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| The prayers and hymns went on at some length. Family came and went on the stage, some weeping, some devoid of emotion. The small children were too young to comprehend; the old were too familiar with death. It was only the middle-aged that seemed to care so fiercely about the prospect of final breaths and dreamless sleeps. As a weeping older brother led an aloof younger cousin off the stage, the priest started his soliloquy.
“Robert was a good son, a good friend, a good Christian. (Robert’s mother wasn’t listening. Her eyes were fixed on the coffin. The images fluttering behind her pale façade were more important to her than anything the priest could be saying.) His life was ended short before he had time to accomplish the many things a person of his academic and moral fiber could have accomplished. It is a tragedy. It is a devasty. (“Devasty?”) And it is a shame. (A stifled wailing blotched the somber crowd before it was repressed. The priest hung his head until the congregation was silent.) The only comfort we find from this young man’s death is that he now walks hand-in-hand with our Lord and savior Jesus Christ. Amen. (The amens reverberated through the room and echoed off the stained glass Virgin that watched over the congregation.) Robert’s life of piety and devotion to our Father in heaven, blessed be his name, has granted him an afterlife of joyous relief from the suffering in this world. He is free from sin and unburdened of hardship. He now knows the Lord and he is forgiven. (The Catholics’ faces lit up at this notion of redemption.)
“So what has Robert’s death taught us? He has taught us forgiveness. He reminds us that Jesus Christ, our Lord and savior, will forgive our sins if we repent. If we take the Holy Spirit into our loving arms, embrace it, believe in it, we too will be forgiven. (The amens reverberated once more.) And we too must remember to forgive. ‘Judge not, and ye shall not be judged; condemn not, and ye shall not be condemned; forgive, and ye shall be forgiven,’ Luke tells us. (Amen). ‘For if ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you: But if ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses,’ Matthew says. (Amen). Forgiveness: it is the teaching of Christ and it is the practice of a good Christian.
“His death has also taught us the evils inherent in the wayward path. If you look to drugs and alcohol to find redemption, you will find naught but a path to Hell. Robert would still be with us today if he had not been tempted, like so many of us have been, to take comfort in the pleasures of the flesh. He was a stray lamb and we were the shepherd. Instead of leading him to the flock, we let him wander into Satan’s valley where he met the wolf. (The preacher paused for the congregation to look at Jake who was still hunched over. He no longer convulsed in regret, but rather was silent, head down, eyes pressed to his palms.) And that wolf promised him a greener lea to graze in and sweeter milk to drink and Robert, without the guidance of his shepherd, was led astray. (Whispers ran through the crowd as heads shook. Most of the older congregation still looked at Jake drained lifeless in the shadows. The children followed their gaze and looked in wonderment at Jake as well.) Let us become better shepherds. Let us become the guiding light to those lost in secular darkness. Let us be the beacon of hope to lead the misguided back to a life of Christian morals. We can be saviors as well if only we uphold the doctrine of Christ, bask in his glory, and share his word with our brethren. Amen. (A stong amen pulsed in the crowd. Faces now focused on the priest; the people had forgotten Jake’s trespasses in the Devil’s land.) Let us bow our heads in silent prayer as we each ask Jesus Christ, our Lord, for forgiveness.”
The organ kicked in and the congregation looked to the floor. Jack was looking down as well, her eyes glassy from the preacher’s words.
“I need a cigarette,” I whispered to her. She didn’t hear. “Jack,” I said and nudged her.
“What?” she snapped back.
“Let me outta here. I need a smoke.” She pulled her legs to the side and I ducked out unseen as the congregation was lost in prayer.
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| We sat for the funeral. On the stage was a bloodied, thorned Jesus piece that hung soberly behind the priest. In front of the priest was the coffin, open for final inspections.
“Did you go up?” Jack asked me.
“Hell no. I’ll remember Robert as he was, not that thing in the box up there.”
