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The reflection of the man stares back at Charlie in the dirty mirror of Paddy’s pub, wearing clothes that aren’t his and a face that seems much older than he remembers being. He straightens up the shirt that he’d had to borrow from Dennis. All Charlie’s shirts were covered in bright red, rat-blood stains and nothing he owned was really funeral attire. His eyes were the colour of it, like a million rats had gone up and died, leaving his eyes red rimmed and jagged.
He could hear Dennis outside the bathroom raving to the gang, who were supposed to be dressed in their good funeral clothes.
“No schemes! We can’t even go to a goddamn funeral without one of you cooking up a scheme. And no Mac, a muscle shirt is NOT appropriate funeral attire.” Dennis was yelling, the tape around his eyes threatening to slip with every octave his voice raised.
“Muscle shirts are black, and they look badass!” protests Mac.
“It’s a funeral, we’re not trying to look badass!” yells Dennis before raking his hands down his face, loudly sighing.
“What about jokes? I’ve got some real good dead mum stuff.” asks Dee.
“Oh Dee, you bitch-” says Dennis, but is cut off by the bathroom door swinging open.
“Where’s Frank?” Charlie asks, his voice taking on a strange pitchy quality.
The gang stays silent, for once at a loss for words.
“I don’t know man.” Mac says, and Dennis grabs his arm aggressively.
Mac has seemingly already forgotten the whole ‘be sensitive to Charlie so he doesn’t kill himself and us’ agreement.
“I’m sure he’s coming buddy.” Dennis reassures, digging his nails into Mac’s arm.
Charlie’s eye twitches but he seems to compose himself.
“He’s probably with-” Mac begins, but Dennis leans in so his lips are an inch from Mac’s ear.
“Do you want me to scratch you?” he hisses.
“Let’s just go.” says Charlie.
Charlie’s lips are stained as red as his eyes when he walks up the pews of the Church to his spot at the front, right next to Mrs Mac, who is ignoring a chaplain telling her not to smoke inside. Mac is fussing over his mother who is grunting and swatting him away. Charlie often wonders how Mac has so much love for a woman who looks and smells like a walking cigarette.
“Mum says she’s sorry about your mum.” says Mac, but Charlie is sure she said nothing of the sort.
Rose-coloured glasses was an understatement for how Mac saw his mother. Charlie wishes he could have the same blind optimism towards his mum, able to ignore all the things she did.
Every night his mum went through the house and flipped the lights on and off so Charlie wouldn’t die. He imagined the last night she lived and breathed and moved, and flicked the lights on and off. He wondered if she forgot to do something so she wouldn’t die too, and wasted all her luck on Charlie. Would Charlie die too now that she didn’t complete her ritual every night?
Mac had organised the whole funeral, Charlie hadn’t asked him too, he just did. Charlie suspects it was just so he could make sure she had a proper Catholic send off. Dennis had even gotten involved and paid the thing off with Frank’s stolen credit card. He probably only did that so the entire funeral wasn’t held in Paddy’s. Charlie didn’t really care why they did it, as long as it got done. Mac was satisfied that Mrs Kelly would go up to heaven, Dennis was happy they wouldn’t have mourners in the bar bringing down everyone’s mood and Mac had assured Charlie that this meant he didn’t have to worry about her ghost haunting the bar anymore. Everybody won, even if the Jesus on the crucifix here was exceptionally bloody. Charlie had been sure he specifically asked for ‘not bloody’. But the last couple of days had passed in a blur and maybe he hadn’t said that at all. Maybe he’d asked Mac for the bloodiest Jesus he could find. He doubted it, but there was no real way to tell through the haze of glue and paint thinner that seemed to coat the last week.
The service begins with a lengthy prayer and lots of gesturing at the wooden box where Misses Kelly lays, unmoving, unbreathing, forever silent, never to speak to Charlie or anyone ever again. Charlie feels like he too lays in the box next to her, like he can barely breathe, he loosens his tie around his neck and tries to suck in breaths of the stale church air.
“Dude, why are you breathing so loud?” Mac asks.
“Why is the priest talking so much? Isn’t today supposed to be about Mum?” Charlie says.
“He’s blessing your mother so she can go to heaven and not have her soul smited for eternity by Satan himself! He’s also a priest so he can talk as much as he damn well pleases!” says Mac, and heads turn at his outburst.
The priest continues like nothing happened. Charlie looks up at the giant bloody crucifix and
thinks it must be annoying to have to forgive everyone all the time. Even when they do shitty unforgivable things like ruin Christmas for you or try to fuck your 3rd grade teacher at parent teacher interviews.
“We both know she’s not going to heaven, Mac.” says Charlie, and Mrs Mac grunts in agreement.
