L. Have three days passed yet?
J. What three days?
L. After grandma died. The three days to bury her.
J. That’s a great question. She died on Saturday, so it has been longer than three days.
L. Why should it be three days?
J. If you keep a dead body at room temperature for three days it smells and can spread disease, so the rule is to bury the body on the third day.
L. Why is it longer than three days for her?
J. We have some extra tools. Like the morgue. Do you remember I told you about the freezer where they keep the dead bodies?
L. Yes.
J. The cold slows down the decay, so we can wait longer to bury her. The coroner removes the blood and replaces it with a chemical that helps preserve the body for the funeral. Then, we can open the casket and look at the person’s face. When my mom died, someone painted her face to look like a clown.
L. What is a casket?
J. The box that holds the body when it is buried.
L. When I’m older, I’m going to see your face when you die.
J. Yes, I hope. It is unlucky the other way around.
L. I’m going to be there with my babies and all my toys and clothes. Well, I won’t have them with me. I’ll take them to my house, or apartment, or I don’t know what kind of house I’ll have–if it will be big, or little, or a caravan. I don’t know still. Apartments are not my style; I prefer a small house or a caravan.
J. Why keep your clothes? Your clothes won’t fit.
L. I’ll be big and have different clothes, but I’ll keep these clothes for my babies.
J. Even the ones with holes?
L. I will buy some new ones. Some are with holes, and there are others with no elastic, so I’ll have to buy some new ones.
The end