Adventures in Funeral Crashing (Complete Novel)

Chapter 1: Funeral Crashing

 The funeral was actually a relief. It was the first funeral I had ever attended. I mean nobody in my family or any family friends or anything had died in the fourteen plus years I had been alive and then the first one to go, is my mom. Sure, I had grandparents die before I was born, but I wasn't born yet, so I never knew them. Anyway, it was a memorable first funeral. I loved my mom more than anything else and it was comforting having all of the people who loved her all around us, even if most of them were just family. And, you know what? It was a nice funeral for being really depressing and all.

It was really cool hearing all the stories about my mom. Things she had never mentioned to me. Like, I didn't know she lived in Los Angeles, California for three months when she was twenty-six just to see if she liked it. She slept on her friend's couch and everything! She was too in love with my dad at the time to stay, but wow, my mom had an adventure! She lived in Hollywood! Where they make movies! I love movies. Maybe one day I'll go into filmmaking even. But, anyway, my mom was there in LA with the movie stars! How cool is that?

Needless to say, the funeral was actually the best part of that whole ordeal. I sound intellectual there, don't I, using the word ordeal? I like to read too – anything and everything. My favorite books range from The Shining by Stephen King (very creepy) to Gone With The Wind by Margaret Mitchell (classic romance) to Shopaholic by Sophie Kinsella (funny chic lit). See, I'm not all dark and dreary. A good book is a good book when you like to read as much as I do. I suppose some of my reading affinity comes from my best friend having ditched me, becoming the weird girl, and having no friends at all upon starting high school. Suddenly, you get a lot of time on your hands to do stuff like read.

So, yeah, I'm not a Goth girl, by the way. I don't wear all black and I haven't dyed my hair black either. I did put bleach blonde highlights into my hair last year, but they've all kind of grown out now and my hair is mostly back to it's reddish blonde again. It's kind of rusty really. My mom always said it was strawberry blonde and that it made my green eyes stand out. I think she was just being my mom because my hair looks rusty to me.

Oh, and to be Goth you have to know it inside out and be good at fashion, in a Goth way. It's not all just wearing black and I'm not good at fashion, by any means. I mostly just wear jeans and T-shirts. To the funerals, I dress up and yes, I do wear black. It's a funeral, you're supposed to. You're respecting and remembering the dead, you know? You should look nice and black is the accepted color for mourning. Besides, the whole point of crashing is to blend into the wake or funeral and fit in, so a black outfit can be key. And, I am there to mourn with them, so it's good to play the part.

So, basically, I'm not a total freak, like Ariel Walker makes me out to be. I just like funerals, which is why I'm at a wake on Wednesday night, instead of at home watching crappy reality television shows or teen dramas like everyone else. And, okay, we do have TIVO and I can always catch them online later, so it's not like I'm missing anything.

It's a wake for Liz O'Reilly. She was only nineteen and died of a drug overdose - a heroin drug overdose to be exact. It made the paper. There have been a lot of overdoses at Laurel Community College in the last two months and it's not the kind of area you'd think would have a major drug problem. I mean, pot, sure, but heroin? Heroin is a hardcore drug. It's something you'd expect to see a problem with in the inner city, not here in the squeaky clean suburbs.

I saw the news article before I even read the obituary. The obituary just said she was taken too soon from her loving family. Nobody wants to admit that their kid was a druggie. Things like that are never in the obituary. Her picture is what really got to me. It made my heart constrict and everything, it was so sad. Liz was really pretty from the photo. You'd never even think of her as using drugs, at least not enough to overdose. Pot, maybe. Alcohol, sure, she's a teenager. Heroin, no way would she be the type to even try it. I guess you can never tell, though. It's crazy.