“The Lord taketh the best, sister,” my grandmother said. “He lived way beyond his threescore and ten.”
“Amen” and “Yes, Lord” went up from the assemblage.
“His life was a blessing to all,” said Pastor, just beyond the circle of Missionary Society women that surrounded Sister Morrisohn. “Yes, but I don’t want him to go,” wailed the widow.
My grandmother, that great old-time saint, had one arm across the widow’s back, massaging her. “Throw the rose, child,” my grandmother urged.
My own arm had somehow gotten trapped around the widow’s waist and I couldn’t snake it out of there without causing a disturbance as my grandmother’s bell of a stomach had pressed the hand flat against Sister Morrisohn’s ribs. Peachie Gregory watched it all from the other side of the hole.
“Throw the rose.”
Sister Morrisohn clutched the flower to her chest. “Can I see him one more time?”
“You shouldn’t, child,” replied my grandmother.
Sister Morrisohn said, “Please,” and the August wind blew aside her veil revealing her ears, each of which was twice pierced—before she had accepted the Lord, of course. “Please.”
My grandmother finally gave in and pulled away, muttering to herself, “Lord, Lord.” She crunched through the gravel in her flat-soled funeral slippers to Pastor and commanded him in a loud conspiratorial whisper to open the casket one more time.
“Amen” and “Yes, Lord” went up from the assemblage again.
When the groundskeeper, a burly man with a patch over one eye, leaned in to pull the levers that raised the coffin up from the hole, Sister Morrisohn took my hand and walked me over to the edge of the shiny box in which Brother Morrisohn lay.
His hair was neatly parted. His lips were fixed in a taut line. He had an expression on his face like a man dreaming about childhood. Sister Morrisohn fixed her husband’s dead fingers around the white rose. When she stepped back from the box, I stepped with her.
“Tha’s all?” said the man with the patch over his eye. A hand in a dirty work glove rested against the controls. “Y’all finish?”
“Yes,” said my grandmother. “You may lower it again.”
The man snorted, “Church folk.” As he set to work lowering the casket, he mouthed what may have been obscene words but we couldn’t hear him for the singing:
We are marching to Zion, beautiful, beautiful Zion,
We are marching upward to Zion, that beautiful city of God
I ushered Sister Morrisohn into the hearse already loaded with sisters from the Missionary Society. The widow squeezed my hand. “Thank you, Elwyn. He really cared about you. Your music meant so much to him.”
“Thank you. I’m glad.”
I remained by the door of the hearse because Sister Morrisohn yet held my hand. Should I tell her that Peachie Gregory was waiting for me, that we had planned to stop off at Char-Hut to finish our grieving over french fries and milkshakes? How does one break away from the recently bereaved?
I averted my eyes and in a sudden move wrenched my hand from her grasp. When I dared look again, the hand that had held mine was brushing at tears.
“Don’t forget about me, Elwyn.”
Strange music began to play in my head. Was my light-headedness a result of her flowery perfume? The memory of the shape and feel of her waist? God forgive me, I silently prayed, this is Brother Morrisohn’s widow. Brother Morrisohn, a man I loved.
“I won’t forget you,” I said.
When I got to my car, where Peachie awaited, I was breathing as though I’d just run a great distance.
“The church is going to be a sadder place without Brother Morrisohn,” I said as we drove to Char-Hut.
“Poorer,” Peachie answered distantly. Her forehead was beaded in perspiration despite the wind from the open window that animated her long braids. It was hot and my old Mazda didn’t have air-conditioning. “No more free rides for the Faithful. The candyman is gone.”
“At any rate,” I said, “I think we presented him a great tribute.”
“Especially your playing, Brother Elwyn. It brought tears.”
I ignored her sarcasm. “He was a great saint. He’ll be missed. I for one am going to miss him.”
“You and the widow both.”
“What?”
“Nothing.” Peachie continued to stare out her window. “I said nothing.”
She was not telling the truth—she had indeed said something, a something that unabashedly implied impropriety: You and the widow both. I may have been in love with Peachie, but I was not going to suffer her insolence. I had never been anything but a gentleman with any of the sisters at the church, Peachie and Sister Morrisohn included. How dare she intimate such a vile idea! Such a rude side of Peachie I had never encountered.
Was she jealous?
Just as I was about to chastise her for her un-Christlike behavior, my Mazda stalled.
“This old car,” she grumbled.
“God will give us grace,” I said, cranking the engine to no avail as the vehicle rolled to a stop in the middle of traffic. Other cars began blowing their horns, whizzing around us.
I got out. Peachie crawled into the driver’s seat. I popped the hood and jiggled the wire connecting the alternator to the battery. Peachie clicked the ignition at regular intervals. When her click matched my jiggle, the frayed end of the wire sparked in my hand and the engine came to life. I closed the hood and got back into the car, rubbing my hands. “That takes care of that.”
Peachie stared out the open window again. “I’m not hungry. Take me home.”
“Peachie—”
“Please, just take me home.”
I passed to the center lane to make a U-turn. The traffic light caught me. I floored the clutch and the gas pedals so that the car wouldn’t stall while we waited for the green. “You could at least tell me what I did to upset you.”
“Who said you upset me? I have serious things on my mind.” Serious things I had little doubt. She was jealous.
“Ever since you got into the car, you’ve been answering me curtly or ignoring me altogether. I thought we were friends.” The light changed.
I made the U-turn. “See there,” I said, “you can’t even look at me.”
“Says who?” She turned on me with angry eyes.
“Are you jealous of Sister Morrisohn?”
“Jealous of the fragile widow?”
“Are you jealous?”
“Now you’re being silly.” Peachie laughed. “Wait. Are you in love with Sister Morrisohn? You certainly seemed concerned about her at the funeral. And what—do you think she’s in love with you? She’s only about ten times your age.”
“You don’t have to be so mean to me. I just thought that maybe you felt threatened.”
Peachie stared at me with eyes that mocked. “And what—how can I feel threatened? Do you think, my dear brother in the Lord, that I possess any feelings for you other than the sincerest and purest friendship?” If she had been standing, Peachie’s hands would have been akimbo. “Did I forget to share with you that Barry McGowan has written to me several times from Bible College?”