Leveled by grief and with professional obligations she opted to fulfill instead of wallowing in it, Rita told Alfonso’s sister to make the arrangements.
“No churches, no funeral homes is all I ask, Lexie. Party, casual.”
The Boys and Club waived their no alcohol policy because Alfonso and Rita had been writing them fat checks for years.
Lexie called and said Billy wanted to put a pint of Jaeger in the casket.
Rita loved the idea, though she thought Billy must be grieving pretty hard too if he was going to buy a pint of Jaeger and not drink it.
On top of that, Billy had given Rita an idea.
The day of the party--Rita demanded it not be called a service or a memorial-- it took her two hours to dredge up the guts to approach her husband, prone, in the fancy box.
A bottle of Jaeger, a few beers and a broken hockey stick had found their way in.
Rita turned toward the assembled friends, pulled a small vial from her pocket.
Harold, from Research and Development, jammed two fingers against his lower teeth and whistled so piercingly that everyone shut up.
“Fonzie always wanted a pool,” Rita said. “First the kids were too little, then I made some lame excuse about insurance premiums. Obviously, he never got the pool he wanted. So I’m gonna pour this chlorine on him as a way of apologizing. Thank you all for coming.”
Rita turned, pulled the cork from the vial and poured the chemical on her dead husband’s chest.
The crowd cheered, laughed, applauded.
Rita, her back to them, yelled “What the fuck?”
She placed the vial back in her pocket, leaned farther over the casket and reached in with both arms.
“Dammit, Lexie,” she said, accidentally loud enough for her sister-in-law to hear.
Lexie slowly approached the casket and Rita. Whatever Rita was doing she wasn’t sure she wanted to know.
With a yank that made the casket stand wobble a bit, she got what she wanted and turned to face the crowd.
Her eyes found Lexie.
“His high school class ring? Let me tell you something about Bishop Worley High School.”
“ About ten years ago they asked Alfonso if he would give the commencement speech at graduation. It was, he said, one of the proudest moments of his life. My husband, as many of you know, has three patents for tomosynthesis components. And they bumped him from the commencement speech when Giselle Ardmore’s crappy pop-country song made it to number one. Fuck them.” She flipped the ring to her sister-in-law. “Pawn that thing.”
She faced her husband again, pulled the pint of Jaeger that was tucked into the padding, said a quick Hail Mary and took a swig.
***
Photo by Lavi Perchik on Unsplash
❤️❤️
HA!