“I still can’t believe she’s gone,” Maryse Robicheaux told her best friend, Sabine, as she stared down at the woman in the coffin.
Of course, the pink suit was a dead giveaway—so to speak—that the wearer was no longer with them. For the miserable five years and thirty-two days she’d had to deal with her soon-to-be-ex and now-departed mother-in-law, Maryse had never once seen her wear a color other than black. Now she sorta resembled the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man dressed in Pepto-Bismol.
“I can’t believe it, either,” Sabine whispered. “I didn’t even think it was possible. I was certain her existence represented the rise of the Antichrist.”
Maryse jabbed her friend with her elbow. “For Pete’s sake, we’re at the woman’s funeral. Show some respect.”
Sabine let out a sigh. “Sorry, Maryse, but the woman gave you holy hell and that son of hers was even worse. I don’t even understand why you wanted to come.”
Maryse stared at the casket again and shook her head. “I don’t know. I just felt compelled to. I can’t really explain it.”
Looking down at Helena, Maryse still didn’t have an answer for why she was there. If she’d come for some sort of closure, it hadn’t happened. But then, what had she expect- ed—a dead woman to pop up out of the coffin and apologize for bringing the most useless man in the world into existence, then making Maryse’s life even more miserable by
being the biggest bitch on the face of the earth?
It wasn’t likely when you considered that Helena Henry had never apologized for anything in her entire life. It had never been necessary. When you had a pocketbook the size of the Atchafalaya Basin, people tended to overlook bad behavior.
“I think they’re ready to start,” Sabine whispered, gesturing to the minister who had entered the chapel through a side door. “We need to take a seat.”
Maryse nodded but remained glued to her place in front of the coffin, not yet able to tear herself away from the un- customary pink dress and the awful-but-now-dead woman who wore it. “Just a minute more.”
There had to be some reason she’d come. Some reason other than just to ensure that Helena’s reign of terror was over, but nothing came to her except the memory of Helena’s gardenia perfume.
“Where’s Hank?” Sabine asked. “Surely he wouldn’t miss his own mother’s funeral. That would be major bad karma, even for Hank. I know he’s a lousy human being and all, but really.”
Maryse sighed as Sabine’s words chased away a wistful vision of her wayward husband, Hank, in a coffin right alongside Helena. If her best friend had even an inkling of her thoughts, she’d besiege her with a regime of crystal cleansing and incense until Maryse went insane, and she was saving the insanity plea to use later in life and on a much bigger problem than a worthless man.
“Hank is a lot of things,” Maryse said, “but he’s not a complete fool. He’s wanted for at least twenty different offenses in Mudbug. This is the first place the cops would look for him. There’s probably one behind that skirt under the coffin.”
Sabine stared at the blue velvet curtain for a moment, then pulled a piece of it to the side and leaned down a bit.
Sarcasm was completely lost on Sabine.
Maryse rolled her eyes and turned away from the Pink Polyester Antichrist and pointed to a pew in the back. “He’ll turn up for the reading of the will,” she whispered as the music began to play and they took a seat in the back of the chapel. “Even I would bet on that one.”
Sabine smirked. “Then he’ll work a deal with the local cops through Judge Warner and everything will be swept under the rug as usual.”
“Yeah, probably. The only thing different is maybe I’ll finally get my divorce.”
Sabine’s eyes widened. “I hadn’t even thought of that but you’re right. When Hank appears, you can have him served.” She reached over and squeezed Maryse’s hand. “Oh, thank God, Maryse. You can finally be free.”
Maryse nodded, as the song leader’s voice filtered through her head. What a mess she’d made of her life. She hadn’t even been married to Hank thirty days before he disappeared, leaving her holding the bag while the various and numerous bookies and collection agents came calling. That was five years ago, and despite the efforts of four different private investigators and several angry friends, she hadn’t seen Hank Henry ever since. Oh, but she’d seen Helena.
