Dan of the Dead

by Wendy Meadows

  “Had I known…” said Elliot, raising his arms in anticipation of another attack against his person.

  “No, I’m serious, Elliot. It was nice of you.”

  “So we’re all here,” squeaked Cat. She clasped her hands together in delight.

  “Well, not all of us,” said Maybe, to which Cat blanched.

  “Oh, I didn’t think about Stuart. That’s not what I meant.” She looked panicked, as if she’d made some terrible faux-pas.

  “Always so nervy, Cat,” said Helena, laying a calming hand on her shoulder. “I think she meant the ever-dependable Dan McCoy.”

  Hoping that the mere mention of his name would summon him, Cassy looked around. There were no last-minute arrivals, no cars finding a place to park. The rest of the people, presumably all relatives of the Wellingtons, had all gone inside.

  “Time to be serious, guys. I think it’s time we said goodbye to Stuart.”

  And with that, they all entered the Oak Hill Church, with Maybe hobbling along behind on bare feet.

  Chapter Six

  The church was small, but more than big enough for the smattering of folks who had shown up. It was a curious old place with exposed solid oak beams that looked like they could weather a storm of biblical proportions. They crossed the high vaulted ceiling in a manner that reminded Cassy of two strong hands coming together, perhaps as if to pray. Oak Hill was not a popular church within Havenholm. There were at least two more and both considerably bigger. This little place was an outlier and an odd choice for the funeral of one of the town’s more well-known, if not exactly illustrious, sons.

  They were shown to their seats by a tall man in a suit who didn’t seem like he was part of the church, but hired by the family. He had the air of being a security guard, if anything. Just what were they expecting at this funeral? thought Cassy.

  The pews were thankfully lushly cushioned. Cassy hadn’t been to church in a long time, but when she had, it was memories of a sore derriere that she’d taken with her. She wasn’t sure if she could have lasted the entire ceremony with the least bit of comfort.

  All these thoughts, she realized, were a distraction; anything to stop her from thinking about the real reason they were there. One of their oldest friends was dead, and as much as Stuart wouldn’t have wanted them to be sad, it was nonetheless a solemn occasion. It was odd to think that Stuart was lying just a few feet away at the end of the aisle in an ornate casket.

  “Can we pay our respects?” asked Cassy to the security guy as he walked past her. The ceremony itself hadn’t yet started and she’d noticed a few people had already gone to look at the body at rest. One white-haired old lady had put on quite the show, bending over the open casket and weeping loudly. She’d had to be taken away by another relative. The guard (the term had stuck in Cassy’s head, even though he clearly wasn’t) replied in a disarmingly soft voice.

  “I believe the family wishes for everyone to view the deceased before the ceremony starts, after which we will respectfully close the casket.” He bowed unnecessarily and Cassy saw that it was his way of ushering her out into the main aisle.

  Helena gripped Cassy’s wrist as she stood up. “Where are you going?”

  “Don’t you want to see him?”

  Having got wind that it was okay to have a look, the rest of the group, those one-time childhood friends, all shuffled out from their seats and followed behind Cassy as she approached where Stuart was. The sensation of being watched was overwhelming as Cassy passed along the family. Not one face was familiar to her, though she suspected that there was an extended element to the Wellington family. Two faces she had been expecting to see, and who were very conspicuous by their absence, were Stuart’s parents.

  Mary and John Wellington had been imposing, though rarely seen, figures in Cassy’s childhood. Whenever she’d been to the Wellington’s large house on the other side of the lake, the two of them had been like figures in the background, operators behind the scenes. John, always identifiable by the sweet cigar smoke that clung to him and heralded his arrival, would often be writing in his office, subject to self-imposed exile. As for Stuart’s mother, she had a similar air of foreboding aloofness about her, but would always be circling around her son, and anyone he should choose to invite to their house. The constant scrutiny and implied judgment had always put Cassy off from going to the large house at the edge of the woods. She was almost grateful that they weren’t there on that day. Then the sobering thought came to her that they might have passed away. Somehow it didn’t seem possible; they’d both seemed so permanent in her mind. Surely they would have outlived their son.

