Had this been any other day, the worst he'd find is some wind had decided to move leaves and flowers around since he last walked by. He was hardly even paying attention as he passed by the graves, but he soon found his vision demanded by a brilliant white figure, illuminated by the creeping sun to add a touch of brightness to the still dim morning. It was a woman, sitting on the grass and leaning against a grave as still as the corpses in the ground she sat on. She was unnaturally white; Morris was sure you could bleach a set of bones and still not match her pale skin, and for a moment he feared that either someone came here to die or was already dead and pulled back out to be put on display. During the summer there had been a string of grave robberies that he got a lot of flak for not catching, but after he caught a brief glimpse of that girl in purple robes, they never had trouble again.
Had she come back and just left behind the body this time? It was a thought, but the next one in his mind was realizing that the woman wasn't wearing anything but a soft grin... a grin he made sure to focus all his attention on as he approached her, doing his best to put on an intimidating huff when he was actually too confused and creeped out to get genuinely angry.
He considers calling out to her, but remembering the lady in purple, he cautiously approaches her before calling out much too loudly for his own tastes, "Hey lady! What the hell are you doing here?"
The woman's eyes opened, but it was clear she hadn't been asleep, and neither did the yell seem to give her a start. She looked at him, and his eyes were now caught by two wide blue pools of blue as clean and cool as a glacier's ice. One another face they might harshly stand out, but compared to her complexion, they were subdued. She was not glowing, but the light liked to play off her skin, although her hair was a more earthy white, with a million bouncing puffs in it that reminded Morris of popcorn. When she turned to look at him, he could see green vines beneath her hair, and the groundskeeper couldn't remember the last time he saw a woman wearing a flower vine in her hair outside of a bridal catalogue. Not that he could seem to find what the vines attached to amidst that poofy mane of white.
The woman broke eye contact as she considered the question, before turning back to him and saying in an airy yet energetic voice, "Sitting, mostly."
The response did not reassure Morris, but it at least gave him a line of thought. She must be on drugs. "Don't get smart with me!" He said, putting on his best crotchety old man voice in his arsenal, "I've seen those Living Dead movies! You've come to dance on the gravestones naked, haven't you?"
She didn't consider this question nearly so long, "I hadn't thought of doing that. Do you want me to?"
The question pierced his façade, his discomfort immediately showing but receiving no answering expression from the girl. "Hell no! 'Sides, I don't even know how old you are. A young girl shouldn't be out here in... well, she shouldn't be out here anyway! It's a graveyard... cemetery really, we ain't connected to no church..." Morris had to remind himself not to pedantic, maybe this girl was mourning in her own strange way... with a lot of drugs involved. He had to admit he mourned his wife with more than a few bottles of alcohol now and again. "How old ARE you?" he asked, hoping to hear a high number to at least make himself feel less skeevy for standing above this young woman in her birthday suit.
The girl looked upwards, staring at the rising sun as if it held the answers. "My age? I had never thought to count the days. Perhaps its something I should start doing now..."
Morris was growing frustrated with the situation, "Why the hell aren't you wearing any clothes?" He demanded, although he knew he wasn't going to get a meaningful answer.
"I didn't know I was supposed to wear any." She said plainly, smiling at her answer innocently. Morris put his face in his hand and rubbed his temples. Craning his head back and exhaling deeply, he realized that soon there would likely be people coming, including his replacement. Pulling off his jacket, he realized how cold it truly was out, and when he looked down at the girl again, he had to ask.
"Aren't you freezing?"
"I'm positively chilled, but don't worry on my account." she replied simply, turning her face away from his now, "You should keep that on. You need the insulation."
"You kidding me? You're gonna put this jacket on now. I can't have you naked in my cemetery, and I certainly can't have you naked and dead, neither."
"But what about yourself?" she said, her voice finally cracking as it showed genuine concern for a man who had only hassled her since they met.
