The Last Appointment

I’ve spent more than three decades in this trade, and I thought I’d seen it all. But the afternoon the county coroner’s office called about Martha Ellison, I felt a chill that had nothing to do with the cold air in the prep room. They said she’d been dead for at least two days when a neighbor found her, and the house had been hot as a furnace. They needed me to pick her up and embalm her right away.

When I arrived at the address—a modest bungalow on the outskirts of Red Creek—the afternoon sun was already bleeding into a bruised sky. Her daughter, a woman in her sixties with the same sharp cheekbones as her mother, met me at the door. She clutched a tissue and spoke in a voice that trembled. ‘Mother always said she wanted to be buried with her cameo. The one with the lavender rose. It’s hers, you know, from her engagement to my father. She never took it off. Please, make sure she has it.’

I assured her I would, and we loaded Martha onto the stretcher. She was light, as many elderly are, but there was a stiffness that suggested the onset of rigor. As we lifted her into the van, I noticed her hand was clenched so tightly that the knuckles were white. Her nails had left crescents in her palm. I made a mental note to gently loosen them during preparation.

Back at the funeral home, I placed her in the cooler overnight, as we’d been short-staffed and I had paperwork to catch up on. The next morning, I brought her into the prep room. The fluorescent lights hummed, and the stainless steel table gleamed. As I unzipped the body bag, I saw that her hand was still clenched, but now it seemed even tighter, if that was possible. I tried to pry her fingers open, but they resisted like stone. ‘Come on, Martha,’ I muttered, ‘let go.’

I left her for a moment to gather warm water and a towel, hoping to relax the muscles. When I returned, I could have sworn the hand had shifted. I blinked and focused. The fingers were still curled, but the angle of the wrist looked different—turned inward, as if she were reaching for something. I shook my head. It had been a long week. I applied the warm compress and was finally able to ease her hand open. But there was nothing in it. The palm was empty, save for the deep red half-moons where her nails had dug in.

I proceeded with the embalming. I made the incisions, raised the arteries, and injected the preserving fluid. As the blood drained out, I noticed the lavender cameo she wore at her throat. It was a beautiful piece, intricate silver filigree with a tiny rose carved from amethyst. I made sure it was secure. As I worked, I talked to her, as I often do, out of habit and respect. ‘Your daughter will be happy to know you have this on,’ I said. ‘She said you never took it off.’

At that moment, the lights flickered. I looked up, but the hum continued steady. Then I felt a draft, cold and sharp, snake around my ankles. I ignored it. But then the body moved. Not a twitch. A definite, deliberate roll onto her side, as if shifting in bed. I stumbled back, my heart thudding. The body lay still again, but the position was wrong—her arm was bent at an elbow, her hand now resting on the table as if she’d been reaching for something.

I’ve seen a lot of things that can’t be explained, but this was different. This was a woman who’d been dead for days, whose blood was being drained, and she had just turned over. I took a deep breath. ‘Alright, Martha. You’re in good hands. You’re going to see your husband soon.’ I tried to calm myself with the usual platitudes. But as I walked around the table to reposition her, I saw her fingers move. One finger, then another, slowly curling and uncurling, as if testing the air.

I called for my assistant, a young man named Leo, who had been with me for two years. He entered, saw the state of the room, and froze. ‘Is that…?’ he started. I nodded. ‘She’s moving, Leo. I need your help to keep her still while I finish.’ We worked in tandem, Leo holding her shoulders while I tied her in place with a soft strap across her chest. But even then, her fingers kept twitching, and I could have sworn I heard a faint rasping sound, like dry leaves rubbing together.

We finished the embalming in record time, but as I was aspirating the body cavity, I noticed something on the inside of her thigh. A small, dark mark, like a bruise. But as I watched, it shifted. It grew darker, then faded. It moved. I pointed it out to Leo, who turned pale. ‘What is it?’ he whispered. I shook my head. ‘I don’t know. But it’s not from decomposition. It’s like a stain that’s alive.’

The mark traveled up her leg, across her hip, and settled over her stomach. Then it began to spread, branching out like a spiderweb. I stepped back, my skin crawling. ‘We need to finish this,’ I said, my voice tight. I worked faster, but the mark continued to spread, reaching her chest, her throat. When it touched the cameo, the cameo grew warm. I felt it from across the room.

I finally completed the procedure and stepped back, wiping my brow. The mark now covered her entire torso, a dark, intricate pattern like cracked earth. Her face, however, remained serene, untouched. I looked at Leo. ‘Say nothing about this,’ I said. ‘Not a word.’ He nodded, his eyes wide.

As we moved her to the dressing room, I noticed that her hand had clenched again, but this time it was holding the cameo. Not merely touching it—gripping it. I tried to lift her fingers, but they were fused. I had to gently pry the cameo away from her grip to prepare her for burial. But as I did, I felt a cold resistance, as if the cameo were trying to pull away from me.

Finally, we dressed her in her funeral clothes, and I placed the cameo back on her, but I didn’t pin it. Instead, I left it in her hand, as she seemed to want it. I have never done that before, but I felt compelled.

The viewing was the next evening. Her daughter came early, wanting a moment alone. She stood over the casket, weeping. As she reached out to touch her mother’s face, I saw her hand pause. She looked at me, confusion in her eyes. ‘Her hand is moving,’ she said, her voice small.

I rushed over. In the casket, Martha’s fingers were indeed moving, gently stroking the cameo. Then her eyes opened. Not a blink. A slow, deliberate opening, revealing milky white orbs. Her daughter screamed and stumbled back, knocking over a row of chairs. Martha’s head turned, and she fixed her gaze on me. Her lips parted, and a thin, dry sound escaped. It sounded like my name.

Before anyone could react, Martha sat up. The cameo glinted in the dim light. She looked at her daughter, then at me, and then she spoke, in a voice that was not her own—a deep, resonant voice that seemed to come from everywhere at once. ‘The appointment is kept.’ Then she fell back, lifeless, and the cameo slid from her hand and clattered onto the floor. It landed in a pool of candlelight, and I saw that the amethyst rose was now dark, almost black.

We closed the casket quickly and held the graveside service the next morning. As the first shovel of dirt hit the casket, I saw a flicker of movement at the edge of the cemetery. A figure in a long coat, half-hidden by the oak trees. I squinted, but it was gone.

Later that day, I returned to the funeral home to clean the prep room. On the table, I found a small, dark stain shaped like a handprint. I tried to scrub it off, but it wouldn’t budge. I covered it with a sheet, but I know it’s still there, waiting.

I think about Martha often. Her daughter never spoke to me again, and she moved away. The cameo was never found; it vanished from the casket before burial, we think. But sometimes, late at night, when the funeral home is silent, I hear a faint ticking from the prep room. It’s the sound of a watch that’s been stopped for years, or the heartbeat of something that refuses to rest.

I’ve learned one thing after all these years: the dead don’t always stay still. And sometimes, they take appointments that have been waiting a lifetime.