Sunshine and the Full Moon by Jon Robinson

Author:Jon Robinson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Koehler Books
Published: 2021-04-21T07:39:43+00:00

CHAPTER 20:

RIP

Friends, relatives, and looky-loos lined the wooden streets five deep to honor Christine, each wearing purple and green suicide prevention bows pinned to their shirts. In the middle of the bow is a picture of Christine in better times. She had an amazing smile, the kind you see the first day of school when you make a new friend.

Noni and I walk out of the motel, and I notice how bright it was under the stars and full moon lighting up the night as Emerson runs up and hands us our bows. I pin mine to my shirt just above Thor’s hammer, then I look out to the crowd to see a group of girls sitting on the curb, face in their hands as they continue to cry. I look to the other side of the street and I see another young girl who looks like she’s waving to me, but I’ve never seen her before. That’s when I notice she’s wearing one of my orange and black Misfits bows in her hair. She looks at Emerson and mimics the pose he took in the cemetery, and the three of us all laugh before her father grabs her arm and they shuffle back into the crowd.

“That’s the mayor’s daughter, Jessica,” Emerson says. “She goes to my school.”

“I can’t believe she’s wearing my bow,” I say. “That’s so cool.”

“What’s a little girl like that doing in the cemetery?” Emerson asks.

“Looks like the same thing we were,” I laugh. “I wonder what she left in the box.”

“I wonder if her dad knows she’s hanging out with dead people. He’s like the strictest parent at our school. Everything is about how Jessica needs to set the right example, how she needs to get straight A’s, and how anything and everything the poor girl does reflects on him and the town, since he’s the mayor. He puts so much pressure on her, sometimes I think she’s going to snap.”

“No wonder she’s hanging out in the cemetery. At least it’s nice and quiet up there.”

“Yeah, no one to tell you you’re wrong.”

The music starts to play and I can see a group of people walking down the middle of the street holding signs and balloons and various pictures of Christine playing soccer and picking flowers and kissing her mom. I recognize the song: Rainbow by Kacey Musgraves. Damn, that song always makes me cry, even without a dead girl (although, on the real, I prefer Thingamajig’s version from Masked Singer). Father Flannery is walking in front of the group, making the sign of the cross while sprinkling spectators with holy water as they approach the bridge.

“It’s hard to breathe when all you know is the struggle of staying above the rising water line,” I mouth along to the song. “Well the sky is finally open, the rain and wind stopped blowin’ but you’re stuck in the same old storm again. You hold tight to your umbrellas, well darlin’ I’m just tryin’ to tell ya, there’s always been a rainbow hangin’ over your head.

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