Seven Minutes to Noon

asked a few obvious questions: who, where, when, why. To all that, there was still just one answer: she died at seven minutes to noon on Friday. It was all they knew.
    Mike walked over to Tim and drew him into a long hug. Tim seemed slight and deflated in a dark gray suit that now hung off him. The burning end of his cigarette was squashed between two yellowed fingers that dug into Mike’s navy suit jacket. From where the children were clustered — now including Ethan, who had arrived with Simon — Alice saw Austin’s glance at his weeping father. There was such anger in the little boy’s eyes; it was as if he had been brought to some dreaded event against his staunch objection.
    It was a dreaded event, Alice thought; it was the worst possible thing. Austin’s anger was absolutely right. She stepped in front of the children and looked at him, not smiling, and let his green eyes fight her. Then she crouched in front of him and held him in her arms. It was a mother’s complicity, a plain acknowledgement that life was a beast. It was the best and only thing she could give him. He did not push her away for a full minute, a long time for a child with friends and a toy within easy reach.
    When she stood, Alice found Tim watching her with bloodshot eyes that looked sunken, almost bruised. Thanks, he mouthed, as Mike drew an arm around his shoulders and led him into the funeral parlor. The double doors had been opened; the service was about to begin.
    Just then Maggie ran up, panting, and immediately spun Austin into a hug. “Aunt Mags has got you now!” she said in a tone that Alice found too buoyant. Grating, almost. But then Austin laughed and Maggie’s onslaught seemed, on the contrary, perfectly tuned. She carriedAustin through the front door. Lizzie ushered in the other children. Alice, Mike and Simon followed.
    They were led through a large lobby into the first floor chapel. It was a wide room, painted taupe and slate blue, with an aisle separating two banks of pews. There was an absolute symmetry to the chapel, Alice noticed, with two large urns of white nasturtiums whose spicy sweetness could not overcome an odor of mothballs and formaldehyde. The huge flowerpots sat on pedestals at the foot of a shallow set of stairs leading to a platform where, set behind the urns, was Lauren’s casket. The golden-hued oak wood was highly glossed, with large brass handles at either end. The casket was closed.
    Alice saw Maggie’s back collapse as soon as they came into view of the casket. She held herself together long enough to set Austin down on the floor. He slid along the first row bench until he was pressed against his father, then coiled into a ball, tucking his head between his knees. Lizzie, Alice, Mike, Nell and Peter slid in next to Austin. Maggie, Simon and Ethan were behind them in the second row. Muffled sobs floated around them like remnants of a cloud that had lost its foothold in the sky.
    Soon the chapel was full. Friends from the neighborhood had come, but mostly Alice didn’t recognize anyone. It seemed as if everyone who had ever known Lauren was there, from her childhood through her college days through her early years in New York before settling down with Tim. Alice was part of Lauren’s motherhood life, and it struck her now what a small slice of time that had been. She felt a thin vapor of loneliness, sitting there among so many strangers who had loved Lauren or at least cared enough to see her off. Alice suspected, though, that some of the mourners hadn’t ever met Lauren but knew her story and had come out of curiosity. The ones standing at the back of the chapel were clearly reporters, with their casual clothes, notepads, and cameras slung over their necks.
    Alice spotted Frannie standing among the reporters. She was dressed in a black skirt suit and black high heels. Her hands were folded behind her back and she leaned against the wall. She nodded, smiling sadly, when she noticed Alice looking at her.
    The service lasted over an hour, with Tim following the rabbi as the first speaker. Alice had never known Tim to have trouble with words — as a lawyer, persuasion was his strong suit — but now he struggled to find something to say. “I can’t really believe this is happening,” he began in a voice that was tinny and thin, scratched from too many cigarettes. From crying himself to sleep or just crying. Alice wanted to rush up to the lectern and save him from the necessity of burying