They say the older you get the more weddings you go to and the more funerals as well.

I want there to be more weddings than funerals for Annabelle, but there aren’t so far.

The service for Gloria Mercy Lee was held on a Monday morning. Everyone in the village of Edelweiss came to see her for one last time before they buried her in the ground, right next to Phillip Solomon Lee, her husband.

I had never seen so many white flowers in my life. They surrounded her casket, hugging her, like a cloud. Inside of it she lay still, looking more asleep than dead. Annabelle picked the dress, she was quite adamant about it, so they don’t let her “Meet Jesus in some horrid thing. She’ll wear her favorite outfit.”

Gloria Lee wore a pearl necklace, a red and white striped dress, with her favorite sparkly red heels when she went to meet Jesus.

I didn’t know her, but somehow her death affected me more than when she was alive. I was oddly jealous of her. I could never imagine this many people coming to my funeral when I die.

I want to become someone like that.

Someone good.

I sit in the front pew, right near the casket, watching Annabelle talk to people, receive hugs, flowers, presents, money, tears. I’ve been here with Annabelle when her grandma died, when she picked out a casket, and today, right when the service started.

I’ve held her every night while she cries, and it breaks my heart because I know she no longer has a reason to stay in Edelweiss. She has more of a reason than ever to leave. The past few weeks she has seen nothing but death at the diner and in her own home.

Near the end of the service, right before it’s time to make the funeral procession to the cemetery, Charlie arrives.

He has two sets of flowers. One for Annabelle and one for Gloria Lee. Annabelle starts crying when she gets flowers from him and I stride over, trying to stop a scene from starting in public.

Charlie takes one look at me and gets tense.

“I’m not here to fight. I’m just here like everyone else. Please, Nicholas.”

“Where have you been,” I ask. “Why have you been ignoring her calls?”

“I don’t know. I think I was just scared.”

“She’s scared!”

I realize I’m shouting, and I try to control myself.

“It’s okay Nick,” Annabelle says. “I’m not angry. I’m just sad. I miss you Charlie.”

“I miss you too.”

He embraced her, fully in his arms and the back of my head started to tingle. I’m irrationally jealous of him still. I know he doesn’t want her but a part of me still thinks he does.

She takes him aside and they talk about something in private and I feel a little hurt. They hug again and I walk away, going outside to get some fresh air. Outside I see Evangeline, sitting on a bench outside near the parking lot.

Seeing a familiar face, I rush over.

“Oh my goodness it’s been so long since I’ve seen you,” she exclaimed. “Are you okay?”

“I should be asking you that,” I chuckled.

“No. I’m not honestly. I should’ve picked up the phone that night. It’s eating me alive. I was stupid and put my phone on silent. I should’ve checked it and-“

“Evangeline no one is perfect. You and Annabelle have to stop beating yourselves up over it.”

She nods and starts to cry while I rub her back.

“No one killed her. She had a stroke,” I explain. “The nearest hospital is far, she wouldn’t have made it anyway.”

“I know. I know. I know.”

She repeats the words over and over while she covers her face and I bring her in close. I let her cry and shake until she’s done. Now she’s embarrassed and scoots away from me.

“Sorry. Sorry,” she mumbles.

She scurries off and I don’t know what I did wrong.

----------------------------------------

After Mrs. Gloria Lee was buried in the ground, and Pastor Grant said a few last words, the funeral was finally over. As everyone streamed into the parking lot, a woman started walking towards Annabelle and I as if a fire was lit under her pants.

“Annabelle,” she shouts. “Wait!”

Annabelle and I stop in our tracks and the moment she gets close I feel like I’m seeing into the future. She’s the spitting image of Annabelle, just twenty years older.

Annabelle cannot comprehend what is happening and neither can I. She falls to her knees and starts screaming an intelligible noise. Charlie dashes over to where we are, and he picks her up while she’s still screaming.

Once she stops screaming, we can finally understand what she’s saying.

“Get out.”

“Go away.”

She refuses to leave and instead begs Annabelle to talk to her.

“Please Annabelle. Please. I’m so sorry. Please. I promise it will be different this time,” the woman said.

Annabelle breaks free from Charlie and runs to her car. She gets in and peels out of the parking lot. The woman is left awkwardly standing next to the both of us.

“I’m guessing you’re her mother,” I ask.

“Yes. Mandy.”

“What did you expect, Mandy?”

“Something. Not this,” she said.

Charlie doesn’t give her the time of day and walks away. I leave with him and once I get to the parking lot, I realize that I came to the funeral with Annabelle, so I don’t have a ride home.

Charlie’s red truck comes up to me and he rolls down his windows.

“You want a ride,” he asks. “It’s a long walk home.”

I want a ride home. I don’t want one from him but there’s still some guilt left inside of me from what happened at the bar.

I said yes and I went in.

I tell him where I live on the outskirts of town, and we try to make small talk but it’s a little awkward. I’m starting to regret getting into his truck. He turns on the radio and the first song that comes on is a love song.

God only knows what I'd be without you

If you should ever leave me

Though life would still go on believe me

The world could show nothing to me

So what good would living do me

“This is my favorite song in the world,” Charlie said. “It’s the song me and Annabelle sung at the talent show when we were in the third grade.”

“You two have always been singing?”

“Yeah. We learned how to in the church choir. Sometimes I think she’s silly for wanting be famous but…it’s not like she doesn’t have a chance.”

“What about you? What do you want,” I asked Charlie.

He goes quiet and thinks while the chorus repeats.

God only knows what I'd be without you

God only knows what I'd be without you

God only knows

After a while, he finally comes to a decision.

“I don’t know. I don’t really know what I want. I guess my wish is to know what I want,” he replies. “I just haven’t thought about it….”

“That’s surprising. I thought you said the other night you were going to become more famous than Annabelle.”

We roll into my driveway and Charlie side eyes me. I don’t know why I reminded him of the other night. He looks at me like I committed a crime.

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“I never said that. I said I’d ruin her. She’s a liar. She knew I liked you and she-“

I lean forward and my eyes feel like they’re about to roll out of my skull.

“She knew? Then why did she do that the other night? Why did she kiss me,” I asked Charlie.

“That’s what I pulled her aside to the funeral to ask her about,” Charlie mumbled.

He groaned and looked up at the car ceiling.

“This girl. This silly girl. She told me that she was angry with you up until you kissed her,” Charlie said quietly. “She don’t know what she wants either.”

I’m quiet, and Charlie waits for me to respond, but I say nothing and try to leave the car. He grabs me by the shoulder and without words asks me to stay.

“I don’t know a lot of things, or what I want to do. But I do know that I want you,” Charlie said.

“Oh.”

I don’t how to feel. Annabelle never told me to leave these past few days. She begged me to stay. I thought it might be weird if I slept with her every night, if maybe things moved too fast, but it didn’t. We never had sex, not because we didn’t want to, but because a part of us knew it wasn’t the right time.

Yet I feel used.

Did she kiss me at night because she wanted me or because she was lonely?

I realize that I also do not know what I want when Charlie kisses me in his truck and that maybe it was not a good idea to get a ride from him. I question myself why I let him keep going, and I guess it’s because I like being wanted.

I like feeling special.

That’s what I wanted all along.

Annabelle and I aren’t so different after all. We both just want to be special.