The pastor began to read the standard funeral Bible verses, meant to comfort those in attendance that the person they loved had moved on to a better place. Maryse smirked at the irony. Mudbug was the better place now that Helena was gone. She cast her gaze once more to Helena, lying peacefully in her coffin.
That’s when Helena moved.
Maryse straightened in her pew, blinked once to clear her vision, and stared hard at Helena Henry. Surely it was a trick of the lights. Dead people didn’t move. Embalming and all that other icky stuff that happened at funeral homes took care of that, right?
Maryse had just about convinced herself that it was a trick of lights and shadows when Helena opened her eyes and raised her head. Maryse sucked in a breath and clenched her eyes shut, certain she was having a nervous breakdown that had been five years in the making. She waited several seconds, then slowly opened her eyes, silently praying that her mind was done playing tricks on her.
Apparently, it wasn’t.
Helena sat bolt upright in the coffin, looking around the chapel, a confused expression on her boldly painted face. Panicked, Maryse scanned the other attendees. Why wasn’t anyone screaming or pointing or running for the door? God knows, she hadn’t been to many funerals, but she didn’t remember the dead person sitting up being a part of any of them.
She felt a squeeze on her hand and Sabine whispered, “Are you all right? You got really pale all of a sudden.”
Maryse started to answer, but then sucked in a breath as Helena crawled out of the coffin and stood in front of it gazing up at the pastor. “Don’t you see that?” Maryse asked and pointed to the front of the chapel. “Don’t you see what’s happening?” Maryse tore her gaze from Helena and looked at Sabine.
Her friend cast a look to the front of the chapel exactly where Maryse was pointing, then looked back at her with concern, but no fear, no terror…nothing to indicate that she saw anything at all wrong with the service.
“See what?” Sabine asked. “Do we need to leave? You don’t look well.”
Maryse looked back to the front of the chapel. That’s when Helena turned to the pastor and started to yell.
“What the hell is going on here, Pastor Bob? For Christ’s sake, I’m Catholic.” Helena ranted. “What are all these people doing here, and why did someone dress me like a hooker and shove me in a coffin? If this is some sort of
weird Baptist ceremony, I don’t want any part of it.” Helena paused for a moment, but the pastor continued as if she’d never said a word.
Maryse stared, not blinking, not breathing, her eyes growing wider and wider until she felt as if they would pop.
Helena turned from the pastor and stared out at the attendees. “I’ll have you all arrested, is what I’ll do. Damn it, someone drugged me and put me in that coffin. I didn’t get there by myself! What are you—some kind of weird cult? I’ll see every one of you assholes in jail, especially you, Harold.” Helena stepped over to the nearest pew and reached for her husband, Harold, but her hands passed completely through him.
Helena stopped for a moment, then tried to touch Harold once more, but the result was exactly the same. Helena frowned and looked down at herself, then back at the coffin. Maryse followed her gaze and that’s when she realized Helena’s body was still lying there—placid as ever.
Helena stared at herself for what seemed like eons, her eyes wide, her expression shocked. The pastor asked everyone to rise for prayer, and Maryse rose in a daze to stand alongside Sabine, but she couldn’t bring herself to bow her head. Her eyes were glued on the spectacle at the front of the chapel. The spectacle that apparently no one else could see.
Helena tore her gaze from the coffin and began to walk slowly down the aisle, yelling as she went and waving her hands in front of people’s faces. But no one so much as flinched. As she approached the back, Maryse’s heart began to race and her head pounded with the rush of blood. She knew she should sit down, but she couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe.
All of a sudden, Helena ceased yelling and stopped in her tracks about ten feet from Maryse’s pew. Her expression changed from shocked to worried, then sad. Maryse tried to
maintain her composure, but the breath she’d been holding came out with a whoosh. Helena looked toward the source of the noise and locked eyes with Maryse.
Maryse held in a cry as Helena moved toward her. A wave of dizziness washed over her, and her head began to swim. One step, two steps, then right in front of her.
And that’s when everything went dark.