The Perfect Holiday

“I’m sure.”

“Why don’t we let Wilma have a yard sale?” I said, patting him on the shoulder. “Just open the doors and let people come inside. Whatever’s left you can haul away or I’ll ren

t a dumpster. Bottom line, I’d like it all gone by this time next week.”

“Okay, if you’re sure.”

“I’m sure.”

Seth leaned against the counter and folded his arms over his belly. I could feel his eyes on me. I refused to look back at him.

He asked, “What about funeral arrangements?”

“Shit, I hadn’t even thought about that.”

“Your mama’s body is at the Gulf Breeze Funeral Home. The man there agreed to keep her safe till you could got home to tell him what you wanted to do far as a service goes. It’s my understanding that she had a burial policy to pay for everything; coffin, flowers, service.”

I didn’t have to think about it. I shook my head and said firmly, “No service. I’ll call him and tell him to cremate her.”

“Shit, son, are you sure that’s what your mama would want?” He stuck out his hands and frowned at me again. “I mean, she has a plot next to your daddy in the cemetery. I’m sure she’d want a service so people could come by and pay their respects. I mean, I know you didn’t have the best childhood, but, Shane, she was your mother.”

“She’s dead, Uncle Seth,” I said. “She doesn’t give a rat’s ass about a service and people paying their respects. And I highly doubt she’d want to spend all eternity in a grave next to the man who beat the shit out of her every day of her life.”

“Yeah, but…”

I held up my hands. “You can have a service if you like. Hell, invite everybody in town that knew Clint and Irene Mavic and throw one hell of a party. Shit, I’ll even pay for it, but I will not be there.”

Uncle Seth stared at me for a moment more, then the frown slowly faded from his forehead. He rubbed tears from his eyes and let his voice go quiet. “No, she was your mother. It’s up to you what to do.”

“Then she’ll be cremated and that’ll be the end of that.”

“What about her ashes?” he asked.

“You want them?”

He frowned at the floor. “No, I reckon not.”

“Then that’s it then. I’ll have the funeral home dispose of them.”

I started to go through the hallway door to look at the bedrooms when Seth asked, “But what about her dog?”

I froze in my tracks and turned back toward him. “Dog? What dog?”

“Biscuit,” he said. “Little white Maltese. Your mama’s dog.”

“My mother had a dog?”

“Yes.”

“At the nursing home?”

“Yes.”

“They let them have dogs at the nursing home?”

Seth smiled. “Yeah. They let the old folks have dogs and cats. Supposedly, it’s good therapy for them.”

“I don’t want her dog,” I said.