Last meal

Last Meal

fiction
edward w pritchard

The last meal was a sort of walking fantasy among food lovers. What would your have if you would be dead tomorrow. Mom's spaghetti, a three quarter pound double chubby burger with avocado, double cheese and mayonnaise, calories be dammed, or a Pepsi and fries with a friend.

Our cousin Len was a food lover and rather than have the last meal he treated us to it. Stealthily over the last year of his life, Len had secretly got each of us to confide our perfect last meal. He did it in a way that none of us suspected what he was doing; despite the fact that Len had cancer.

Molly, who is my sister had Carrot cake and macaroni and cheese, I had spaghetti with cream cheese, balsamic vinegar, and lots and lots of salt. Sharon my always dieting wife had a twelve ounce porterhouse steak.

Len had died yesterday and Mr. Waters met us at the funeral and drove us over to his restaurant after the service and before the cemetery ritual.

Good old Len. The cold wind at the cemetery seemed friendly to me that day.