Hellbound

Her mother is letting the flowers die, right there on her kitchen table, and there is nothing you can do about it. Her mother lets everything die. Not just flowers, but houseplants, childhood pets, and even her own daughter. Killer, you want to scream, but you weren’t supposed to know her daughter, not like that, anyway, and it isn’t the sort of sentiment you can express at this Catholic mess of mourning without drawing attention to yourself. Instead, you smooth the wrinkles in your frilly dress and clench your fists tighter as the priest cautions the mother against keeping photos or shedding tears and urges her to make a cross in the air whenever her daughter’s name is mentioned. The dead girl’s sister asks aloud why people kill themselves, but her embarrassed mother hushes her with cake. Jesus asked questions, you think, but you say nothing. Your heart stopped asking questions years ago, the very first day you held her daughter’s hopeful, hell-bound hand.