The Funeral (fiction)
Three days ago, Richard Marek's death had been put into print. The sky had darkened considerably in the time that it had taken the news to reach their apartment walls, but when it had, neither of them were terribly surprised. Oliver sat near the window as rain hammered against its pane and attempted to read the paper that he had opened in order to distract him from the rapid pace in which Eleanor went from room to room. He checked the face of his watch and only received a glare from its glass face rather than the time. He had barely noticed she had paused to address him until she was nearly finished with her sentence.
"So you're going then," he stated evenly, regardless of what she had said. He didn't look up from the blurring words on the page, but rather examined the choice of attire from peripheral vision.
"I just told you that," she replied as she pinched on an earring back. "You should be there, too."
Oliver sighed and turn the page; a large photograph depicting someone else's philanthropy caught his attention, but the words meant nothing even as he tried to focus on them. He finally spoke to her through the fog of comprehension, "Why should I go?"
"Because," Eleanor began with a faint sigh -- the tell tale sign that she was growing impatient. "Richard was your friend."
"Was, being the key term in that sentence, yes," he responded and finally looked up. "You're going in that?"
"Black is the color of mourning," she replied as she bent down to buckle her shoes. "This was a more appropriate choice."
"I hardly think that attending Richard's funeral in red will go over well at all with his relatives," Oliver countered. "They all ready talk so highly of you."
"It was his favorite," Eleanor explained with a shrug of her shoulders as she ironed out the hem of the red dress at her knees. "I think they would understand."
"I doubt it," he snapped at her underneath the rustle of the paper as it was folded closed and ironed out against his leg.
"What do you care, Oliver?" She asked with a faint smirk that was more out of exasperation than anything. "It's not like you're going to be there to know what comment they may or may not make any way."
He nudged the thin frame of his glasses closer to the bridge of his nose and angled his shoulders further back in the chair. For a moment, he was quiet. She spun the thin strips of silver against her wrist so that their clasps were facing the underside before she took a step toward the hallway.
"You loved him," Oliver said quietly when she was just far enough away that it sounded like nothing more than a murmur.
"Sorry?" She called to him as she pulled her coat and umbrella from the closet.
"Him," he began again. "You loved him -- Richard -- didn't you."
Eleanor put her slender arms through the sleeves of her coat and fastened the buttons. Her chin tipped downward so that her hair shaded much of her facial expression from him. She chose not to answer his question and instead, cinched the belt of the coat tightly before it was tied off.
"Elle," he spoke softly.
"I don't really think it matters," she murmured against the lapel of her coat.
"It does matter," Oliver countered as he rose from the chair. "It changes everything."
"Does it?" She asked as she finally snapped her eyes toward him. "What, exactly, does it change?"
"It changes this--"
"What."
"Us," he replied as he gestured between their bodies. "For starters, the situation for another."
"I don't really think it does," she replied as she walked to the table in order to collect her keys from its surface.
"Then why can't you answer me?" He asked as he lingered near the table and pressed his fingertips against the space she had just drug the keys from, as though he could feel the heat transference from skin to surface.
She tipped her head back so that her eyes were focused on the ceiling for a moment. When they leveled on him, her mouth was drawn in a line that twitched between a smirk and a snarl, though that was dispelled quickly as she spoke, exasperated, "What do you want me to say, Oliver? Yes, I loved him. I loved Richard as any woman could really love him, considering the fact that he was never really there when he was with me. I loved him until the day he found out he was dying."
Oliver let the silence hang heavy before he bothered to ask, "And now?"
"And now, what?" Eleanor snapped as her hands curled into loose fists at her sides.
"And now, do you love him?"
"Don't be ridiculous, Oliver," she replied as she turned for the door.
He followed after her and grasped her arm at its crook just before she settled her fingers on the doorknob. "That doesn't answer my question, Eleanor."
She let her jaw cinch shut as she turned to break the hold he had on her arm. "What does it matter now, he's dead, you're not."
"I can't--"
"You can't what? Live in a relationship built on a lie?" She interrupted with a brow quirking upward. "Funny, isn't that how we met in the first place?"
"Elle," Oliver started but was halted as she turned to the door again.
"I'm going to be late," she spoke softly as she opened the door.
Defeated, Oliver let her leave. He hadn't realized how tight his fists had become until he brought up his left wrist to check the time again and noticed the way that the skin bleached over bone. He imagined the church all ready so full of people and their echoed sorrow bouncing off of the vaulted ceiling. He imagined how the coffin would look; done up with a spray of white roses and calla lilies like a waterfall. He imagined how Eleanor would look in the second row, with her mouth set in a firm line while everyone around her cried. Richard had never been a man who was loved, but a man who was respected. That was the only thing that Oliver had managed, or so he thought, to best him in. For twenty-four years, he had lived in the other man's shadow; as he heard the elevator close in signal that Eleanor would soon be on her way to church, he felt something in him lighten.
For the first time in twenty-four years, Oliver felt relief.