Free Creepy and Maud by Dianne Touchell

button through, scalloped hem. It’s too big for her and is cinched in at the waist with a wide brown belt.
     
    Real burials aren’t like the ones in books or on telly. I am disappointed. There’s no priest, or if there is he’s in civvies. If I’m being buried, I want someone officiating in a robe. Or at the very least in some sort of uniform. I don’t want the person in charge dressing, or behaving, like one of the guests. Speaking of guests, this lot are seriously underdressed. Several of the women are in prints and there are very few ties around. They look like they’re on their way to Sizzler. There’s a green cloth over the mound of excavated dirt, which pleases me, and they have obviously put some dosh into the coffin. But it’s all over so quickly. No friends or family members speak, no one reads a poem, there’s no music (apart from some kid listening to an MP3 player), and there’s no committal. Maybe they don’t do that at real burials. Maybe that’s only in books, too. Like the good trees. I wait and wait for someone to pick up a fistful of dirt. Doesn’t happen.
     
    The coffin isn’t even lowered until the guests have left. I don’t understand that at all. That’s the big finish, isn’t it? I watch it lowered. It’s smooth as anything, justglides downwards on this strap and pulley contraption. When I’m sure everyone is safely on their way back to their cars, I wander over to have a proper look. I even pick up a handful of dirt and throw it in. Seems like the right thing to do. The backfillers don’t seem to mind. They even stop shovelling to allow me access.
     
    I get the bus home and think about Nanna and how little you can tell about her from her mourners. Mourn (verb; Middle English, from Old English murnan, akin to High Old German mornan to mourn, Greek mermera to care): 1. to feel or express grief or sorrow; 2. to show the customary signs of grief for a death. It occurs to me that the mourners at a funeral are the Pandora charms of a life. The little bits and pieces of people we either collect or create from go to whoa. The symbols of who we are. ( She was one of life’s true gentlemen.) How sad. Poor Nanna.
     
    By the time I get home, there are quite a few cars outside Maud’s house. I guess they didn’t go to Sizzler, after all. Dad is all pissy because a couple of cars are parked on our verge. He even goes out and puts notes on the windscreens. Dobie Squires is all antsy because he always is when Dad’s pissy. Mum is smoking at the kitchen window, flicking ash into the sink, describing to Dad what she can see of what’s going on. They should ask me. By that time, I’m upstairs with my binoculars.
     

SIXTEEN

    Then I commended mirth, because a man hath no better thing under the sun, than to eat, and to drink, and to be merry: for that shall abide with him of his labour the days of his life, which God giveth him under the sun.
    —Ecclesiastes 8:15

    Lionel is on our doorstep by the time his final guest is manoeuvring his car off our verge. I say manoeuvring because Merrill dragged the bins up for collection while Li’s guests were still out back consoling each other over curry and profiteroles. I’ve never known Dad to take the bins up so early before. In fact, Mum is usually hollering at Dad about ‘getting the bins up’ right until bedtime. But here we are, middle of the afternoon, and Dad’s ‘getting the bins up’. He wedged them in on either sideof the cars on our verge. It wasn’t easy for them to pull on to the street—the recycle bin was nudged hard and tottered threateningly for a second or two—but ultimately Dad seems pleased with the inconvenience he imagines he has caused. I know he’s pleased because he stood at the lounge window watching, rocking gently back and forth on the balls of his feet, muttering to himself. What he isn’t pleased about is Limo-Li turning up on our doorstep as the last of his guests is manoeuvring away.
     
    Lionel is