The funeral was dismal. This much was expected, but Ada had had such high hopes that it would be just the slightest bit different—they had, after all, called it a ‘celebration of life’, which normally meant there would be a barbeque and possibly cake, but instead this celebration of life just meant that there would be balloons handed out and they would sing slightly happier gospel songs than the ones that were normally sung, albeit through their choking sobs and tears.

When Ada had scoffed at the funeral and at the balloons and the little hors d’oeuvres scattered across the tables, her mother told her that she was in denial, that she would feel the brunt of it soon enough. Ada had scoffed at her, too, and her mother had sighed and moved on to greet the guests.

“Help with the flowers, Amanda,” her father told her. His voice was so tired nowadays, so weak. Ever since the accident, it was like everything had just drained away and an empty shell was left behind. Ada wondered if she would ever be able to find all that had left her father and force it back in so he could smile again. She wondered this often.

“I don’t know why you got these flowers,” she said, hopping down from her perch on the church stage. “He didn’t like these flowers. He liked Queen Anne’s Lace.”

Ada’s father just looked at her. “Did you expect a vase of weeds at every table, then?”

She shrugged. “I don’t know. It would have been more appropriate, don’t you think?” She grabbed one of the vases sitting beside her and dropped it as carelessly as she could without breaking it onto the table nearest her. “He would have wanted it.”

“He would have wanted a lot of things.” He sighed and ran a hand across his chin, which now looked very scruffy and rough. He hadn’t shaved for days. “If he had it his way, he would have us all singing Nirvana and Led Zeppelin instead of the gospel songs.”

Ada snorted quietly. “I wouldn’t mind that.”

“I know you wouldn’t. They were your favorite bands first.” He looked wistful. “He looked up to you so much, Amanda. He wanted to do everything that you did.”

“Well, he shouldn’t have,” Ada said, frustration building in her chest, ready to explode. “He should have been a normal teenager. Normal teenage boys do not follow their older sisters around.”

“He loved you.”

Ada softened. “I loved him, too. But that didn’t really help us much, did it?” She set up another vase and rearranged the flowers. “He would have hated all of this,” she whispered. “You know that, don’t you? He would have hated us all saying that this was a celebration of life, and he would have hated the music, and he would have hated the flowers.”

Her father touched her shoulder. His hand was calloused and Ada wanted to throw it off of her. “It’s okay to cry, Amanda. He wouldn’t care if you cried.”

“I don’t want to cry,” she said. “This is stupid. I want him to wake up.”

“He isn’t going to wake up.”

“Thanks. I really needed that.” She kicked at one of the tables angrily. “Just. Leave me alone, okay?”

He drew his hand back and cradled it to his chest, as if it hurt him. “I’m going to go find your mom.”

“She’s outside talking to everybody,” Ada said. “They’ll come in any second.” She ended the conversation by spinning on her heel and placing the last vase of flowers, carefully, in the center of the circular table.

Ada had seen Oliver many times after the accident. Hell, she was the person who found him—he was lying there in the center of the road, neck at an odd angle, in a puddle of something dark. Ada heard herself scream, felt her legs sprinting toward him, felt his clammy skin under her fingers. It hadn’t really registered that the next morning, he wouldn’t wake her up blasting some band she had just introduced to him. He wouldn’t randomly start crooning her favorite songs, trying to match pitch with Kurt Cobain and never really succeeding. But she had always smiled, always laughed with him. It hadn’t occurred to her that it wouldn’t happen again.

The second time she had seen him, he was already all dressed up in his best suit, the one that he had worn to the dance in his year, and they had put foundation on his face so he wouldn’t look so pale. Ada’s mother was standing next to the casket, touching his shoulders and his cheeks and his chest and sobbing into this little napkin because she couldn’t find her handkerchief before they left the house. Ada’s father was crying, too, and trying to be manly and tough about it, but his whole body shook from trying to hold it in. They both told Ada that everything was going to be okay, and they hugged her close to their bodies.

Ada still hadn’t shed a tear. Not then, not now, standing in the small church with her brother’s body on the stage. She went up to the casket and peered inside.

“Heya, Oli,” she whispered to him. “I’m not going to let your celebration go to hell.” She sealed the promise with a soft kiss to his cold cheek. “The duty of youth is to challenge corruption.”

People were beginning to filter into the church. There were a lot of Oliver’s friends—skinny, gangly teenagers that normally wore skinny jeans and graphic tees, but were in ironed suits, now. Some of their faces were impassive, as if they were trying to prove their strength by not crying, and some, like Oliver’s closest friends that Ada had met a thousand times, that she had complained about a thousand times, were sobbing. One of the impassive ones looked up at her, standing by herself on the stage and nodded, and Ada nodded back. They understood each other. They weren’t going to cry—not because they were trying to prove themselves, but because they couldn’t find the emotion within them.

Oliver wasn’t gone. He was just sleeping. Why would they be emotional about that? He was sleeping, and eventually he would wake up, or they would all go to sleep too and then he wouldn’t have to sleep alone. That was the way it was, and Ada—and this boy standing with his trembling mother—knew it. She could tell, looking into his eyes. They just needed to wait. There was no need to mourn.

