1
It was strange, Ava thought to herself as she watched the plain pine box containing her mother lowered into the dusty ground, she was technically an orphan now.
Her t-shirt stuck uncomfortably to her back as ponderous beads of sweat rolled lazily down her spine, collecting at the waistband of her threadbare jeans. The dark tendrils of hair which had escaped her messy bun, were plastered to her neck as the raging inferno of the midday sun beat down on her unprotected head.
Who the hell thought getting buried at midday was a good idea?
She squinted and tried to focus on the monotonous monotone of the preacher. Even with her sunglasses protecting her eyes from the harsh glare of the sun, she was still seeing spots and weird reflections of light.
The coffin hit the hard, compacted ground with a thud and Ava shifted uneasily. This time it had nothing to do with the heat. Her mother was really dead, this was it, her eternal resting place. She reached down inside herself for something, anything, that felt different.
Nothing.
Well no, not exactly nothing. She felt sad, of course she did, but the bald-faced truth of it was that although her mom was dead, nothing had really changed. She didn’t feel any different which only served to confirm one uncomfortable fact. That even when her mom had been alive, Ava had always been alone.
Caroline Annabeth Wallace, or rather ’Serenity’ as she’d always been known to her friends, had lived life very unapologetically on her own terms. She’d blown from town to town, commune to commune, with all the turbulent grace and unrelenting ferocity of a summer storm, on a whim, and with no regard for the daughter she dragged along in her wake.
Her mother had loved her, Ava had never doubted it, she’d simultaneously both baffled and annoyed her and she may not have always understood her, but she’d loved her none the less.
Ava rolled her shoulders uncomfortably; her skin felt like it was melting off her body in the relentless Arizona heat. She glanced down at the small plaintive whine of her dog Bailey, who sat at her side, pressing her heavy body against her legs.
‘Alright girl,’ she murmured under her breath as she stroked her head, ‘not long now.’
The droning sermon ran on and on. Like the opening credits of Star Wars, it felt like it was never going to end, and no one was really paying attention. Bailey gave a dissatisfied sniff and trotted off, stretching out under the scant shade of the nearest tree, her long pink tongue lolling out of her mouth as she panted heavily.
Knowing she wouldn’t go far Ava once again turned her attention back to the mismatched assembly of characters pretending to listen to the eulogy, as if it were the most riveting thing in the world and they weren’t all stoned out of their minds. A riot of tie dye assaulted the eye, along with beads, bare feet and Birkenstocks. Everywhere Ava looked was long hair and sweating bodies, overlaid with the unmistakable scent of weed, which hung over the proceedings like a miasma.
Well, Ava thought absently, at least her mom had gone out the same way she lived; high, at one with nature and the very center of attention.
She let out a slow breath and blinked the sweat from her eyes. It was typical that her mother had managed to die during one of the hottest months on record, thank you climate change, but then again, her mom had always loved the bright blazing sunshine. The hotter the better as far as she’d been concerned, unlike her daughter who’d always preferred cooler, overcast, moodier weather.
Ava supposed it reflected their personalities perfectly. Her mother had always been a glass half full kind of girl, whereas Ava didn’t have a glass, or if she did, hers would not only have been very definitely empty but also possibly smashed on the ground with someone stealing the pieces.
The reading finally concluded, and the mourners shuffled forward to toss brightly colored, wilted flowers onto the coffin. Ava waited until they slowly began to drift away one by one, in pairs and small groups. Stepping forward she stared down into the open grave, scuffing the toe of her frayed sneakers in the dusty ground as she frowned, at a loss as to what to say.
‘Bye mom,’ she murmured finally, ‘say hi to dad for me.’
Her fist tightened around a limp bunch of wildflowers she’d stopped at the side of the road and picked on her way to the funeral. Half of them were probably weeds she thought to herself in amusement, but they looked pretty, so she figured what the hell. Her mom probably would have liked them anyway; she’d never really liked hot house flowers cut at the peak of perfection.
Perfection, she’d told her, was overrated. Freedom was everything.
It was just as well, Ava mused ruefully. She couldn’t have afforded to buy flowers anyway, not even from the local gas station. With one final lament she tossed the flowers down onto the coffin and watched as they landed with a faint thud and parted in the middle, sliding slowly off either side of the curved lid to be crushed along the edges of the grave.
Figures.
She shook her head and turned around to find a familiar face standing right behind her.
‘I’m gonna miss her,’ he murmured, his eyes flickering over Ava’s shoulder and lingering on the gaping hole in the ground.
‘Baz,’ she nodded in greeting, she’d known him since she was a kid. He’d been one of her mom’s oldest friends and also, unbelievably, her lawyer.
His hair was steel gray shoulder length and his eyes a vivid cornflower blue. His weather-beaten face was tanned and etched with deep lines. He wore loose fitting harem pants decorated garishly, patterned in primary colors and on his feet were battered leather sandals. His only concession to the formality of the occasion was a rather boring gray pin-striped tie, which knotted tightly around his neck and lay against his rainbow tie dyed t-shirt.
‘I like your tie,’ her mouth twitched in amusement.
‘Thanks,’ he nodded seriously. ‘Ava…I’m sorry about your mom, she was one of a kind.’
‘That’s one way of describing her I suppose,’ Ava murmured.
‘If you’re feeling up to it,’ he continued, ‘I need to read you her will.’
‘Mom didn’t have a will.’
‘Yes, she did,’ Baz corrected her.
‘But mom didn’t have anything worth putting in a will,’ Ava shook her head. ‘What’d she do? Leave me her stash of weed and the last couple of kegs of her homemade daisy wine?’
‘Ah her daisy wine,’ Baz smiled in remembrance, ‘the first time I had your mom’s wine I lost six days.’
‘You’re lucky you didn’t lose your internal organs,’ Ava muttered.
‘Good times,’ he chuckled.
‘If you say so,’ Ava shrugged.
‘Anyway,’ Baz shook his head, ‘the will. Can you stop by the cottage?’
‘Is that really necessary?’ she replied in annoyance.
She was down to her last thirty bucks and had been sleeping in her truck for the past week. She was almost out of gas too, the trip to Arizona had pretty much cleaned her out. There was a diner just down the street advertising for a temporary waitress. She really should try sweet talking the owner into giving her a job for a couple of days until she had enough money to blow town again, not spending the day reminiscing with Baz about her mom.
‘It really is important Ava,’ he told her bluntly, sensing her reluctance. ‘There was a lot about your mom you didn’t know.’