Chapter 45

• One thing that Roxanne decided that she liked about wakes was that there was always something to do. Although the standard would be to linger, to dwell, to mourn, Roxanne had next to no memories, let alone experiences with Hannigan to make a spectacle of. She had, unknowingly or not, already committed terrible, immoral things in the past few hours. Over the course of the past few months. With the weight of Jake on her shoulders, she didn’t necessarily feel like she was about to take on an additional layer of sitting beside someone who could’ve been Hannigan’s coworker, friend, or relative, and have the audacity to share in their grief.
• As soon as her feet hit the bottom landing of the staircase, Dina was quick to whisk her away, tugging her back into the kitchen to arrange fresh plates of food. Whether Dina disregarded the tears on Roxanne's face as stock standard grief, or as something else entirely, she was relieved that they went unspoken for.
• That was how she spent however many hours it was until the sunlight began to pour out of the house like sand through open hands when Roxanne had flicked the lightswitches on as she walked from room to room, her arms well past the point of tiring from the weight of the large platters of cheese, cured meats, pickled vegetables. With every sharp, clunking snap of a light switch, she draped layer upon layer of proverbial linen over herself, locking whatever lingering thoughts of Jake, of her mother, far away in the recesses of her mind. She bounced from group to group, offering food and empty smiles, head blissfully blank, repeating the same cyclical script that she had slowly built up over her first few rounds of the sitting rooms.