No Happy Endings

A Tear for Each Grave

 The girl shut the gate, closing herself in. The graveyard stood before her, desolate and grey in the cool autumn air. There were no red and orange fall leaves strewn here. There were no pines. "At least there is that," thought the girl, "They honor the dead, even if they don't grieve them." Her light blue eyes swept the cemetery. Her parents had always told her they were piercing yet gentle. Her father fancied she could see into his soul. But even his daughter's eyes couldn't see beyond what's real, though she always saw the beauty in the world.

She walked forward, not faltering in her step as she moved with purpose. She stopped, as she came to the grave she had sought out. She knelt and cried one bitter tear for her uncle, who had bounced her on his knee when she was still young. Another man his age had thought he played poker too well.

"A tear for each grave," the girl said, "Someone must grieve for them."

The girl walked across to the next grave. A rich man rested here, but she didn't know his name. He had the grandest tombstone of all and had left the name blank, certain none would not know already who he was and what he had done. Nobody knew. His son-in-law owned his fortune now through the man's now-dead daughter who had married the poor man days after her dead father could no longer stop her. She was in her grave too now, next to her father. Not even his name had survived. The girl shed one tear for each, something the fortune could have never bought.

The woman now moved from grave to grave, shedding tears the dead had never found in life. She stopped at two small markers. She had babysat little William. His family had always shared the not enough they had, somehow. He'd had another brother and three sisters, too much for their father who was in and out of jobs, but their house overflowed with love. One Christmas, William found a bicycle by the cold fireplace, devoid of a tree, a gift too expensive for his parents to have bought. His parents told him it was from Heaven, but it took a semi-truck, not his bike, to get him there. His father lived on for several years, but the woman stopped seeing his soul when she looked into his eyes after the day William died. After seven years, he followed his heart and son to the grave. The woman hoped they were together again, letting two large tears wet the ground for each.

"One for each," she whispered, holding further tears back, "Or some will be without."

She stopped at many more, giving one tear each to graves beyond count. The woman stopped at one grave more. She knew who lay in the grave, but couldn't recall his name. They had shared some sort of connection, no, relationship. He wasn't quite a brother to her, but she didn't know what more he could have been. Her mind was tired from trying to think, her eyes were red, and her body ached. She tried to read the name, but couldn't make it out. She gave her last tear to that grave.

Her grey eyes, old from age, swept the graveyard one last time, and she smiled to her friends and family. "Farewell, my loves," she said, as she laid down into the ground next to her husband, "Shed a tear for me."