Tag: Short Story

Chapter 3 – Part 1
Robbie: The Funeral (Before the Tea)

Robbie sat on the floor in the lobby of the church with his back against the wall. He finally been able to convince his dad that to give him some space so he could finish editing the eulogy he was going to read at the funeral. It was an hour and half before it would start and no one was there yet, except for his family and the church custodian.

Robbie was dressed in his suit, but he didn’t care about getting it dirty. He was focused on the same thing he’d been writing for the past two weeks. He had the eulogy out and kept scratching out words that he’d written only to rewrite the same thing moments later. No matter how hard he tried he just couldn’t get it right.

He felt, rather than saw, Jesse sit down next to him. She reached over and grabbed the pen from his hand.

“It’s going to be great. Stop worrying.”

He turned to look at her. “I just don’t want to disappoint Mom.”

“You won’t. Are you kidding me?” Jesse laughed. “She was so proud of you. You were her favourite!”

“No, I wasn’t,” he said, his eyes got huge. “She loved all of us.”

She raised her eyebrow at him. “I know she loved me, and I’m not mad or jealous or anything, but you were definitely her favourite.”

He could feel sobs bubbling up his throat, burning. His eyes stung with tears that he tried desperately to bite back. She wrapped her arms around him and hugged him.

“I miss her,” he whispered.

“Me too.”

They sat for a bit as Robbie read and reread the eulogy when Jesse suddenly broke the silence: “What’s Dad doing?”

She pointed at their dad pacing back and forth in front of the glass front doors. Suddenly, he dropped to the ground in his suit and did a couple of push-ups. Then, he’d jump back up, do a couple of bounces on the balls of his feet before he started pacing again.

“I have no idea. He came to my house first thing in the morning acting weird. He insisted on taking me out for breakfast and wouldn’t leave my side. At one point, he tried to escort me to the bathroom.”

‘What?” Jesse said, giggling.

“Oh sure, you laugh ’cause it’s not happening to you. I hate that Dad thinks I’m weak.”

“He doesn’t think you’re weak.” Jesse insisted.

“Why else is he hovering over me? He doesn’t think I can handle today,” he frowned. “You know, I’m stronger than people think.”

“I know. And so does Dad,” Jesse said. After a pause, she added, “Okay, seriously, what is he doing?”

Robbie looked up and burst out laughing. Their dad was facing the glass door and exaggeratedly frowning and glaring, all the while talking to himself clearly arguing with his reflection.

“There you are!” Alison said, striding towards them from the sanctuary doors, her heels clicking on the hardwood floor of the lobby. She glared at Jesse as she walked. Robbie sighed. This had always been how Ally handled stress. She got as busy as she could so she didn’t have to feel how much pain she was in.

“I better go,” Jesse whispered as she patted his arm and then stood up. “You’ll be great.”

“I can help too,” Robbie said, starting to get up.

“No,” Alison said, “You work on the eulogy. Make it perfect.” she said, smiling at him. “C’mon Jesse.”  Then she turned on her heel and walked back into the sanctuary.

“Geez, no pressure or anything.” Jesse rolled her eyes at him. “Seriously, it’ll be great.”

He started reading over his paper again, as she walked away.

Chapter 2 – Part 2
Jesse: At the Funeral Tea

Jesse started to walk through the house looking for Robbie. When she didn’t find him inside, she slipped out to the backyard and started walking around the house. It was a warm day out and people were sitting on the back patio in lawn chairs. She didn’t see him sitting among any of them. When she got to the front yard, she saw her dad sitting by himself on the front step.

“Hey stranger,” she said, sitting down next to him. She wasn’t too surprised to see him out here. He often retreated from big social events partway through to get a breather. “How are you doing?”

“Oh, you know,” he said, giving her a half smile. “I’ve been better.” They raised their eyebrows at each other and said together: “But I’ve also been worse.” She smiled.

