Christopher Moore - Secondhand Souls

“Uh, yeah.”

“Of course not.”

“Was that why my clothes always smelled like lemon?”

“Don’t be silly. You couldn’t smell things in that body. Hey, what should I wear to the funeral tomorrow? I don’t think my monk robes are appropriate, but it’s been so long since I’ve worn a dress.”

“Wait a minute. I used to wake up under the bed wondering how I got there.”

“Shh, shh, shh, quiet time. Rest. Rest. Sleep.” She gently stroked his penis like she was petting a kitten.

There was a thump in the hallway like someone had dropped a bag of dicks.

Which Little Pony is appropriate for a funeral?” Jane asked, flipping through Sophie’s closet.

“I don’t think any,” said Charlie. “It’s a wake, Jane.”

“Smurf? Little Mermaid? This big red dog, I forget his name?”

“Doesn’t she just have a normal little dress?”

“Why are you taking her to a funeral anyway? She’s just a little kid. Despite her being the big D, she doesn’t really get death. After you, uh, died, it was pretty awful trying to explain.”

“What did you tell her?”

“I told her that when you die, fluffy monkeys take you shoe shopping with a black card.”

“That’s horrible.”

“And very hetero,” said Cassie from the other room.

“No, it’s not. I see what you’re saying, Chuck, but Sophie didn’t even know Cavuto.”

“We’re not going for Cavuto. We’re going for Inspector Rivera. He saved my life. Sophie wouldn’t even have a daddy if it weren’t for him, so we’re going. Funerals are for the living.”

“Fine. What’s Audrey wearing?”

“A black dress.”

“Well, I can’t go now, that’s what I was going to wear.”

“No, you weren’t. I saw my charcoal Armani hanging on the doorknob in your room.”

“Okay, I wasn’t, but Cassie was, so she can’t go, so I can’t go.”

“Gray dress,” Cassie called from the other room.

“Not helping,” Jane shouted. To her brother, under her breath, she said, “Can you believe we marched for the right to marry, for that ?”

“You didn’t march,” Cassie called.

“How did you hear that?” Jane said. “Do you have this room bugged?”

“Jane, please, can we find something?” Charlie said. “Audrey’s waiting downstairs.”

Before Jane could dig back into the closet, Sophie marched into the room, past them, pushed her toy box over to the closet, climbed on it, pulled out a blue dress, jumped down, went over to the bed, where she laid out the dress, then crossed her arms and looked at them.

Charlie and Jane slunk out of the room to give the child the privacy she seemed to require.

“It’s my Armani,” Jane said. “You were dead.”

“You swiped it when I still lived here. What tie are you wearing?”

“No tie. Cream satin camisole.”

“Nice.” He put his arm around her, side hug, then hip-bumped her into the couch.

Cavuto’s wake was held in the grand ballroom at the Elks Lodge, which took up the third floor of a large building just off Union Square. The enormous room was paneled in dark mahogany, with tall cathedral windows that looked out over the square. There were perhaps five hundred people in the room when Charlie and his family arrived: Audrey on his arm, Jane and Cassie following, each taking one of Sophie’s hands between them. Most in attendance were San Francisco cops, all in dress uniform, but there were also police and firemen from a dozen different departments, and more polished buttons than a royal wedding procession.

Charlie immediately spotted Minty Fresh across the room, towering above the crowd, and near him, Lily, in a black lace and brocade Victorian dress with a plunging neckline and bustle, and a black-feathered hat with a veil. Charlie escorted Audrey in their direction, and as they cleared the crowd, saw Fresh was talking to Inspector Alphonse Rivera.

There were introductions all around, condolences, and when Rivera shook Charlie’s hand he grasped it with both hands and held it for a second. “Charlie, you have no idea how happy I am to know you’re here,” Rivera said, looking directly into the eyes of a stranger he’d never even seen before.

But Charlie did know, and he believed him, because in the face of a death, overwhelming, irresistible death, what moves you is life, and Charlie being here, even in the body of this stranger, was the thing that would touch this strong, collected cop the most. “Wouldn’t be here at all if not for you, Inspector,” he said.

Rivera still held his hand. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there to help pull you out of the bay. I—”

“You needed to be somewhere else,” Charlie said. He could see Rivera was still a little stunned, as could happen to you, mercifully, after the death of someone close. The grief or remorse might come over him later, like a rogue wave, but right now he was functioning, doing his duty, carrying on. There’d be no sloppy songs with his fellow officers for this one, no raucous, funny stories, of which he’d have had hundreds. He was part of the fraternity, but he stood out from every other cop in the room, in the city, in the world, because he knew who, what , had killed Nick Cavuto. “I’m going to get them, Charlie.”

“Absolutely,” Charlie said.

Minty Fresh leaned down, said, “We’re going to meet tomorrow. Everyone. We just need to pick a time and place.”

“The Buddhist Center,” Audrey said. “Noon?”

Minty Fresh looked to each of them for a nod.

Charlie looked around for Jane, Cassie, and Sophie, and saw they were already in a reception line that ran four deep halfway around the great room and was moving, slowly, by a thin, middle-aged, balding fellow in an immaculately tailored suit.

“Brian,” Rivera said. “Brian Cavuto. Nick Cavuto’s husband.”

“I didn’t even know he was married,” Charlie said.

“Neither did I,” said Rivera.

“We should pay our respects,” Minty Fresh said, directing Audrey and Lily to go before them to the line with a slight bow.

As Lily went by, Charlie whispered, “Nice bustle.”

“I liked you better when you were in the cat box,” she said.

Brian took Rivera’s hand and held it in both of his the way Rivera had held Charlie’s only moments before, gripping and shaking his hand with the rhythm of his words as he spoke. He had that lean, stringy strength of a marathon runner. Cavuto used to say guys like that wanted to be the last one everyone ate if they went down in a plane crash in the mountains.

“Inspector Rivera, I’m so glad you came.”

“I’m sorry for your loss,” Rivera said, because that’s what you say. “Nick meant a lot to me.”

“You were his best friend,” Brian said. “Nick talked about you constantly.”

Rivera couldn’t keep up any pretense. This guy had been Nick’s husband. He’d know bullshit even if he didn’t call bullshit.

“Evidently I didn’t even know him at all.”

“You knew him,” Brian said, patting Rivera’s hand. “He was a huge lunch whore.” Brian smiled and released Rivera’s hand.

“Okay, maybe I did know him.”

“That was one of his favorite things. He would tell me at least twice a week, while we were eating dinner, like I’d never heard it before.” Brian then did an uncannily accurate impression of Nick Cavuto: “ ‘Fucking Rivera says I’m huge lunch whore.’ That’s what he always called you, ‘fucking Rivera.’ ”

“Well,” said Rivera, pinching the bridge of his nose for a second, waiting for the power of speech to return. After a quarter of a minute or so, in which Brian waited patiently, not touching Rivera’s arm, which might have caused the detective to break up in front of four hundred cops, not offering comfort, just waiting, politely looking at his shoes, until Rivera said, “he was a huge lunch whore.”