By the time Shannie and I slithered through the funeral parlor's back entrance, the coroner had already removed the body. "Thank God for small favors. At least we don't have to work around him," Shannie whispered as we stared at the complex web of blood and brains splattered across the white washed walls. "Jason Pollock would be proud," Shannie muttered.
"Fuck, the walls needs to be repainted."
"Tell me about it," Shannie replied.
"Let's get to it."
I gathered the necessary cleaning supplies as Shannie drug a chair to the center of the room. "What are you doing?" I asked.
"Disconnecting the smoke detector," Shannie answered. I watched her sweatshirt rise above her jeans revealing a thin swath of stomach.
"Why?"
"I'm going to need a smoke and I don't want to set it off."
"Dumb ass, they're going to smell the smoke."
"Dumb ass, they're smokers," she said.
"Steve ain't," I complained.
Between the gagging, fresh air breaks, and the lengthy drags on our cigarettes, it took us hours to finish the job. Between the two of us, we killed a pack of cigarettes. "I'm a dumb ass," Shannie said flushing the last bucket down the toilet.
"Why's that?" I asked "They can hear the hopper."
***
"He fucked with us while he was alive and now that he's dead, he's still at it," I told Shannie during his funeral. The day was raw and overcast, exhaust from the procession spiraled skyward. "I can't sleep, Every time I close my eyes - every time - I see his goddamn brains clinging to the wall like some kind of, of," I stammered. "Of, Christ, I don't know, but they hang there, taunting me. I can't wait till he's buried! I'm telling you I'm going to get even - I'm going to piss on his grave!"
"Whatever," Shannie sighed.
"I'm serious!
"Just James, What you don't do is more powerful than what you do."
"What's that supposed to mean?" I questioned.
"Oh young Grasshopper, the absence of the positive outweighs the negative."
"Huh?"
"You don't see me in any rush to whip up a mud pie and throw it on his grave. The absence of positive deeds outweighs committing negative ones."
"You haven't whipped one up since Count." The procession turned into the Cemetery's driveway. My comment got me thinking. "Would you have made one for me? You know, if I, if I would have died?" I stammered as Shannie parked.