Set against the backdrop of the 2020 Covid-19 outbreak, a young woman, Gravely Eaton, is stuck working at the family funeral home with a father she hates. The world is dying around her, but there seems no escape from her boring life with no friend...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
The phone beside my bed rang at precisely 8 a.m. I was lying down but not sleeping. I couldn't sleep after the last glue session with father. I spent the hours between then and sunrise staring at the ceiling in my room. It's something I did a lot, ever since I was a little girl. It's just my way of thinking. The ceiling didn't change, and I could identify with that. It was always the focal point of my boredom. As long as it didn't change, I wasn't changing. Maybe I was hungry for normal human conversation, but I picked up the telephone receiver and took the call. Mitch was on the other end. His voice was awkward and faltering at first, and I knew immediately he had difficult news. My uncle never called that early in the morning.
"Gravely, something terrible happened, dear." He took a deep breath. "I got a call from Gracie's partner a few hours ago. Honey, I'm sorry, your mom had a heart attack. She's dead."
Mitch had few other details to give me. He only said my mom had a history of heart problems and she died in the downtown apartment where she lived with her partner. The funeral would be a closed affair but a viewing of the body would happen at Blacks Funeral Home in a day or so. Mitch would take me if I wanted. I said yes without hesitation. Was it ironic that I wanted to see my mother, even in death, but she couldn't make time to see me? I thought it was the classy thing for me to do, to show no hard feelings and all. Or maybe I was just conditioned that saying goodbye in funeral homes was the way to go. It came naturally.
I saw no point in talking about mother's death to my father. For one thing, I didn't have any details about the situation. For another thing, I didn't think he'd care.
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
Father kept to himself and time passed slowly for the next couple of days. We passed each other in the hallway at one point and I did bring up the subject of finishing the skin graft to his back but he kept walking and disappeared into his apartment. He slammed the door shut to punctuate his silence. He was in control and we both knew it.
Unknown to him, I had contacted the law firm that managed our business and legal affairs to discuss father's will. As luck would have it, Jim Stevens, the lawyer, was on holiday and wouldn't be back for another week. His secretary told me that she would pass on my message, and I was penciled in for a meeting with Jim after he got back. It was a baby step in the right direction for me, tangible progress to look forward to. I told the legal secretary not to call me, I would call her. That way, father couldn't intercept any messages and head me off at the pass.
