounding their lips. He only tuned back in to Mr. Grant's speech when it became apparent that he wasn't saying anything at all. He had paused, then scanned the room for a moment, looking across the front pews from Pelafina all the way over to Diane. His face contorted into a misplaced smile and he raised his hands, blurting out, "But all this past tense! Jared would never have wanted us to keep on looking back! He would never have wanted us to waste our time mourning his death at the cost of us refusing to go on with our lives! I say, let's do him this one last favour! Let's move on, shall we? All things forgotten, I say. Let's put it behind us, and move on."
He lowered his hands to the pulpit, gripped both sides of it, and flashed another chesire grin across the entire room, before nodding and taking his seat once more.
After Mr. Grant had performed his speech, a number of other people said a few vague, generic words about Jared. Charlie didn't recognise any of the people delivering their eulogies, but he did recognise the insincerity in their voices as they spoke; he doubted very much that any of them, Grant and Stern included, actually cared about his uncle. No-one seemed genuinely bothered by his murder, and so all the deliverances were hollow and wooden. He smiled despite himself, but quickly remembered his mother, still holding back her tears beside him, and felt a hot surge of shame slap him across his face.
As more false confessions of affection were given, Charlie's mind wandered, and he took to studying the four candles on the stand behind the pulpit. His mind emptied as he watched them flicker, then stay still; he began to notice all the patches of light on the stone walls that this candle illuminated; witnessed overlapping Venn circles of light cast from other candles, intermingling and slipping together, then apart, then together again. Each section of the wall brightened and darkened depending on the subtle drafts of air around each flame, and the tones of every part of the illuminated wall slid into one another, like a murky lake of magma. Entranced, he watched each of the four flames dancing alongside one another, sometimes swaying in tandem, sometimes pirouetting by themselves, a ballet of candlelight, and now, as all of the flames ducked low-
One of the candles went out.
Charlie snapped to, and saw his aunt Pelafina step up to the pulpit, preparing to give her eulogy. Her steps were slow and strained - one of the incense bearers stood to help her, but she scowled at him and batted him away with one of her veiny, wrinkled hands. Charlie had no idea how old his aunt was, but her hair had been gray and straggly for as long as he had known her; today, at her husband's funeral, it was no different, aside from the black gossamer veil that half-obscured it from view. Her hunched body made it up the steps that led to the wooden pulpit, and she looked over at her audience as she took her place behind the fixture.
"No-one is more aggrieved than I at Jared's... passing. We are... were, a devoted couple, strong to the end: no-one could seperate us. But here, today, we seperate. It was untimely, yes, but Jared and I have had such a long and wonderful life together. We first met when I was a child, back at Midwich Elementary..."
Pelafina croaked out her recollections of her husband, and Charlie's gaze wavered back towards the candles again. Now he noticed how each candle was alternately casting shadow and light over not just the walls, but the things on the walls, too - from the metal braziers, which gleamed in reply to each guttering of the flames, to the tapestry of a woman holding a child in her arms.
Another of the candles went out, sending spirals of thin smoke into the air and around the tapestry. Charlie gazed as the smoke trailed over the woman's clothing and framed her serene expression, making her seem lazily afire. As he regarded her face, he felt himself begin to slip into slumber, the smoke drifting across the hall over to him, becoming an enormous, dense blanket of mist that covered him, caressed him, and nursed him to sleep...