(2012) Colder Than Death (8 page)

If a lip or lips, a nose or an ear is missing, the embalmer possesses a variety of restorative waxes with which to model replacements. Pores and skin texture are simulated by speckling with a little brush, and over this cosmetics are applied. If the mouth is swollen the embalmer cuts out tissue as needed from inside the lips. If too much is removed the surface contour is restored by padding with cotton. Swollen necks and cheeks are reduced by removing tissue through vertical incision made down each side of the neck. In instances of emaciation, a hypodermic syringe loaded with massage cream is injected into the hollowed and sunken areas.

Once the body has been properly restored, it’s washed, dressed and shaved if it's a male. Cream-based cosmetics available in pink, flesh, suntan, brunette and blond are applied to the hands and face. Hair is shampooed, combed and, if necessary, set and the fingernails are manicured. Then the body is placed in the coffin and wheeled to the Viewing Room.

I'd known Nolan since the first day I began working at Henderson's Funeral Home, and I liked him. He was kind to me, but I couldn't stand to hear him talk. His voice was the most grating sound I'd ever heard. A tad high pitched with a slight scratchiness to it, almost as if he were talking through the speaker in a drive-thru restaurant. And he loved to talk.

He spent so much time alone with bodies that he cried out for human contact. Because I was always around, I was usually it. And before I came along, Lew was his primary target. Or Lew's wife. Since I'd hired Clint two-and-a-half years ago,
he
took on a large chunk of Nolan's yakking as well. I'd learned long ago that the best way to avoid spending too much time with Nolan was to act as if I were in a rush or very pre-occupied.

“Good to have all this business, eh, Del?” He opened the back door of the hearse and waited for me to join him. “You just missed Clint. He took the silver hearse for a lube job.”

We each grabbed an end of the body bag containing Brandy Parker and, as we made our way to the Embalming Room, Nolan tried to get at least five conversations going about different topics. Each time I interrupted him or pretended not to hear or feigned ignorance of the subject. After all these years I still felt guilty about not being friendlier with Nolan. In the beginning, though, it was much harder. Nolan was forty-three. I was a Senior in high school. I didn't view him as a father figure, but I viewed him as an older man and therefore felt I owed him enough respect to listen to his non-stop rambling.

He sent me a Christmas card every year, gave me a present, always something nice. He never missed my birthday. Always sent me postcards from his travels to trade conventions. When I was in the hospital having my appendix removed he came to visit me. Because I spent so much time avoiding him, I never got to learn much about him. And I never gave him the benefit of finding out much about me.

We shared no secrets. I knew more about Perry Cobb's personal life than Nolan's. I'd never been invited to his home. I knew that he was married once, when he was in his Twenties, and that his wife had walked out on him, and that he had never remarried. Lew told me that in all the years he'd known Nolan since his wife left, he'd never gotten serious with another woman. I got the implication from Lew that Nolan's wife had broken his heart.

For that reason alone I felt an odd kinship with Nolan. The woman he loved had walked out on him. And my first love had pretty much walked out on me.

Glancing at Nolan, I could see he was anxious to get to work so I started for the door and mumbled a “Good-bye.”

Nolan said, “See ya, Del,” then, as I closed the door, I heard him unzip the body bag and immediately start talking to what was left of Brandy Parker.

Chapter 10

While Nolan did his part in the burial of Brandy Parker, I continued to do mine, which consisted of a handful of tasks that could be taken care of over the phone. Getting the obituary to the newspaper. Contacting the crematorium. Ordering flowers. Because the coffin wouldn't be leaving the Home for a church service and as I would be bringing the remains directly to the crematorium, pallbearers wouldn't be an issue. And there was also the issue of whether or not the body would be wearing any clothes.

Despite the fact that it would be a closed casket ceremony I had an obligation to ask Suzanne Worthington what her wishes were regarding the clothing issue. As with most aspects of the funeral and burial process, the typical person doesn't consider certain areas until the situation arises.

