The Guillotine | ONC 2022

III

"Are you talking about Armand?" Henri sighed with a hint of sympathy in his voice. "You can't be so harsh on him. He didn't mean to offend you, he just never knows how to behave in these situations. You know, unlike most of us Jacobins, he really comes from the most humble background and he wasn't lucky enough to gain sponsorship for studying at the university. That's why he doesn't like attending these events, being among so many erudite men makes him feel like a savage." 

"Oh… I didn't know that." I gasped astonishedly, "He always has the air of a well-educated man." 

"Yes." Henri chuckled and picked at his portion of chicken, "Until he gets angry, then he'd be able to make a sailor blush!"

I slapped Henri over his ear with my fan, admonishing him, "Stop laughing! This is a funeral!" 

Although I didn't see the point in genuinely mourning for a man as ordinary and useless as my husband, I at least had the decency to pretend to do so. 

My son was such a barbarian…

"And what?" Henri mumbled with his mouth full. "Yes, sure, he was my father, but-"

This time I lost my patience completely, using my palm to silence him instead. 

"Don't talk with your mouth full! Are you still a small boy, or what?" I hissed, raising my fan again, threatening with another blow.

Henri snickered amusedly, swallowed what he was eating and continued as if nothing had happened. 

The boy just enjoyed irritating me…

"Yes, sure, he was my father, but he died two weeks ago. That's when I cried, that's when I mourned for him. What did this day change about the irrevocable fact that he's dead and will never return to us again? Why should I open old wounds that have been sealed long ago? My father died two weeks ago and I made peace with his death. What would be the point of crying now when I no longer feel anything?" My son ended his 'moving' speech, taking another bite of his chicken.

"That kinda makes funerals lose their meaning, don't you think?" I retorted, placing the utensils back onto the sides of my plate.

Not that I was going to eat something anyway…

"And that's exactly my point!" Henri murmured excitedly, again as if to annoy me on purpose, before he took the care of swallowing whatever was in his mouth. "Funerals are an utterly illogical concept! When your close relative dies, you can't wait for two weeks, pretending as if nothing was happening, and then suddenly burst into tears when the priest arrives. No, you deal with the loss on your own and at your own pace… it's not like some kind of burial ceremony would give you peace anyway, you'll still have to accept the fact of the loved one's demise and once that happens, who cares if the body is lying in a fancy tomb or if it was eaten by stray dogs? One way or another he's dead, nothing will bring him back and these details really won't make any difference."

"Oh, you cynic…" I sighed. "So you think two weeks are enough to forget one's own father?"

"Yes, perfectly enough. Life is too short. If I spent mine, mourning about the deaths of others, I'd just waste time. " Henri shrugged indifferently.

I scoffed, shifted my gaze from Henri to my untouched meal and remarked venomously, "And whose fault is it that we had to wait two weeks?"

"It's not my fault that I was wounded!" Henri defended himself.

"And whose then?" I growled. "It's not the Girondines who suck at fighting, it was you… and you could have acted like a real man for once and attended the funeral despite your own petty selfish problems… you would have cried out of pain if not out of grief at least. And it wouldn't be such a cheap comedy… this isn't a funeral anymore! This is a political debate!"