My Funeral Friend(s)
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To say nothing of the boy would be remiss, as his role in this story was an integral one. But it is a role that is often overstated. The truth is that he could have been anyone, anywhere, and the end result would have been the same. If anything he was just a consequence of my life. Another left by the wayside in my whirling dervish of a journey. But I didn’t put him there. He was like that when I found him. I swear. Standing over a prostrate form, trying to decipher whether the darkness and rain are simply playing tricks on you, one’s mind wants to dismiss the worst-case scenario. Undoubtedly, I feared for it. But the truth of the matter was that I hardly even considered the notion that the soil on the young boy’s shirt could have been blood. I assumed anything but. I told myself it was mud. When I shook him he did not answer. And this troubled me because I had been hoping he could tell me what to do next. We were all that each other had. Nobody else had bothered to stop. They simply zoomed passed, their headlights lighting my task for a little while before they inevitably faded out, leaving me to decide for my own. I suppose I should have considered that nobody was stopping to help because anybody of sound mind would dial 9-1-1 and wait out the storm inside the comfort of their heated seats and mp3 serenades. Knowing what I know now, I can finally admit that nothing about my mind was sound. But I had pulled over. I had peered down the ravine and seen the body. And I had acted. Whether my actions were right or wrong, I no longer bother myself with. All I can do is remind myself that of all the people who drove by that tragic scene, I was the only who had actually tried. That is my redemption. The boy’s t-shirt could only do so much to hide what had happened to him. Once I realized it had been sliced through, I lifted a corner of the shirt to look underneath. It didn’t require the mind of a surgeon to diagnose that the boy was in awful condition. The wound ran straight from his armpit to his belly button, cutting deep and mercilessly. Unless I acted post haste, he would have bled out at my feet.
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About the Book
Hitchhikers can be an unpredictable lot, to say the least. But if they share one thing in common, it's that they're all desperate. And it's that very notion that drives Mitch Harpring to seek them out. You see, Mitch doesn't care where you are, how you got there, or where you're going. He'll take you as far as you need to go. All he asks, all he wants in return, is that you go to his funeral when he dies. The only catch is, Mitch has worked in a stock room and locked himself up in his apartment at night for about…a decade. That isn’t the interesting part of his story, mind you. It’s merely a means of illustrating just how physically and mentally unprepared Mitch is to take on a street gang, a semi-truck, multiple stabbings, and the world’s most frightening spider. Ever. But he’s willing to risk it all so long as he can get somebody, anybody, to come to his funeral.
About the Author
Joseph Bertalmio lives most of his life based on a dare that he made with himself a long time ago. And he’ll never let that good-for-nothing fiend prove him wrong. Ever.