Jessica S. Carter

The Time Capsule

No one wants to handle the dead when they may be contagious. She learned that early on. As the virus spread, her freezers could no longer contain the deceased. No amount of N-95 masks, social distancing and other personal protective equipment could quell the tingle in the throat of her support staff. Most of them quit early on. Too stricken with the stress of catching it. Too worried about those at home they couldn’t bring those types of problems to. She respected their decisions. As an employer, she did all she could for her beauticians, for her facility manager, her fleet manager, and her grounds keepers. She made sure they wouldn’t go under while the country tried to figure out how to move forward. She stayed, of course, because she had no one to go home to anymore—and it was her duty to the dead to lay them to rest with dignity.