She’d try to change my ways every time Ella and I would visit her and Ah Gong in Singapore, and she always made us and Mom promise we’d get closer to God whenever we were about to fly back home.
I guess this is what I get for breaking that promise.
Grandma disagreed with everything myah masaid.
Our father’s mom wasn’t so much the religious type, but she was spiritual. Apart from my sister, she’s the only person in my family line who was cremated.
She’d tell us all the time that the worst thing we could do was end our existence in a box. We were made from the earth, and we should give back to the earth, not trap ourselves in stone to be kept on display like entertainment.
No one agreed to her demand to dig a hole in the backyard, wrap her body in some rag, then throw her in. So we settled on sprinkling her ashes around the forest surrounding the manor. It was Ella who did it. There was no way it would’ve been me. They had a special bond.
I still loved Grandma though—she was the only true mother figure I had.
Sure, she was always yelling at me for being forgetful, or not listening, or talking back, but she’d always let me have a single treat from the cookie jar afterward. She always said it wasn’t a reward but a reminder that, at the end of the day, we were still family, and we’d never turn our backs on one another.
As a child, hearing that would tear me apart. Because how could Grandma think that while the woman who birthed me demanded I eat in a different room than them. Then I’d come running back and see Grandma and Ella gardening, smiling,and laughing, showing each other the different things that had grown while I was locked away in my bedroom.
Grandma and I never had anything to bond over. I was always desperate for that one thing that would make us smile and laugh like she did with my sister.
I’ve lost my chance to find it, but I’ll finally have something she’d relate to. I’ll be in a hole in the earth, covered in rags.
I stare at my milky, unseeing eyes and my mouth, frozen in an eternal scream. My skin is greener, with shades of brown, and rounded with bloat.
Everyone always told me I had my mother’s eyes. I’ve always disagreed until today. I see it now. It’s there in the emptiness, that hollow nothing. I suppose I am my mother’s daughter, bitter and deceitful. I’m glad Ella doesn’t look like her.
Taking a deep breath through my mouth, I lower the white cloth back over my face and take my time folding the sheet around my corpse until I’m swaddled like a baby. The only thing I feel when the fabric slips through my hand is frustration. But when I can’t touch my own body?
A tremor works through me as I gaze down at the only real evidence I ever existed. I entered this world with purpose and left inconsequential. Everyone saw it coming, but it stings all the same.
No one will miss me. This isn’t a feeling or a biased opinion. This is a fact. No one is going to miss me now that I’m gone.
No one will mourn my death but me.
Mom and Dad won’t.
Megan might’ve, but truthfully, she and I both know I died the night Ella did. This was inevitable. I would never have taken the steps to end it, but I wouldn’t have stopped nature from taking its course.
I work my jaw and mentally count down from ten to give myself what I need to keep going. I can’t even utter the words,“Rest in peace,” because I know fate is never going to be kind enough to let that happen.
But Ella deserves to have it, even if I don’t.
I bend down to grab my ankles, only for my hand to slip right through my own body. Gritting my teeth, I try again. This time, my fingers wrap around a solid surface. My grip is fickle at best, but I know I need to do this.
I shut my eyes and give myself another three seconds before pulling. This is what my life has become: dragging my own corpse by the feet through the remains of my family home.
I only manage a couple of feet before my corporeal legs thump onto the floor, right through my hands.
“Fuck,” I hiss, leaning over and attempting to grab them again.
I go through on the first try. Then the second, third, fourth, and fifth, but finally, I make it on the sixth.
But another couple of steps later, the loudbangof my heel hitting the wooden floor echoes through the hallway.
Why can’t I touch my own fucking body? How is this hard? I picked up that goddamn grimoire fine.
My eyes heat. I lean forward to snatch my ankles back up, andnothing. My corpse feels like fucking air beneath my fingertips, like I never existed. Snarling, I manage to grab my legs, only to lose my grip again seconds later.
“Stupid fucking—” I slam my hand over my mouth and inhale deeply before I start kicking my rotten corpse.
