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LSCSC Ch. 11 — Ms. Smiley

Ferg
6 min readJan 27, 2025

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Ms. Smiley Davis sat in the driver’s seat of her beige Ford Pinto, in the parking lot of Mrs. Smiley’s funeral home and crematorium. Her funeral home, though she was no Missus.

Mrs. has been shown to be more marketable than Ms., rang the voice of her former business advisor. Whole lot of help that’s been. She hung both her hands on the worn steering wheel of the Pinto and pressed her forehead against the back of her hands. The American prayer position, only possible in the driver’s seat of an automobile. It was early morning, and the sky was still in the process of deciding whether or not to brighten. The sky was a steel blue color, and the air was cool, though the concrete still shook and shimmied with heat lines from yesterday’s sunny beatdown.

Smiley lifted her head and looked out the front windshield. She was the only one here. Unsurprising, considering the only other employees of Smily’s Funeral Home were a mopey teenage white girl and an ex-lumberjack with neurological issues, neither of whom ever showed up on time.

The parking lot was small, though bigger than some of the other businesses around. A ‘crime’ for which Smiley had also been harassed repeatedly by those same business owners. Those same white, business owners.

The building itself had been many things in its years. Though it had been converted into a…

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Ferg
Ferg

Written by Ferg

A lover of fiction and stories that move. Come in! It's cold out there! I have a fire going- have some hot choco- or tea, I suppose, if you have no taste buds.

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