A Death on Jupiter Mountain

The Beginning

 My name is Beckett Kingsley, and if there's one thing you need to know about me, it's that I love my grandfather.

He died a week ago. 

And today is his funeral.

My real dad hadn't been in my life for very long, he left my mom eighteen years ago while she was still pregnant with me. He was really only in it for the money anyway, at least that's what mom always told me. Hence why I became a Kingsley and not a Smith. 

One time mom told me she'd rather die than give my father any part of me. Dramatic, I know. But also understandable when it comes to the Kingsley family, we didn't just let anyone close to us.

The absence of my dad doesn't affect me much,  I think it helps that I've never met him. I do wonder about him sometimes and what he's like. Mom doesn't like to talk about him so I'm not exactly sure what made him leave or how she found out he didn't love her. But this isn't about him. This is about my grandfather.

Samuel Kingsley raised me while my father disappeared and while mom coped terribly with the fact that no one wanted to be around her for any real reasons. Instead, they like the money and power that followed the landed under the Kingsley name.

What a burden it is to be rich. 

Through most of my childhood or life for that matter, it had mainly been my grandfather and me. But now Samuel was dead, leaving only two Kingsley's left.

My grandfather's funeral was beautiful, mom had done a good job putting it together through a matter of five phone calls. 

Everyone gathered outside under the incredibly hot sun. I'm sweating in my suit. The end of July is the worst part of summer by far. But I'm not going to say anything about it, mom is already upset enough.

I watched my grandfather's casket get slowly lowered to the ground. People threw flowers on top of it every so now and then. Mom threw in a bundle of lavender, my grandfather used to say it reminded him of his wife. She died of cancer before I was old enough to remember her.

And no, I'm not talking about my grandmother. My grandfather was married five times before he found someone that he thought was actually worth keeping around. I'm sure my great-grandparents would be rolling around in their graves if they ever found that out. 

The funeral was held at the family estate, a large house on an even larger plot of land. It's a tradition. In the farthest corner is our own personal graveyard. A whole twenty by twenty-foot square filled with dead Kingsley's. Creepy, I know.  

I'll end up in this exact square one day, with a funeral that's probably pretty similar to this one. Only I hope no one drops roses on my casket, a flower like that shouldn't be ruined by death.

All of the funeral goers and I watch as my grandfather hits the ground with a soft thud. Mom lets out a loud sob. She grabs my hand and looks at me with tear stain cheeks. Soon she would go off to the bathroom and fix her makeup for the second time today. I squeeze her hand gently and watch with her, and everyone else, as the first pile of dirt falls on top of my grandfather. 

I feel kind of bad for mom. I'm all she has left. Weird how that works.

She didn't have any other kids. Kingsley's stopped having more than one child generations ago when we kept fighting each other for the family fortune. If you only had one child, they would never have to compete with anyone.

How easy it is to be given the world and all the money in it. 

But I've never been very good at listening so I will definitely be having two children.