  Their son, who Cassy now saw for the first time in over two years, save for a brief chance encounter at Nottingham station that lasted less than a minute. He looked just like he had on that day, though the rosy color in his cheeks was done by a skilled mortician and not the winter air. Cassy came to the edge of the casket. It was predictably expensive looking, and lined with pure white silk. It appeared to be more comfortable than any piece of furniture she had at home. The thought made her chuckle, a noise she had to stifle with the back of her hand. Furtively, she looked around, but didn’t think she’d upset anyone.

  “What’s so funny?” said Helena, just behind her.

  “It’s odd, isn’t it?” said Cassy, looking down at Stuart. “He’s there and yet he’s not.”

  Stuart was—or had been; it was so hard to think about these things correctly—a handsome guy, with his longish blond hair and pale blue eyes. The years had been kind to him, except of course for the obvious.

  “I can’t even look,” Cat piped up somewhere behind Helena.

  There was an intense calmness to Stuart’s face that put Cassy off while looking at him. It was not the Stuart she knew, who along with the other two guys, Elliot and Dan, had been a rambunctious and wild trio. “I can’t,” she managed to say and pulled away. Cat walked back to her seat, keen to get away from the casket itself. One by one, the old Havenholm gang paid their respects and reclaimed their seats before the ceremony began.

  Chapter Seven

  “Those that knew Stuart remember him as a cheerful, playful soul, but strong willed, too; not afraid to rise up to any challenge. For many, he was an example of how to strike out on your own and make the most of life, to truly live it. And live it, he did.” The priest cleared his throat in what seemed like a rehearsed manner. He looked over the assembled mourners as if to check that he had their undivided attention.

  “Who writes this stuff?” whispered Helena into Cassy’s ear.

  “I know, right? Stuart was a bum.” Perhaps she was being unfair and Cassy wished she hadn’t said that about Stuart. She hadn’t kept up with him for some time and maybe he really had changed. While they had all been friends, Stuart was considered more of a playboy than anything else, living off his parents’ wealth.

  The priest shuffled his notes and started up again in his pompous and over-articulated manner. “Havenholm was always close to Stuart’s heart…”

  “Literally hasn’t been here in fifteen years,” came Helena’s hushed voice once more.

  “…It’s here that he grew into the man so many of us remember with fondness. It’s only fitting then that this is where he should finally return…”

  “Death’s the only way you’d get me to stay here, too.”

  “Helena, stop it.”

  “A place with so many memories of the living and the deceased; cherished and forever in our hearts. It is in times like this that we are grateful for those that still stand by our side and are grateful for the time spent with those that are no longer with us, blessed in the knowledge that one day we will be reunited…”

  “Cliché much? Seriously, this guy needs to hire a writer. I have a friend who—”

  “Will you be quiet? You’re going to make me laugh.”

  The priest continued for what seemed like an eternity, pontificating needlessly and talking about Stuart in a vague way just generi
c enough that what he said could be applied to anyone. It reminded Cassy of palm readers, or spiritualists and other types that gave her profession a bad name.

  The man in black and white stepped down from the lectern, abandoning his notes to address the congregation.

  “Here we go; the big finale. Our boy’s going off script!”

  “Helena, I’m serious.”

  From across the aisle, Cassy noticed she was getting the evil eye from a white-haired old dame, some aunt or other.

  “Great, now I look bad.” On the other side of the aisle, where most of the family sat (the friends had all been grouped together with a smattering of unrecognized faces), Cassy was surprised to see a few people in fits of tears. Older people mostly, though a woman of roughly her age dabbed at her cheeks with a handkerchief. Most prominent of all was a surly looking man, balding, with thick glasses, whose creased face shook with each laborious sob.

