in a dead language - vmon

viii.

On that day, you laugh in the middle of the funeral the way you do when you're in pain. You clutch the microphone in your hand like it's your lifeline and you crack a joke about him, and you laugh at your own joke like it's the funniest thing in the world, and you laugh like a man with nothing to lose and a world to gain, and you laugh like you're high, and you laugh like it's your last laugh.

Then you cry. You're grinning hard, jaw jutting out, and you close your eyes to hold back the tears as you laugh and laugh and laugh and — sob. You sob like it has just hit you that your best friend is gone when it could've — when it should've — been you. You sob like a child, and you sob like a man who lost everything, and you sob like you're alone.

I pull you into my arms and kiss your forehead like we're alone, like we're not in the middle of a funeral, like his mother isn't sobbing. I pull you into my arms and lead you down the steps, and then we sit and wait until it's all over.

Then it's over.

On the way home, we get ice-cream like there's nothing wrong in the world, and we walk through the main roads like we're not going through hell.

We survive, like we usually do.

(I will never know how we do that. I will never know how we don't always do that.)