Chapter 45
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
HAILEY
S ometimes it takes figuratively weathering a size-twelve boot with worn treads and the laces too tight to understand someone. Navigating this loss, walking in my dad’s shoes, I finally fathom it. Grief is claustrophobic and agonizing.
A soldier’s coffin is draped in a flag while the elderly are decorated with flowers. Dean’s is covered in pictures. I pick one up of him as a toddler. Chocolate smears his right cheek and mischief dances in his eyes. I set it back down next to the one of him with a cherry-red Strider bike, his helmet on too loose so it exposes his forehead. There are at least two dozen more painting his childhood memories… First steps, first tooth, first grade, first dance. Madison hangs on his arm for that one, and if it wasn’t completely inappropriate for a church, I’d shred it until there were no remnants left of that two-timing…
“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” Murphy’s burly voice booms.
“If God himself wouldn’t smite me for thinking it, then yes. That’s what I’m thinking,” I say.
“I think God has a sense of humor if you ask me. He was perfectly fine letting farmer Dan over there believe he’s going to get a woman looking the way that he does,” Ramirez says.
Daniels threads his thumbs through the straps of his overalls and winks back at him. “You’re lucky I wore a shirt under this.”
“You boys are terrible,” I say.
“You love us.” Jackson carries a set of folding chairs down the aisle, passing them off to Marshal and Ramirez to build another row beyond the front pew. We’re expecting a large turnout.
On his second trip, he hauls an easel up the altar steps and sets it up beside Dean’s mahogany casket. I’m grateful his parents decided to keep it closed. I’d rather remember my friend’s beautiful spirit than a waxy replica of his body.
Jackson places a framed portrait of the Iron Summit crew in the mount, and my eyes immediately find Reed. An ache spreads from my chest down my limbs until my whole body feels it.
“You miss him, don’t you?” Marshall places a comforting hand on my arm. He’s always been the sensitive one.
I clear my throat. “Of course I do. Dean was my best friend.” A tear slips from my eye and I quickly wipe it with my sleeve.
“I meant Morgan,” Marshall clarifies. “No offense, McCafferty.” He taps the lid of Dean’s casket.
“Well, Reed Morgan is a hard guy not to miss,” I admit.
Murphy unfolds and straightens the last of the chairs. “Have you heard from him?”
I shake my head. I saw the look in his eyes when we got off that helicopter. It’s the same look he gave me when I told him I couldn’t leave town with him. He’s not coming back.
“Don’t count him out yet,” my dad whispers, brushing past me and setting up a microphone on the opposite side of the easel .
“Does anyone know what’s happening at this thing anyway? I’ve only ever been to old people’s funerals,” Daniels says.
“Expect a lot of He died before his time and God takes the good ones too young .”
“Wow, Ramirez. I didn’t know you were so religious,” Daniels teases.
“My grandmother is Catholic.”
“And I didn’t know Catholics were so LGBTQ+ positive,” Murphy mutters.
Ramirez rolls his eyes. “Well, you’re not supposed to use birth control or get divorced either and she had one kid and three husbands. All religious people live their own version of the church they belong to.”
“Let’s maybe not do this in a place of worship,” I say to them.
“Oh, I’m sorry, Hayes,” Ramirez says. They’ve all taken to calling me that ever since they heard my dad do it. “Gentlemen”—he snaps his fingers—“let’s give the lady some space so she can get her prayer on.”
“It starts at five and there’s an open mic,” I remind them. “I better see all of you in one of those front-row seats and on your best behavior.”
I can imagine it now. This is their first break since the season ended and most of them have already spent forty-eight hours at the local tavern. The last thing Dean’s family needs is for the crew to show up to this thing plastered.
“Yes, Mother.” Daniels salutes me.
They slowly filter out the back chapel door until I’m left in the room alone.
A picture of Dean and me eating pizza on my bed catches my eye. I run my fingers over the edges, wishing I could will that moment into existence one more time. It hurts not having him here .
I set it back down and swipe at the fresh stream of tears drifting down my cheeks. It’s weird talking to a box, but it might be my only moment left alone with him. So, I sit down a little way away from his casket and close my eyes. If Dad can talk to Mom, I can do this too. I pretend Dean’s standing in front me, listening to the goodbye I should have given him when I left McCall.
“Do you remember what you said to me the first time we met? Is this seat taken? It sat empty for years before you moved to town, and it never really bothered me all that much because I was used to the seats around me being empty.
“There was always one at my kitchen table and the rocking chair on our front porch. Our couch cushions didn’t have any imprints until you came along and filled them. You took up space in my world, and it wasn’t until that day on the bus that I started to notice when a chair next to me remained empty.”
I peep around to the endless rows of vacant folding chairs stretching out on either side of me.
“Later this afternoon, these chairs will fill with people who love you. People whose lives you mattered in and ones who will feel the void you left behind. People like me. But I’m scared that without you, like the last four years of my life, the seat next to me will always feel empty.”
I fall forward on my elbows and cover my face with my hands. The weight of all he left behind pulls at the roots that once made me feel deeply grounded. I know I can’t fall apart at this funeral. I have people I need to be strong for, so I let myself do it now. I feel everything all at once, as if a wave came along and swept me under the current and out to sea. I’m drowning, silently drifting away, until a voice whispers, “Is this seat taken?”