Cemetery

This story was accepted into Catch, the Knox College literary magazine. Let's ignore the fact that I recently graduated.

"Cemetery"


In the backyard, the guys stand around the grill, smoking and ashing their cigarettes onto the grass. Mario claims he’s done this before, that he knows how, but the grill still isn’t lit. The sun goes down, falling behind the trees in the graveyard at the end of the block. On the foldout chair by the back porch, the thawed hotdogs and hamburger patties are set, covered from the insects that have returned for the season. Mario holds his hand over the grill; he feels nothing.

Larry goes to the cooler to bring back more beer, digging through ice for new cans, and handing them out, dripping. They begin to debate whether to use lighter fluid—after some time, they agree not to, and to start over; they dump the used charcoal in a corner of the yard where the grass doesn’t grow. This time Mario reads the directions.

Daisy stands under the front porch light, by two people she knows but isn’t close to. She listens in and out of their conversation, holding a beer like it’s not what it is. Tonight she wears a new dress she bought in the city, and a new hair color. Earlier today, she dyed her hair over the kitchen sink of her apartment—the one in the bathroom has long been broken, and the landlord forgets to come by. In the past, Mario came by. With a towel over her shoulders, she watched the dye stain the dirty plates, the silverware, and circle around the drain.

Mario comes around the front to tell everyone that the food is cooking. He sees Daisy under the light, but he talks to other people first. When everyone goes into the house, making their way to the back door, Mario and Daisy begin to talk, but about nothing. He looks away, down at the porch floor, and sees her legs crossed. She’s leaning against the post with her hands behind her back, her new blonde hair falling in her face. When he asks her if she’d like to go for a walk, she pretends that this isn’t a sweetheart deal.

Walking slow, they reach the graveyard, and Daisy says she’s never been. Mario pushes the gate open and goes in first. Going through, they read the names and dates in stone, the epitaphs they think they’ll remember, but none will stay. By a grave with a statue of a civil war soldier they sit and don’t speak. When Daisy tucks her hair behind her ear, Mario holds her face and brings it towards his. On the ground, he feels for her skirt and pulls it up. Daisy will think about the grass stains later.

Back at the house, in the backyard, Larry is buzzed. In the corner of the yard he sees the space where they dumped the first batch of charcoal, lit red and heat waves rising. In the upstairs bathroom they fill a bucket of water in the bathtub, spilling its contents on the hardwood floor as they make their way downstairs and out the back door to the burning spot. When the small fire is out, no one notices that Daisy and Mario have been gone until they return, back from trying to raise the dead.