REESE

chapter forty five.

Third Person POV:

When Jonathon was fifteen, he attended a funeral.

The funeral was for an American Capo that was killed in a targeted attack overseas. Don Vanderbilt, Jonathon's father, had ordered the entire empire to attend the elaborate burial and properly pay their respects. He had made it clear that attendance was mandatory and there would be dire consequences for anyone that didn't show up.

So of course, Jonathon didn't have a choice in the matter, he sat front row at a funeral for a man he hadn't spoken to once.

The Capo's funeral procession featured thirteen limos carrying intricate flower displays and twelve more filled with high-ranking mob members. After the ceremony was finished, the Capo's widowed mother came forward to toss a handful of dirt into the coffin as per tradition. It was then that Don Vanderbilt rose from his seat and announced in front of six hundred people that he would be awarding her a cheque for five-hundred-thousand dollars in compensation for her loss and her son's loyalty to the empire.

As if half a million was enough to make up for the loss of her child.

Every person in attendance praised Don Vanderbilt's kindness and generosity. 'This is how the American empire treats their people,' they boasted proudly. 'Look at how unselfish and giving our Don is.'

Jonathon thought it was a goddamn joke. With great difficulty and even greater control, he held his tongue around the crowd. It's a show. He wanted to scream at them. He doesn't care about the man that died for him, the man that now lies here before you, six feet under. He doesn't care about you either, it's just a trap. Don't fall for it. But like puppets, they all danced when their Don pulled their strings. No one saw beyond the pretty lies in front of them, no one saw beyond the broken promises.

No one saw the Capo's mother throw a cheque for half a million dollars into her son's grave.

No one but Jonathon.

In a split-second decision that would earn him a brutal beating later, he decided to walk over to her. Quietly stepping into position beside her, he said nothing as he heard the graveyard clear out and the dozens of cars pull away. He just stood at her side, unmoving, as the workers filled the grave up with dirt and the coffin alongside a cheque most people would kill for, slowly disappeared in a sea of brown. Neither one of them said a word for minutes, maybe even hours, the silence was loud enough.

"I don't miss the firsts."

Jonathon didn't react when the old woman finally spoke up from beside him. He just kept on breathing, quiet as the gentle wind around him, hoping that she didn't hate him as much as he hated himself for taking part in such a misleading, degrading and cruel funeral service.

"They keep asking me about his firsts. If I remember them, if I miss them." Looking up at the sky she smiled. "The first time he walked, the first time he laughed, the first time he told me he loved me. They always ask about the firsts, but I don't miss the firsts."

When she bent down, Jonathon finally turned his head. He watched as she smoothed out the dirt of what was now her son's grave. She carefully picked up and removed rocks and stray pieces of grass. "I miss the one hundreds."

Drawing a flower in the dirt, her gray veiny hands shook. "The one hundreds. The sayings, the pet peeves, the aspirations, the mannerisms; all the things I saw and heard a hundred times or more from him. Like how he hated the smell of rosemary. He would tell me over and over to stop buying scented rosemary candles because the smell would give him a headache." Wiping away the flower she started drawing two stick figures holding hands. "I would get annoyed at how many times he would say it and just to piss him off I would wear a rosemary scented perfume when he would come and visit." She smiled.