It was a sad affair. All the pews were filled, leaving everyone else to squeeze in together. They were careful by the stained glass windows. The family didn’t recognize many of their guests, but then again, their boy had picked up crowds of friends in his life. The minister nodded at two altar boys who then struggled to close the doors.
“Please be seated.”
The family hugged each other close as they prepared themselves for the tearful ceremony. A couple of guests saw that the hug left some room on the pew and quickly slid in.
“So where is Waldo?” the minister began. “We’ve been asking that question his whole life. But now there is no need to search. His body may be going six feet under the ground, but Waldo lives on in each of us. We may have found him too late to save him, but he always found a way to make us smile.”
The room shifted, as they remembered their various misadventures with their late friend.
“Ma’am?” the minister addressed Waldo’s mother. “I am aware that the family wants to say a few words.”
“Yes,” she declared, and she tearfully made her way to the podium. “Hello. Thank you for making time to see my son off. Waldo was a bit of a character, wasn’t he?” This got knowing chuckles from the crowd. Even the uptight minister’s straight line of a mouth ticked upward.
“I remember all the times I lost him in the supermarket or at the carnival,” the mother continued. “Whenever I found him, though, he wasn’t afraid. He wasn’t crying. He just smiled, waved, and said, ‘You set a new record, Mom!’ God, I just wish... that I had found him earlier that fateful night. My son... why did you have to get lost in the railyard?”
At this, Waldo’s brother jumped up and led his mother back to her seat, pushing off some guests to give his mother more room. Then he addressed the church. Nostalgia washed over him. “I was there when my little brother was born. He was late. The doctors had to perform a C-section. It was as if he wanted the doctors to work to locate him.”
A couple of doctors in the corner exchanged amused glances. Waldo had almost made them lose their medical licenses. They were mad that day, but they would lose a million medical licenses for that boy.
The brother continued, “My brother and I looked so alike, my mother dressed us like twins for a while. She put little hats and striped shirts on us. As I grew up, I didn’t want to dress like my little brother anymore. But he never stopped wearing his ‘traveling clothes,’ as he called them. And yet, our resemblance is still uncanny. I can’t bear to look in the mirror because all I see is him. That’s all anyone sees. In job interviews, I don’t even get interviewed! The boss just looks at me, laughs, and calls in his associates, saying, ‘Hey, I found him!’ They laugh until I have to see myself out.”
Waldo’s sister spoke next. “Before he got glasses, Waldo would look in the mirror and panic. ‘Where’s Waldo?’ he would shout over and over. When his glasses came in the mail, I put them on him and smiled. ‘Here’s Waldo,’ I said. ‘Here’s Waldo,’ he nodded. My brother was so friendly, too. I would take him to the park and he would run off and immediately make between 300 and 500 friends.”
“Ol’ Wally never did tell me where he was going. Sometimes he would leave the house and not come back for days,” Waldo’s wife, Wenda, said, smiling ruefully. “I would text him, asking where he was, but he would always respond saying that he couldn’t tell me. Wally, our whole time together, I wanted to know where you were. But now I know where you are, and I would give anything for you to text me and keep me in the dark.”
As Wenda took her seat, a man in a top hat rushed to the stage. “I know I’m not family,” he conceded, “but I spent more time with Waldo than I did with my own family. We used to stand next to each other in the bazaar. He never bought anything. But he noticed me. And then people started noticing my vacuums because of him--especially after I started making my vacuums red and white striped. Thank you, Waldo.” He then took off his top hat in mourning and squeezed into the front pew.
Suddenly Waldo’s dog―Woof―howled, sensing danger.
“He was my best friend!” cried out a man wearing a yellow-and-black striped sweater. The room gasped. “Calm down! Yes, it’s me: Odlaw.” He stalked from the back of the room toward the podium. “Waldo was my nemesis. But he...he…”
Woof fell silent as he heard Odlaw shedding tears at Waldo’s passing. “He gave me purpose, damn it!” The crowd turned to the minister and he waved it off. Grief manifests in different ways for different people.
“I never caught Waldo or his magical walking stick. But those days chasing him were the best of my life!” Odlaw fell to the ground in tears. Quietly the minister slipped something into Odlaw’s hands. “His will dictated that you have this.”
Odlaw felt power in his grasp as he held the smooth wooden cane. This only made Odlaw cry more. “Waldo!” he sobbed. The minister picked up the nemesis-less man and carried him out of the room to the lobby to lie down.
Waldo’s mentor and friend Mr. Wizard Whitebeard wrapped up the ceremony: “Waldo did a noble thing. He made people feel like they had a friend wherever they went. There was no moment of realization that he was waving at someone behind you. He was always waving at you. Rest in peace, my friend. May your ghost get lost in the graveyard every night.”