“Vices and Virtues”

Flash fiction by Anne Pittens

Death impacted Jenna’s life unexpectedly. There was no quiet knock to warn of its approach; it just up and took Grandma right in the middle of the Chicken Dance at a cousin’s wedding.

Given a choice, Jenna suspected that righteous old Grandma might have selected a better dropping ground – some place where all her friends and family were not drunk and flapping at the crucial moment. While the morbidly fascinated ogled the body, Jenna stole three quick shots from behind the bar and contemplated the scene from several feet back.

Something about death was personal; not the kind of thing you should be doing in front of a crowd. After all, it was your body’s final craving. The ultimate release. Who wanted to surrender to needs of that nature with everyone gaping at you?

Apparently, you could live with all the dignity you wanted, but dying with it? Ha! After making all the right choices in life, the Grim Reaper, with a lascivious leer and a terrible twinkle could yank your final option!

Seeing the old gal flat out like that, Jenna noted that death was not a tidy process, not the way it appears once you see the body in the coffin all spit and polished. Anything could happen. You might lose control of your bladder and stain your skirt, or in the case of dear Granny, you might fall the wrong way and everyone would get to see your granny panties.

Worse things could happen Jenna supposed. At lease she had not crashed from Mr. Crapper’s commode, her poopy rosebud winking at the world. Sometimes you just had to count whatever blessings you were left with.

Jenna watched the body turn from phyllo pastry pale to the gloomy gray of a winter day. Once confirmed dead by all the unqualified, Grandma was unceremoniously dragged, her skirt hitching up under her, to an anteroom.

Thank God they moved her. When she dropped, her ample thighs splayed open under her voluminous dress and a most ungracious view presented itself. No granny panties here! Whoever knew that Grandma would meet her Maker wearing a black garter belt and sexy stockings topped out with feathery red boas? That was sure to give Jesus a start!

Apparently, the stockings weren’t the only thing unseemly about Grandma; Jenna didn’t care to speculate whether the black triangle was pretty panties or a box of Loreal long lasting!

Later, when Jenna and her mother were going through the dear woman’s drawers, they discovered she had something of a lusty craving for pretty little lady things. One drawer was so overloaded, that unmentionables of every color, contour and curious capacity eagerly popped out – once the invitation was issued.

Oh, the things you find in the drawers of dead people. Now that was a lesson worth learning. Be careful what you leave behind; other people will have to clean up your vices as well as your virtues. On the upside, with careful planning, unwary relations rifling your drawers provided a lovely opportunity for a final bit of toying.

Then let the chisel stutter your epitaph!

Anne Pittens is a writer living in Whitehorse, Yukon with her husband and dog.

“Vices and Virtues” placed 3^rd in Witcraft’s on-line magazine annual contest, 2024. It was published in November of that year. For more about submitting to Witcraft and a few other places, see here.

See Brian Henry's upcoming weekly writing classes, one-day workshops, and four-day retreats here.

Read more short stories, essays, and reviews by your fellow writers here (and scroll down).