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Show 410 "They've started already. Come on." They ran up the steps to the viewing room, which was still full of people, though they had begun to file through the doorway to the chapel. His mother was staring into the open casket, with Sonia next to her holding her arm. "Come on, Stephen, just do it. You'll be glad you did." "Lorrie, forget it. I mean it. I can't even look at that thing." Lorin had laid his hand on his brother's back and was escorting him through the crowd. "It'll be okay, Stephen, I'll stay with you. Hi, Miriam." A short woman with a beehive hairdo had just stepped over and patted him on the arm. She pressed a handkerchief across her mouth. Lorin stumbled as his brother suddenly stopped. "Oh my God," said Stephen. Lorin looked and saw his mother bending over the open casket. All he could see of his father was the last exposed button on his shirt and the pair of crossed hands. He tried to remember which one had been on top before. The men from the mortuary were starting to look busy. One of them moved a spray of flowers from the end of the viewing table so that the other two could have room to work. "Don't close it yet," Lorin called. His sister turned. "Hurry," she said. One of the men was gently lifting his father's head and another was fitting a white temple bonnet onto it. He tied the straps under the chin. Lorin's mother looked at her two sons as though she was not sure who they were. The resistance Lorin felt in his brother's back was making him impatient. "Come on. You can't not do it now that you're here," he said into Stephen's ear. "I'll look at him. That's all I'll do. She can see me do that." "You're going to lay your hot little paw on him," Lorin said. |