Two days later, the Screech Owls all went to the cemetery, where little Liam Fontaine would finally be laid to rest.
The Owls wore their team sweaters and acted as an honour guard. Muck and Mr. Dillinger acted as pallbearers.
A priest spoke, but Travis wasn’t listening to what he said. He stood, staring at the freshly dug grave and the small white coffin, the air heavy with the scent of flowers, and he wept. He didn’t even bother to wipe away the tears.
He had never known the boy. Liam Fontaine had been dead for decades before Travis was even born. And yet Travis couldn’t get it out of his head that they were burying the same boy he had seen that night as he came home from the movie.
He knew it wasn’t possible. He knew it made no sense at all. But that was how he felt.
After the priest stopped speaking, they lowered the coffin, and old Mr. Fontaine leaned over, placing something down into the grave.
Mrs. Lindsay and Mrs. Nishikawa came along with armfuls of roses, handing one each to the Screech Owls for them to place in the grave.
This was what old Mr. Fontaine had done, thought Travis, maybe leaving an orange lily, and he stood behind Nish and Sarah to take his turn.
Sarah dropped her rose and moved on. She, too, was weeping openly.
Nish dropped his. His face was red, his cheeks burning with tears.
Travis bent to drop his rose on the coffin and realized that it was not a flower at all that Liam Fontaine’s father had sent to be buried with the boy.
It was the ball from the championship game.
THE END