by Laura Sanger Kelly
1.
“Take it seriously”
At first the rain had been scattered and light. By mid-afternoon is had become ferocious funeral weather. Rain fell from the sky in angry sheets; the wind howled like a wounded beast. Small, stinging pellets of hail crashed against the tent over the grave.
Karen was quickly commended to the ground, her closed casket strewn with pretty little flowers. Inside she was serene and peaceful, her long blonde hair framing her quiet face.
That was one advantage of swallowing sleeping pills by the fistful and washing them down with a bottle of sour mash whiskey: she looked fine on the outside.
Rachel was the last person to leave the funeral. She and Karen had been college roommates Rachel staying close while others disappeared from Karen’s increasingly mood swings. In the end, Rachel was the only family Karen had.
They looked so alike that they were often assumed to be biological sisters. Both were Texas blondes, with bright blue eyes and strong smiles. They used to joke with one another: The big difference between Texas blondes and California blondes was that while California girls kept spending money to try and make themselves better, Texas girls already knew they were more than good enough -- the money needed to be spent on them, not by them.
The happiness was a façade hiding Karen’s depression. She had fallen in intense, manic love with a man she was dating. The relationship had been about six weeks old when he announced that he was marrying a friend he had just managed to form a romantic attachment to after years of waiting. Karen’s heart snapped instantly, falling from a delirious high into a devastating low.
Rachel had intentionally not called the recent ex-boyfriend to inform him of Karen’s death. It was the one manipulation she allowed her grief as she arranged Karen’s funeral.
By the time Rachel got home from the funeral the rain had grown heavier. Droplets crashed into her, driven by the wind, and she shivered as she stood in her carport, searching for her house keys. She glanced around, feeling oddly uncomfortable about her new home. The house had been Karen’s and she had left it to Rachel, a token of appreciation for standing by her during both the unbearably happy days and the incomprehensibly sad.
As Rachel considered her new property, the young man who lived next door waved to her.
He wore a heavy black raincoat, and was sitting on a tired lawn chair whittling a piece of white wood. He looked up at her, his eyes the color of blue topaz.
"Real gully washer, isn’t it?" He said. His short, bleached goatee caught the reflection of a stab of lightning.
"Are you locked out?" Thunder crashed overhead; Rachel hugged herself.
"Nope. How was the funeral?"
"Fine, I guess."
It had gone according to the Order of Service.
He whittled, his head weaving back and forth.
"What are you doing?" she asked. The wind made her shiver.
"Watching."
"Watching for what?"
"Ghosts." He rotated the piece of wood, admiring it. "You believe in them?"
She shook her head. It was a cruel joke on a day like this. "No. Dead is dead."
"And buried."
She opened her back door, and locked it behind her when she entered.
Perhaps she was being rude, but she was still angry about Karen's death.
Rain splattered against her windows.
The young man continued to whittle in the downpour, humming to himself.
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