The dressing of the corpse is always a touchy issue. Should a man be dressed in his underwear or not? Just a T-shirt or only his shorts or both? Socks and shoes or barefoot? Should a female wear a bra? Pantyhose? One would think that with closed casket viewings any clothing at all would be a moot point. Why bother dressing a corpse when no one would be seeing it? The same question could be asked about the logic of putting shoes on a corpse in an open coffin. Why? The body isn't going anywhere. But considering the decomposed state of Brandy Parker's remains, it would be natural to question the wisdom of dressing the corpse in conventional clothes. I decided to suggest a traditional burial shroud. I called the Worthington home. A man answered. I introduced myself and asked for Suzanne.

The man blurted an abrupt, “Hold on,” and roughly set down the receiver on a hard surface. What seemed like close to a minute later, Suzanne picked up. She had the same pre-occupied, disinterested attitude she displayed in our earlier meeting. I presented her with the choices. She opted for the shroud, but before committing to it said, “I'd better discuss this with my daughter. Let me call you back.”

Less than two minutes passed. It was Suzanne with the news that Quilla would chose the clothes that Brandy Parker would wear. We also discussed the matter of the photograph of Brandy which would be placed atop her coffin. They had a framed 9x12 color picture of her. I said I would stop by in an hour to pick it and the clothes up. When I got to their house, a basement-less, oversized ranch that looked larger than it really was because of an attached garage, I found that neither Quilla nor Suzanne were home.

Alan Worthington answered the door, a Blackberry to his right ear. As he talked he raised his left hand, palm up, which I took to mean that I should wait. I expected him to step back a few feet and continue talking, but he stood there in front me, as if I weren't even there, separated only by the screen door.

He looked to be in his early Forties and had a thick black mustache that made him look like a Seventies porn star. He was about five feet five, a good eight inches shorter than I. He wore an expensive, but still noticeable hairpiece. I didn't like his eyes. They seemed to be always moving, darting back and forth like a neurotic rat in a maze. After a minute or so he turned to me. “You here for the clothes and picture?” His voice had the same abrasive impatience he'd had on the phone earlier.

“Yes.”

“Wait here.”

He disappeared into the house for about thirty seconds, returning with a plastic bag from a grocery store.

“Here,” he said, handing the bag to me as if it contained garbage. “I'm supposed to tell you to hold it on the side so the stuff doesn't get wrinkled... as if it matters, right?” He rolled his eyes. “The kid put a pair of shoes in there too. Why I don't know. It's not like Brandy's going out dancing.” He laughed cruelly.

“The fact is,” I said firmly, in a tone carefully measured to make him feel stupid. “
Most
people put shoes on their loved ones. And
most
people also insist that underwear and socks are placed on the body.

He glared at me with a genuine sense of disgust.

“That's sick,” he said. “When I die I want to be cremated and I want my ashes put in a bottle of Dom Perignon and dropped into the Caribbean. Look, between you and me, if you want to give these shoes to some charity, fine. We're done, right, chief?”

“Yeah.”

As I headed back to my car I understood why Quilla couldn't stand this guy. I wasn't looking forward to seeing him later that night when, he, Suzanne and Quilla would arrive for the viewing. A part of me hoped he wouldn't come.

Someone representing the Home has to be present when bodies are on view. Lew and I alternated. Sometimes Clint filled in.

We weren't crazy about having Nolan greeting people at the door. All you had to do was have a kindly expression on your face--which Nolan possessed naturally--and be ready to direct people towards the Viewing Room in which the body of the person they were coming to see was laid out. The problem was that Nolan wanted to talk to people, oftentimes people in mourning or deep distress. If he engaged in minor chitchat it might've been acceptable, but Nolan would occasionally forget himself and reveal that he had done the work on the body.

*****

Because Brandy Parker would be the third body on view and since Lew was out of town, Clint would have to be on hand to help with the greeting. The Viewing was scheduled from 7:00-to-9:00 p.m. At my suggestion, the family arrives first, anywhere from fifteen to twenty minutes earlier, to have the first look at their loved one in private and to check over the appearance of the body. Sometimes there's an inappropriate amount of make-up on a female. The plain Jane in life shouldn't look like a Vegas showgirl in repose. Sometimes the hairstyle is all wrong, curls instead of straight hair, bangs instead of a bun. Sometimes the lips have been arranged in an uncharacteristic smirk or snarl.

