Complete Me (Book Three of The Kirkland Family)

Complete Me: Chapter 1

Chapter One

The Kirkland family celebrated life with birthdays, marriages, Sunday afternoon barbeques and Friday night movie dates. And funerals. They rejoiced in the life and love surrounding them, gathering friends and family to praise and cheer the wonderful times past. Good food, hearty laughter, and long, exorbitant stories abounded. It was their way.

But this burial service was not a Kirkland funeral, and Rose Kirkland sat in silence, cloaked in the somber tranquility of the morning. The only sounds around the gravesite were the murmur of prayers and the early summer breeze rustling the leaves of a nearby hickory tree. Sitting with her parents, Rose wished her heart felt as peaceful as that breeze tickling her cheek...but it didn't. She felt heavy. All the way to her bones. Leaden, tired, and awkward. Well, Rose usually felt awkward, but today...

Today, on a Thursday in early June, she buried a man she loved.

Folks foretold Mr. Shaw's passing for years now. He turned one hundred and three on his last birthday, but his advanced age did not usher him to meet his Maker. Or rather, not the direct factor. Oh, no. Mr. Shaw had been more spry than men half his age. He died with his wit and judgment still in prime condition. He suffered no ailments, other than a slight case of arthritis in his left knee and a carefully regulated indigestion problem. Mr. Shaw had been Rose Kirkland's best friend—she loved him with all her heart—and he did not pass on to his next life from disease or what should have been old age. In fact, Rose imagined God's confusion and shock upon seeing Coleman Shaw pass through the Pearly Gates. It had shocked Rose, who knew Mr. Shaw better than anyone else in the world.

Those who knew Mr. Shaw never truly expected the oldest man in the area to finally perish. Really...what would the world be like without Coleman Shaw? How would the town survive without the baritone of Frank Sinatra records crooning out of the open doors of his shop on sultry summer afternoons? Or without sampling his newest pepper jelly recipe at the county fair? Or hearing his grumbles with every game he lost during Bingo Night at Momma's Place? An aching loss settled over the cemetery, because an era had died with the man.

It had been the roses. The roses killed Mr. Shaw. The same roses that Mr. Shaw propagated, grew and coddled from cuttings of Rose's great-grandmother's bushes, grew them in large planters outside his store, because they were Rose's namesake, and everyone knew how much Mr. Shaw adored that girl. And bless her sweet heart, Rose Kirkland just did not have a green thumb on any part of her body.

The less whimsical version of Mr. Shaw's death was that a rather large thorn caught under his thumbnail while pruning them, and an unexpected infection set in. Mr. Shaw—like most men Rose knew—refused to have a doctor check it. After a week, the infection entered his bloodstream and his aging body couldn't fight it. The official cause of death had been sepsis. Not execution by rose bushes.

Rose felt as if she killed him. During his final breath, even as his priest performed the Anointing of the Sick, Mr. Shaw made Rose promise she wouldn't feel guilty. But he died. Died. From her own namesake. How could she not feel guilty? He would still be here if it weren't for her...if she hadn't taken that part-time job back in high school and kept working for him...if Rose wasn't her name...if he hadn't cared for her.

Needless to say...today, Rose hurt. Her heart ached. The numbness in her body sapped all her energy. Her head burned with too many tears. After a week of preparations, the vigil, the funeral liturgy, and the Rite of Committal, Rose lost count of the tears, the pain, and the questions.

Her father leaned over. "How are you doing, Rosebud?" Justin Kirkland asked his youngest child.

"I'm fine, Daddy," Rose replied in a remote voice.