“It’s like it’s not even him with all the make up. He looks like a Barbie doll.”
“That ain’t right," I said. The preacher was saying some hymn or psalm or something, I don’t really know the difference. The rest of the congregation pulled out their kneeling pads and sank to their knees. The old woman next to me tried to pull down our section’s pad, but my feet were in the way.
“Dave,” Jack nudged me and smiled pointing to the woman.
“Oh shit. I’m sorry,” I said to the woman. She looked at me sternly before kneeling and placing her praying hands on the pew in front of her. Jack got to her knees as well.
“Are you serious?” I whispered to her. Her eyes were closed in prayer.
“I’m Catholic,” she whispered back. I shook my head. Scanning the crowd I picked out the rest of the Jews: Robert’s mother, her family, Michael Steinberg, Yonah Goldblatz, Ben Walters (another half-breed like Robert). My eyes stopped on Jake Burns. He was sitting alone towards the corner of the room in the shadows. Above him were the second level pews with their southern-facing stained-glass windows. The pictures in the giant panes portrayed the Virgin Mary and the Immaculate Conception. There were opaque glass rings for the halos above the holy figures’ heads which the light shined through with such intensity that the few peoples’ faces in the pews on the second level were completely drowned out by the glare. I squinted and looked back down to Jake. He held his head in his hands. He was shuddering. He was crying.
The preacher went on, the peoples’ heads still bowed in prayer. I looked to Robert’s mother. She was sitting closer to me out of the glare from the windows. I could make out her bloodshot eyes. They were dry. All of her tears had been shed in the past week. There just wasn’t anything left. She turned her head toward Jake and a black lace veil replaced her gray visage. Jake was still shuddering, guilt-ridden, shrouded under the shadow of the Virgin Mary. The image held until the preacher finished the psalm or prayer or whatever it was and the people all raised their heads. Robert’s mother returned her empty gaze to the coffin on the stage.
“I’m surprised so many people showed up for this,” Jack whispered to me as she scooted back into the pew. There were a lot of people. It was SRO as if Bill Irwin and Nathan Lane were about to come out as Vladimir and Estragon. The thought was morbidly amusing.
“I know,” I said.
“He was such a bastard,” Jack said.
“I know,” I said. “I know.” Jake was still shuddering.
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| “Oh, my, God!” It was Rachel Bern. We hadn’t spoken for a while. She gave me a hug. “How are you? I haven’t seen you since middle school.” This was false of course. We went to high school together and saw each other in the hallways on an hourly basis. In middle school I used to go to her house everyday after school. We would sit outside in her lawn eating Combos or Doritos or whatever other little snack bags her mother had bought at Costco that week. Then she had moved to the north side of town and turned lioness: her pride became her.
“I’m fine. How are you?”
“I’m great! I miss you guys.” She gave Jack a hug as well. Jack looked at me over Rachel’s shoulder as they embraced and gave me a “seriously?” look. She had had a similar experience with Rachel that I had. Rachel continued joyfully. “What are you up to? Are you still in school?”
I let Jack do the talking. “Yeah, just finishing up. Finals are next week.” Rachel turned to me.
“And what about you, Dave? What are you doing?”
“Just home for this funeral.”
“I mean what’s your major?”
“English.”
“I always thought you would do English. You’re so smart!” This was utter bullshit. Lies flowed from her mouth like a dung Trevi. “Well it was nice seeing you guys. Give me a call tonight. I think I’m going to go out with Sandra and Pea.”
“Pea?” Jack asked. I was similarly confused.
“Penelope. You know.” Jack and I shrugged in ignorance. “Penelope Esperanto? She was a grade ahead of us. Drove that cute Mercedes.” We shook our heads. “Oh well. Give me a call if you want to meet up. I’d love to chat.” And then she left.
“What the fuck was that?” Jack asked. Her eyes followed Rachel who bobbled through the crowd awkwardly.
“I have no idea. You want to give her a call tonight?” I laughed. Jack looked at me with a half-furrowed brow. “That’s what I thought.”
