Last Dodo Bird (eBook)

SHE’S GONE

All day the word surreal kept spinning inside his head. He had mostly heard the word used by distraught witnesses to a tragic or bizarre occurrence. The wide-eyed witnesses on the TV news would describe what they had seen as surreal. Odd, he thought. The word is seldom used in everyday language, only when something catastrophic happens; even something horrific. Yesterday on the telephone, he was informed of his own tragic, surreal event, and amid the swirling maelstrom of that awful conversation, he needed to process and comprehend only five potent words:

Mary • work • aneurysm • hospital • dead

Sean Rousseau’s life, the one he had known with Mary for the last twenty years, was over. Hearing those five words, he entered into his own private state of surrealism. The pain of missing Mary would come later, as the reality of her passing sank in. Mary died on Monday in the early afternoon. On Tuesday, he, along with Mary’s two daughters, Judith and Angela, met with the funeral director to make the necessary arrangements. The three sat like stone statues across the desk from the director, answering questions that he read in a dry, monotone voice, from a sheet of paper. Other than the three informing him that they had all agreed there would be no post-cemetery gathering for friends and well-wishers, as they were too heartbroken, nothing more was said between them.

Mary’s wake was held the next day, on Wednesday, at a funeral home near where Sean and Mary had lived together. Visiting hours were between 4:00 and 8:00 p.m., but due to Mary’s many friends and admirers, the wake lasted well past 10:00.

Angela and Judith stood at the head of the receiving line, right next to their mother’s casket, and alongside them were Sean and Judith’s husband, Charlie.

Sean greeted such an endless flow of people that at times their faces became a blur. Whenever that occurred, he’d leave the reception line, walk to Mary’s open casket, and gaze down upon her. Even in death, her beauty was radiant. She looked like she was asleep, peaceful and happy, with rosary beads wrapped around her hands resting at her waist. But she also looked lifeless. Mary’s spirit was gone.

She was dressed in her favorite black dress. The daughters had asked him to select it. “Sean, about Mom’s favorite dress… well… you know better than us what that is.” And so, he had chosen the black dress that she had always worn at parties and special events. As Mary had always said, “It’s great for any occasion.”

Continuing to look upon her, he stared at the exquisite jewelry he had selected for her to wear. A brilliant yellow gold necklace inset with a stunning 3-karat green emerald. The emerald was semi-wrapped in a gold leaf accompanied by a luminous pearl. On her left hand, she wore a sparkling sapphire ring encircled by diamonds. Looking at the ring, he remembered the day he bought it for her.

“Sean, everyone has a diamond ring,” she had scoffed coyly. “I want something different, like a sapphire. Of course, there will have to be a few diamonds around the sapphire,” smiling at him, knowing he would not deny her anything.

And that much was certainly true; as far as he was concerned, Mary could have anything she wanted. The ring signified their relationship was permanent, regardless they would never marry. He was Catholic and divorce was not a consideration.

Eventually, the wake came to an end, and everyone was gone, except for Sean, Charlie, Judith, and Angela.

The funeral director walked over solemnly and began outlining the next day’s events. “First, the priest will say prayers over the casket; after that the casket will be closed. Then we will proceed on to the church for the funeral mass, and finally the funeral procession to the cemetery.”

The four listened with their heads bowed, each lost in their own thoughts.

When the funeral director finished, Sean said his goodbyes to Angela and Judith, silently acknowledged Charlie with a nod as he headed for the door, and drove home. In a daze, he entered the house, sat on the couch, and mindlessly watched television. Ten minutes later, he turned off the TV, brushed his teeth, changed into his pajamas, and went to bed.

Early the next morning after a restless night’s sleep, he woke to begin what would be one of the worse days of his life. Sitting on the edge of the bed, staring blankly at the wall, he muttered to himself, “Mary’s last day.”

It would be the last day he’d ever see Mary; he couldn’t get the thought out of his mind; the finality of it all. It just can’t be real, he kept thinking.

