E-Mailing Your Story (To Me) Will Not Save You

Sadie and Brett, stepping up 2 the streets

So, things are pretty terrible in these parts. All of my time is taken up by either this novel or the gym or work, leaving me no time to do anything fun. I often have to stay up really really late after work to complete my writing. I'm kind of freaking out here.

But luckily, you guys have come to the rescue. I straight up plagiarized from some novels from last year. However, I'm sure that you will find the effect to be more than pleasing.

I am now at 32,000 words.

Unfortunately, for those of you who are not Esmondes, you will probably not find this very funny. In fact, I didn't even attend the funeral that a lot of this is based on, but it has lived on in our collective memories for years.


The Redington Funeral home in Friendship, Maine, was a bustle when the Halls arrived in their black limousine. Businessman clad in black suits congregated outside on their cell phones, apparently unable to leave their work behind for one day to attend the funeral of a colleague. How can anyone become so cold? How does the gravity of the situation—a man dead, leaving his family behind—not elicit any sympathy from them? As they made their way through the crowd, Susan nodded at several of them. The looks of both sympathy and judgement that they gave her must have been humiliating; did everyone know that Jeremy Hall was an adulterer? Or did they just know what kind of person Jerry was, and wonder what kind of person that Susan could have been to stay with him? Sadie would never know; all that she knew was that she wouldn’t wish this kind of pain on anyone, not even the person who had broken her heart.

Sadie was disappointed to see that nothing seemed to improve when the service had finally started. A portly and bald man stepped forward, cleared his throat, and delivered what would famously go down in history (to Sadie, at least) as the worst eulogy of all time.

“I don’t know how you all feel about this, maybe this will help, maybe it won’t,” an inauspicious beginning, if ever there was one. “But I find, when I have lost someone, that it really helps for me to think about that person and how they relate to building materials. Now, maybe it’s because I’m losing my house in a couple of weeks because the churching business just isn’t what it used to be, all of these kids hooting and hollering with their Twitter accounts and their iPhones, turning their backs on the Lord. No apps can replace the church, no way Jose!” He stops to clear his throat. “Now, as we all know, my boss,” he pauses, his finger pointing toward the ceiling. ”My boss...Jesus, would be considered the cornerstone of any building. He is absolutely necessary in the successful completion of any type of construction. Try to build a house without him, you’ll learn!” The man chuckles at what he seems to think passes as a joke before continuing. “When I think about Jeremy, I think, Jeremy was the type of person that... you know... you could... build a house on Jeremy, he was just so solid. Jeremy, was... a foundation stone. And in the kingdom of our Lord, as we have learned, his house has many mansions. And all of them, every single one, is built upon a foundation. A foundation, made up of people like our beloved Jeremy.”

Everyone is staring at this man transfixed in horror, hoping that perhaps he simply got off to a rocky start and would follow this up with something at least moderately relevant and inoffensive. Sadly, all hope that he would turn a corner and amaze them with his speech was lost after what followed.

“I think that we can all agree that Jeremy was a natural at home décor. For those of you lucky enough to have visited Jeremy’s home—which I did once, and I will tell the story, don’t worry—it is obvious that the man just had a gift. Now, I had seen his wife Susan in church every week, and she had been alone since Jeremy was away a lot. I was able to swing an invitation to their home, hoping to score some alone time with Susan, if you know what I mean—” he has to pause as the room is filled with shocks of horror. “—But when I walked in and saw Jeremy sitting in the living room, well, I backed off, as any man would. Susan was holding onto one of their dogs on the deck—Jeremy just loved those dogs, didn’t he! Am I right, folks?” No one nods in appreciation or agreement, but the man who never really introduced himself just ploughs on.

“It wasn’t just dogs that Jeremy loved—he loved all animals! This was really exhibited by his love of hunting. Every time he killed one that he was really proud of he had it stuffed and displayed it in their lovely home where he may have picked out a throw pillow or two. Those dead animals that he kept around the house were really well placed! I mean, it was like a safari! I know that all of you hunters out there have gotten some advice from Jerry about where best to display animal corpses around your own homes. Like I said, a gift!”

The room was thunderously silent. The man at the lectern had at last stopped speaking, but it was unclear whether he was finished, or incorporating some sort of dramatic pause, or perhaps he was waiting for applause? Finally, he spoke again, quickly and unceremoniously delivering the details of the interment, as well as the location of the reception following the service. Then he stepped away from the lectern, and quickly left the room.

Brett had grabbed her hand part way through the eulogy and was yet to let go; while his grip was incredibly tight, she much preferred hand pain to what she knew that Brett wanted to do to this strange man. Susan is weeping quietly beside Brett, and it probably isn’t because she will miss Jerry’s home decorating tips. Sadie thought it best to help Susan outside; she had seen her dehydrated, and it’s pretty gross.

However, as soon as they walk through the doors to the hall, a bright flash disorients them. Before their eyes re-adjust and they are once again granted their vision, they can hear the sounds of what Sadie makes out to be “Pose” by Justin Timberlake featuring Snoop Dogg, one of the duds off of his inimitable FutureSex/LoveSounds album. Upon listening closely, Sadie discerns that the song appears to be about Justin Timberlake and Snoop Dogg pretending to be photographers, so that they can convince women to take their clothes off.

Noticing the disgusted looks on their faces, what appears to be hair styled in the shape of Emilio Estevez circa is uncredited—yet still impressive—role in Mission: Impossible, says, “This should set the mood.” It was amazing how that hair cut had started to become animated. Amazing, and disturbing.

“Set the mood for what? Who are you, and why are you bastardizing my father’s funeral?” Jake Hall roared at the Emilio hairstyle. The hair turns around revealing a man.

“Jim Jimerson,” he extends his hand. “Funeral photographer.”

“We didn’t book a funeral photographer,” Brett says, seething with anger. “Do we fucking look like we want to remember this day?” Sadie surveyed the group, and quickly concluded that no, they did not. Unfortunately for Susan Hall, she was not one of those people who look good when they cry. Her face was bloated as if she had spent the previous night consuming only Bud (not light) and the morning consuming only various kinds of carbs. In addition to bloat-face, her entire face was beet red.

As Justin pleaded with them to “expose those things you want to show,” Jim Jimerson seemed to think that “those things that they wanted to show” was an oddly robotic shimmy accompanied by the Charleston. He also asked them to put on fake moustaches, and then asked Jake and Brett to rub their crotches on Susan’s head. To put things lightly, Jim Jimerson was messing with the bull, and would soon get the horns. Sadie decided to lead Jim out of the Redington Funeral Home, worried about his safety if he were to be left alone. Additionally, she was impressed with his technique, and didn’t want to burn any bridges with Jim Jimerson so that she could make use of his skills for her future wedding photos.