Prologue

The Funeral

    Her coffin is closed, hovering above the large opening in the earth not too far in front of me. Since it’s my mother’s funeral, I sit in the front row. Cynthia is to my right, sobbing her little heart out. Grandma is to my left, also crying. I am in between them, my eyes dry as bone. Maybe I’m still in shock or something. Maybe I’m convinced I’ll wake up to the smell of coffee wafting in from the kitchen down the hall and laugh at how realistic my dreams have become. Whatever it is, I’m not crying. It’s not for lack of trying or anything either though, because I am. Trying, that is. I’m trying to think of anything I can remember that had made me cry in the past. I focus on images from movies, excerpts from sad books, disturbing things that have haunted me from childhood. Nothing.
    Someone stands in front of us making a speech about my mother. She was wonderful, beautiful, she cared so much about her family. I’m not concentrating at all, really. I know that if my mother was here, she wouldn’t be concentrating either. She’d be in the back, smoking a ciggarette in one of her many black suits, her face shielded by a black veil despite the early summer heat. She’d be dabbing at her non-existant tears with a hankercheif, her attention on trying to appear as dignified yet heartbroken as possible. I should have remembered the veil thing, or at least thought of sunglasses.
    I guess the thing for me is that everyone seems so surprised. Everyone. Even those whom I thought knew her well. I mean, it really wasn’t much of a shock to me. I’d like to think that it’s because I knew her better than most people, but  my whole life she was a mystery to me- one big depressed mystery who would sit in her room writing in her journal with the blinds down, keeping the water in her bathroom sink dripping because the noise helped her think. She lead her life dramatically, so it only made sense that she would end her life dramatically. The world’s martyr, Jesus Christ almighty on the cross. I, however, saw her as the great and powerful Oz whose life mission was to keep the world from seeing the man behind the curtain.
    My father was exactly the same way. An overdramatic himself, he was one of those who’d been dying since the day he was born. I never knew him when he was diagnosed as healthy. Had he ever been? He seemed to simply contract one disease after another. He had colds, flus, viruses, tumors, cancers, bites, stings, rashes; each disease more exotic than the next. My mother fed off of his dramatic nature and he fed off of hers, each of them growing fat on the overacted emotions that were played out so often that I think we almost started to believe they were genuine.
    I believe that my mother and father loved each other. More than that, though, I believe they loved the way they made each other feel. My mother loved doting on my sick father, and my father loved being doted on. My mother loved the praise and attention she got from others for taking care of my father, my father loved the attention and care he got from my mother because he was sick.
    Sometimes I wonder why they decided to have children at all. Kids take time, attention, care and dedication, all of which I’m more than certain they wanted for themselves. Possible theories include that my mother pushed for it because she knew she’d be praised for taking care of children on top of her sick husband, and that she didn’t look past the attention that would come with pregnancy and baby showers. Or, more likely than anything, they didn’t realize that a baby would actually be work. Thus my theory for why they had a second child: if they had two, we could take care of one another when they got tired of caring for us, or when there was no more attention to be gotten from having a cute new baby- whichever came first. Therefore, it doesn’t surprise me that she waited until I was two years old to have Cynthia.
    Maybe that’s what my mom was hoping for when she took all of those pills. If she even considered us at all. Thinking about my mother, it’s hard to imagine her coming out of that glorified spotlight to think about anyone but herself, especially those two little girls she shared the limelight with only when it would make her own grow even just a little bit brighter.
    “My beautiful little girls, you make Mommy so happy.”
    Cynthia grabs my arm and holds my hand, squeezing it tight in hers. We’ve always been pretty close, but it’s hard for me to comfort her when she’s upset, especially when she throws tears into the mix. I don’t know why. The past month had been especially hard. She squeezes my hand tighter as the coffin in front of us lowers, and my mother’s body finds it’s place six feet under ground. I glance off to the side to eye the grave next to where my mother’s will be; a grave so fresh it lacks a headstone, and the ground on top has yet to begin re-growing grass.
    As dirt begins piling on top of my mother’s wooden box of a new home, my eyes stay locked on the fresh, unmarked grave of my father.