“Die in a field and tell me what rots first, you or your clothes. When the crows swoop down from the peaks of the barns they roost on, where will their beaks be persuaded to strike? Will it be the nylon handbag you carry over your shoulder, or the sunken eyes that wilt away in your skull? Their claws can tear at the fabric of your shirt, but the acids in their stomach can’t break it down the same way they can flesh.
“The creatures of the dirt will come next, seeping out in hordes from the cracks in the dry earth. Termites and scarabs, flesh flies and maggots. They’ll roll over your body like a wave crashing over the shore, and when they recede, like the sand that gets pulled back into the sea, your skin will have peeled away one layer at a time. They’ll nest in parts of your body you wish would have never played host to any forms of life, but do you know what they’ll leave untouched? The synthetic.
“They’ll struggle, choke even, on the polyester and rayon that make up your attire. The Vietnamese leather that is your left boot will stop your rotting foot from decaying back into the earth so that the grass may grow greener here in future years. The bugs will quit on your corpse only when it is devoid of any nutrients they may find serviceable, and your jewelry, like the rest of your apparel, will serve them nothing.
“The work is not done when the insects withdraw, however, for the fungus still has its part to play. Candida and pin molds will bring you home, returning you to the ground in the same way you came from it. It is not a horror story, though, but quite the opposite. There is no suggestion of St. Peter at the end of your decomposition. The only entity who will call your life into question is the muddy ground that greets you when you’ve finally sunken down into it. Only then can you see what it has left behind.
“May it swallow you and only you. Not the clothes on your back or the items in your pocket. The earth will digest no plastics nor fibers. They do not lend to its cause. There can be no judgment for them or their worth, for they were not molded of the same clay. They will stand the test of time, and that is their greatest flaw. Overstaying a welcome on this Earth is nothing to be celebrated, for there are creatures in the wings that are waiting to take over. There is an ecosystem counting on your departure, and your death spells life for their colonies. Your clothes, however, cannot say the same.
“So, tell me again, how important is it that you get a new outfit?”
My knuckles are white from gripping the shopping cart so tight and I turn my eyes away from the clothes on the shelf. Instead, I stare twenty feet up into the air, where a hollow fluorescent bulb flashes back at me.
“Not important, Dad,” I say.
We leave empty-handed.
Duncan Rivers is a fiction writer whose work is published/forthcoming in venues like Wilderness House, Marrow Magazine, Sinking City, Rubbertop Review, and more. He lives in Toronto, Ontario, where he can usually be found struggling to walk his lazy dog and working on his debut novel.
Image: scifinow.co.uk
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