Ashes to Ashes

"Funny, always imagined I'd be the one six feet under." Emily lit her cigarette with only slight satisfaction, finding little comfort in the nicotine that flooded her system.

She exhailed slowly, watching the smoke trail into the air and dissapear. "And I should have been too..." She had always imagined herself dying slowly of suffication, though not so slowly that she would outlive her brother. She wasn't suppose to have to go through this.

"That's the way we planned it at least. After mom and dad died, we, Adam and I that is, agreed that Adam would go on to further the family name - after all, he was the only one left to carry it. I would die before I reached thirty due to lung cancer or some such, and he would be the one putting me in the ground."

She sighed, finally looking at the audience in front of her. An outdoor cerimony would have made Adam happy, so she had done it for him... and for her addiction. She smiled ruefully after taking another drag from the cigarette, "And now look at me!"

She passed a hand down past her body, the body of an old woman to sick to be considered living, and to aware to be pronounced dead. "Adam had so much more to offer this world than I do... He had a family," she held her hand out to the first row, "A widow and two daughters. He left his love and his compassion, but he failed to leave his name." She smiled politely at the shocked faces of the crowd, "You know ma... she'd be rolling in her grave if she knew the Powel family name would be gone in a generation!"

"Whoop his ass, more like!" The crowd agreed with smiles.

"That she would," Emily agreed, "with the all the vigor that eighty year old woman could muster."

"Bless her." someone commented.

"Bless momma? Maybe, but today we're here to bless Adam, and his life... and his family." she adressed them directly, "Myra, I know you miss him - we all do... But think of what Adam would want. Adam didn't believe in tears and flowers - he had a gypsy's soul, just like his father before him. We can do nothing for him with our tears, but we can honor him with our memories and our strength..."

She smiled and opened her arms, forgotten cigarette letting ashes go like so many petals off a flower. Though her lungs were blackened from many years of smoking, her voice was still pure, and still good. She hailed the audience with her voice.

It was a light song, with joy and music infused into the very chords her voice spoke of. And with a slow step she walked into the congrigated and sang until she could stand it no more. Dancing along the isles she watched as others joined her, moving away from the grave site and towards the open field.

And when the festivities were in full swing she found herself a chair and faded out. The last words on her lips were a tune praising her brother's life, even though she knew no such song would accompany her. This she did, not because she had to, but because she loved her brother... and his was a life to sing about while her's was a life to grieve.

And when they burried her by his side not two days hense they would remember her only as a lady of sixty, with the soul of a gypsy.