We’re so sorry, sweetheart. But last-minute international flights are just exorbitantly expensive, and to be honest, funerals are terribly emotionally exhausting. This is simply too trivial a matter to completely ruin a non-refundable family vacation.
Too trivial.
The phrase sliced through my consciousness like a serrated blade. The burial of my entire world was an inconvenience. A buzzkill.
As the mahogany and the white wood finally began their agonizing descent into the earth, my phone buzzed against my hip. I slowly withdrew it from my pocket.
Mother: When you’re finished dealing with all that gloom, call me. We have something very important we need to discuss regarding the estate.
I stared at the glowing screen until the harsh white light fractured into blurry streaks.
Daniel’s younger sister, Elise, stepped to my side holding a black umbrella. She tracked my gaze to the screen, her tear-streaked face instantly hardening into a mask of pure disgust. “Is it them?” she whispered, her voice laced with venom.
I offered a single, microscopic nod.
“Do not answer that, Clara. Let them rot in the sun.”
“I won’t,” I replied, my voice sounding as though it belonged to a stranger—hollow, raspy, and entirely devoid of warmth.
Not yet.
Three agonizing days bled away before I found myself standing in the foyer of my utterly silent house. The stillness was suffocating. Beside the front door, Lily’s bright yellow rain boots sat perfectly aligned, their rubber surfaces still speckled with dried mud from her last puddle-jumping expedition. On the kitchen counter by the sink, Daniel’s favorite chipped ceramic coffee mug waited for a refill that would never come. My universe had violently ceased to exist, yet the mail carrier still dropped off junk catalogs, the electricity bill arrived on time, and the world’s cruelty continued its unyielding rotation.
As the clock struck seven that evening, heavy, impatient fists hammered against my front door. It wasn’t the tentative knock of a mourning neighbor bringing a casserole. It was a demand for entry.
I slowly turned the deadbolt and pulled the door inward.
My parents stood on the porch, bathed in the amber glow of the porch light. They were dressed in expensive, wrinkled linen resort wear, their skin baked to an irritated crimson. Mason lounged against the hood of their rented luxury SUV in the driveway, his thumbs furiously scrolling through his smartphone, utterly disinterested in his surroundings.
My mother didn’t wait for an invitation. She simply bulldozed past me, dragging the scent of coconut sunscreen and stale airplane air into my foyer. “Well, finally. God, Clara, you look absolutely dreadful. Have you even slept?”
My father stepped in behind her, his eyes immediately darting around the living room, taking inventory of the furniture. “Let’s skip the pleasantries. Where is the insurance paperwork?”
I blinked. Slowly. The sheer, unadulterated audacity of the question took a moment to fully process. “Excuse me?”
My mother dropped her oversized designer handbag onto my entryway table with a heavy thud. “Oh, don’t play the fragile, weeping widow with us, Clara. We’re your family. We know Daniel had a substantial life insurance policy. The payout from an accident like that, involving a commercial vehicle? It must be astronomical.”