He was caught off-guard again... especially since he had plenty of padding on besides the top jacket. He figured he knew the root of the problem though, "It'll make me feel better for you to wear it. 'Sides, it'll warm my heart, and that will keep my warm enough!" He said, feeling a bit hokey after saying it, but he found old age also was quickly gaining him some freedom to say silly things like that.
The girl abandoned any attempt at argument at least, standing up and wrapping her body in the jacket. "Pull it down a little, so it covers most a ya..." the gravedigger said, trying his best not to explicitly say she should cover all her private parts. He let out a sigh of relief when she stood up and seemed content in the jacket.
"Is this good?"
"Perfect, now... you can't be lingering 'round a cemetery, so... go on. Head on home. You can keep the jacket I guess, ragged old thing anyway. Looking for an excuse to replace it really..."
"I don't have a home." She said simply, but when she saw how these words pierced him, she immediately injected concern in her voice again, "I'm sorry, did I say something wrong?"
"This whole time I thought you were some yuppie who got strung out and ended up here... didn't think for a second you were homeless." Morris turned away from the girl, rubbing the back of his head until he grumbled at himself for treating her the way he did. He nearly leaped when he felt the girl's hand on his elbow.
"Don't worry on my account. There was no way you could know."
Morris was thankful she disarmed the moment, but feeling her cold hand was enough to give him another line of thought, "Well... it ain't much, but my shift is almost over, and I've got a little shack near here with some hot chocolate bubbling just waiting for me. I should at least send you off with that, and who knows? Maybe the day will warm up and you won't need my jacket! ...We'd... we'd find you something else to wear of course."
The girl nodded, "I would gladly keep you company." It was a strange way to accept the invitation, but Morris was glad to quickly herd the girl away from the graves, trying not to push her along but always finding her able to speed up when it was clear he wanted her to. When they reached the shack, Morris swiftly filled up a mug of chocolate for her and bolted back to catch his daytime replacement, doing his best to act non-chalant.
"Hey, where's that beat up old rag you always wear?" Daniel asked. The younger gravedigger often joked about Morris's jacket, even offering to buy Morris a new one on occasion... an opportunity the old man might jump on sometime soon.
"Caught on a branch last night, got a hole big enough to bury a body in now. Gonna patch it up and hope it still fits." The lie came easily, and although he couldn't hide his discomfort at the eventful morning, Daniel didn't seem to be too good at reading people.
"I swear, Morris, you'd wear that thing in two halves if it was split down the middle!" Daniel laughed, and Morris laughed to be polite, and after the necessary transition of keys, information, and workplace humor that was only funny while at work, Morris headed back to the shack, only realizing now he left the girl alone with all his worldly possessions.
He threw the door open with more force than was necessary, looking around the shack as if he expected a tornado had gone through it... only to find the only thing out of place was the woman he had invited into it, with a mug of hot chocolate in her hands that wasn't missing a single drop. "You didn't drink any of it? Just warming your hands, huh?"
"No, I wasn't sure if I should. I was waiting to drink it with you." To say she said it with a smile was redundant; most of what she said was said while smiling, save when concern was on the agenda. There was a bit of a lift in her voice though, and he finally allowed his unease to defuse as he threw himself in a wooden chair across from hers, grabbing his hot chocolate and wasting no time pouring it down his throat. The girl finally lifted her mug, touching the edges of it with her lips and trying to drink it, but Morris could tell something was up.
"Too hot for ya?"
"No, it's fine," she said, doing her best not to flinch as she poured it down her throat, her long white eyelashes flapping repeatedly as she tries to keep it down.
"Let's let it cool then," Morris said, setting the mug aside and finding the girl more than obliging to mirror the action.
Speaking of "the girl"...
"You got a name?" Morris asked.
She considered this question for a minute, like someone being forced to recall where they were three months previous, but she came up with a diplomatic non-answer to break the quiet, "What would you like to call me?"
Morris laughed. The girl seemed pleased to hear the laughter, beginning to laugh as well before he waved a hand to stop her, "That's not how this works! Are you telling me you don't have a name? No... that's silly. Fine, if you won't share it, what should I call you at least?"
