The Dead Romantics (70)

“Well”—Seaburn extended a hand toward the front door—“see for yourself.”

I walked up the pathway to the front steps, and hesitantly opened the front door—and stopped dead in my tracks. Because two of the three parlor rooms were full of flowers. Not just any flowers—wildflowers. All separated by color in clear glass vases. There must have been . . . there must have been a thousand of them.

I was baffled. “How . . . how did . . .”

Mom came out of the red parlor room, where Dad’s casket sat. “Oh, Florence! Aren’t all these flowers lovely?”

“Who . . . how did . . . when—”

Then Heather stepped out of one of the parlor rooms, wiping her hands off on a handkerchief. What was she doing here? I began to ask that exact thing when she outstretched her hand to me and said, “Your dad was a good man. We will always want to help when we can. And you were right. But people change. Even me.”

I looked down at her hand, then at her again. “You . . . did this?”

“Dana helped me,” Heather replied, not retracting her hand, waiting. “We organized donations last night and this morning to buy and deliver the flowers needed. I’m sorry,” she added.

I didn’t know if she was telling the truth, or if she had some ulterior motives—to look better if word got out about our confrontation? To paint me as the spoiled woman who never grew up? See? Heather did change, it was Florence who couldn’t let the past die!

Or . . . maybe that was my brain being cold and bitter. Thinking everyone had an ulterior motive when maybe, this was just what it looked like.

I took her hand. “Thank you,” I said.

We shook.

Then she took the vase of blue wildflowers and disappeared into the blue parlor room. Mom motioned for me to come into the viewing room when I was ready.

Seaburn elbowed me in the side. “Go see your old man so we can open up the house.”

“Yeah, I should.”

I breathed out a long breath, steeling my shoulders. One step at a time. Carver and Alice were waiting inside the red parlor room—Dad’s favorite room—and outstretched their hands to me. I took them, and squeezed them tightly, and together we walked up to the dark mahogany casket decorated in wildflowers of blues and reds and yellows and pinks, to begin to figure out how to say goodbye.

The afternoon was a blur of people drifting in and out of the funeral home, shaking my hand and giving me their condolences. Casseroles began to pile up in the refrigerator in the kitchen, and more than one bottle of champagne was spilled on the hardwood floors. The entire town was here, crowded into the old Victorian house and across the lawn, in their best black clothes. They paid their respects to Dad one at a time, and the three Day siblings stood off to the side, our hands clasping one another’s, keeping ourselves upright. Mom was stalwart, sipping on a glass of champagne, so gracious to everyone who came to say their goodbyes.

“Of course he’d be buried in that god-awful red suit,” Karen said, dabbing her eyes so her makeup wouldn’t run. “Of course he would.”

“Alice did a great job,” John said, in his best black boater shorts, black shirt, and pizza hat. “Looks like he’s still kickin’.”

Someone else said, “He was so proud of you.”

And everyone else just went by in a blur. I barely registered their faces.

“You three are the best kids an undertaker could have.”

“So proud.”

“Great guy.”

“He was so proud.”

“Such a good man.”

My bottom lip wobbled, but I bit it to keep myself firm. Whenever I felt myself giving way, Carver would squeeze my hand tightly, as if to ask, Do you need a moment? And I would squeeze back that I was okay, and tighten my grip on Alice’s hand, too. The world spun on, and we were still here.

When the last of the visitors finally left, including Mrs. Elizabeth in a pretty pink suit because, she said, “Black isn’t my color,” with her ghostly husband in tow, I closed the front door and locked it. The smell of the wildflowers was so overpowering, we elected to keep some of the windows cracked to air the place out. But even with them open, the funeral home felt so quiet, I almost couldn’t stand it. Mom busied herself in the red parlor room, picking up the dried flowers off the ground and situating the wildflower vases. The arrangements wouldn’t be moved until tomorrow, when we had the graveside service, and I had to wonder how we’d get all of these damn flowers hauled over to the cemetery.

I leaned back against the front door and breathed out a long breath.

“Everything okay?”

I glanced up toward the voice. Ben was standing awkwardly in the middle of the foyer, his hands again in his pockets. I hadn’t seen him since he disappeared on the Ridge, and I felt instantly better just seeing him. His presence was a balm.

“You missed all the fun,” I said in greeting, wiping the edges of my eyes. Thankfully I’d worn waterproof eyeliner today.

He glanced around. “The wake . . . is over already? How long was I gone?”

“A few hours,” I replied. The Ridge felt like an elephant in the room. What had he been about to say? What would he have wished for?

“Are you okay?” he asked, worried. “I mean—that’s the wrong question. Is . . . is there anything I can do?”