Corrosive

12:09 PM

Two days later, on Monday, I walk beside my parents as the hearse drives to the church. I picked the wood the coffin is made from- oak, pale and strong. Ten years before it rots enough for Mill to start decomposing.

My parents forced me to go back into her room, yesterday. We went through all of her things, and decided whether to sell, give to charity or bin them. Her books all went to charity, for example. Some of her nicer clothes, Dad put on Amazon. The rest went to charity. We sat down with her laptop and a USB key, and downloaded all of her photos, her music, some documents onto the key. Then, I reverted it back to the factory settings.

And my parents found the Danger Box. And made the connection with the hidden part of the code. They read the list and found the code, but agreed with me there was nothing behind the bookcase. I got her copy, and her scarf. My Dad took the covers of her bed to wash them. Her room was empty when we left it.

We reach the church, and my Dad and I move to lift the coffin. Dexter and his brother appear, and various uncles and male cousins join in. As I'm carrying the coffin, I can feel her weight, and I start murmuring to her. I'm near her head, after all.

'You've ruined me, Mill,' I begin. I haven't done any homework since Friday. I can claim that I was organising the funeral, but seriously, Mill, I can't do my homework now. I don't want to. All I want to be doing is translating.'

I think of the moments that have come. I know them off by heart.

~*~

You've never seen things being held delicately till you've seen Honour hold things delicately. I mean, seriously, that girl was holding a packet of popcorn delicately. Who holds popcorn delicately?!

~*~

'I woke up today,' Gwen said in our locker room this morning, 'and nothing in the kitchen worked. No oven, no grill, no microwave, no toaster, no kettle- I couldn't even take a shower, because it's an electric shower,' her friends laughed at her misfortune, but Gwen wasn't done. 'And the wifi's gone- it's like living in a post-apocalyptic world!'

They all laughed at that.

~*~

So Louise wasn't in yesterday. I'd been filling her in on all she'd missed, which was a lot. Exams coming, orals for language classes, and in Home Economics, the ingredients for the next thing we're cooking. I laughed a little and tried to make a joke out of Louise's absence.

'I mean, of all the days you could've chosen to be out!' I thought she'd been sick.

'Shut up!' she snapped, and I was so shocked, because she's never snapped at me before, that I immediately said, 'Okay.'

We sat in silence for about five minutes, until I asked, 'So, why were you out yesterday?'

'My friend died.'

'What?'

'Of cancer.'

'What? I'm so sorry. I thought you'd been sick.'

'It's okay.'

We sat in silence for another while.

'When was the funeral?'

'Last Saturday.'

'But it only hit you yesterday?'

'Yeah.'

We sat in silence again for about thirty seconds, and I was about to change the subject when Louise dropped a fourth bomb.

'It's the second friend I've lost to cancer.'