Walt folded the paper.
He laid it down on the casket. Right next to Tommy’s crayon letter. And the Santa hat. And the Tigers cap.
Then he stood there with both hands flat on the lid of my father’s casket, and he cried. Big, heaving sobs. In the red velvet suit, in the ninety-four-degree heat.
Father Kowalczyk came over and put his arm around him.
Nobody moved for a long time.
The rest of the funeral Mass was a blur. Father Kowalczyk gave the homily. I don’t remember a word of it. I remember he talked about Saint Nicholas, the real one, who left gold coins in poor families’ shoes in the middle of the night and never let anyone see his face.
I remember the box fan humming in the aisle.
I remember that nobody fanned themselves with my father’s picture for the rest of the Mass. They all just held it.
At the end, when the pallbearers came forward, Mike stood up. He walked to the front. He took his place at the right front handle of the casket.
Then he stopped. He looked at Walt.
“Walt,” Mike said. “Take the left one. Up front. With me.”
Walt shook his head. “Mike, I can’t. Look at me. I’m in a Santa suit.”
“I know,” Mike said. “Dad would want Santa up front.”
So Walt Kowalski, seventy-eight years old, in my mother’s homemade red velvet Santa suit, with the white beard hanging around his neck, carried my father’s casket down the center aisle of St. Mary’s next to my brother.
And as they went past every pew, people reached out and touched the casket. And then they touched Walt’s sleeve.
Out on the front steps, in the blazing July sun, the hearse was waiting.
And behind it, parked at the curb, was a red Ford pickup truck. With a pine wreath wired to the grille.
Laura Bennett writes about complicated family dynamics, difficult conversations, and the quiet moments that change everything. Her stories focus on real-life tensions — inheritance disputes, strained marriages, loyalty tests — and the strength people find when they finally speak up. She believes the smallest decisions often carry the biggest consequences.