“I asked what you planned to do for her funeral?” Penciled in eyebrows crashed together in a wavy line.
I fought the rising panic at what my answer might cause. It was a cruel kind of irony that Nana passed so close to her favorite holiday.
Another sign of bad luck.
They were stacking up high enough to urge me to get out of here as fast as possible.
Nana wanted me to spend three months here, but how could I when every sign pointed me toward Boston? “I’m not having a funeral. Nana wanted to be cremated.” Declan had given me the paperwork with her last wishes after I wrapped things up with Ronan. “She always talked about having a celebration of life event at the pub when she passed.”
“Oh.” Her cup rattled on the table when she set it down. “I suppose if that’s what she wanted…”
“It was.” That tone, right there, was why Mom always felt trapped here.
Gossip and judgment were too easy to be unleashed when everyone knew everyone else.
There was no such thing as privacy in a town like Clover Hill.
My breathing hitched as my mind crashed back to last night and my flirtations with Finn.
Even that little escapade risked landing me in the gossip spotlight.
“It was great meeting you, but I should get going. Mr. Devaro is expecting me.” And I had to get away from the feeling of prying eyes and nosy questions.
No one considered themselves nosy here. It was just life.
And they were the reason Mom always told me to get out of Clover Hill.
She wanted me to find the peace she never found and experience a bigger life than what this place offered.
It didn’t matter that I’d never minded the closeness of the community.
I’d never found myself on the wrong side of the gossip tree.
Easy enough to avoid when you’re a kid, unless you were the type to be in trouble all the time.
If the woman said anything else, it never reached me.
I powered my way to the funeral home, met with Mr. Devaro, and was reassured that everything was in order and Nana would be ready to take home in a matter of days.
He asked if I’d like to see her.
How was I supposed to answer?
Saying yes felt a little too macabre, and yet saying no might represent some kind of reluctance that would give him pause.
I scrambled for an answer that felt true to myself. “I’d rather remember her the way she was. Seeing her…like that,” I waved vaguely toward the back rooms where I’d attended Mom’s funeral. “She wouldn’t like it. Too undignified.” That’s what she’d told me the last time we spoke. She disliked the whole idea of a funeral where people could gawk at her and touch her like she’d become some sort of curiosity.
Leave it to Nana to come up with something like that.
I hadn’t argued with her. No point. Nana knew her mind and what she wanted. I just had to honor her wishes.
“Very well.” Mr. Devaro, a whip-thin man with a bald head and wide spectacles stood and held out a manicured hand. “I’ll give you a call once she’s ready. Should be tomorrow morning.”
Like she was getting ready for a party. I suppose she was, in a way. A party at the pub. One last hoorah.
“Thank you.” I shook his hand and beat a hasty retreat, stopping outside to suck in deep lungfuls of clean air to drive out the heinous odor of dead things lingering in my sinuses.
My stomach pitched in a series of nauseating rolls that forced me to cover my mouth and swallow hard. I could not puke in the bushes outside the funeral home.
