Free Liar's Bench by Kim Michele Richardson

McGee.
    Daddy turned away to wipe his eyes, then folded the document and tucked it carefully inside a kitchen drawer. He cleared his throat and nodded toward the breakfast plates. “Have some of those scrambled eggs and toast.”
    â€œSmells good,” I lied. “I should’ve set the alarm earlier to fix breakfast.”
    He offered an empty smile. “Thought I’d give you a break.”
    I took a few nibbles of a slice of burnt toast before tossing it unceremoniously into the trash.
    We drove all the way to the United Methodist Church in silence.
    An usher greeted us at the church steps and escorted us to the front pew. The organist was playing “A Mighty Fortress Is Our God” as people filled the church. Soon it was packed with people cooling themselves with cardboard fans advertising Russ-man’s Funeral Home, and a hush fell over the crowd. Pastor Dugin began to speak about life and death and God’s glory. And Mama. It hurt to hear him talk in the past tense.
    The rest of the service passed in a haze of hallelujahs and amens, all shrouded in the cloying stink of funeral flowers.
    At long last, the organist began to pump out “Shall We Gather at the River?” which was mine and Daddy’s cue to stand and lead the procession from the church. The pallbearers followed, Sheriff Jingles among them. I couldn’t bear to look back at Mama’s casket, but the telltale jangling of his keys told me it was on its way.
    At the church door, the usher waited to lead us over to the procession car, Bud Lincoln’s black Mercury, the one he kept spit-shined to rent to Russman’s for funerals. Bud eased out of the lot and followed the hearse past the Unity Baptist Church, the bowling alley, and out toward the Peckinpaw fairgrounds. Patches of bluegrass shimmered in August morning dew.
    In the opposite lane, Roy McGee’s car slowed just shy of stopping, then quickly passed. Daddy twisted around and stared hotly at McGee until he was well out of sight.
    Our car followed close behind the hearse, winding its way lazily toward Cemetery Road, past the good people of Ella Mudas Tilley’s hometown. I studied the faces of townsfolk along the way. On the sidewalks, people stopped and nodded, nudging their children to do the same. Farm women backed away from their clotheslines and edged closer to the road in solidarity—women who wouldn’t even look Mama in the eye after she married Tommy. Today, the gentlemen and farmers took off their hats and caps. Oncoming cars pulled over to the side of the road and even into ditches as we passed in quiet procession.
    We pulled up to Summers Cemetery. Daddy came around to my side and opened the door, leading my body where it didn’t want to go. I paused at the tall bur oak and shuffled toward the cemetery’s big iron gate, afraid to complete our procession.
    It wasn’t a fear of the cemetery itself, because I knew the history of most of the 111 graves here in Summers Cemetery, including the four I’d added. The freshest was Patty, buried the year I turned ten, a wolf spider who’d spun a beautiful new web night after night, weaving her orb precisely from the porch railing post to our screen door. It was beautiful. I had become so attached that I wouldn’t let anyone use our front door for a whole month. Then, one morning, I found Patty curled up on the ground beside the door. Heartbroken, I’d covered her in cotton, placed her in a match box, and carried her over to the family plot to bury alongside the others: Ricky, a cranky old barn cat who’d belonged to my grandparents and died of old age; Pauline, the field mouse that Ricky’d caught and delivered to our doorstep; and Speck, the passing monarch butterfly whose short life span had ended on my windowsill. They were all lined up alongside Grammy Essie’s and Papaw’s graves. Now, Mama would join their somber ranks.
    Daddy took my hand and