You get the call, your breath catches in your throat. You're shocked.
You keep saying "no" and waiting for the "haha, just kidding, no one
died" but they never do.
It's real.
OMG.
What to do?
They're pulled over on the side of the road trying to breathe and you
are 30 minutes away, but you say "I'll come get you" and start walking
to your car.
They collect themselves and say okay, okay, I think I can drive home.
You say okay, if that changes, I'll come.
You walk back into the house, lead anvil in your chest.
You start calling family. You reach someone. You lose composure the
instant they answer. This is alarming, because now they think the exact
same thing you thought when you first got that phone call 15 minutes ago
(that your loved one was in a ditch bleeding). You want to reassure
them that you're okay but you're crying too hard to get the words out.
F*ck.
You make more phone calls, sobbing uncontrollably, but the second time
you have to say the words "___ died" you can at least get exactly two
words, and not one more, out at once without gasping.
After you get off the phone, your brain begins playing an instant
slideshow of every moment you had with the person who died. And then
every moment you were supposed to have together.
Your sweetie will come home.
You will cling to each other and sob.
You pack a bag. You don't know how long you will stay. You'll pack all
the wrong things anyway because it won't occur to you to check the
forecast.
It's bedtime, and you're exhausted, and in a state, and a little scared by the grip grief has on you.
You'll cry all night. You'll cry yourself to sleep, you'll sleep 1 half
cycle and wake up crying. You'll fall back asleep and wake up crying
again. This will happen for a few wretched hours.
You'll have weird dreams, dreams like the deceased getting a brand new
car that she was supposed to get as a present but never saw. This isn't
something that happened in real life but your brain will make it up as a
metaphor for all the missed chances.
This will all suck just as much as you imagined, and even more.
When you finally rise to face your horrid new reality, you won't
recognize yourself in the mirror. Your eyes will nearly be swollen shut.
You shrug. I guess I'll just be ugly now, you think.
You'll leave the dishes in the sink and drive.
You'll arrive at your father-in-law's house. He's in shock. You all
drive to the funeral home. No one knows what happens next, so you go to
the place where they've done this before.
You get out of the car and break down when you walk into the funeral home.
You'll turn away, embarrassed at your awful social skills. Whatever.
This is your life now. Not only are you now ugly, but also rude.
The funeral director walks you through what needs to happen next.
When do you want to have the funeral? The clock is ticking. Where should
it be? What cemetery? Do you have a plot? Let's make an appointment
with the cemetery, you can go there next.
The funeral director will talk about everything from the release forms
you must sign to transfer your loved one from the hospital where they
died to the funeral home, to the difference between an obituary and a
death notice.
You look at the line items.
It will cost more to run a death notice ($300/day) than have a limo take
you from the funeral to the cemetery ($150) during the service.
You'll spend 4 hours numbly talking logistics.
On the table are breath mints and tissues.
The furniture in the funeral home is just as old, dark and depressing as you'd imagine funeral home furniture to be.
Why didn't you order pizza? You're suddenly starving and dying of thirst.
(This is good practice, however, because you'll spend the next three days at appointments like this.)
You drive mechanically from the funeral home to the cemetery appointment.
A "family services counselor" discusses plots and pricing with you in skillfully sensitive ways.
They avoid referencing all the buried bodies and instead refer to regions of the cemetery as "occupied."
You learn that it's not enough to buy a casket, but that you have to buy
a "liner" too. Otherwise the earth sinks in and the ground cannot be
made level. Liners are thick AF. Some are "moisture proof" but those
cost more.
You can pay as much as you want for a casket and a liner. The cheapest option is a pine box for $700.
The fanciest caskets will cost $10k but a decent, average one is about
$3,500. (Later, in a dark mood, you will search Amazon and find the same
one for half price. The pine box is available in a do-it-yourself kit
for $350).
Eventually everything is done for the day and you leave and get into the back seat. Your phone battery is on 2%.
Everyone has been texting you to see if you're okay. You don't know what
to say. "Hanging in there," you write, wanting to be honest but not too
TMI.
And that is day 1.
