Martha sat by the window, watching the golden evening light stretch over the headstones. She sipped her tea, finally letting out a long, steady breath. In Oakhaven, the dead were buried on Sunday so the living could start over on Monday. And for the first time in fifty years, Martha was looking forward to breakfast.
The Vicar spoke of "eternal rest" and "the cycle of the week," but the villagers were looking at the hole. There was an old superstition in Oakhaven: a Sunday burial meant the soul didn't have to wait in the vestibule of the afterlife. It went straight to the head of the line, fresh for the Monday of eternity. Buried on Sunday
The procession was a quiet affair of black umbrellas, looking like a cluster of beetles scuttling toward the open earth. Silas’s widow, Martha, didn't cry. She held a single white rose, its edges browning from the wait. Martha sat by the window, watching the golden
"Late to his own party," she whispered as the pallbearers stumbled slightly on the slick grass. And for the first time in fifty years,