InsaneJournal

Marcie carried the tote bag nervously in her hands as she pushed open the door to Western Funeral Home and stepped inside.

She hadn't had a lot of contact with death in her life. Her dad's brother had died in a motorbike collision when she was very young. She remembered the casket, everyone in black, but she'd never been allowed to look inside. When she was at high school, a teacher had passed away from a heart problem. A lot of girls had sat together and cried loudly and dramatically, even those who only days before had been bitching about him and saying he was useless. Marcie hadn't cried. She'd loathed that teacher, and she wasn't about to start pretending otherwise. And having dealt with death on a more personal level through miscarriage, she'd felt separated from all the others who mourned.

The loss of her pregnancy had been difficult. She hadn't cried much then either, not like she had when her boyfriend had left her. She'd seen it, in the hospital, for a moment as it was being taken away in a kidney dish. It wasn't grown enough to be something, but it wasn't nothing either. And although she had come to resent the being growing inside her as the catalyst to her troubles, she had also started wanting it too.

Like she had wanted Tragos. Like she had started harbouring tiny, unformed dreams, where Tragos didn't have to leave her for days on end, and maybe they ran an auto shop together, and had a funny little dog, and wore matching wedding bands on their fingers. Not something, but not nothing either.

All such thoughts were gone now, scattered like leaves in the wind. Now she was anxious about Kaden, halfway across the country, desperate to not be alone. And Tragos, who could never be touched by loneliness again.

She walked softly up to a reception desk, and looked about. The room had a hushed feel, so when she lightly touched the top of the service bell, the ding it made seemed very loud.