“Except, you know,” he voice choked up. “This time, I’m not sure I have.” He said, whispering the last part.

She wrapped her arms around him and rested her head on his shoulder. “I miss her too Dad.” She said.

They sat in silence for awhile when suddenly he abruptly stood up and thundered down the steps to the grass.  At first, she had no idea what had provoked this sudden change in mood.

Then she saw a man saunter down the street towards them with an odd hobble to his gait. “Who is that?” she asked. But her dad was already halfway across the front lawn and didn’t appear to hear her.

“No. You are not welcome here.” Her dad announced, waving his hands at the man. The man didn’t seem deterred by her dad at all and kept walking towards them. She had never seen her father upset like this. Usually it was her or her mom that lost their tempers.

“I told you at the funeral, you are not to be here,” her dad said. The man was now standing in front of her father.

“He’s my son. I have a right to see him,” the man said. He tried to walk around her dad, but her dad grabbed the man’s arm and pulled him back.

“I’m not going to tell you again. Go home.” Her father said.

The man jerked his arm away and once again tried to walk past him. Suddenly, her father swung his arm around and punched the man in the side of the jaw. The man grasped his jaw while her dad immediately grabbed his fist and crouched into a ball cupping his hand to his chest. He glared up at the man. “Not today.”

The man, still grasping his jaw, stared down at her father, hesitating. Finally, he seemed to make up his mind and turned away from her dad and started to walk away.

Jesse ran to her father. “What was all that about?” she asked, putting her hand on his shoulder.

“Don’t worry about it,” he said, walking back to the porch, grasping his hand.

“You’re bleeding!” she said, when she saw drops of blood running from his knuckles. “Wait here.” She quickly raced back into the house and, carefully avoiding Alison, grabbed the first aid kit from the bathroom. When she got back she found him on the porch around the side of the house. The porch wrapped around the side and her parents had set up a porch swing. Her dad was sitting in the swing, rocking slowly back and forth. She sat down beside him and began to clean up the gash on the his hand. “Are you going to tell me what that was all about?”

“Nope,” he said.

“Who was that man?” she asked.

“No one.”

“Clearly.”

She worked in silence cleaning and disinfecting his hand. He was just about to stick a bandage over it when he stopped her. “Don’t tell Robbie,” he said. She looked at him to see a worried expression creasing his face.

Confused, she nodded anyway. “My lips are sealed,” she said, as she placed the bandage on his hand.

Chapter 2 – Part 1
Jesse: At the Funeral Tea

Jesse drove up to her parents’ house. Cars packed the driveway and lined both side of the street. She slowly drove by the house looking for a place to park. There were people in dresses, heels, and suits walking down the street towards the house.

“Alison is going to kill us,” Jesse muttered as she scanned the sides of the road for a space. “I can’t believe you made us late.”

“Who cares.” Robbie sat hunched in the passenger seat staring out the window. “You’re late for everything anyway.”

“K, seriously, what’s gotten into you today?” she asked. Robbie just scowled and continued staring out the window.

“Finally!” She quickly pulled into a neighbour’s driveway to turn around and parked in the space in front of their house. When they got out she saw her bumper was slightly creeping over their driveway. “Close enough,” she muttered to herself.

Robbie was already moping his way back to their parents’ house. She quickly caught up to him. “You okay?” she bumped her shoulder against his.

“Great.”

She gave him a concerned look but didn’t say anything. They walked in silence until they reached the front door. She barely made it in the door when Alison caught sight of them. Jesse cringed as Alison stormed towards them.

“Finally! Do you see all these people here already? You left—”

“Give it a rest already,” Robbie snarled at her then slipped away into the kitchen.

Alison’s jaw dropped as she stared after him. “What was that?”

Jesse just shrugged her shoulders glad that Alison had already stopped yelling. “What can I help with?” she asked, eager to keep her calm.

