A light mist floats around the tombstone. I feel the cool air breathing on my skin as I walk, the gravel crunching and scattering beneath me. I read the carved names, but I don’t recognize. I’m told their my family, but I feel no connection.
They both died years before I was born.
I’m sad I never met them, sad I couldn’t make a connection, but I’m not sad for their deaths, any more than the corpses beside them. I’m told blood’s thicker than water, but what does blood mean when I can’t know, or love, two generations before or after me. What does blood mean, I think, as I stare through the dirt and tall grass, and hear the church bells ringing through the night.