Wednesday Write In #30

Prompts: overdose : mither : gloss over : poach : digest

The sniveling overdose of sentimentality during the funeral service made me smile, but I managed to get through it without rolling my eyes. There was lots of delightfully vague nonsense about how Mike had been such a good guy, we’ll really miss him. Course, being a good guy is what they say at your funeral when you’re a loser. No one said how great he was at his job or how much respect he managed to develop. No one spoke about how he would reduce morale in the office or fail to support Head Office’s demands. No, instead we got some mithering nonsense about being a good father, a loving husband. Community service. Coping with his cancer with bravery. A twat, basically.

Outside the Church, in the snow, I glossed over the service when giving my condolences to his wife. It’s one of the things I’ve learnt as I’ve gotten older. Sometimes people aren’t mature enough to  be rational at that moment, exactly? Instead I made some benign comments about the service, which she seemed to not react to. She was blond, tired. Black drained her, as a colour. She’d be better in brighter colours in a few months.  I didn’t mention to her my plans to send an email to HR about Mike’s pension. His figures were too low over the last five years to warrant any increase. At least, they weren’t when I looked at them over after his stupid outburst after the Christmas Party. “Cold hearted bastard”, indeed. If I was so cold hearted, how come he was the one yelling names? He should have thought of his family more, got sense, kept quiet. It is a demand of working life we all have to make, Mike.

Ah. There was Brian, from Head Office. I wanted to say hello to him, to have him see I saw him and vice versa. There was a rumour going around I was about to be poached from this dismal back water, promoted to Head Office. Next summer should see me gone. I walked up to him, and found to my surprise he was ill mannered. I never would have expected it from Management, but there he was, staring at my held out hand. “Brian, hello,” I said, hoping he would remember the right thing to do. Instead, Brian seemed to think he was …justified? in taking a step back. I kept my composure. “I hope everything is all right?” I asked, my voice low.  He looked at me with the most pompous assurance. “You might want to consider the decision,” he said, “of attending the funeral of the man many consider you drove to an premature death.”

I stared at him, realising.

“Please, if nothing else, consider it something to digest.”

The realisation washed over me, as he walked away, as they all walked away from me. People just despise success. They’ll revolt against it, and against people who achieve. Its happened so many times before, and here it was happening again. I watched him walk away, thinking to myself how sad it was. Some people will never know the depth of their own self delusion, the lies that they tell themselves. Shaking my head, I pulled my coat around me tightly, and headed back to the office.