  Had Stuart been so treasured to illicit this kind of emotional outpouring? Suddenly, Cassy felt guilty for not being wracked with inconsolable grief. She’d been close friends with Stuart at one point in her life, had even loved him in that teenage way, but she felt oddly detached at that moment. She looked to the others who sat close by to reassure herself. Predictably, only Cat was anywhere close to tears, but she seemed to be that way most of the time. Elliot was uncharacteristically stoic, a sign that perhaps this was affecting him most of all. On the other hand, Maybe seemed relaxed, but that was Maybe, taking everything life threw at her in stride.

  “I need a cigarette,” said Helena, without whispering now.

  “Just wait. Have a little respect.” It had started out amusing, Hell’s little asides, but it was getting to be a little too much now. Cassy looked to her sister, ready to reprimand her more severely should it be needed and noticed instead the strained look on her face. Of all the people in the room, braying uncles aside, the service had taken its toll on Helena most of all. “Just a little longer,” she said, trying her best to comfort her older sibling.

  “I’ve been asked to read a message from Stuart himself,” said the priest, indicating that he was coming to some kind of a conclusion. He produced glasses from somewhere (Did vestments have pockets? wondered Cassy) and looked at the words before him.

  “We all deserve love; as hard as it may be for some to give that love, and for others to receive it, it is our duty to do so unconditionally. This much I have learned over the years and always sought to live by that rule. I wish to make it clear that I love all of you equally. In my eyes no one is more deserving than another. We shall all be judged equally, I can only hope the same for myself.”

  There was an uncomfortably long silence where it seemed like the priest was going to continue, but when he said no more, there came a tentative clap from somewhere in the back on the family side. It halted suddenly when no one else joined in. The priest looked up from his paper and Cassy could have sworn he was about to bow. Instead, he did start talking again to an audible collective sigh but was cut off sharply when the large wooden door at the back of the room was swung open and in stumbled a man who clutched the doorframe as if his life depended on it.

  “So sorry,” he blustered drunkenly. A small flask slipped from his hand and clattered on the floor loudly. Painfully teetering on his heels, the man stooped to pick it up, then hid it in his jacket pocket. Almost immediately it fell out again and once more clattered to the floor. All eyes were on him now—this shamble of a man treading steadily across the floor as if traversing a rickety bridge.

  Helena stood and unleashed a few choice words that made Cassy bristle with their blasphemous connotations. Not that she was overly prudish, or even a church-goer, but still it seemed out of place at a funeral.

  “Dan McCoy you insensitive—” Helena fumed, “Just what do you think you are doing?”

  It was Dan, all right. Sigh. Always late, always making an entrance. Cassy hadn’t recognized him immediately; his beard was scruffy, his hair unkempt. There was also the small detail that he was horribly drunk in a way she’d never seen him before.

  “Like I said, so very sorry.” Dan seemed to regain control of his body and marched forward. He acknowledged his old friends with a nod as he passed them, continuing straight to the casket. A small, thin man who sat on the front row tried to stop Dan’s progress, but there was no halting a man this inebriated and determined. With a solid strike of his forearm, Dan pushed past and staggered the rest of the way before doubling over at the edge of the raised coffin.

  Worried that Dan might do something even more disrespectful, Cassy got up to help him back outside, but was held back with a light touch from Helena.

  “Let him get it out of his system,” she said, wisely. Cassy sat back down, frozen, as was everyone. Dan peered into the casket for the longest time. He seemed to be saying something and Cassy craned forward to hear.

  “He’s gone,” said Dan, his words blending. “I’m too late, he’s gone. He’s gone.”

  Dan rocked back on his heels then stood erect. Though not suddenly sober, a mournful calm had come over him. The priest who had been as entranced by the spectacle as everyone else, went to Dan’s side and helped him walk away. With a roll of his shoulders, Dan dismissed any help, but the fight was gone from him. Quietly, he turned away and walked back down the aisle and left the way he had entered only moments before.

  “How about that cigarette, Hell?”

  “Now you’re talking.”

