Free A Penny Down the Well: A Short Story Collection of Horrifying Events by J. A. Crook Page B

some
paperwork and shook her head. “No, no. I’m sure you did just fine,
Clint, thank you.” And she gave Clint a bright smile. “So, I’m
guessing you’re ready to meet today’s client?’
    The suggestion made Clint
wince. He was displeased with the thought of referring to a dead
person, waiting (if one did such a thing) to be carted off, as a
“client.” By no means was the dead person the client, Clint
thought. The client was the family. This analysis was kept to
Clint’s mind and he simply nodded, though he was certain his face
and silence expressed the negative.
    Marie, uncaring or
preoccupied, stood and moved on past Clint with the keys to the
viewing parlor in hand. Clint followed. He eyed Jesus again. Jesus
eyed back. The second battle of the Mexican standoff came and
passed. Eventually Clint and Marie made it to the
parlor.
    As there were before,
candles lit the room, though the majority of them were out. A dim
dome light near the entrance into the room gave a hint of
illumination to the dark room and stabilized the flickering he’d
experienced before. The demons were gone, Clint thought, and was
consumed by the thought until snapped away from it with the final,
halting click of Marie’s heel before the grey casket.
    Marie gestured to the
picture of an old woman. The woman was exactly the visage of the
typical elderly woman, with many generic qualities. Her hair was
short and was a desperate mix of silver, grey and black; the black
an homage to the societal model hungry for youth and rebellious
against age. Clint new the elderly to be rebellious to little more
than their own creeping mortality, despite, though a stereotype he
understood, the majority of them were more religious than the
youthful. The hairstyle itself wasn’t youthful. No, instead she
displayed the image of a person, like many her age that were
interested in rekindling their youth, not the model of youth present. The large,
auburn-tinted glasses dated the time exactly when she may have
decided to stop moving forward with style and fossilize eternally
right where she was. Her lips with thin, but very red with
lipstick, a boldness Clint had only seen in women most recently.
Her eyes were small and brown, with hanging eyelids that left the
only contrasting white in the photo at a string of beads around her
neck. She wore a church-going sort of blue dress. She was just an
old woman, which was settling to Clint.
    “ Her name is Maggie.
Maggie Wilcox. She was a dear old lady and the community here cared
for her very much. You can expect there will be a lot of friends
there at the funeral.” And Marie’s affections as she spoke,
dripping from each word thickly, brought Clint to assume that Marie
knew the woman personally at some point.
    “ Alright. I’ll make sure
everything goes as planned. Follow the lead car.” Clint said with a
half-smile, sticking to what he knew and nothing more.
    Marie nodded quickly and
stepped hastily past Clint. A sharp sniff suggested she may have
been crying, but before Clint could think any further of the
peculiarity of it all, Larry and Morton came in, Larry with what
was becoming a trademark, a tuna fish sandwich, and Morton with his
hulking size and uncomfortable silence.
    With his mouth full, Larry
pointed off toward Marie and spoke aloud, casting fish particles
out of his mouth as men would have cast nets to catch the now
minced and chewed thing. “What’s with her?” Either the eating while
saying so or his general demeanor made the question lack much true
compassion.
    Clint shrugged, truly
unsure, but likely more concerned than Larry was. “I think maybe
she knew the lady.” Clint looked back to the picture, joining a
second staring match. He muttered, “Maggie.”
    “ Right.” Larry said,
glancing up to Morton, who didn’t bother to look back. “Well, we
got work t’ do kid, so maybe you should get your effects in order.”
Said like a true man of the business.
    “ My effects?”