The Funeral Makers Read Free Page A

embarrassed Amy Joy stumbled past her, losing a flip-flop. When she bent to pick it up, there was a loud ripping sound. The seat of Amy Joy’s faithful slacks had finally given in to the stress of adolescent fat.
    â€œJust leave it there, miss,” said Sicily, and kicked the flip-flop to one side. She turned and looked back at their visitor. “Good night, Mr. Gifford,” she said. She let the screen door bang shut and latched it. Then she closed the inside kitchen window and locked it. In case Chester Gifford still didn’t get the hint, she closed the two Venetian blinds in the back windows and snapped off the porch light.
    â€œWe’re closed for the night,” she said and turned to Amy Joy, who was studying herself in the mirror of the medicine cabinet on the kitchen wall.
    â€œAll right, Amy Joy Lawler. Let’s hear it.”
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œYou know what.”
    â€œNo, I don’t.”
    â€œWas that Chester Gifford lurking out there like a thief in the night, or was it not?”
    â€œI guess.”
    â€œYou guess, do you? Well, let me tell you that this will be brought to your father’s attention. I’m on my way home now to cook his supper, and Amy Joy, this is one time he will be told .”
    â€œOh, Mama,” said Amy Joy, and squeezed a pimple.
    â€œDon’t pick at your complexion,” said Sicily. “And you look at me when I’m speaking to you.” Amy Joy turned to look at her mother, a dollop of blood on her chin.
    â€œNow look what you’ve done to your face,” said Sicily, passing her daughter a tissue from her apron pocket.
    â€œIt isn’t bad enough that you’re thirty pounds overweight, you have to go around picking at your face. Honey, what’s to become of you? Reading True Confessions all day when other little girls your age are reading cookbooks and sewing patterns.”
    â€œWho wants to cook and sew?” Amy Joy asked and turned on the radio Marge had won by punching the lucky name “Perry” on someone’s ticket board. “‘Life gets cold and empty, when your self-respect has died.’” Amy Joy danced along to the music. “‘What does it take to keep a woman like you satisfied?’”
    Sicily turned the radio off. “Now you listen to me, little girl. Have you been seeing Chester Gifford?”
    â€œI guess,” said Amy Joy.
    â€œYou guess what? Have you or haven’t you?”
    â€œYeah, I suppose.”
    Sicily sank into a chair at the kitchen table. Amy Joy snapped one last meager bubble, then tossed the dying gum into the trash can at the end of the stove.
    â€œWhat’s wrong with Chester?”
    Sicily removed more tissue from her pocket and blew her nose. She cleared her throat for the second time that night.
    â€œAmy Joy, you are my only daughter. And you are only fourteen. You’re a baby. I thought God gave you to me as a blessing in my old age, but I swear, it’s getting harder and harder to think of you as a blessing.” Sicily looked at the floor as she spoke. Finally, she chose a time to look directly at Amy Joy, who was leaning against the refrigerator. A piece of tissue spotted with blood was stuck to the ravaged area of skin.
    â€œTake that bloody rag off your face while I’m talking to you.”
    â€œIt’s bleeding, Mama,” said Amy Joy, and returned to the mirror to dab at the small volcano.
    â€œ Well, don’t pick it then ,” said Sicily, raising her voice. This was something she hated to do. Marge was famous for voice-raising and Sicily was determined to pave roads of her own.
    â€œYour friend Chester Gifford is at least thirty years old if he’s a day. And not to mention the fact that he’s been in trouble with the law a dozen times. You are barely fourteen years old, young lady, and he’s a full-grown man with a mustache.”
    â€œOh, Mama.” Amy Joy was now