“Who are you trying to insult, Dothan, me or them?”
“I’m not trying to insult anyone. I came to pay my last respects to Maurey’s queer brother.”
I slugged Dothan in the stomach. He doubled over and I hit him in the face, then he was down on the snow and I was kicking him.
I lost control, which is something I’d never done before. A kidney stomp immobilized him long enough for me to go for the head. There was a rush of memories—of Sonny and Ryan beating me up in October; of Dothan beating me up in the seventh grade; of him fucking Maurey when I couldn’t; of Maurey, Shannon, and Lydia dismissing me. I kicked the living bejesus out of that bastard.
Then hands were pulling me off him and the bimbo was screaming. The New Yorkers looked aghast. I guess they weren’t used to personal violence.
Chet was saying, “He’s not worth it, Sam. Back off.”
Maurey was saying, “You split your stitches, tiger.”
She borrowed handkerchiefs from the New Yorkers and wrapped my hand tightly. I watched Dothan’s woman hold his head in her lap and pat his lips with snow. His eyes blinked, but didn’t focus.
As we walked into the church, Maurey said, “I wish you’d let me get to him first.”
“It was my turn.”
“Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord; even so saith the spirit, for they rest from their labors.”
The priest, whose name was Father Jack, held his arms out about sternum high, with the thumbs and forefingers made into Os. Blond beard, thinning hair, thick forearms—Father Jack looked like Edward Abbey in a ghost costume.
“The Lord be with you,” he said.
Chet and a smattering of people at the back said, “And with thy spirit.”
“Let us pray.”
Chet kneeled and after a few false starts, the rest of us followed. Chet was Episcopalian, which was why we were having the funeral service in the Episcopal Church. That, and AA met in the parish hall, so Maurey knew Father Jack. But the rest of us in the family’s pews weren’t Episcopalian, or much of any other denomination, so we were lost when it came time to sit, kneel, or stand. On top of saying good-bye to his partner, Chet must have felt like he was leading a very slow aerobics class.
The church was a dark log building with two lines of pews wide enough for four people or five if they scrunched up. Pud sat against the north window with Roger at his side. Then it went Auburn, Maurey, Chet, the aisle, me, Shannon in her new outfit, and Toinette. Dot Pollard was behind me, with the three friends from New York behind her.
The rest of the church was maybe three-quarters full of Pete’s high school friends and people who go to funerals to prove they’re not dead yet. I heard sniffling from the far back and sneaked a look to see who it was— Ron Mildren, being glared at by his wife, Gloria.
Pete was in the bois d’arc box with ivory inlay on top of a walnut table a few feet in front of Chet. My theory that dead people know what’s going on around them for four days after they die applies just as much to ashes as bodies. Pete knew what I was thinking, so I’d best be careful.
Father Jack announced he was going to read to us from the Book of Job. Not my favorite book. God tests Job by killing his children, then says, “You passed. Here, have some more children.” If God killed Shannon, then said, “That was a test, I’ll replace her,” I would say, “Forget it, you jerk.”
As the Father read, “And though after my skin worms destroy this body,” I leaned forward to check out the front pew’s handle on the grief process. As usual in groups, I felt responsible for everyone’s peace of mind. Roger sat pale and unblinking; Auburn was restless. Chet was tremendously sad, yet he had dignity. He didn’t jump up and bash the priest in the mouth, which is what I probably would have done.
Maurey looked both beautiful and beat up by life. Her eyes were muddy and the scar on her chin seemed whiter, but she was still concerned about the others. One hand touched Chet’s shoulder and the other arm extended over Auburn and rested on Roger’s leg.
Shannon’s shoulder touched mine; I leaned my weight toward her in case she needed support.
Job’s part ended and Toinette went to the front with her viola. She played a wonderfully wistful song I’d never heard before, which she told me later was a “Romanze” by Max Bruch. Toinette’s face was golden and her belly was huge. When she ran her bow across the viola strings, they seemed not so much to weep in the tragic keening of a violin, but to cry out a deeper, more elemental pain. The viola mourned not only Pete, but all loss everywhere. After Toinette finished, she gave Father Jack a shy smile and walked to her pew, and he sat there on his bench, looking poleaxed.
Shannon put her fingers over my good hand.
After that, Father Jack read another Bible verse, this one from Revelations, the book hippies used to quote in North Carolina. I tried to follow, but when he read the part about no more death, sorrow, crying, or pain, I drifted off. I’m not sure a world with no pain at all would be that desirable. The boredom would be debilitating. I could write a novel about it sometime.
When Maurey and Pete were kids their mother drove them into Jackson to the Baptist Church every Sunday while their father went fishing or hunting or read detective stories by the woodstove. If anyone asked Buddy where you go after you die, he always said, “San Francisco.” It was a family proverb:
Shannon jabbed an elbow in my ribs. Everyone was looking at me. Maurey mouthed, “Go on up.”
The eulogy. In the excitement of the last couple of days, I’d forgotten the eulogy.
Father Jack said, “Mr. Callahan.”
I was careful not to touch anything because my hand was starting to throb and I was afraid blood might ooze through the handkerchiefs and stain the oiled wood of the pulpit or the cloth that hung over the top. I said, “I met Pete Pierce the day President Kennedy was killed.”
Chet stared at me, unblinking. So did Roger, but his unblinking face sucked in light while Chet’s glowed with emotion. Like the difference between the moon and a black hole.
Nothing to do but plow ahead. “Pete must have been six or seven. He wanted to watch cartoons, but they weren’t on because of the assassination coverage. He and Maurey got into a fight and she smacked him in the nose.”
Maurey was frowning. It seemed awfully important not to disappoint her in this, which meant the story had to go somewhere, mean something.
“I realized then how a family works; the members of a family may fight like cats and dogs, and they almost never understand what the others want or feel, or who they are, but that doesn’t matter. What matters is the love that flows without reservation. Without doubt.”
Father Jack shifted his weight on the bench. I wondered what he thought of us behind that beard. Was it just another day’s work for him, like me at the golf cart plant?
“What else do I remember about Pete?” I asked myself and the congregation. Had to be something. “His mother. When Pete’s mother was sick all those years, he took care of her. Pete loved his mother very much.”
The people looked up at me, expecting more. I hadn’t yet said enough to quit. “After she died, he went to New York City and got a job in the theater, managing lights for plays and musicals.”
Chet had stopped watching me and was staring at the box of ashes. His eyes were striking. They showed more than the grief of separation. You could see that he’d received something permanent from Pete, something I had never felt with a woman—friend or lover. It came to me that the funeral wasn’t for Pete; it was for Chet.
“Pete Pierce was gay,” I said.
Maurey moved her hands into her lap. The three guys from New York rustled in their seats. I could tell from some faces farther back that not everyone had known. Instead of addressing the group, I spoke directly to Chet.
“Pete was proud of being gay, and I think that pride is why he chose me to say words about him today. He knew I wouldn’t pretend he was someone he wasn’t. He knew I wouldn’t skip over one of the central elements of his life.”
