If at first you don't succeed, then level the playing field and take a second chance.
Two years ago, Ellie Harrison collapsed under the weight of her past and the fallout that caught up with her. Like a shell of her former self, she retreated away f...
Numbness was the closest companion that got me through the twenty minute procession and thirty minute Committal. I felt completely detached emotionally, like I watched myself go through the motions. Mom and Jake seemed like they internalized their own final thoughts and our limo ride from the church to the burial site at St. Johns Cemetery in San Mateo was both silent and surreal.
The sight of Dad's casket lowered down to a double depth, the cool metal of the shovel's handle in my palm as I tossed a pathetically small pile of loose, grayish-brown soil on top, and the murmured rounds of the Lord's Prayer and 'Amazing Grace' swirled around me like an out of body experience. I wasn't sure what his gravestone read because my eyes couldn't look higher than the ground.
One by one, the attendees paid their respects and retreated to their vehicles until only Mom, Jake, Logan, and I remained. Logan remained stoic at my side, his hand tightly wrapped around mine while I silently watched as the relationship dynamics played out in front of us. Jake and I had lost a father but Mom her husband and best friend, Uncle Darren his only brother, and Dad's car dealership coworkers and boss their friend and employee who wouldn't report to work on Monday.
While respects were given with silent or softly murmured words and a toss of soil into the gravesite, Mom squeezed her arms around Jake. After a few moments where she sobbed uncontrollably while tears leaked out Jake's eyes, she nodded, buried her head in his shoulder, and he steered her towards the exit.
My feet however, refused to budge even after the gravediggers had completed the burial. Throughout today's entire service, I'd been led, nudged, or gently prodded but now that I was left alone for the first time under my own control, I was frozen.
"Ellie." Logan's hand squeezed around mine and gently squeezed it. The late afternoon sun warmed my damp cheeks and a soft breeze blew my hair into my eyes. With his other hand, Logan swept them aside and gazed down at me. "We can stay as long as you like."
"I never apologized," I confessed in a soft whisper, my eyes transfixed down at the freshly piled dirt mound near Dad's headstone.
"He's probably listening now," Logan spoke in a quiet, somber voice that matched the tenderness in his gaze. "Do you want to give me a few moments?"
"Please." I watched as he honored my request, stepped halfway over to the cars, and waited with his hands stuffed in his pockets.
With a slow, raspy breath, tears trailed over my cheeks before my knees sank into the trodden grass near Dad's final resting place. "D-dad," I stared as a knot of guilt twisted hard in my chest and weakened my stomach. "I'm s-s-so s-sorry. I didn't mean what I said and... I-I-I'd give anything to take it back."
My chin tipped downwards, I leaned forwards in my knelt position, and tears dripped onto my hands clasped between my legs. After a few silent moments where my ragged gasps filled the air between me and Dad's rested body, I reached out a shaky hand and clasped a handful of fresh earth.
The smell of the loose soil tingled the inside of my nose as I brought my closed fist up near my mouth. I breathed out one last, "I'm sorry," over my tightly clenched knuckles and tossed the handful onto the pile.
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