Mortuary Confidential: Undertakers Spill the Dirt

“Do the rules also mention you sitting on your ass doing nothing?” I glared at him and marched back to the spare and jack. I picked them up and went around to the front of the van and got down on my hands and knees and looked under the chassis of the van. I found what appeared to me to be a suitable place to put the jack and started cranking. After I had the rim off the ground a few inches, I took the wrench and tugged at the bolts holding the old tire on.

“You’re doing it wrong!” the man called from his truck. I ignored him. The bolts were stiff and I was using every ounce of my strength. The van rocked perilously. I stopped and waited for it to stop moving. Then I tugged at the wrench, applying more even force. These bolts are really on there, I thought as I gave the wrench a final pull. The jack kicked out from under the van and it crashed down. I dove out of the way just in time. I sat on my rear end a few feet away, shaking from my close call.

“You’ve got to loosen the lugs before you jack up the van!” the man in the pickup truck called.

Thanks, asshole! I thought, picking myself up off the shoulder and dusting my coat off.

I retrieved the wrench from where I had flung it and found that by partially standing, I could put all my weight into loosening the bolts. I got all five loose and again jacked up the van. I slipped the spare on the rim and let the vehicle down. The spare donut seemed really soft, but I wasn’t going to ask the useless idiot in the pickup for anything like an air pump.

I tightened the bolts and navigated slowly back onto the interstate. Opening my window, I flipped the old guy the bird before I roared off. I kept the van at thirty-five all the way to the mortuary.

It was a long ride back.

CHAPTER 10. Severe Clear

Contributed by a bicyclist

One night about ten years ago, I received a call at the witching hour. It’s not at all unusual in my business to get calls in the middle of the night, but this call was quite unusual. It went something like this:

“Freeman Mortuary. Gabe speaking.”

“Yes,” the shaky voice on the other end of the line said. “My name is Betty Drake. I’m sorry to bother you but I didn’t know who else to call.” She paused and wept.

“Did someone pass away?” I inquired, still lying in bed with my wife, the lights out.

“Yes…no. It’s our dog, Clear.”

“Oh,” I replied. “I’m so sorry to hear that.”

“Thank you,” Betty said. “We heard some noises about an hour ago and came out to the kitchen—my husband and I—and found him…dead!” She wept again. I remained silent. Betty composed herself and continued. “We just moved here and we didn’t know who to call. My husband suggested I look in the phone book for a funeral home. We knew the undertaker where we used to live and he came and got our last dog twelve years ago. I found your number in the Yellow Pages and called.”

“You want me to come get your dog?” I asked.

“Well, yes,” she said. “If that’s something you do.”

No, that’s not something I do, I thought, but what the hell. “I’d be happy to come get your dog,” I said. “What kind is it?”

She told me and gave me her address. I promised to be there within the hour and hung up. I redialed the phone. “Hey, Tom, don’t be mad, but—”

When I hung up with Tom, I lay in bed for a moment thinking, Don’t look at the clock, don’t look at the clock. I looked and groaned. My wife just rolled over and continued sleeping.

Tom and I arrived at the Drake household forty-five minutes later and found a crying Mrs. Drake and a somber Mr. Drake. They were an older couple; I guessed them to be in their early to mid-sixties. Mrs. Drake led us into the kitchen, where one of the most beautiful dogs I have ever seen, a husky with a black and white coat lay on the floor.

“We were never able to have children,” Mrs. Drake said. “So our dogs are like—” She bit her sentence off.

Mr. Drake knelt next to the dog and stroked the fur around his neck. “You ever dive?”

“Excuse me?” I said, confused.

“Dive. You know, skydive?”

“No,” I said, “can’t say that I have.” I was lost.

“We called him Clear,” he said. “His official name on his kennel papers is Severe Clear because his eyes were the exact color of the sky on a perfect skydiving day, called a severe clear day.” Not sure if I was supposed to comment, I remained silent. “I was Airborne. I used to dive,” Mr. Drake said, looking up for the first time from his place on the floor.

I nodded.

“I dove for sport later in life. When Betty brought this little guy home from the kennel and I saw those eyes, I knew exactly what we were going to name him. Either of you guys have dogs?”