Hearse
“Are you gonna keep doing that?” Harper barked, finally showing some emotion. Doreen didn’t reply;She was still a little off in her own world continuing to tap. “Dori?” Harper asked calmly. Doreen could be spacey at times,but not at a moment like this. “Doreen!” she snapped. Doreen finally paid attention, “What? What’s wrong?”. “You… you were tapping. And then you just spaced off again. I need you here,Dori, like actually here”. “What are you talking about? I am here, I’m just a little caught up in my thoughts. Maybe you could feel something for once. God, you’re like a robot who doesn’t feel anything!”. Another bit of silence ensued. Doreen went back to tapping. She felt it was helping her breathe and keeping her from bawling her eyes out for days on end. “I’m not a robot!” Harper spat, slapping her hands down onto her thigh. She sighed heavily,hoping to calm herself down, but she only felt anger. “I do have feelings”. “What feelings? Anger? That’s probably the reason we’re in this mess—” “We don’t know that, we don’t know why, or even how. Maybe if you were truly present we would not be sitting here waiting in this parlor...” Harper trailed off, tears finally falling down her cheeks. “You can’t just blame it all on me, ” she sobbed. Again, another silence fell over them. The couple sat on a sturdy blue plastic bench. Close enough that their thighs were touching, but the two women were still far apart. One of them, the older-looking one, wore a black blazer that was tailored to fit just right and high heels that made the already tall woman tower over her peers. Pinned to her shirt was a name tag that read Harper. She had frown lines around her mouth, the sort of lines one could only receive if you had been scowling all your life. Overall, she remained composed while sitting here waiting for the end of her life. Her counterpart, Doreen was quite the opposite; her hair was unkempt and her clothes looked slept in. Tears formed in her eyes that she would wipe away before they could travel down her pale cheeks. The younger woman looked as if she might be sick, or as if saying goodbye would send her into shock. She made a sweep of the room, stopping at the door expecting someone to walk through, and when no one did, she started tapping her fingers against the plastic bench. The older woman grimaced at the sound of the constant tap, tap, tapping. “Didn’t you hear me earlier?” Harper questioned. “Sorry,” the tapping slowed down,almost as if Doreen might stop, but instead she just tapped her leg slow and soft. The silence was almost worse than their arguing. Harper sighed heavily and looked around the room, stopping at the clock. What seemed to be an hour of waiting and talking was really only ten minutes. It wasn’t time for the committal, but Doreen hated to be late, and Harper took her time with everything so they left their house fifteen minutes early to ensure there would be no complications. And there weren’t. The car-ride over was filled with the same unbearable silence that was going on now. They hadn’t even turned the radio on. “If you hadn’t pushed him to be perfect, we wouldn't be here. I-I wouldn’t be spending his college money to rent a hearse,” Doreen screamed as the pallbearers’s office door creaked open. Harper looked at her shoes. Embarrassed by what her wife had just said screamed, she stood up from the bench. She looked back at Doreen, whose face was a light red, and she offered her hand. The doors to the funeral home opened, springing to life as Harper pressed the silver button to get in, her hands full. Doreen was a few steps behind carrying nothing, her hands-free. Now they were running behind, but they walked in silence to where the celebration of life was held. The walls were a sea green with a complimenting carpet that covered the long hallways and the chapel. The women walked close to each other, Doreen still a few steps behind. Doreen was a shorter woman compared to her wife, but she still kept up on their walk to the chapel. No one else was there. Harper’s legs were reaching farther past the pews leaving Doreen behind now. She grabbed the photo of their son off the easel hurrying as she snatched the rest of their things. “You know, I’m sure the hearse and the rest of the cars will follow. We can slow down, take our time, get there when it’s okay. When you’re okay. Harper?”. There was no response. Since the meeting, Harper had been eerily quiet. Normally there was yelling, but today nothing. Just as fast as Harper had come in, she was out the doors. Doreen trailing behind her. “Please, just please talk to me”. Harper’s head turned around, as if she was ready to talk but then her head quickly turned right back and headed for their car. Their car. Doreen didn’t bother trying to help her. She instead went straight for the Hearse. Unfortunately, there was only one seat, and Doreen was going to take the spot. “Hey! What do you think you’re doing?” Harper’s face was red. “Getting into the hearse. There isn’t room for both of us”. “I—“ she stopped for a minute. “Fine, you go in there, but there is no us. Not anymore”. Harper stormed off. Doreen slammed the hearse door as she got in.
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March 2021
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