Post from Craig Hubley

I remember Wendy saying once that if someone robbed her, they must have needed the money more than her. Or at least that they were so fucked up that she felt more sorry for them than the money could ever be worth. She was as gentle as a lamb. I don't think I'd ever heard anyone say that for real before. Nor since.

When the man jumped out of the bush and yelled 'surprise', she was. Otherwise her arm might have stayed still. She might have lived. She might have not. If only he'd known what I knew. If only he'd known to ask, instead of shooting.

Nobody blew bubbles during the funeral procession. When the speeches were over it was time. I thrust two bottles of the Pustefix into Kane and Katie's hands, and kept one for myself. I saw a bunch more come out. It was a twenty one ring salute. Or near enough. As the bubbles rose, snowflakes came down, coating them, weighing them down to Earth. Down to Wendy.

They lowered her. We threw in the dirt. Not on her head. Some put their back into it, one or two shovelsful, just to feel the weight of it... not everyone can be a pallbearer. Too bad. We all need to feel the weight.

Eventually there were just a few of us left there, staring at the casket, unbelieving. I took the last of the 'fix out, soaked the ring, and held it over Wendy's head, crouching low. 'One more', I whispered to her, and the wind filled a single bubble and freed it from the ring. A good big one. It lifted lazily in the air, against the falling snow, and shattered only when it hit a raggedy-bark tree just up from the bottom of the hill. 'Her tree' I said, and marked it with a mum from the graveside, where wreaths and wreaths of fresh flowers were laid, slowly becoming coated with snow.

Later, in the church hall, two older people were asking 'did they catch the man who did it?'. One said 'yes'. The other said 'good'. The first said 'they won't take long to try him'. The second said 'that's probably good - they hang them there you know'. The first looked satisfied. As if more death was a good thing.

I tried not to listen. I thought that they must have missed Wendy, their church Sunday School teacher, who might have taught them to really listen to the prayer:
'Forgive us our daily trespasses, As we forgive those who trespass against us...'

I wondered, also, if it was fair to ask her father, in whose arms she had died, to point a finger so yet another might die. I thought, how could anyone ask anyone to do such a thing? So politicians could 'do something'. So tourists wouldn't be scared. So the money might continue to flow. So the press would turn to the morbid spectacle of 'justice'. So Wendy, who stood for mercy and forgiveness, could be comfortably forgotten. And the rest of us would learn to have no mercy. And expect none in return. Perhaps not even from God.

It struck me that Wendy would have wanted to know about the man. If he had been anything besides a murderer: brother, son. I wondered if they would hang the man from a raggedy-bark tree. And if his family and friends would gather. And mourn.

I wondered if it would be really any different than what was going on here today. I wondered about all the ways that we lose our way, and end up in the cold hard ground with little left behind.

Others knew her better. But of all my Sunday School teachers, Wendy was the only one who ever got through to me. Thanks, Wendy, for making the Lords Prayer, which filled my mouth four thousand times in school, real to me. It will not be forgotten.