Grave silence

“The sun is bleeding.”

Thunk.

Thunk.

Thunk.

“Look, Mama–” The boy tried again, his chubby hand pointing along an imagined trajectory. “It’s bleeding!”

His words were loud this time, enough for his mother to pause. Her steps made no sound against the gravel, yet he felt her warm presence standing beside him.

“My word, it is.” Her laugh rained like morning dewdrops in his ear.  “I think it rather looks like a coin.” She pursed her mouth, then looked him straight in the eyes.  “Why would you say it is bleeding?”

The boy fidgeted with a loose weed. “I don’t know.” The plant snapped free and coiled around his finger. “Why would you say it looks like a coin?” he asked back, mouth falling into a crooked smile.

His mother said nothing. Her eyes were the perfect shade of a clear summer sky, but they always darkened with unspoken things. “Do you bleed?”

The question took him aback.

Does he bleed? Everyone bleeds. Why would she ask that? Was she upset he hadn’t answered her question? No... No. His mother was never upset. At least not in an obvious way.

She smiled delightedly when rain poured down in torrents; she smiled encouragingly when he got in trouble at school; she smiled through her teeth when she twisted her wrist in the summer house. Even when his chicken Cuckoo died, her mouth curved up while, funnily, her eyes curved down. She just smiled.

It had to be something else.

His eyes caught on his scraped knees, a fine scab weaving over his wound. “I suppose I do bleed. I fell today at school.” That was a partial truth, but her wasn’t prepared for the full truth just yet.  

“Sure you did.” She crouched down, patting her dirty hands clean before reaching over and touching his knee. Her skin was a ghost's touch, there and gone once more.

“It doesn’t hurt anymore,” he assured her.

She smiled. “I know you can manage it.” With a grunt, she stood up, wet hair clinging to her neck. A single droplet of water fell from her soaked red blouse onto his denim trousers. “Just make sure you don’t go over the edge, alright?”

The coldness of the stone seeped through his clothes, making him shiver. “I promise, Mama.”

Her hands were still stained with soil.

“Remy?” A rough voice called after him. “Don’t sit on the stone, you’ll catch a chill, sweetie.”

His grandma limped over, taking off the plastic gloves. She placed the shovel she had used for digging against the grave and took a shaky breath. “Are you ready to go?”

Poppies now bloomed tall at the foot of the stone, a fiery red against a murky brown. They were beautiful, yet his grandma’s cheeks were stained with tears.

The boy blinked up at her.  He was never ready to leave. He nodded anyway.

“Bye, Mama.”

Only grave silence greeted them in return.