By coming early the family can point out errors and Nolan can correct them.

I looked at my watch--6:35. No one from the immediate family had arrived. I stepped outside the front entrance onto the veranda and looked at the parking lot. Nothing. Not even the other two bodies on view had callers yet. I glanced towards the entrance to the lot. No cars were visible. The warm October evening seemed more like June. I decided to stay outside until someone came. I gave the building a quick once-over. It could use a paint job and work on the roof. I would wait until Spring.

Our Home is small by traditional standards and quite normal-looking. Rather than a Victorian or Gothic design, ours is more Colonial, painted white with a cheery yellow trim, with abundant windows. I've been kidded it looks more like an International House of Pancakes than a Funeral Home. DiGregorio's, on the other hand, is straight out of The House On Haunted Hill with arches and gables and turrets. Built with a dirty, reddish brown brick that hadn't aged well and hadn't been cleaned since I'd come to Dankworth, the structure was a sad, depressing reminder of death.

For Quilla's sake I hoped she and her parents would pull in then and there. This part of the service is always the most painful for the family because it's the first look they have at the deceased and they must acknowledge for the first time that their loved one is gone.

Even a closed casket is unsettling because of the knowledge that someone you love is inside. In some ways it's
more
distressing because the survivors never get a last look at the deceased. I've always felt that this last look is crucial to the grieving process because the reality of death is the single truth that has to be faced.

Life is over. The person is gone and never coming back.

I was about to go back inside when I saw Clint's station wagon pull into the lot. He was late. I expected him at 6:15. He waved at me then pulled around to the back. Within thirty seconds he was jogging towards me. He was 24 and a nice guy, personable, good with the bereaved and capable of squeezing a few extra dollars out of someone making arrangements. He had two drawbacks: pathological lateness and the woman to whom he was married.

“Sorry I’m late,” he blurted, out of breath.

I'd heard those words dozens of times. I gave him a non-threatening stare, as if he were a six-month old puppy who had just peed on the couch. “No one's here yet anyway.”

“Cookie and I had a fight,” he said. “A big one.”

“The usual subject?”

He nodded yes.

Cookie was alone on a night Clint was supposed to be off.

For the entire time Clint had been working for me, she was alone most evenings and weekends. Her weekdays were occupied working as a substitute teacher for barely more than minimum wage at a Catholic elementary school forty-six miles away, a hellish commute that also drove her crazy, especially in winter. Part of Clint's responsibility as our apprentice was to be at the Home most of the time so I could try to add some normalcy to my own life.

“She gave me an ultimatum,” said Clint. “I either get some guaranteed decent hours or she's divorcing me.”

“We went through this last year, Clint. That's how you got Sundays off.”

“I know. I know. But it's not enough, Del. She's not a social person. Cookie has a hard time making friends. We have this intense, co-dependant thing going on. She's not good at finding ways to keep busy and there's only so much TV to watch and so much to read and she hates housework. She's starting to listen to Christian music and she's joined a Bible study group at church. Sometimes she answers the phone with 'Praise Jesus' instead of 'Hello.' I don't know what to do. Is there some way I can have
one
night a week off? If I told Cookie that we could have, say, Tuesday evenings to ourselves... it would be enough to calm her down for awhile.”

I was about to tell him that I'd need time to think about it when I heard the sound of a car pulling in the lot. It was a police cruiser. I could see Perry Cobb at the wheel. He punched the accelerator as if he were a seventeen-year-old out with his father's rebuilt '57 Chevy and headed for a parking spot a few feet from where Clint and I stood.

“Tell you what, Clint, I'll think about it.”

“Del, I love working here with you and being a Funeral Director's all I ever wanted since I was twelve years old. But I love Cookie too.” He seemed on the verge of tears.

“This is a business filled with broken marriages and bachelors,” I said. “The statistics are against you. Like cops. Listen, I need to talk to Perry. Why don't you go inside?”

Clint nodded and went into the front entrance of the Home just as Perry was getting out of his vehicle. He slammed the car door and strutted towards me.