  Chapter Eight

  It wasn’t cold. The sun was as high as it was going to get and cast a clear light on the eastern-facing wall of the church. Even so, Helena fumbled a cigarette from the pack and held a trembling flame to the tip.

  “What was that fool doing anyway?” she hissed, smoke curling from between her lips. She offered the pack to Cassy who refused it wordlessly. “I mean, he’s drunk as anything; has no respect for anyone—living or dead.”

  “We all have our ways of coping,” offered Cassy.

  “That, sis, was not coping.” Helena jabbed her cigarette over to where Elliot sat on the low wall, one arm around Dan’s shoulders. Whether this was to comfort him or to prevent him from toppling over was unclear.

  “They were good friends,” said Cassy.

  “We were all friends with him, Cassandra. Dan, no more than any of us. It doesn’t give him the right to show up to a funeral more drunk than I’ve even been in my life.”

  That last part wasn’t exactly honest, but Cassy let it slide. In their wilder years it had fallen to the younger sister to walk Helena back home to avoid a calamity, and once there, limit the mess before Mother found out.

  “Well, it was going on a bit long, wasn’t it?” said Cassy, concerned that Helena was taking the whole thing to heart as if it was a personal attack on her. The spent cigarette pirouetted to the ground and was crushed under Helena’s heel.

  “It wrapped things up swiftly, didn’t it?” The sisters laughed and with it, came release. “Can you believe the state of him though? He must have started early.”

  Elliot had left Dan who was now laying on his side and was making his way over to the sisters. He looked concerned and apologetic, but calm.

  “Is he going to be all right?” asked Cassy.

  “Until he sobers up, he’ll be just fine. Then he’s going to pay in a big way, and to be honest he deserves the mother of all hangovers for what he just pulled. I’m going to take him inside to sleep it off. Apparently there’s a room at the back we can use. Father whatever-his-name-is was kind enough to let us use it.”

  Helena already had another cigarette between her lips, though it was still unlit. It became a waving distraction as she talked.

  “I wish I had such a low view of myself that I could get that drunk. I think I need a shot or two,” said Helena. Cassy believed her. Stuart’s death had got to her more than Helena was letting on.

  “Well he’s in no fit state for the wake so I’ll stay with him,” said Elliot, looking over his s
houlder to see if Dan was okay. The drunk had slid off the wall but was otherwise doing great. “I’ll catch up with you guys later if you’re okay to give Maybe a lift.”

  Cassy assured Elliot that it would be just fine and watched as he returned to Dan. Together the two of them made a slow, stumbling, and not at all elegant march back into the church. Most of the other attendees had already filtered their way out, the ceremony having been somewhat spoiled for them. The little old lady with the white hair had apparently cried the last of her tears, as she appeared to be joking with a group of similarly-aged people Cassy didn’t recognize.

  The other big bawler, the balding older man, was making his way towards the sisters. Cassy watched his slow gait as Helena lit her cigarette.

  “I think Stuart would have appreciated it,” she said, referring to Dan’s upsetting arrival. The balding man was definitely heading their way and Cassy didn’t know what she was going to say to him. “Stu was always a bit of a hell-raiser himself. Do you remember that time we all snuck into his neighbor’s house because they had an indoor pool? It was like in the middle of the night and we all went in through an unlocked door. You know what it’s like on the other side of the lake; all those big expensive houses. They think they’re so isolated and untouchable that they just leave their doors open. Or at least they used to. We had to creep through the house to get to it. I should have been scared as hell, but you know…kids.”

  With his hands thrust into his pockets to keep against the chill of the morning air, the man picked up his pace.

  “I wasn’t there. Too young.” Cassy remembered the incident in great detail despite not being present. Helena hadn’t been able to keep the secret and had spilled the beans as soon as she got back the following morning, her hair still wet, and the smell of chlorine on her clothes. She remembered being scandalized at the thought of her sister stripping to her underwear in front of the boys. It was an unthinkable embarrassment for Cassy at the time.