A brisk October wind fluttered Chris’ unzipped jacket as he stepped through the gate of his hometown cemetery toting a bulky, khaki-colored bag. It was dusk and the branches of nearly naked trees crackled above him. No other living soul was there. He whistled Bobby McFerrin’s “Don’t Worry, Be Happy” rather loudly as he threaded his way around the gravestones.
Chris had been whistling past or through the Bumbleberry graveyard for over a decade. In his mind, whistling a happy tune in this sad place kept the Grim Reaper at bay. Chris flirted with death for a living. He needed to repel the Reaper.
Three of his six closest friends were buried in the cemetery. Sarah was the latest, as of yesterday. She was the founder and fearless leader of Bumbleberry High’s unsanctioned X-treme Sports Club. The close-knit group of seven had called themselves the X-ters. Skydiving was Sarah’s pleasure drug. Her life came to an untimely end during a skysurfing competition when her sky surfboard failed to release correctly, shot skyward, and collapsed her parachute.
Chris whistled his way up a small hill to Sarah’s freshly dug grave, pulled a bouquet of white lilies from his bag, and laid them at the foot of her headstone. “These lilies represent eternal life. Your spirit is definitely eternal, Sarah. You taught me how to embrace my fears and pursue my dreams. If it wasn’t for you, I wouldn’t be the powerboat champion I am today. You’ll always be my spirit guide.”
He blew a goodbye kiss to Sarah’s headstone then whistled his way to his next stop: Tyler’s grave. It was almost dark now, and leaves swirled in the wind.
Tyler was his best friend since kindergarten. The two of them were born thrill seekers. In elementary school, they were skateboard kings. By high school, Tyler was into motorcycle racing and freestyle motocross. Chris’ passion was fast boats. At age nineteen, Tyler was the first of the X-ters to meet a premature end. His motorcycle flipped from beneath him on a rain-soaked ramp and landed on top of him.
Chris knelt beside Tyler’s speckled-grey headstone, pulled a pint-size skateboard from his bag, and laid it across the bottom of the granite with the glo-in-the-dark words “Go Tyler!” facing out. “Your mom gave this to you after you won your first competition. She gave it to me after you passed. It’s been sitting on a shelf in my bedroom for the past nine years. Now, it should be with you.” He fist-bumped Tyler’s headstone. “Love you, bro. I miss you every day.”
He stood, took a deep breath, then whistled his way to his final destination: a white marble gravestone not far from the cemetery exit. It was completely dark now, but he knew the way by heart. The moment he spotted the white tablet, he stopped, reached inside the bag for the lavender bouquet, and strolled slowly toward Samantha’s grave as if the grass beneath him were a wedding aisle. Lavender was Sam’s favorite. Sweet memories of his soulmate swirled through his mind as he took a whiff. He had fallen for Sam at his first X-ters club meeting. At five-foot-one, she was a pixie paraglide girl with sparkly green eyes and a mischievous grin.
When Chris reached Sam’s grave, he laid the bouquet against the marble and spoke softly. “I’m still pining for you, Sam.” He paused and wiped a tear from his cheek. “Of course, you already know that.”
He heard her voice in his head. “We pine for each other, babe.”
Sam passed away two years earlier in a paragliding accident in Switzerland. She had been excited about her first sail in the Alps. But nervous, too, as the Alpine winds are highly unpredictable.
Chris had seen a hint of uneasiness in her eyes when Sam waved goodbye and leaped from a mountaintop above Lake Lucerne. By the time she circled her glider around to blow him a kiss, though, her face was radiant. An hour later, he fell to his knees beside the lake sobbing as he watched her struggle to reinflate her canopy before she crashed into the water. Turbulence had literally sucked the wind from Sam’s sail. Chris woke every morning to the memory of her last airborne kiss.
He kissed the top of Sam’s gravestone like he used to kiss the top of her head and whispered “I love you.” Suddenly, his phone dinged with a text notification.
It was a strange message: “PLEASE DON’T DO THE KEY WEST RACE!” Stranger still, it came from Sam’s number, which he’d never deleted from his phone.
Chris wondered if one of his powerboat buddies was screwing with him, and replied: “Who is this?”
“It’s me, stupid. Your deceased FIANCE.”
Chris’ heart raced. Sam had accepted his marriage proposal the night before she died, but they swore to keep it secret until they returned home. After she died, he couldn’t bear to tell anyone. Not even his parents or hers. It was just too painful.
He texted back. “But how . . .”
“Mind texting. Learned it from a deceased techie. Good thing you never deleted me.”
“I could NEVER delete you. But why text? You’re in my head.”
“Cuz I need you to promise IN WRITING you’ll drop out of that race!”
“Why?”
“Because the winds will be really bad. Two people will die.”
“How do you know?”
“I have my sources.”
“Sources?”
“Yeah. Us after-lifers look out for each other.”
“No worries, Sam. I’m on top of wind and water conditions.”
“PROMISE ME YOU’LL DROP OUT!
“Okay! I PROMISE!”
“One more thing. Keep whistling that ‘don’t worry’ tune. Especially when you’re racing.”
“Why?”
“The Reaper really hates it. Usually, the whistling-past-cemetery thing doesn’t work on him. But he won’t come near anyone who whistles that McFerrin tune.”
“Why?”
“Word is, it mellows him out and he can’t do his job.”
“If only we’d known sooner, Sam.”
“Just keep on whistling, Chris.”
INSTANT NOODLES 