Billy’s obituary is ready for the paper, it turns out only Vincent knew Billy’s full legal name (which is “Franz Josef Karl Weisslechner”, I mean, honestly? Who wouldn’t become bulimic with that kind of name* ?! He should have had it changed when it was still time!), and we picked together a nice poetic bit from “Green Grass” by Tom Waits, instead of a religious sentence, because Billy was very much anti-Catholic. Vincent asked the hospital to inform the parents, because nobody here can be bothered with them any longer, and anyways the chance that they as much as care considering their plenty of other social and material obligations are pretty slim.
We are cleaning out his stuff from his room, not sure right now if we should send it to his parents in Austria or give it to charity or what to do with it, probably another phone call would clarify that point, but as above, nobody is interested in the task.
We are collecting money for the funeral, because we want it to be very nice and right now it’s not clear who is going to pay for it. Billy will be cremated and we are discussing what to do with his ashes.
Some people are angry for some reason, others are crying here and there. I am thinking to myself I would have wanted Billy to live and come out on top of it all, but at the same time I could not picture it at all, how that would possibly be; he maybe should have gone in some long term therapy where they teach one how to have a thick skin and not give a shit, but first of all where can you find that? and then how the hell would Billy get the money for such an elite treatment? Pretty unlikely.
All I could picture instead would have been a never-ending struggle of suffering and never wising up, if one wanted to say so, because Billy somehow had the tendency to walk up to the most unlikely people asking them to love him, and if someone is like that and at the same time more than five years old it will be endless drama for life, in my experience.
So compared to that a dramatic end is perhaps better, one can breathe again, or can one? Not sure, really, maybe I am lying to myself here, but right now we are busy sorting this funeral out and all what has to do with it.
It’s a very sad and very busy moment, and quite honestly: I hope it will pass soon, I am not good with grief at all.
* As of Billy’s parents’ choice for their son’s name, find more information here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franz_Joseph_I_of_Austria