go now, you are forgiven
I cannot really say that I’m happy she’s dead; that’s sort of sadistic, which is one vice everyone tries to hide. I can say I’m not surprised or upset or really even affected at all, but I’m the only one with a car and how can you deny your friends a ride to a funeral? We waded across the grass to the enormous crowd of umbrellas. It’s sort of unfair, I think, that the heavens would cooperate in this great production of mourning. Jackie grabbed my arm. Her eyes were dripping big black tears. Jackie’s only association with the dearly departed was once in 7th grade, when in a scandalous game of spin the bottle, Stephi (God rest her soul) kissed Jackie’s heartthrob boyfriend generating some of the juiciest gossip for weeks. It is not surprising that Jackie is so torn over the death of her former foe; she’s one of those people that easily gives in to the emotions of others.
My troop trudged through the thick mud. We stood next to Jackie’s mother (who could have driven Jackie after all) and her neighbor, Mr. Rob. Mrs. Rob wasn’t there, she was sleeping with Jackie’s dad, who wasn’t there because “he had to work.” Stephi’s boyfriend stood next to the coffin with her family. He had on a bright pink shirt with one of those stupid name brand animals on it, and sunglasses. A pink shirt at a funeral, for christsake. He held his arm around Stephi’s mother while her grandmother patted his back in admiration. They didn’t know that Michael snuck in Stephi’s window at night, that he would hate her if she hadn’t been beautiful, that once he made her smoke a cigarette in a liquor store so she’d look of age and his fake wouldn’t be questioned. Maybe it’s a good thing they didn’t know. I wish I didn’t know.
It seemed odd, as I stood there shivering, that there were so many people present. The crowd sighed and sobbed in rhythm. The woman she hit was 72 and sprightly, on her way back from a game of BINGO at the senior center. Her funeral (it’s a shame neither I nor anyone can remember her name) was small because I guess at 72 it’s less of a surprise for her to have died, whereas a 20-year-old’s death is a tragedy. Shouldn’t some noble soul point out the cocaine on Stephi’s dashboard? Shouldn’t some guilt ridden friend point out that she had it coming? But I’m being sadistic again. Still, if it was up to me I would have stopped that whole damn parade of a funeral and tossed her in the ground without as much as a murmur and forced the masses to that other graveside, of the woman that deserved some celebrating. It wasn’t up to me.
The preacher droned on. He knew Stephi well, she went to church every Sunday and Wednesday and chili cookout and vesper supper. She was an “angel among men” said the old man. I almost laughed but that was the logical me coming out again. Everyone else was stifling their common sense, the same was to be expected of me. I dug my toes into the mud and tried to drown out his ignorance with the rain noises. I thought about Stephi. She slept in History class and drove a brand new Pontiac. She never really did anything to me directly, but the image I cannot let go of is of her at our graduation. She had to stand between a couple of grimy kids as alphabetical fate sometimes falls. One was a guy named Smit, a learning disabled student that was getting some sort of work diploma. He was smiling and jumping around, and his mom was taking pictures. Out of pure elation he grabbed the necks of the two people next to him in line-Stephi and some girl named Holly. Holly smiled and posed, but Stephi jerked the guy’s arm away and screamed. I remember thinking you couldn’t get much lower than not humoring a kid like that. Yes, you’re right. An angel among men.
I looked up to the people singing. It was nice, I must admit, that rain and the singing blending together. I wanted to join in the beauty but my mouth stood resolute in its disgust with the ceremony. The singing was over and the casket still sat on top of the earth as everyone trickled away. Jackie tugged my arm. “Don’t you wanna watch it go down,” I asked her. She looked at me like I was crazy. What are funerals for? So I walked away with her, but I stood outside the car in the pouring rain with my hand on the car door, watching Stephanie Delisle being lowered six feet under, not low enough if you ask me. But nobody asked me.
also, i am gonna delete pretty much everyone's journals from my friends page and make this mostly friends only so i don't feel like i'm advertising my feelings. if you want to read it still just lemme know
only connect! that was the whole of her sermon. only connect the prose and the passion, and both will be exalted, and human love will be seen at its height. live in fragments no longer. only connect, and the beast and the monk, robbed of the isolation that is life to either, will die. -e.m. forster