Legacy

Arnie drew his last breath. And of course, he died.

I kind of expected it. Fifty years of smoking clearly would do him in at some point. Unfortunately, it had to happen after I got to know him - after he became my friend. Had I not known him, it would have saved me a trip to the cemetery.

They buried Arnie on a Saturday morning and engraved on the headstone was:

Arnold Joseph Miller

25th June 1930- 3rd August 1995

May he rest in peace

Jesus, Arnie. No wonder you're dead. Smoking since you were fifteen!

The crowd of mourners soon left, gliding silently between the headstones of the long dead. They left their last words and took their tears with them. Soon, they would change out of their black attire and change into their summer dresses (it is August after all) and sit in their gardens sipping wine.

"To Arnie," they would say as the scorching sun beats down on their pale skin. When the sun set and the people intoxicated, they would retreat to their homes and shut the door on another day without Arnie.

And so summers and autumns and winters and springs pass and good old Arnie lies a good few feet under the cemetery grounds, silent. No one visits him, no one speaks of him and (unsurprisingly), no one remembers him. It is another life wasted - his stories, his experiences, his values gone. But what can we do? Poor Arnie's dead and gone. Perhaps if he'd left a legacy...

Smoking for fifty years - foolish Arnie..