Anchor Grind (H.S. / A.U.)

Chapter 35

TRIGGER WARNING: Gun Violence, Young Adult Violence, and School Shooting Violence Ahead for the next few chapters!

No POV

A blur of faces moved through the doors of New Bethel Baptist Church. Some were flushed, some collecting tears, and others downturned hoping to hold a composure for the grieving family inside.

All day the weather was mimicking the actions of those below the clouds. A gray sky that blew cold winds from the west, spraying salty ocean air through the town of Venice Beach, while the clouds wept for the loss of a life taken far too soon.

A mother was clutching her necklace, a heart shaped pendant that had two birthstones encrusted on the front, she splayed a hand upon her husbands shoulder while he shook the hands of anyone who came to offer condolences and tell their own stories of memories they shared with the recently deceased.

Two girls were hidden in a back corner of the room, one held a box of tissues for the other that sobbed through the pain. The girls clung to one another, at the beginning of the day they were strangers, but now they came together to share a bond they didn't know they would ever have to endure. A mourning girlfriend, a weeping sister who was equally brokenhearted but in a different way.

There was a sad sort of solitude in numbers as coworkers, friends, and family all came to give words of their own behalf. Some came from nearby, some from states away, stories of achievements, a previous girlfriend, a childhood friend, even a grade school teacher who heard the news in passing and felt the need to fly in and pay respects.

There's a sad sort of beauty seeing someone so young and beautiful, what you would assume as full of life turned instead pale, caked in a layer of makeup to hide the rigor mortis bruising and the fresh flowers in the casket to mask the smell of embalming chemicals preserving the likeness of a fresh face for the families benefit.

There were some kids that played tag in the front lawn of the church, not understanding the severity of the situation, or the true meaning behind it. Too young to learn what this dismal occasion was representing.

There have been movies, songs, and all sorts of media that have shown gruesome and evil horrors of the world and beyond, but that was nothing compared to watching a parent have to stand with an umbrella over their head, the sound of rain cascading with the heavy sobs of pain that each person couldn't help but elicit between clumps of dirt falling onto a casket.

One speech of greatness, two of sorrows, three of good memories that now live in the past, and a last one about what could have been achievements if you had more time alive.

No one would forget a day like this, it etches itself into your memories developing as a core part of you that burrows deep into the depths of your soul. It emerges when you start to remember life being too good, or if you think you are strong enough to overcome the past, a wave of emotion will pull you under and take you back to that place of hurt where you watch the one you love get put six feet deep, while you have no choice but to go one without them now and live a life they never got to experience.

A young girl mentions that this feels like the end of her world. Her blue hair whips around her face as the wind nips her skin and tears have perpetually stained her face from the days leading up to the actual burial of someone she loves. It may be just one day, but for her it seemed like it was the last day. The last day she would feel the same, the last day she knew who she was, and the last day she would see his face. These were all things she told to her mother, another grieving soul.

Someone places a bouquet upon fresh dirt, she reminds the tombstone that she will never forget him. Whispering I love you's that roll off her tongue like the falling rain, a hand tracing along the etched flower on the frontside of a dusty gray tombstone.

An attendee stuffed the paper in his pocket, the same one that he was handed at the beginning of the ceremony. The inside features some inscription or quote that has been repeated time and time again for other events similar to this.

The photo inside displays a smiling face, the same you once saw in the casket. Only this version was full of life, radiating through bright honey colored eyes and tousled hair streaked naturally by sunlight. The name, dates, all of it repeated itself on the same tombstone that so many had shed tears over, tossed flowers at, and spoken whispers to today.

Levi Kenneth Carson

1971 - 1996

Beloved son, brother, and friend to all

You'll be remembered in every ray of sunshine, until we meet again