Mary cannot be dead.

Only four days earlier they had enjoyed themselves over a delightful dinner at a romantic restaurant in the nearby Village of Skaneateles.

How can this be?

He attempted to have breakfast, scanning the cupboard and the inside of the refrigerator for something palatable, but couldn’t decide on anything. He showered, dressed in his black suit, and drove to the funeral home, where he parked the car, walked slowly towards the entrance, and went inside.

Angela and Judith were already there, as well as many of Mary’s friends. Sean nodded hello to the girls. Their eyes were puffy, and their eye makeup smeared. He sat quietly beside Angela, Judith sitting on the other side of her, and Charlie next to Judith. The room was thick with the moist aroma of flowers, the fragrance emanating from dozens of elaborate bouquets that seemed to surround the casket like a multicolored halo.

He was sure the daughters were thinking the same as him. Shortly their Mother’s casket would be closed, never to see her again. Both were softly weeping, tears running down their cheeks.

The priest entered the room, paid his condolences to the daughters, and said prayers over Mary’s casket. Finished, he paid his condolences once again, and left. A staff member of the funeral home walked to the podium and began announcing the procession order to the church.

During the announcement, the funeral director pulled Sean aside. “Mr. Rousseau,” he whispered hoarsely, “Do you want the jewelry removed before we close the casket?”

“Look, it’s her jewelry, and stays with her! End of story!” Sean stammered, rising to the reality of the moment before slipping back into his dreamlike state, dismissive of the several turned heads his brief outburst had caused.

“Of course.” The funeral director nodded, motioning with a white-gloved hand for the casket to be closed.

Once outside, Charlie, Angela, Judith, and Sean stepped into the limo, and sat there quietly, waiting for everyone else to get into their cars. Within a few minutes, the funeral procession slowly began moving towards St. Joseph’s Church.

Judith and Angela wept, dabbing their eyes with moist pink tissues. Sean wished he could say something to comfort them, but he was too distraught himself to find the words. Charlie just gazed out the window with a blank look on his face.

The limo arrived at the church and parked behind the hearse. The pallbearers climbed out of the hearse and walked to the back. One of the pallbearers opened the back door, while some unseen individual inside the hearse pushed Mary’s casket rearward. The pallbearers lifted the casket from the vehicle and with the customary reverence reserved for such occasions, ponderously carried it up the steps to the church’s entrance. There they placed it onto the gleaming stainless steel carrier covered by a white linen sheet.

Sean, the daughters, and Charlie exited the limo, and trudged up the stone steps of the church, arms interlocked. Once all four were inside the church, the priest walked around the casket saying prayers. When he finished, the funeral director pushed the casket towards the altar, the pallbearers marching alongside, with the four following close behind. Once the casket was positioned at the center of the altar, they were directed to the front pew to be seated. A few minutes later the mass began.

Sean was oblivious to his surroundings. He felt as though he was in a daze frozen in time; still very deep in the grasp of the powerful sense of the surrealness of this whole scene. The only thing he would later remember, after this excruciating ordeal was finally over, was Mary’s friends, one by one, standing at the podium sharing their fond remembrances of her. But what stung him the most was the way they all talked in the past tense, a chilling reminder Mary was no longer alive. His mind reeled with denial.

This just doesn’t seem right.

This cannot be real.

Mary can not be dead.

And as the melancholy funereal music echoed in the high rafters of the church, Sean was simply not yet ready to believe it.

The mass ended, the funeral director stepped into the aisle, and began to push the casket towards the church entrance. Sean, Judith, Angela, and Charlie followed, walking two by two behind. Mary’s friends followed them, each of them stepping into the aisle as the casket passed their pews.

Back once again at the front doors, the pallbearers stepped forward, lifted the casket off the carrier, and slowly carried it down the church steps and placed it inside the black hearse.

Is it really possible that it was Mary’s body inside that casket?

Is she really gone?...