How Intimacy Blooms in the Darkest Seasons
The Funeral and the Stranger
The cemetery sat on a slope of wet grass. Coley stood in a borrowed black dress, watching dirt fall onto her mother's casket.
She didn't cry. That felt dishonest somehow. Her mother had been sick for three years. The end, when it came, arrived exactly on schedule.
A girl Coley didn't recognize stood near the tree line. Dark hair. Hands shoved in a denim jacket. She looked like she didn't want to be there either.
After the service, Coley's aunt pulled her toward the church basement for potluck. Casseroles. Quiet conversations that stopped when she walked past. She slipped outside instead.
The girl was leaning against a blue pickup truck.
"I'm Sonya," she said. "Went to middle school with you. My mom's a nurse. She worked with your mom at the hospital."
Coley nodded. She had no memory of this person.
"You want to get out of here?" Sonya asked.
Something in her voice felt like permission. Like escape. Coley climbed into the truck without answering. They drove toward the ridge road, toward the dark line of pines that marked the county line.
Why did Sonya show up at the cemetery?
Why did Coley follow her?