Day 115 - 39 Days, Give or Take

 39 Days, Give or Take

 Matthew Ryan Fischer

 

Sean greeted the body at the airport, if such action could be considered a greeting. He represented his family as his father’s body was delivered back to the states. He signed some paperwork and nodded as a staffer reviewed their process with him. Sean heard some of it, possessed almost none of it, his mind focused on other things.

His mother wanted a quick funeral and limited memorial. She wanted it over. Not to move on, but so she wouldn’t have to think about it quite as often. Sean wasn’t in the mood to argue. He wasn’t in the mood to do anything, especially arrange a large gathering of people who would all nod and say the same platitudes. His father would be in the ground for a long time. There would be plenty of time for years of empty words.

His father had been found in his hotel room, collapsed on the floor, when the maid came to change the sheets. He appeared to have been in the middle of a morning routine of light stretching and weight conditioning. So, he had passed before breakfast, but he had definitely been awake. Sean hoped it had happened quickly and there hadn’t been much suffering. He had heard terrible stories about slip and falls and people being paralyzed and laying to waste away, undiscovered for weeks. Not the victory of falling asleep and never knowing what had happened, but far better than some torturous drawn-out conclusion.

It had been three days already. The funeral would be another two. Sean wasn’t sure why he was counting. There were plenty of ways this could go and plenty of religions and customs that required things happen in specific orders or within a specific amount of time. Sean didn’t adhere to any of these, and to his knowledge, neither did his father.

In offering her condolences Belle, a life long friend, had told Sean about a Buddhist belief that the spirit remains on earth for up to thirty-nine days and would stay with their loved ones. Perhaps if there was unfinished business, the spirit would send a sign. Perhaps the spirit would help the loved one grieve and move on. Sean didn’t question her logic. It seemed like a rude thing to do. Who would the spirit follow, him or her mother? Who would get the message? Did creeks in the floorboards or birds chirping too early in the morning count as something he should be listening for? She was trying to help. He tried to leave it at that.

Sean did a minimal amount of research online regarding burial customs. He found mention of an orthodox Christian belief that the spirit left on the fortieth day, and mention of a Japanese belief it was the forty-ninth day. He found nothing to corroborate Belle’s story. Not that she was wrong, he was certainly no expert of Buddhism, but she could have heard any number of things and mixed the facts up in her mind.

But he wasn’t counting the days. Because he didn’t believe in such things.

His mother wanted an open casket. Sean was less that enthused. He wasn’t interested in seeing his father in such a state of unnatural rest, with strange makeup on and inhuman features already setting in. He knew what he wanted to remember, and the unreal wasn’t it.

That night, sitting in the dark, alone, crying, Sean was hit with a terrible thought. What if his father was watching and he was missing the message? What if he his father had already been trying to say something for three days now? If Sean didn’t hear it, would his father be able to move on? If the thirty or forty or fifty days came and went, and Sean failed his father, what would happen to his father’s spirit? Would it be allowed to move on? Or would his father be trapped? Trapped following Sean or his mother, or worse yet, trapped in the casket with his own decaying body. That sort of torturous hell would that be, to slowly watch yourself rot, and be stuck for eternity with your own remains. Sean suddenly wanted his father to be cremated.