Passed away

This story was previously published by Spinetinglers U.K. in their 2008 anthology. 

Ingrid had grown to hate those two words in the twenty years she had been writing obituaries for the Berkeley Bugle. When would these relatives get a grip? she thought. The dead didn’t “pass away.” They didn’t “drift peacefully to sleep.” They died. Croaked. Expired. Ceased to breathe. Choked on their own vomit. Or, drowned mercilessly in a boating accident. They died painful deaths due to cancer, and left loved ones to pay the bills. Gasped for their last breath in the dying throes of emphysema.

Waiting for hummingbirds

I sit

So still

Wait and watch

Barely breathe

There you are