When the day came for Ollie’s funeral, there were not nearly as many people as there’d been at the last funeral I’d attended; it was nothing like Kent’s service. We stood in an open field, surrounded by nature, in the place where he’d proposed to Mary many moons ago. She said it was the day her life began, and it only seemed right to go back there to absorb that same love she’d felt years ago.
And oh, there was love. So, so much love showed up for Ollie, including former students, colleagues, and friends. Although the space wasn’t packed with reporters, fans, or cameras, it was filled with the only important thing in the world: love.
Everyone made sure to comfort Karla and Mary to the best of their ability, and the two were never alone. As the service went on, there were tears, laughter, and stories filled with light and love.
The perfect tribute to a perfect man.
When the pastor asked if anyone would like to share words, it only took Graham a second to rise from his seat. My eyes locked with him as he handed Talon over to me.
“A eulogy?” I whispered, my heart racing fast. I knew how hard something like this would be for Graham.
“Yes.” He nodded. “It might not be any good.”
I shook my head slowly and took his hand, squeezing it lightly. “It will be perfect.” Each step he took to the podium was slow, controlled. Everything about Graham had always been controlled. He almost always stood tall, never wavering back and forth. As my eyes stayed glued to him, my stomach tightened when I saw him stumble a bit. He grabbed the podium and refocused his stance.
The space was silent and all eyes were on him. I could smell the lilacs and jasmine surrounding us as the wind blew through them. The earth was still wet from all the rain we’d received over the past few days, and whenever the air brushed past, I could almost taste the moisture. My eyes didn’t move from Graham. I studied the man I had learned to quietly love as he prepared to say goodbye to the first man who ever taught me what love was meant to look like.
Graham cleared his throat and loosened his slim black tie. He parted his lips, looking down at his sheets of paper, which were filled with words front and back. Once more, his throat was cleared. Then, he tried to speak. “Professor Oliver was a…” His voice cracked, and he lowered his head. “Professor Oliver…” His hands formed fists on the podium. “This isn’t right. You see, I wrote this long speech about Oliver. I spent hours upon hours crafting it, but let’s be honest, if I turned this paper in to him, he would call it complete shit.” The room filled with laughter. “I’m certain many of the people here have been his students, and one thing we all know is that Professor Oliver was a hard-ass when it came to grading papers. I received my first F on a paper from him, and when I challenged him about it in his office, he looked at me, lowered his voice, and said, ‘Heart.’ I didn’t have a clue what he was talking about, but he gave me a tiny smile and repeated, ‘Heart.’ I later realized he meant that was what was missing from my paper.
“Before his classes, I had no clue how to put heart into a story, but he took the time to teach me what it looked like—heart, passion, love. He was the greatest teacher of those three subjects.” Graham picked up his pieces of paper and ripped them in half. “And if he were to grade this speech of mine, he’d fail me. My words speak on his achievements in his career. He was an amazing scholar and received numerous awards that recognized his talents, but that’s just fluff.” Graham chuckled, along with other students who’d had Ollie as a professor. “We all know how Oliver hated when people added extra fluff to their papers to reach the required word counts. ‘Add muscle, not fat, students.’ So now, I’ll just add the strongest muscle—I’ll add the heart. I’ll tell you the core of who Professor Oliver was.
“Oliver was a man who loved unapologetically. He loved his wife and his daughter. He loved his work, his students, and their minds. Oliver loved the world. He loved the world’s flaws, he loved the world’s mistakes, he loved the world’s scars. He believed in the beauty of pain and the glory of better tomorrows. He was the definition of love, and he spent his life trying to spread that love to as many people as he could. I remember my sophomore year, I was so mad at him. He gave me my second F, and I was so pissed off. I marched straight to his office, barged in uninvited, and right as I was about to shout at him for this outrageous issue, I paused. There he was, sitting at his desk crying with his face in the palms of his hands.”
My stomach tightened as I listened to Graham’s story. His shoulders drooped, and he tried his best to hold himself together as he continued speaking. “I’m the worst person in those situations. I don’t know how to comfort people. I don’t know how to say the right things—that was normally his job. So, I just sat. I sat across from him as he sobbed uncontrollably. I sat and allowed him to feel his world falling apart until he could voice what was hurting him so deeply. It was the day one of his former students committed suicide. He hadn’t seen the student in years, but he remembered him—his smile, his sadness, his strength—and when he learned that the student passed away, Ollie’s heart broke. He looked at me and said, ‘The world’s a little darker tonight, Graham.’ Then he wiped away his tears and said, ‘But still, I must believe that the sun will rise tomorrow.’”
Tears flooded Graham’s eyes, and he took a beat to catch his breath before continuing, speaking directly to Ollie’s family. “Mary, Karla, Susie, I tell stories for a living, but I’m not very good with words,” he said softly. “I don’t know what I can say to make any sense of this. I don’t know what the meaning of life is or why death interrupts it. I don’t know why he was taken away, and I don’t know how to lie to you and tell you everything happens for a reason. What I do know for a fact is that you loved him, and he loved you with every ounce of heart that he possessed.
“Maybe someday that fact will be enough to help you through each day. Maybe someday that fact will bring you peace, but it’s okay if that day’s not today, because it’s not that day for me. I don’t feel peace. I feel cheated, sad, hurt, and alone. All my life I never had a man to look up to. I never knew what it meant to be a true man until I met Professor Oliver. He was the best man I’ve ever known, the best friend I’ve ever had, and the world’s a lot darker tonight because he’s gone. Ollie was my father,” Graham said, tears freely falling down his cheeks as he took one final deep breath. “And I will forever be his son.”
For the past few nights, I’d been sharing a bed with Graham. He seemed to be more at peace when he wasn’t alone, and all I wanted was for him to find a little bit of peace. The May rain showers had been coming down heavily, and it was our background music as we fell asleep.
One Sunday morning, I woke up in the middle of the night due to the sound of thunder, and I rolled over in the bed to see that Graham was missing. Climbing out of bed, I went to see if he was with Talon, but once I reached her nursery, I saw she was sleeping calmly.
I walked throughout the house searching for him, and it wasn’t until I stepped into the sunroom that I saw a shadow in the garden. I quickly tossed on my rain boots and grabbed an umbrella, walking outside to see him. He was soaked from head to toe with a shovel in his hands.
“Graham,” I called after him, wondering what it was he was doing until I glanced over at the shed where a large tree was leaning, waiting to be planted.
Ollie’s tree.
He didn’t turn back to look toward me. I wasn’t even certain he heard my voice. He just kept shoveling into the ground, digging a hole that would hold the tree. It was heartbreaking watching him soaking wet, digging deeper and deeper. I walked over to him, still holding my umbrella, and lightly tapped him on his shoulders.
He turned to me, surprised to see me standing there, and that was when I saw his eyes.
The truth lies in his eyes, Ollie had told me.
That night I saw it, and I saw that Graham was breaking. His heart was breaking minute by minute, second by second, so I did the only thing I could think to do.
I placed the umbrella on the ground, picked up another shovel, and started to dig right there beside him.
No words were exchanged—none were needed. Each time we tossed the earth’s soil to the side, we took a breath in honor of Ollie’s life. Once the hole was large enough, I helped him carry the tree over, and we placed it down, covering the base back up with mud.
Graham lowered himself down to the ground, sitting in the mess of nature while the rain continued to hammer down on us. I sat down beside him. He bent his knees and rested his hands on top of them with his fingers laced. I sat with my legs crossed and my hands in my lap.
“Lucille?” he whispered.
“Yes?”
“Thank you.”
“Always.”