Papaya at the Funeral

Caroline stood by the buffet table at Jim's wake, staring at the fruit arrangement. Someone—probably his secretary—had included papaya among the grapes and melon cubes. Jim had hated papaya. He called it 'the blandest of all fruits' and once made her promise never to serve it at their dinner parties. Now it sat there, orange cubes mocking her from their place beside the cloying sweetness of pineapple.

She adjusted her black **hat**, tilting it lower to hide eyes that refused to produce tears. The steady stream of coworkers and distant relatives moved past her, offering sympathetic nods and platitudes about Jim's 'heart of gold.' Caroline nodded back, wondering how many of them knew about the credit card debt, the late nights at the office that weren't spent working, the condoms in his briefcase.

'He was a **bear** of a man,' someone said—a man Caroline vaguely recognized as Jim's boss. 'Strong. Resilient.'

Caroline thought of Jim in his final months: hollowed out by chemotherapy, reduced to a whisper of himself. She'd held his hand through it anyway, smoothing his hair, bringing him soup he'd never eat. Love was stubborn like that.

The back door opened and Jim's brother—drunk already—stumbled in with his massive **dog**, a beast of indeterminate breed that immediately began sniffing mourners' crotches. No one asked him to leave. It was the kind of inappropriate detail that made grief feel real, like the time Jim's mother keeled over at Thanksgiving and they'd finished their stuffing before calling 911.

'Your **orange** scarf,' a woman whispered, too loud. 'It clashes with your dress.'

Caroline looked down. She'd forgotten she was wearing it. Jim had bought it for their anniversary two years ago, back when he still remembered dates and still pretended to care. She wound it tighter around her neck, the silk rough against her skin.

She took a papaya cube from the tray and ate it, letting the bland, vaguely sweet flavor fill her mouth. Jim was right. It was terrible.

'To Jim,' his brother toasted, raising his bottle. 'The bastard who owed me fifty bucks.'

Caroline finally cried—not because he was gone, but because he'd never pay that debt, and somehow that unfinished business felt like the truest thing about him.