Cannot Wait to Get to Heaven - Fannie Flagg [35]
Can’t wait to get to Heaven
Oh I’ll be so happy there
When I walk down that ivory hall
And run up those crystal stairs.
Oh I’ll know Him when I see Him
I’d know Him anywhere.
Then all my struggles will be lifted
When I reach that kingdom in the air.
Can’t wait to shout hallelujah!
No more earthly burdens will I bear
’Cause when I see the Heavenly throne,
I know…Yes I know
He’ll be waiting for me there!
When she finished, Neva thought, “Nice lyrics, and very fitting.” She guessed if anybody had a shot at getting to heaven, it would have to be Elner Shimfissle. The woman had been such a source of inspiration for the whole town, always had a smile on her face. Neva felt her eyes misting up, and reached for a Kleenex. You’d think that with all the years of experience in the funeral business, she would have become immune to feeling bereft, but she hadn’t. Some passings were easier than others, of course, but as their ad stated, she cared deeply about all her customers, the living and the deceased.
Macky Goes to See Elner
11:15 AM
When they went through the double doors, the doctor turned Macky over to a young nurse to take him the rest of the way. As Macky walked through the hospital hall down to the room where they had Aunt Elner, he felt as if someone had kicked him in the stomach. Although he had tried to keep it together for Norma, when he had first heard the news from the doctor, he had been devastated. For the past forty years, rain or shine, he had gone over and had coffee with her before he went to work. And even when they had moved to Florida, she had come with them. The truth was, she was his best friend and had helped him through many a crisis, some things that Norma knew nothing about and, hopefully, would never know about.
One thing in particular had only been between the two of them. He had not meant for it to happen. Lois Tatum, a nice-looking girl with brown hair that she wore in a ponytail, had been a waitress at the Tip-Top café downtown, across the street from the hardware store. At the time, Linda had just gotten married, and Norma had been suffering terribly from empty nest syndrome. She had volunteered for a hundred different projects just to keep herself from, as she put it, “going stark raving mad.” Norma had thrown herself into community service and had kept herself so busy with one committee meeting after another that he hardly ever saw her. So when Lois had always seemed happy to see him come in at lunchtime, and had always laughed at his jokes, Macky had been secretly flattered.
She was about fifteen years younger than he was, divorced with a little girl, and when she needed something fixed in the small duplex she rented, he had been happy to do it. He had helped out a lot of people in town; as far as he had been concerned they were just good friends. Then one afternoon she had come over to the hardware store and tearfully confessed, “Macky, I’m so in love with you, I don’t know what to do.” He had been caught completely off guard. In all the years he had been married he had never looked at another woman, never even entertained the idea. Maybe it had been the timing. After Linda had left home, although he had not talked about it, he too had felt lost, and with Norma being so busy, maybe he had been vulnerable. He didn’t know the reason, but after Lois left, and he