Page 41 of Thin Lives

Emma knew it probably wouldn’t do her any favors to ask, but she couldn’t help herself when the words slipped out. “I know you were close to Father Day, so this must be hard for you.”

Calisto barely reacted. “Harder.”

He had found the priest, too.

She couldn’t begin to imagine.

“I’m sorry, Cal.”

Calisto did smile then. It was small and fleeting, but it had been there. Just as fast, he pushed off the wall, pocketing the cigarette and rosary he held. Stepping past Emma and into the entryway of the private room, he stopped for a second to mutter, “I should say goodbye before I convince myself otherwise.”

Why did she feel like he was talking about more than just the priest?

“Horrible day,” Affonso muttered, glaring up at the gray sky.

“Fitting for a funeral,” Emma replied.

Affonso didn’t bother denying it.

Light sprinkles of rain fell on the graveyard and over the people as dirt was thrown into a waiting grave. Not five minutes before, Father Day’s casket had finally been lowered after a long and well-deserved procession.

They had moved from the one church to the graveyard at Father Day’s church so the man could be buried at his parish.

It was the only thing about the day that really made Emma wish she hadn’t come, or at the very least, excused her way out of the burial by saying she needed to get home and rest. That would have been a viable, believable excuse, surely.

But no.

Instead, she was standing in a graveyard that she hadn’t visited in months. More months than she wanted to admit. Her baby boy was buried just four rows down, under a maple tree where he was both shaded, but also where he could be colored by falling leaves in the Autumn.

Emma had come to the graveyard on and off after her baby passed away shortly after his birth, but then her trips went from once a week to maybe once a month.

Then she stopped altogether.

It was less painful this way.

She didn’t want to get caught up in remembering the hell that day had been when she birthed him, knowing he would die. She didn’t want that sadness and fear to color up her current pregnancy, and put her straight into an anxious, driven mess.

So she avoided it.

Or tried.

“Well,” Affonso said, tugging on the lapels of his jacket. Another shovelful of dirt was tossed into the grave, and people began to turn to leave. Quite a few stayed behind. “I suppose that’s that, isn’t it?”

“It is. What was that about with Ray earlier in the church?” she dared to ask.

Affonso pulled off his sunglasses, ones he didn’t need with the current weather, and peered over his shoulder. Emma followed his gaze, but found he was staring at nothing but the row of parked cars along the road of the cemetery.

“Nothing,” Affonso said after a moment. “Don’t worry your pretty little head about it.”

Emma forced herself not to glare.

He always did that. Dismissed and deflected while making her concerns seem petty and useless. It irritated her more than she could explain, but it was nothing new.

“Before I get any wetter from this godforsaken rain,” Affonso mumbled, glancing back up at the sky, “I am going to the car. Let’s leave.”

Emma hesitated. No doubt, she needed to get off her feet for a while. She had an appointment with her specialist in two days to check her cervix again and make sure a stitch wasn’t needed just yet, but she didn’t want to push her luck.

Still, while she was here …