“She won’t if you keep interrupting the priest.” hisses Mac in a way that reminds Charlie of Dennis.
Scanning the audience, Charlie is dismayed by the small turn out. Besides the gang, there’s only about ten other people, none of which Charlie knows. He tries to focus on the front, looking back up into the eyes of Jesus. His body was all twisted and impaled, but Charlie can’t help but think that even someone carried Jesus once. Charlie’s shoulders ache. Nobody ever carried him.
The priest seems to be finished with his long prayer and calls Charlie up to the front, Charlie takes a long sip of his ‘diet coke’ before handing it to Mac and stumbling up to the altar. He had one too many beers at the bar this morning, or drank too much diet coke wine in the car, either way he finds it hard to focus on the pieces of paper he has written all over.
The paper is borderline incomprehensible, even for Charlie. “CAT <3 MUM” is written in big letters across the top, and then below there are a ton of angry faces. “CAT H8 MUM” was the last thing he had written. He seemed to remember writing more, sure he had written something that would be worth reading in front of all these people. Charlie looks up at the audience, it’s hard to make them out with his eyes blurring from a mix of the glue and the wine and the tears. The pain in his chest stops him from speaking, he can’t do anything but breathe too loudly. Mac seems to be mouthing something at him but the world is topsy turvey.
Mac moves more quickly than seems physically possible but he’s caught Charlie as he topples to the side, before his head can hit the wooden box where his Mum is.. His Mum. Mac rights him upwards, and before Charlie has even realised it, he’s sobbing into Mac’s chest, in front of all these people. All these people and not. Frank.
“Frank used to bang my Mum.. and he couldn’t even show up.” Charlie says and Mac nods.
“Frank’s an asshole.” he agrees.
Charlie spins out before Mac can catch him again. He presses his stained-red lips to the microphone.
“My mum is lying in that box. She died as she lived: horizontal!” Charlie drunkenly slurs.
“Why does he get to make dead Mum jokes!” says Dee, going to stand up. Dennis grabs her and pulls her back into her chair.
“It wasn’t a joke Dee! That’s why, you goddamn bird.” Charlie yells into the microphone and Dennis loudly laughs. Mac’s mum has fallen asleep in her chair in the altar.
“Nobody here actually gave a shit about my mum. Misses Mac is here because Mac made us pick her up on the way, and none of us wanted her here and I don’t think she even wanted to come.” Charlie announces.
“Everyone wants my Mum here. Don’t listen to him Mum, you look beauti-” says Mac, but Charlie cuts him off.
“Mac and Dennis are here because they doesn’t want me to go crazy and kill myself. Who will do Charlie work then? And Dee is here because she for some reason thinks my mothers funeral is the perfect time to practice her terrible comedy routine!”
This time no one protests, and Charlie continues.
“And the rest of you people are here because my mum slept with you once or we’re simply interrupting your usual Sunday service.”
“My own sisters couldn’t even show up. They don’t care about Mum because no one did, she was a crazy old whore. I never left Philly because I was sure she’d die without me. And then, she did. I didn’t even have to leave Philly to abandon her.”
Charlie’s eyes are blurry with tears.
“And now what do I do when there’s no one left to turn the lights on and off at night to make sure I don’t die? Who will call me seventeen times a day just to check I’m still okay?”
Charlie’s aware he hasn’t said anything for much too long, and his drunken sobs are wracking through the church and making everyone uncomfortable. He feels a set of hands land on his shoulders and Dennis is knelt down on the floor where Charlie has collapsed in on himself like a small child.
“Let’s go home buddy” says Dennis.
“I can’t.”
“Let’s go to Paddy’s then.” suggests Dennis.
Charlie feels so tired. He’s not sure he can move any of his limbs. He’s not sure if he’ll ever be able to walk again, if he’ll ever be able to wake up and deal with the long stretch of silence, he’s not sure if he’ll be able to deal with the fact that the only parents he’s ever had are dead, dead, not here. But Mac is, and so is Dennis, and so is Dee, and they’re looking at him expectantly.
“I’ll carry him.” says Mac, and scoops Charlie up, and he’s too tired to protest.
Mac carries him out of the church and Charlie’s tears have made Mac’s muscle shirt all wet but no one says anything. And as he looks over his shoulder, he sees the plain wooden box that would be his mother’s new home. He thinks of the dirt she will descend into in a matter of hours, and Charlie won’t be there. And neither will Frank.
But the gang will be with Charlie, and they’ll carry him back to the car and drive back to Paddy’s. Charlie will never see his mother again, and for the first time in fifty years, the pain in his chest loosens and he can breathe.