(Salt Lake City, UT) “We gather here today to remember our dear friend Jennifer. She was a dear friend, a loving wife, and dog mother to Jovi, her miniature schnauzer.” All eyes went to the dog, just at it had mounted the pillow left on the floor in the corner. Lacking any understanding of the seriousness of the proceedings, Jovi began humping the pillow with reckless abandon. “Oh god,” the pastor continued. “You really hate to see that on a day like today.”

 

Trying desperately to move on, the pastor invited up the deceased woman’s husband to the podium to say a few words. “Hello everyone, thank you for coming,” Charlie began, trying to hold back tears. “I wanted to say a few words about my wife Jennifer. You know, she really changed me. Made me a better man.” Charlie began to weep and paused for a few seconds trying to hold it in.

 

Meanwhile, Jovi showed no signs of stopping and was thrusting with such disregard for the mood in the room that you might think this dog was mad. After a particularly forceful hump, the pillow fell over onto it’s side, causing Jovi to follow and bang against a cabinet.

 

Charlie looked up from his spot on the stage, face red and wet with tears, trying to hide his anger at Jovi. The dog he had never wanted in the first place. He would keep the dog, sure. Jennifer would have wanted that. But that thing was getting boarded every weekend while he went to Miami to “work through his depression.” He tried to make eye contact with his brother Daniel to try and motion for him to do something about it, but he was too busy talking with the man next to him.

 

Charlie started again, but noticed that there were still a few in the crowd watching Jovi. “Jennifer helped me understand what it meant to love, and be loved. She was my everything. I don’t know what I’ll do without her.”

 

Just as he was about to finish off his speech with the dope line he had spent 5 hours writing the previous night, he saw movement out of the corner of his eye. With horror, Charlie realized that Jovi had moved on from the pillow to a different victim, Jennifer’s Mother’s leg. Mrs. Crenshaw tried her best to gentle push Jovi away, but each time he came back with more and more gusto.

 

Finally, Charlie rushed off the stage and picked up the dog before turning his attention to the mourners and saying, “Thank you again for coming. The reception will take place in the lobby, enjoy the punch,” before exiting stage right and out through the side door.

 

No one exactly knew what to do, but slowly brave souls made their way out of the sanctuary and out towards the punch and cookies lining the tables in the lobby. Soon, only two women remained, covered in black lace obscuring their faces. Slowly they rose and went to the open casket.

 

“They did a good job on your nose,” one woman said to the other. “It really looks like you.”

 

“Not as if it mattered,” replied the other woman. “Did you see them? None of them even came up to see me.”

 

Moving closer to the other woman, the first woman put a finger to her lips and said, “It’s alright. We’ll have a new life now. One where we won’t be brought down by the likes of them.”

 

“You’re right. You’re always right. I love you.” The woman pulled up her veil and kissed her on the mouth. “Now, let’s go before someone sees.”

 

The two women made their way out of the church and left their former lives behind. No one knew the truth. No one suspected a thing.

 

 

But that was where they were wrong. A young girl had been wandering through the lobby when she noticed the two figures standing over the casket. She watched as one of them lifted her veil to kiss the other. She did not understand why, but before she could understand what was happening the two women were leaving and she could not catch them.

 

The child then made her way up to the casket in order to see what might have caused the two women to act the way they did. When she got up to the stage, she lifted herself up on her toes to look into the coffin. As soon as she saw the nose of the women lying there, she knew. She had seen the same nose lean across and nuzzle against the cheek of another.

 

Susie June would carry this secret with her for the rest of her life, only whispering it softly to Jovi each night before she fell asleep beside her new friend.

 

 

 

This article was written by Nathan Ellwood, who puts the ‘fun’ in ‘fundamental truths of the universe.’ Follow him for more on Twitter @NPEllwood.