“I’m sorry for your loss.” 

“No, you’re not,” I muttered, grunting as I brought the mallet down onto the makeshift gravestone, burying the foundation in the ground at the head of the newest grave. My mother’s grave. “No one’s sorry anymore.”

“You could at least pretend that I am.” 

I hammered once more, cementing the stone into the dirt. Wiping the sweat from my brow, I turned to Charles, letting the mallet fall from my hand, hearing the dull thud of it bouncing off the earth. “I did, the first few times.” 

His lips formed a thin line, and I could practically see his mind searching for the right words to say to me. 

“Don’t bother,” I said, shaking my head and walking past him, out of the graveyard. “There’s nothing to say, anyway. It’s just how it is.” 

“How can you be so calm about this?” I stopped, my hair whipping against my back in the gentle breeze. I grasped my left wrist, my thumb rubbing against the scars that lingered there. 

“Because it’s inevitable. It’ll happen to the rest of us eventually.” 

“And that means we just, what? Accept it?” I gritted my teeth, my left hand balling into a fist. “We just pretend that we’re okay with it?” 

“I’m not okay with it.” 

“You really don’t seem like it.” 

“What would you prefer?” I shouted, turning to him. “Would you rather I be a wreck? A screaming, crying mess? Swearing at whatever God is out there, begging for my mother back? Like you? Huh?” The words struck him like a bullet, and he looked away, tears forming in his eyes. I turned my gaze upward, breathing deeply and unclenching my fist. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that.” 

“No, you’re right,” he said, wiping his eyes before a tear could streak down his face. “It was a stupid thing for me to say.” 

I breathed out deeply, walking back towards him and reaching up to put my hand on his shoulder. “I did all of my crying weeks ago. You know that.” 

“Yeah, well, I guess I just hoped the pattern wouldn’t continue before it got to anyone I cared about.” 

I looked out over the field. One grave dug every day, for the last ninety days. Soon, there would be ten more. 

“Who do you think’ll be the last one?” I asked him, reading my mother’s headstone. Sadie Rivers. Loving mother and wife, resolute until the end. 

“Dunno. Hope it isn’t me.” He bent over, picking up the mallet lying in the dirt and handing it to me. 

“Thanks.” I took it, sliding the handle through one of the belt loops on my pants. “Why do you hope it’s not you? Maybe if you’re the last one, you get to live on.” 

“Yeah, sure, but even if it didn’t kill you if you were the last one alive, you’d have nobody. You’d be alone.” 

I thought about it for a few moments. “I guess that would be pretty sad. I can’t imagine what being alone would be like.” 

“Yeah.” 

I gave him a small smile, and he did his best to return it, though his eyes betrayed his sadness. He knew that he only had ten days to live, at the most. 

Then again, so did I. 

“Hey,” I said, stopping myself from spiralling down that train of thought, and trying to think of something that would stop him as well. “I’ve got a question.” 

“Yeah?” 

I took one final look at the graves before taking Charles’ hand, leading him out onto the street, away from that grim reminder of our reality.  

“How do you describe a feeling?”