Mr Pruitt, the funeral director, set his pumpkin pie on my mothers Thanksgiving table and said to Amber, I need to ask you about the signature on the withdrawal form, because it is not Bettys.
My mother never withdrew her prepaid funeral money. She thought she had lent it to Amber. What really happened was worse. Amber had gone to the funeral home herself, with a form, and signed my mothers name to pull out all six thousand two hundred dollars, six years of coupons and skipped hair appointments, the money Mama saved so none of us would ever have to pass a hat.
Mr Pruitt buried my daddy and my granddaddy. He had known Bettys signature for forty years, and the one on that form was not it. He kept the form instead of processing it clean, because something felt wrong, and he came to Thanksgiving dinner to make it right.
Amber asked why an old woman would waste money on a casket. Then she forged that old womans name to take it.
Forging a signature to withdraw someone elses funds is not a family loan. It is forgery, and it does not get smaller because you married into the family. Mr Pruitt laid the form next to Ambers store-bought pie, and the whole table saw the two signatures side by side.
My son Travis went very quiet. He had not known. When he understood what his wife had done to his grandmother, and in whose name, something changed in his face that I do not think will change back.
Faced with a forged document and a funeral director willing to take it to the police, Amber returned the money within days. Mamas funeral is prepaid again, casket, flowers, and the service at the same Methodist church where she married Daddy in 1965.
Mama set one extra plate that Thanksgiving, for Mr Pruitt. She said he was the only guest who ever came to dinner and gave her back her own peace of mind. She is seventy-nine, and she is not worried about her funeral anymore. We are all worried about a few other things now, but not that.