dead body

I sat next to a dead body, once.  It looked alive, except it wasn’t.  All the colors were the same.  It didn’t stink, yet.  It was the thinnest body I had ever seen, thinner than any body I’d seen alive, with the possible exception of Maed Kake.  I sat on a stool, next to the plain wood platform used as a bed on which the body lay, the man’s parents and brother there with me, in the small cinderblock room with thin linoleum sheeting, not much thicker than drawer liner paper, covering the cement floor. 

Kaked had worked for me for almost three years.  His brother was not more than 25 or 26 years old.  I’d “loaned” him two and a half million rupiah (about $250) to help him and his parents bury the body.  Just the week before I’d loaned him about one million rupiah to pay for hospital bills.  If I’d provided all the money up front, would he still be alive?  I don’t know.

There were no tears.  The mood was no more mournful than cheerful.  It was resigned.  These people had already seen one brother, one son, die in childhood.  It was not a new event.  Besides, there were still lots of brothers left – three.