Past Forward Volume 1 Read Online Free PDF

to show this to people. We only keep one of
each in stock in the back for charity cases and such. Most people
are insulted if I offer them something so shabby…”
    Very decisively, Willow pointed to the third
coffin shown in the brochure. “Mother would have approved of that
one. I’d like that.”
    A million details followed, each more
exasperating than the last until finally Willow stood. “I am done.
I want that casket, a plot in the cemetery if we cannot get a
permit to bury her on our property, and a nice minister to perform
the—the whatever it’s called.” After a moment, she regained enough
control to remember the word. “—funeral.” She took a deep breath
and continued. “I want a prayer, Mother’s favorite scripture read,
and we’ll sing ‘Our God is Alive.’”
    Smiling through unshed tears, Willow nodded
at Bill. “I’ll see you back at my house. I trust you for the rest
of the decisions, but as far as a ceremony or whatever, that’s all
I want. It’s all Mother would have wanted. I’ll pick her some of
our flowers and cover the coffin with them or maybe she can hold
them. Whichever. Please try to get a permit for burial at the
farm.”
    With that, she rushed from the building but
neither man followed. They stared at one another for a moment
before James Jorgensen said, “Wow. She’s going to crash hard when
it hits her, but right now, wow.”
    Bill glanced at the closed door and nodded.
“Wow.”

    Willow passed a small deli just around the
corner from the mortuary. She’d never eaten in a restaurant—for
that matter, she’d never eaten away from home except for their
occasional picnics at the creek. Suddenly, she felt a keen desire
to try restaurant food.
    A line to the door of the deli dissuaded her
from entering. She asked a woman going into the deli if there was a
good restaurant in town and was directed to Marcello’s. Once
inside, she knew she’d been sent to exactly the kind of restaurant
mentioned in her favorite novels.
    Stunned at the prices of the food, she
quickly opened her tote and retrieved her mother’s wallet. She
hadn’t counted the money from the teapot; she’d just taken a
handful and left another handful for another time. Seeing a hundred
dollar bill, she breathed a sigh of relief and slipped the wallet
back into her purse. As she did, her phone rang sending shrill
sounds reverberating around the quiet room.
    “Oh, I am sorry!” she exclaimed as she
struggled to find a way to turn it off. In exasperation, she slid
the phone open and then shut it again disconnecting the call.
    A waiter hurried to her table and asked if
she’d mind setting the phone to vibrate but she pleaded for help to
silence it. He showed her how to turn the phone completely off and
then turn it back on again when she was out of the building. “But
it’s not necessary, miss, we just ask that people put it on vibrate
so as not to disturb our other diners.”
    “Well, it would be rude for me to talk while
eating anyway so off is better anyway.” As she spoke, she noticed
several people mumbling into their phones, many with a lunch
partner waiting for them to complete their call. “What is so
important to discuss that you can’t wait until after you eat?” she
mused aloud.
    “That’s the question of the times, isn’t it?
Can I get you something to drink?”
    And so began her first experience in a
restaurant. She asked about everything and finally settled on
lemonade. At first, she chose hard lemonade, thinking it was extra
sour. When she couldn’t produce identification to prove her age, a
question she’d found incredibly amusing, the waiter, Brendan, said,
“Sorry, we can’t serve alcoholic drinks to anyone who looks under
thirty-five without identification.”
    “Alcoholic! I just want nice sour lemonade!
I don’t drink alcohol.”
    Every lunch special sounded better than the
last, until she finally said, “Choose something for me. Anything. I
just don’t want anything