She began to think again, one hand busying itself in her long fluffy hair, pulling at the vines and revealing the blossoms on it looked exactly like her hair... but some dots don't get connected even by the most astute minds, and Morris was drowsy and baffled by the predicament. He focused instead on her reply, "You can call me Gypsum if you like."
"Gypsum's not a name! Give me something I can call a lady."
"I'm sorry, I'll think of a better one... is Gypsy acceptable?"
Morris winced at that name, "Maybe it was once, wouldn't like to call you that though. You need a proper girls name... Gysel. That's kind of like you were going for, right?"
The girl perked up at the name, "That is a marvelous name! Thank you for it!"
Morris couldn't help but blush, "Come on now, it ain't that creative. It is a pretty name though, I'll give you that."
"Not half as good as your name, I'm sure," Gysel said, nestling herself in the chair as if she was shuffling on her new name.
"Eh... Morris has got me this far. Too late to toss it out."
"I think it's a lovely name, Morris." Gysel said, Morris only able to resist the blush of receiving a compliment from a lady by disbelieving the compliment entirely.
"Alright Gysel," the name already seemed a decent fit in his eyes, "What's your story? If you ain't got a place to stay, there's better places then the corner of a gravestone to go to."
"I'd rather not burden you with my story," she said, not showing even an iota of sadness as she said it, "I'd rather hear about you."
"No no no... we're talking you. I've been at this place over 25 years, but you're the new person here." Morris's voice lowered as he leaned in, Gysel leaning in as well to better hear, "If it's something... bad, you can tell me. We don't gotta call police, or we can if you want. I don't need more details than you want to share."
Gysel places a hand on Morris's shoulder, another upgrade to her smile adding to her next words, "Your concern is very noble. I am glad to have a man like you looking out for me, but I am not hurt or in trouble."
"But something is off, ain't it?"
"No. I am sorry I can't give you a better picture, I just don't know the details myself." Morris pulled back from Gysel's hand now, sitting up in his chair to consider her again.
"You are a queer little girl... you sure you aren't on something?" he said, quirking an eyebrow.
Gysel sat back, looking down as she said, "Well I am on your chair."
That broke Morris. He begins to guffaw, Gysel trying to join in a mutual laugh but finding her small contribution overwhelmed by the old man's booming laughter. "Alright, alright! That's too clever for you to be strung out on something, so I'll leave you to that business. You know, you remind me of those Kobber people a bit. The ones that came to Vegas a few years back?"
"What's a Kobber?" Gysel asks, daring the hot chocolate again, or at least putting it close enough to her lips to make her seem like she's imbibing a bit of it.
"Surprised you didn't hear of them! I guess that's fair though, I didn't believe they were real until they started burying some of them here. Some people complained they were causing trouble or bringing trouble or whatever, but for me, just had to make the plots bigger or smaller and the rest didn't bother me none. I heard it drove some other gravedigger across town mad though."
"They... brought trouble?" Gysel's expression had taken a downturn. She wasn't angry or sad, but it seemed as if the concept was foreign to her and her brain was working overtime to understand it.
Morris waved his hand dismissively at that idea, "Rumors and hogwash, mostly. This part of Vegas at least never got scorched, or attacked by monsters, or whatever nonsense that bird on the TV said happened this week. The Kobbers... well, they're the good guys. They help people, but when you stop the bad guys, you can see the bad guys better I guess. They can't hide under rocks anymore."
"Hmm..." Gysel was pensive now, her mug sitting on her lap and reminding Morris to stand up and grab her a decent pair of pants and a belt she could tie to make it fit her right. "That's what I want to do."
"What's that?" Morris said, popping out of a bureau with the pair he deemed "least masculine" and thus fit for Gysel.
"Help. I want to make others look better. It sounds like the Kobbers need that, so people don't say they bring trouble anymore."
