Member-only story
Fiction
Loyalty
A story of an odd-sized casket
This story was my entry to the Owl Canyon Press Hackathon #4 (2020). Winning stories can be found here; although my story was not selected, I still think it is worth sharing. The first and last paragraphs were provided by the contest. The challenge was to write eighteen paragraphs to fill in the middle (for 20 paragraphs total), each with no less than fifty words.
It was an odd-sized casket, too small for a man, too big for a child. A flag was draped over it, a smallish one. It was carried by four men in uniform, though it was hard to tell for sure from a distance what uniform it was, or even if they were all men. There wasn’t room for the usual six pallbearers due to the small size of the casket since it would have made for a comical service to have all six jammed together, shoulder-to-shoulder, crowding around an under-sized coffin. So the extra pallbearers were in the ranks of many others in uniform standing beside a small open grave. The officiant wore a robe instead of a uniform and must have said something because there was a long silence, then a burst of laughter.
Laughter, at a time like this? I thought, watching the procession through narrowed eyes. It would seem as though some of the soldiers were not taking the occasion seriously, and such defiance of solemnity could not be…