by Matthew Harrison.
It was the stillness that made Jacob Stewart look up from his phone. Grandpa Mark wasn’t making that horsed breathing sound from his white bed anymore. “Grandpa Mark?” Jacob said. His grandfather made no noise, and his chest wasn’t moving either. Gooseflesh prickled on Jacob’s arm. He’s dead. What should I do?
Jacob didn’t have a lot of experience with death; his mom didn’t even let him see his hamster when it died, and last year, when Uncle Harvey died, Mom hadn’t taken Jacob to the funeral. “Six-year-olds shouldn’t see something so sad,” she had said. But now Jacob was all alone in what his mother called a ‘hos-pic’ room while she was getting coffee.
Of course, Jacob had known about death; his teacher had read the class a book explaining how natural it all was. Animals and plants died to feed us, and we died to feed the dirt. Death had a purpose. It wasn’t just about the things that died; it was also about the things around death. The things that changed because of death.
But to be in the same room with it was different than hearing about it from a book with cartoon animals.
His phone slipped between his fingers; the angry squawk of a bird from his game faded away as he stood up. “Grandpa Mark,” Jacob said, taking a step forward. Why did I call out to him? He’s dead. Dead people don’t speak.
One of Grandpa Mark’s hands lay at his side, the fingers sticking out of the blanket like the fallen pale branches of a tree sticking out of snow. Jacob reached forward and grabbed onto the hand. There was no familiar squeeze or rubbing of the knuckles that Jacob used to hate and now wanted more than anything. “Grandpa Mark?”
Something inside him pressed against his eyes, a familiar feeling that happened when he was about to cry. He wouldn’t cry, though. Not now. Maybe at the funeral because that’s where you were meant to cry. And he would go with his Mom to the funeral; it wouldn’t be like Uncle Harvey or the hamster.
“Oh no,” a croaked voice said from behind. It was his mom, standing in the door frame with a steaming cup in her hand.
Jacob let go of his grandfather’s fingers and ran to her, smothering his face into the soft fabric of her dress as he wrapped his arms around her. The tears started falling right away.
“H–he’s gone, Mom,” he said through wails and sniffles. “He’s gone.”
His mother’s arms fell on top of him, pulling him closer to her. “I know. I know. Are you ok?”
Jacob peeled his face away and looked up at his mother. He snorted, wiped at his nose, then nodded. “I want to go to the funeral. I want to go and say goodbye.”
His mother cradled his head, sniffling at her own tears. “Of course, dear. Of course.”