Raincoats | The Umbrella Academy

The White Violin

The joint funeral took place just a couple of days later. Five small caskets lined up in a row. They were lowered one by one, into their own holes in the damp earth. It didn't rain that day, seemingly in spite of the cliché.

"I'm sorry you can't be there."

A hand reached out to grasp hers. It was cold and boney in that way that old people's hands are. She filched away. She always did.

"Now, Charlotte." The coldness felt like it was seeping into her own bones, covering her skin in goose flesh, and filling her with ice. "I know that this has been very hard for you- what happened was terrible- but it wasn't your fault."

Her eyes met her case worker's briefly. Charlotte never held eye contact anymore. The woman wouldn't be on this job much longer, that much was clear. Her hair was fully white at the roots, her hearing completely shot. Soon there would be someone else to place Charlotte in temporary homes.

She never thought it was her fault. Should she have?

"You know that, right?"

Yes. She had never thought otherwise.

The screams were there despite that. Like something whispered into her ear that only she could hear. They were forever present in the back of her mind. When her hospital room got quiet, and she could hear her own breathing, it was like they were right there, bellowing out in agony and begging for help she couldn't give.

They were in caskets, now. Buried six feet under the damp earth. The screams shouldn't be heard from there.

"Right."

The silence was too much, always too much. The screams-

"How are you feeling?"

She hated that question. The past few days that was a mantra, repeated by every person who entered the room. The answer, the real answer that she would never really speak, lost meaning. Bad. That was simple, too simple to really describe it. Charlotte couldn't describe it. When she grew up, maybe she'd find the right words, but those words would haunt her as well.

"Well." That was simple.

"Your legs?"

The pain was slowly starting to subside. The taut skin hurt when stretched. The doctors explained that the majority of the burned area was replaced by something called a skin graft. It was hers, just in the wrong place.

She could walk, though, so she supposed she was alright. "Okay."

The days flew by, merged together, and dragged on all at once. What time was it? When did the funerals take place? Charlotte didn't know.

It wasn't until a month later that she was allowed to visit the cemetery. It was raining that day and she was wrapped in a raincoat that she had recently been gifted. A pity gift to shield her from the constant rain in the somber Irish town. It stood out against the dreary sky and rolling green of the lawn.

Yellow had been Jasmine's favorite color. She used to have a pair of pants that she adored, the same bright yellow as the coat Charlotte wore as she stood over her grave.

They should have been cremated, the little girl thought absently. Their bodies were surely burnt to shriveled crisps already, why not finish the job? It was truly a challenge to separate herself from the idea of their deaths enough to not break down. Grown ups would call it strength, but it wasn't that; it was stubbornness, an incredible stubbornness at the tender age of ten.

It was a wonder that anybody let her there at all. Charlotte's mental state was a debate amongst the doctors. Perhaps they should put her in a facility. She had claimed to having severe delusions during the incident to begin with.