My Aunt Gladys died. She was 93, and I had been warned the end was approaching, but then it came pretty quickly – early one Friday morning. My brother texted me the news. When we were small she insisted we refer to her only as Beautiful Aunt Gladys. She signed all our birthday cards “Love from Beautiful Aunt Gladys”, or just “B.A.G.” Between ourselves we called her Bag for short, but we never forgot what it stood for. Gladys was also particular about clothes, and not just her own. When I was home for Thanksgiving in 2018, she seized my forearm as my father walked into the room wearing a bright blue top. “I want that sweater burned,” she whispered through gritted teeth. As I pack for my flight to the States, I discover that both sleeves of my black suit are dotted with moth holes, exposing the pale lining. This is a disaster, I think. Then I think: the one person who would give you a hard time about this won’t be there. The only family Gladys had left were my Dad, who is 100, my two sisters, my brother and me. To have the Dowling siblings in charge of deciding your final arrangements might be regarded as rank misfortune, but luckily Gladys was clear about what she wanted: nothing. She sometimes reaffirmed her wishes in the middle of other people’s funerals. I don’t want any of this, she would say. Nuh-thing. But nothing is hard. People want to send flowers somewhere, and we have a bag of ashes to deal with. By the time I get to Connecticut on Tuesday plans are in place: a private interment on Friday, followed by a small reception for friends and neighbours on Saturday. “It’s what she wouldn’t have wanted,” I say. We spend much of Thursday trying to unblock the sink in Gladys’s apartment. Although it’s not a pressing issue, it seems preferable to going through all the stuff – the jewellery, the silver, the photographs – to decide who takes what, and what, ultimately, will go unclaimed. It’s a challenge, since the blockage is resistant to every tool in our arsenal, but when the drain finally clears in the afternoon it feels like a hollow victory. On Friday morning we drive to the Catholic cemetery where my father’s forbears long ago established a plot, back when either the family was flush or granite was cheap. My great-grandparents’ names are cut into one side of an impressive monument; my grandparents are on the other. Gladys’s name has already been carved on to a plaque alongside that of her husband, John – my father’s brother. I can’t remember the last time I was here, until I realise I have never been here. Gladys’s ashes have been placed – crammed, really – into a sewing basket with a lid she embroidered. My sisters are wearing her shoes. There is a vase filled with buttercups. It’s not nothing, just the closest we could manage. I brought a poem to read, which I figured would be mostly for the benefit of the official overseeing the ceremony. But there is no official. My hands are shaking as I unfold the paper. “This is from the internet,” I say. My throat begins to close as I read the first line. My sister, who went before me and had a better poem, suffered the same problem. After I’ve finally choked the words out we mill about in the sun. “When do they do the thing?” I say. “They’re waiting for us,” my sister says. She signals to two cemetery workers sitting in a truck a little way off. They drive over. “I’m sorry for your loss, really,” says the larger of the two, lumbering up the slope with a shovel. He apologises for the state of the grass, launching into a complaint about new contractors that I can’t really follow. He puts the sewing basket into a plastic tub and seals the lid with glue, before kneeling to place tub in the hole. With transparent effort he regains his feet, and then holds out the shovel. “I always like to ask the family,” he says. My brother takes the shovel and tips two scoops of dirt into the hole. I step forward. “You’re welcome, sir,” the man says, passing me the shovel. As we take turns, he talks at some length about a recent coyote invasion. “I seen one the other week, just here,” he says. “Thought it was a family dog or something. Nope.” I’m reminded that tragedies are sometimes briefly leavened by the timely appearance of a comic gravedigger. I think: Gladys would have loved this guy. My sister’s partner takes the shovel and, putting her shoulder into it, lifts one spadeful of dirt, then another, and then a third. “Whoa,” says the gravedigger. “We about to hire this one.”