She stepped off the stage and slinked toward the hours d’oeuvres table. The boy met her there. He had a silver ring in his right ear and more piercings on his face—in the middle of his bottom lip, his eyebrow, his nose.

“I haven’t seen you before,” Ada said.

“Oliver and I had a kind of secret relationship,” the boy replied, giving her a small smile. He also had a piercing under his top lip, a ring lying against the top of his gums. Ada wondered why anybody would want metal in their mouth.

“What is that supposed to mean?”

He squinted. “Did he not tell you? You’re his sister, aren’t you?”

“What is that supposed to mean?” Ada repeated.

“I mean we had a secret relationship.” The boy looked at her and raised his eyebrows a little bit. Ada’s eyes widened.

“Oh. Oh.”

The boy seemed amused. “I’m Spider,” he said, holding out a hand. “Amanda, right?”

“Ada,” she answered. She took his hand cautiously and they shook. “How long?”

Spider shrugged. “A few months, I guess. We didn’t really get that much time together. Being in different grades, and all that. Can I ask you something?” Ada nodded. “When he died. Was he in pain?”

“They said that he died immediately,” Ada said. “I guess there would’ve been some pain. I don’t know.”

Spider nodded. He looked around the church. “He would have hated all of this,” he said quietly.

“I know. I kept telling my dad. He won’t listen. And he wouldn’t add any good bands to the track.”

“No,” he said, “You don’t understand. He would have hated this—nobody knew who he was. You didn’t even know about me, and you were his best friend. He only wanted to be understood. And he didn’t even get that. He’s in a coffin that isn’t even that cool looking and he’s got orchids on the tables.”

Ada stared at the flowers. “There’s nothing wrong with orchids,” she said. “They’re pretty. But they aren’t him.” Spider clucked his tongue and bobbed his head in agreement. His eyes kept sweeping over the church, lingering on each person, as if he were memorizing their faces, memorizing the moment. “He wanted Queen Anne’s Lace. He didn’t care if they were poisonous.”

“Your father. Is he the fellow with the beard over there?”

Ada leaned over to look. “Yeah, that’s him.”

“What do you think his reaction would be if we changed the CD?” Spider opened up his jacket a little bit and pulled out a case just far enough so Ada could see the corner.

“Is that a mix?” Ada asked.

“Nirvana, Led Zeppelin, Rolling Stones,” he said, “And more. I thought he would like that better than what’s playing now” which was some slow song in tenor about angels and something like that. Ada hated it immediately. She grinned.

“Oh, my dad would absolutely hate it.”

“How do you feel about making Oliver’s funeral a little bit more…Oliver?”

Ada wanted to kiss this boy. “Are you serious?”

“I’m here for Oliver. I’m not here for anybody else. I don’t want to disappoint.” He smiled at her. His piercing showed. “So? What do you say? We have to make a few more improvements, of course. Like these flowers, for instance.”

“Do you know where we can get Lace?”

“There’s some on the hill. We just need scissors and we’re all set.” Spider slid out the CD case again and passed it to Ada. “When I come back with the flowers, you put the CD in. How familiar are you with his bands?”

“Are you kidding me? I’m the one who introduced him.” Ada pointed toward the back of the church. “There are some scissors back there. Don’t take too long.” She watched him lope toward the indicated room before she climbed back onto the stage. She displayed the disk to Oliver. “Look, Oli. We aren’t going to let your funeral be boring. Me and your boyfriend, we’ll make it all better.” She patted his hair—still fluffy as every other day—and smiled a little. “They should have put you in one of your band tees. What do they know? You hated suits.” Ada looked back toward the church entrance. Some plump woman was hugging her mother, and they were both sniveling and wiping their noses and dropping salty tears on each other’s shoulders. Ada’s father was standing beside them, patting their backs and looking awkward. She wondered briefly if she should let them grieve in their own way, with their orchids and their gospel music and stiff clothes, but she pushed the thought away almost immediately. She would give this to Oliver, her last gift to him. She would make him understood before he was put into the ground if it killed her.

The funeral was for the living. But that didn’t mean they could forget what Oliver was about.

At this moment, Spider burst back in. He was holding an armful of Lace, his face bright and a little red from exertion. He looked at Ada. She went over to the CD player and ejected the disk, replacing it with the mix that Spider had given her. The player gave a whir, and Robert Plant filled the church. Time seemed to freeze. All of the people standing inside stopped what they were doing—Ada’s mother even stopped crying—and they all listened, silent, throughout the whole song. When it was done and Plant was replaced with Kurt Cobain, there was a sudden mixture of laughing and sobbing from the rest of the guests, sounding a little hysterical, and both of Ada’s parents turned to look at her. She couldn’t read their expressions.

“What are you doing, Ada?” her father asked.

“They weren’t weeds,” Ada said. “Not to him.” And she turned up the radio.