“Make sure all of the hor d’oeuvres and sandwich platters are full. I think the tables are already half empty. There’s more food in the kitchen.” She bustled off with a T-towel slung on her shoulder and an apron around her waist.

Jesse washed her hands, moved to the table set up in the dinning room, and saw that Alison was right. Half the plates were empty and filled with crumbs. They had clearly been picked over. She grabbed a couple of trays and was on her way back into the kitchen when Aunt Millie stopped her with a hand to her shoulder.

She was in her nineties, slightly hunched over, with three shawls draped over her shoulders. She had a long necklace of pearls that hung down, the end swimming her tea. She didn’t seem to notice as she walked towards Jesse.

“Oh dear!” her eyes immediately brimmed with tears. Jesse set the plates down and wrapped her arms around Millie. Soon they were lost in stories about her mom when she was a kid.

“I remember the first time I met your mom. I was over visiting your Grandpa. You mom must have been about five or six. Her and Martin became fast friends.”

“Who was Martin?” Jesse asked.

Millie’s eyes opened wide for a second. “Oh dear, eh, I meant Joe of course. This old memory of mine gets fuzzy sometime. Anyway, they were running around the backyard in their bathing suits running through the sprinkler. Every time she ran through she burst out into giggles. They were attached at the hip for years, those two.” Millie wiped a tear away with her finger.

This is why she wanted to have the tea here. She wanted to hear all of the stories about her mom. She wanted to relive them and learn all of the stories she didn’t know yet. She wanted to remember and savor each memory so she wouldn’t forget the incredible woman her mother was.

She spent the next hour going from guest to guest, hugging them, crying with them, and laughing at stories. Every so often Alison would grab her by the elbow and drag her off to the kitchen or to clean/refill something. She had every intention of helping, but inevitably, she would get distracted by someone. After an hour of this Alison was clearly losing her temper.

“This was your idea!” Alison hissed at her after she dragged her once again into the kitchen.

“Exactly! I wanted to do this so we could actually talk to people and enjoy it. Not to lock ourselves in the kitchen,” she said, feeling exasperated.

“The food trays aren’t going to refill themselves.” Alison’s French braid was coming undone and fly-aways were wisping around her head. “And where’s Robbie?”

Come to think of it, she hadn’t seen him since she got here. “I’m not sure. Something’s up with him. Like, more than just Mom’s funeral.”

“Well, he hasn’t helped at all,” She huffed, before spinning on her heel and walking away.

Chapter 1 – Part 2
Alison: After the Funeral Tea

Alison walked back inside, leaving her Dad on the porch. When she got there, she saw Jesse was already cleaning. She got to work and the two silently cleared away the dishes and wiped up the spills. It took nearly an hour and she was completely drained by the time it was done. Overall, it had been an exhausting day.

Jesse hugged her before she left. At some point while they were cleaning, their dad had slipped upstairs and gone to bed. She had a key and was just going to lock the door on her way out when she heard music softly playing. She had to listen carefully because she could barely hear it. Following the sound, she realized it was coming from the basement.

When she opened the door that led down the stairs, soft notes of Simon and Garfunkel’s “Sound of Silence” met her ears. She followed the music down the stairs and found her brother sitting cross-legged on the floor surrounded by photo albums.

“You okay?” she asked.

“We never really knew her,” he said. He flipped the album page and pointed at a picture of them. They were at the beach. Alison remembered that day. They’d spent the day playing in the water on a deserted little bit of beach out in the middle of no where that their mom had discovered. After that it became their beach. It was a little out of the way, so they only went there about once or twice a year, but it was always the best day of the year.

Alison smiled looking at the photo until Robbie slammed the album shut. She looked at him in surprise and saw he was glaring. “Lies. All of it.”

Behind her she heard the creaking of the stairs. She turned around to see her dad standing in his bathrobe. His expression was more sad than she’d seen all day.

