“Her grandfather had died of kidney failure, nothing to do with a blow to the head, and it became apparent that careful attempts had been made to mask some ugly bruise.”

It was midway through the wake’s visiting hours, and the mortuary’s tiny chapel had grown crowded.  Alice made her way through the jumble of mourners to the open casket’s side.  Her grandfather lay in it on his back, dressed in his beloved fly fishing garb, his rimless glasses perched slightly crooked over closed eyelids.  She choked back a sob before noticing a bluish tinge through extra thick makeup near the left temple of her grandfather’s face.  Her eyebrows were knit as she realized the edges of the tinge were almost purple.  Her grandfather had died of kidney failure, nothing to do with a blow to the head, and it became apparent that careful attempts had been made to mask some ugly bruise.

            Alice turned on her heel and hurried through the crowd into the foyer, where she found the mortician standing discreetly in an office doorway with his hands clasped at the waist of his black suit.  She strode over to him, narrowed her glare until his eyes met hers, and hissed, “What the hell happened to my grandpa’s face?”

            His eyes traveled anxiously around the smattering of guests in the foyer, resettled on her, and motioned her into the office.  He followed, closed the door partway, glanced through its opening, then looked back at her with his mouth in a tight line.  His forehead creased with unease.

“Well?” she demanded.

            “I’m afraid there was a bit of an accident.”  His voice was hardly more than a whisper, and Alice had to lean forward to hear him.  “In the preparation room.”  The mortician was a tall, middle-aged man with thinning hair and a long neck in which his Adam’s apple plunged several times before he said, “He fell off the table.  I had an awful time trying to get that fishing vest on him, and…he slipped.”  His unsteady voice fell even further.  “That’s never happened to me before.  I’m terribly sorry.”

            The sounds from the foyer became a murmur of white noise as Alice felt herself blinking rapidly.  A heat had risen behind her ears.  The corners of the mortician’s eyes brimmed, and his lips trembled as he mumbled, “I’m so terribly sorry.  I did my best to cover…”

            Then he began whimpering; his head lowered and turned away.  Suddenly, an image of her grandfather twenty years before, strong and vital, casting from the shallows beside their family’s old river cabin, invaded Alice’s mind.  She’d always marveled at the practiced precision of his movements with the rod, his strict, solitary concentration with its calm stillness.  In the image, the blue hour had begun, and a hatch of mayflies hovered over the tumbling water in slanted shafts of the dwindling sun; her grandfather’s face was lit by the sun, too, awash with quiet, reverential joy.

            The mortician sniffed loudly.  Alice swallowed, reached out her hand, and gently rubbed his shoulder.  “It’s all right,” she said softly.  “It doesn’t matter.  Don’t worry.”

Don’t Worry

By William Cass

William Cass has published over 325 short stories. He's been a Best Small Fictions, Best of the Net, and six-time Pushcart nominee. His two short story collections were published by Wising Up Press.

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