My mother's funeral

We had been planning my mother's funeral since forever, it seemed, and so we were all excited when it finally arrived. And so we were all very upset with her when she was still alive the day of.

"How are you feeling, Ma?" Julie asked, nervously looking at her watch. It was already 9:27 and the service (small, dignified, open-casket) was scheduled for 10:00.

"I'm just fine," said ol' Mom, sipping a cup of coffee and nibbling on a pastry--part of a spread bought for the reception, after her own funeral, no less! The thoughtlessness! The disregard!

She was perfectly healthy--no major illnesses, no minor illnesses, not so much as a headache or a sniffle. At worst, she was a bit confused to see us all in the house wearing black on a Tuesday morning when we should have been at work, some of us in different states. It was irrelevant by now anyway--the plan had been blown long before. Even if she had dropped dead on the spot, we never would have been able to cart her to the funeral home and dump her in the casket in time. What, with all the bureaucratic hoops you have to jump through when someone dies. It's almost not worth dying at all, to spare your loved ones all that goddamned hassle.

"You look tired, Ma," said David, who had not yet entirely given up hope. "Why don't you get in the car and fall asleep."

"Oh, but I'm not tired," said Mom, "and why would I want to sleep in the car?"

"We rented that nice black limousine out front for you, so you'd have plenty of room to stretch out." David pointed outside, where the driver was leaning up against the limo's door and smoking, staring out at nothing.

"I'm fine, thank you though," said Mom, 59, fit as a fiddle. "I'm just so glad to see you all here."

Jennifer slammed her fist on the kitchen counter in disgust. Mom jumped.

"Why don't you all just leave her alone," yelled Steven, who for years had been the black sheep of the family.

"No, it's fine, Steven, thank you though."

"Look, Mom," I said, having decided we had been dancing around the maypole long enough. "We've got big plans today, so are you croaking anytime soon or what?"

"Heavens no," she said, grabbing her chest. "Is that what this is about?" We all walked out, muttering.

We reconvened on the front porch. Jeff was carting the spread out of the kitchen.

"What do we do?" someone asked.

"Grampa Hamilton" (Mom's dad) "is hanging on by a thread," I offered hopefully. The old man was in a home, slowly wasting away and losing his mind. "Maybe we could at least drop by and see how he's doing."

"There's no time!" cried Michael. "Besides, this was a funeral for Mom, not Grampa Hamilton."

"It can be adapted; most any funeral will do," said Jill. "But not Grampa Hamilton. He's a veteran; we'd have to go through all that..."

"Oh yeah," we all said, and the idea was discarded.

"Why don't you just kill Mom?" Steven said, quite out of nowhere. He wasn't even wearing a suit, but tight, grimy black jeans and a skintight black sweatshirt. "I mean, that's what you're all thinking anyway, isn't it? You people are sick!"

Mom was looking out at us through the screen, so we closed the front door.

"We need a funeral NOW," said Richard, who had an important meeting scheduled that afternoon, after making a quick appearance at the reception. I was chewing on a block of cheese and swallowed prematurely and it got stuck in my throat. I started coughing and coughing and they all started staring at me and I kept coughing and coughing until I couldn't get enough air to even cough and they just keep staring, like they were waiting for me to finish or something.

I reached down into my throat and pulled out the cheese. I had gnawed the corners off and the cheese had sort of glommed together and I held it there, like a little rubber ball in the palm of my hand.