“Robbie, come upstairs. I think it’s time we had a talk.” Robbie glared back and didn’t say anything. They stared each other down with Alison looking between them stunned. Robbie was usually the easy-going one in the family. She couldn’t make sense of what was happening. “I understand you’re mad, and you have every right to be. But at least hear what I have to say. I’m guessing you have some questions.”

Robbie sighed and got up, leaving the albums in a heap on the floor and stomped up the stairs after his dad. Alison slowly slid the albums back onto the shelf. By the time she got upstairs they’d shut themselves in her dad’s office. She could hear voices behind the door, but couldn’t hear what they were saying. She decided to leave them to their talk. Jesse had been right; something had happened today and she had completely missed it. She walked out the door, curiosity and guilt warring to consume her.

Chapter 1 – Part I
Alison: After the Funeral Tea

Alison walked through the living room picking up half full cups of tea and coffee and carried them to the kitchen. Dishes clattered together in the sink. Crumbs covered every available surface mingling with brown droplets and rings. Normally she’d be muttering about coasters and the inconsiderateness of guests, but today she just brushed it onto the carpet without a second thought.

It wasn’t the guests that bothered her right now. She stomped into the dinning room and started to rearrange the picked-over platters to that she could stack them together more easily. She managed to pick up seven platters, all stacked precariously together and started walking towards the kitchen when her toe cracked against the leg of the dinning room table causing her to propel forward, the trays sliding from her grasp. Everything crashed to the floor, food spilling everywhere.

That’s when she snapped. Her grief over losing her mom, her frustration with her family for not helping more with the funeral preparations, and total lack of sleep all culminated together as a wave of fury washed over her. Leaving the food and broken platters on the floor, she stormed through the house looking for her sister Jesse.

She found her outside on the front lawn waving good-bye to the last guests as they pulled away from the house.

“What are you doing?” Alison asked, her heels clicking on the driveway as she stomped to where Jesse was standing.

Jesse whipped a tear off her cheek and clasped her hands at her heart. “Mrs. Sanders had the best stories about Mom. Did you k—”

“No, I didn’t know,” Alison said, cutting her off. “What I do know is that once again I’m doing all the work. I’ve set everything up. I made sure the guests were comfortable, and now I’m cleaning up by myself. And the tea was your idea!” She could feel tears threatening to overcome her, but she fought to keep them down. “And where’s Dad and Robbie? I’m doing this all on my own! Don’t you care about how Mom’s life was honoured?”

Jesse sighed. “Of course I do! The whole point of having the tea was to mourn with people and hear their stories about Mom. That’s why I wanted to do it the tea here. I didn’t want to spend it worrying about things that don’t matter.”

“Wh—”

Jesse held up her hand to stop her. “And second of all. While you’ve been so busy running around, you completely missed the fact that Dad got in a fight was some guy at the funeral.

Alison’s mouth opened.

“His fist was bleeding and everything. And Robbie! I’ve been trying to figure out what’s been going on with him. But of course, You probably didn’t notice any of that. You were too busy making sure the cucumber sandwiches were cut just right.” She pushed past Alison, leaving her standing, once again by herself, in the driveway.

It took some time for Alison to find her dad. When she did, she found him on the porch along the side of the house. And, of course, he had heard everything.

“Did something happen at the funeral?” Alison asked. The boards of the porch creaked under her feet as she walked to the railing and leaned against it to look at him. He was sitting in the porch swing slowing rocking back and forth. It was where her mom used to sit.

There was a long silence before he responded. “Someone from the past came back and I needed to make sure he stayed away.”

“That was cryptic,” she said, looking up at him from her place on the porch steps.

“Yup,”

“You’re not going to tell me who he was?”

“Nope.”

“Do you want me to take a look at your hand?”

“Jesse cleaned it up earlier. Thanks anyway.”

She started to walk away, but hesitated when she hit the grass. “Love you Dad.”

“Love you too, Pumpkin.”