“You see Mrs. Cohen yet?”
“Not yet.”
“I’m kind of nervous. I don’t know what to say.”
“I know,” I agreed. “What do you say to a mother that has just lost her son?”
Jack shook her head in regret. “It’s all fucked up isn’t it?”
“Yep.”
“I guess an ‘I’m so sorry’ is the best we can do.”
“That’s such a cop out.”
“Yeah, but what else are you going to do?”
“My dad wanted me to bring her a fruit basket.”
Jack chuckled, her eyes still following Rachel who was bubbling fiercely to Robert’s mother. “A fruit basket? Seriously?”
“Yep. Fresh pears from the orchard.”
“What orchard?”
“We have an orchard.”
“You have an orchard?”
“That’s what I just said.”
Jack stopped staring after Rachel and looked at me crossly. “Don’t be a dick.”
“I’m not.”
“Yes you are.”
She was starting to annoy me. “Okay.” I was done with the conversation.
“Oh c’mon. Lighten up. We’re at a funeral.”
“That makes no sense.” None of it made sense. Damn you Robert Cohen. Why’d you have to go and get yourself killed?
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| The funeral was bitter. Robert’s mother was Jewish, but his father was Catholic. When the parent’s had split, Robert took his mother’s name. His father wanted a Catholic burial though, which the mother agreed to so long as the body was buried in a Jewish cemetery. And so it went.
Jack had kindly offered to pick me up. “You look nice,” she said when I got into the car garbed in my black suit and tie.
“I always look nice,” I said. She scoffed at this.
“I mean it, Dave—I’ve never seen you dressed up. It suits you.”
“Suits suit everyone. That’s why they’re called suits.”
“You’re ridiculous,” Jack said. I smiled. We went to the funeral.
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| I woke up the next morning to a cat howling outside my window. It was 6 am.
“For fuck’s sake,” I groaned. I heard my mother mobilizing in her room and covered my head with a pillow. The damage was done—I was awake. I threw on a pair of flannel PJs that I found folded in the dresser and stumbled down the stairs. The air held the lingering cold from spring, but the weather was primed for early summer. Ma was making coffee.
“You want?”
“Yeah, let me get a cup.” She nodded and smiled and grabbed another mug from the cupboard above her. I sat at the table with my face in my palms.
“You sleep okay?”
“Yeah, fine, except for the fucking cat.” Ma laughed. “Why can’t you just keep them in at night?”
“Because that’s cruel. They go out when they want. This isn’t a prison, Dave.” She was right. Throughout my childhood I never had a curfew, I was never grounded, I was never told “no” when I asked to go somewhere or do something. I was the only one out of my privileged group of friends that grew up making my own mistakes. My parents were parents, not guardians (in the truest sense of the word). Perhaps it was the New York in my folk, perhaps it was the Jew, but there was something different about us and I was grateful for that.
I rubbed my temples with my fingertips, palms connected at their heels still holding my heavy head.
“Milk?” my mother asked from behind me.
“No. Black.” She walked over and placed the steaming mug in front of me then pulled out a chair across the table and sat down.
“What are you so tired from? You haven’t done shit since you got home.”
“It’s six o’clock in the fucking morning, Ma,” I retorted. She sipped her coffee placidly. Something rubbed against my ankle and I heard a purr. I stuck my hand beneath the clothed table and a cat face rubbed against my fingers. I scooted my chair back a pinch and the cat jumped into my lap. “I hate this cat,” I said stroking the cat’s nape.
“She loves you. She’s glad you’re home.” I grunted a gruff laugh still looking down at the furry lump in my lap. “And so are we,” Ma added before taking another sip from her mug.
When the cat was sufficiently affectionized, she took to the floor and pawed at the back door window. Ma slid the glass door open and the cat bounded outside. I felt a brisk draft as I started to drink my coffee. It had grown cold while the cat purred.
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