23

The funeral home looked very gay. Behind its lighted windows many shadows moved. Fex made himself small as he followed Audrey up the path, dragging his feet as if he were going to the dentist. I don’t know what to say, he thought. I don’t want to go. I’m afraid. But I’ve got to. I’ve got to pay my respects. What shall I say? I’m sorry. I feel bad. Angie was my friend. I’ll miss her.

Any or all of these things were true.

Please accept my sympathy. Once he’d heard his grandmother say, “May God have mercy on her soul,” when a friend of hers had died. Wasn’t that God’s job, to have mercy on people’s souls? Angie was a good lady. A kind person. There were plenty of stinkers around. Why couldn’t one of the stinkers have died instead of Angie?

Standing on the top step, Audrey turned to see if he was coming. The door was flung open. A man stood there, dressed in a shiny black suit that must once have belonged to someone much bigger, much fatter than he was.

“Ah,” the man said, as if he’d been expecting them, “there you are.” Fex fought the urge to run. “Come in,” the man said. Briskly Audrey did as she was told. Fex had no choice. He followed.

In the room beyond, the crowd roared like a seashell. Fex took a deep breath. “Why don’t I wait outside?” he said in a squeaky voice. As if he hadn’t heard, the man in the too-big suit said, “You’ll want to see her.”

Fex’s head felt funny, not entirely his. The back of his neck tingled. Perspiration ran down inside his underwear. Audrey had disappeared.

“I came with my friend. Her name is Audrey,” he babbled. His voice sounded ridiculous even to his own ears.

An old lady came at him.

“She looks beautiful!” the old lady said. Who did she mean? Audrey?

“Like a saint! Like a beautiful saint!” The old lady’s little gray hand fell on Fex’s shoulder. She gazed into his eyes, which were level with hers. The odor of fried fish clung to her clothes. He tried to work his way free. The smell of fish frying had always made him feel sick. She hung on. He wanted very much to hand her a karate chop he’d been practicing for some time, but he didn’t dare. Not here. She wouldn’t let him go.

“She was a wonderful girl,” the old woman hissed. The strong smell of fish rose again to his nostrils, settled somewhere in his stomach. “You’re a friend of hers, eh?”

Fex nodded, conserving his strength. He struggled silently. The little gray hands held firm.

“Come with me,” she said. Candles flickered; heat and the scent of flowers overpowered him. He let himself be led.

Up ahead was a casket. He knew what it was, although he’d never actually seen one in the flesh. Or whatever you called it. He’d seen a picture of one once in a magazine. You’ve seen one casket you’ve seen them all, he thought. It was shiny, very shiny. Brand-new.

“There.” The old woman’s hands dug into him. Her voice was thin and triumphant. “Didn’t I tell you? Is she beautiful or is she beautiful?”

She pushed him down, forced him to kneel beside the casket. It crossed his mind that she was extraordinarily strong for such an old person. “Say a prayer,” she commanded. Fex put down his head, closed his eyes, and tried to pray. His mind was blank, the way it sometimes went in class when he was called upon to answer a question. Even when he knew the answer perfectly well.

He moved his lips in an effort to fool her.

Behind him, people moved, murmuring sorrowfully. Using up the oxygen. When your oxygen supply was used up, you passed out. Hadn’t they just studied oxygen in science? He was going to pass out.

Fex forced himself to raise his head. He brought his eyes to the level of the casket’s edge. The person lying there had a smooth, pink, untroubled face. Her lips were rouged and slightly smiling, as if at a private joke. Her glasses were gone. She wore a dress covered with dots. The dots made spots in front of Fex’s eyes. An enormous sense of relief came over him. Why, that’s not Angie, he thought. He’d never seen this person before in his life. It was all a mistake. Angie’s not dead. This is someone else.

He started to rise, to get to his feet. He was going to get out of here even if he had to knock the old woman down.

“Sorry,” he said in a loud voice. “That’s not Angie. You’ve got the wrong person.” He took a step away from the stranger lying there, lying peacefully in a dress with white dots. If they didn’t know that Angie never wore dresses, with or without white dots, then they should. That did it. That made him know for sure that this wasn’t Angie.

“Sorry,” he said again. It seemed to him that everything swayed: the room, the people watching him with open mouths, the candle flames, the flowers. Everything swayed. There must be a storm coming.

“Catch him,” he heard someone say. “Get him,” and that was the end of it.