Morris nodded at the sentiment, even if he wasn't sure it was a wise or well-thought up idea. "Well you're a bit late to meet 'em. They left for a tropical paradise I heard, probably to get away from it all."
"Then I'll go there." Gysel said simply, only to be a little confused when Morris laughed, although she instinctively joined in without understanding why they were laughing again.
"It ain't that easy, sadly! You'd need to pay the plane fare, and that's no easy feat! You didn't even come here in clothes, you'd need a lot more to get out to K...Kiwihawaii or whatever it's called."
"I have nowhere to go, but Kiwihawaii sounds like a place I can do marvelous work."
"...You've got me in a pickle here. I hate to tell a kid not to chase their dream, but you just aren't cut for it right now-"
"Then will you teach me to be?" she asked.
"Ehh... not sure what I can do..."
"I can help here, until I'm cut for Kiwihawaii. Although I can stay here as long as you like of course. I wouldn't mind being here forever."
Morris suddenly recalled a young man in his thirties who thought the same thing and was now here thirty years later. He'd heard Daniel say similar things during his first two years of work here as well. Looking down at Gysel, her face full of optimism and a heart full of help, he couldn't condemn turn her away. Even if he couldn't get her to an island, he'd give her the means to leave this cemetery...
"I won't need you that long. If you want work though, I don't think we can really hire you... but... maybe if I pretend you're my daughter, we can work the same shift. They wouldn't care about a constant "bring your daughter to work day" I hope. You pull your weight, you get some of my pay, and we can get you in some nice clothes first."
"These clothes are very nice!" Gysel said, standing up now that she had the pants tied properly to herself... A brown tattered jacket that was too big yet still didn't close properly, a pair of old workpants hooked on her hipbones and threatening to become a pile on the floor any moment, and a belt that was really just a long cloth strap given a fancier name and a buckle.
"We'll get you something nicer. You can pick it, and before you go saying something like 'But you'd pick it better!', I pick for you to pick it because that's the best pick!"
"You got me there," Gysel smirked, Morris unsure if he had really won or if she let him win.
"Not sure if you're the right age to be my biological daughter... and it would make more sense to adopt you. I'm pretty sure you're no kid now, but I bet you can fool most into thinking you're sixteen at least. Do adopted kids get the last name or not though..."
"A last name? What is yours?"
"Gaye. Morris Gaye. Guess that'd make you Gysel Gaye, not much a ring to it..."
Gysel perked up as an idea reached her head and blurted itself out, "Or Nosegay!"
"...Nose...gay?"
Gysel adjusted herself to be more neutral, "It's the name for a small bouquet of sweetly-scented flowers. I might be overstepping my boundaries to choose such a name... but it makes an excellent pair with your name, without taking it or outdoing it."
Morris rubbed his chin, the sound of scratching stubble the only noise in the shack for a moment, "Not sure it doesn't outdo it... though I can at least keep pretending I'm Marvin Gaye's brother with my name. Never heard a girl... or guy, with your last name."
"I'm sorry, I should have chosen something less unique-"
"Keep it. Before we get another debate and you end up named Calcium or some other absurd name."
"That is wise," Gysel said. Morris wasn't a man used to compliments from anyone but his late wife, especially with Gysel handing them out like free samples at the grocery store. It would take some getting used to... but he didn't realize how much he was going to miss it.
It had just become February, and although he only had a few months left with her, he soon realized how much he wished he could have made her his daughter. Someone to talk to, dote on, teach and work with. She was always eager to please and perform, not afraid to get her hands dirty even when Morris himself balked at the task. She even had a way with visitors to the cemetery, much more consoling than the old gravedigger who had been hardened by his own losses. If Morris hadn't resolved himself to send her to the Kobbers, he'd have probably kept her the rest of his life.
For the months ahead though, Morris went from just trying to get her in a good enough shape to leave, to counting the days until he'd be forced to send her on her way.
Many people come to the cemetery to leave flowers for the departed, but to Morris, Gysel felt like a flower left on a grave just for him.
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