All the girls in our town are assigned a corpse to carry once they’re old enough. It stays with you nearly forever, slung around your neck, or held in your arms, or somehow fastened to your body if you’re clever enough, or lucky enough to get help to do so.

Boys don’t get corpses. They walk around unburdened, free to do whatever they want. You’re lucky, we girls are told when we’re young, to so intimately know the meaning of life. To stare death in the face. To deeply understand sacrifice. You’ll see. This corpse will make you better.

Your corpse is with you all the time. At breakfast. At school. At the mall. You only get a break when you’re almost one yourself—that is, when you’re very old. Those women, the retirees, are called future corpses. My mother still carries her assignment, but my grandmother’s tour of duty is done. My dad claps Grams on the back. You’re free! he says. Some grandmothers party when they’re finished, whooping and hollering, but not mine. My grandmother doesn’t smile, never has. She is stooped and bent from years of carrying the dead, has a glazed look in her eye. I’m tired, she moans from her easy chair. She doesn’t even wear her blue ribbon, her sole reward for decades of service. All she wants is to rest. We flick on the TV for her, and she watches, dazed. She is now a future corpse.

Mom tells me, Never mind your grandmother. She pops a pill surreptitiously, then smiles, reaching for the vacuum with one hand while adjusting her corpse with the other. She trips, smashes her knee on the corner of the coffee table, yelping in pain. I look up from my homework. My brother passes through the living room, headphones on, not noticing that my mother has taken a spill as he heads out the door. “I’m okay!” Mom winces out. “Nobody run over. I’ll be fine. Really.” She curses under her breath, readjusting her corpse, which has tumbled awkwardly to the wrong side of her body. She continues vacuuming. She left her job ages ago because juggling everything was too much. She still carries a business card though, one that says, Justine R. Helms, Career Mom & Corpse Carrier. Ask me about my great kids, Lana and Jason. I scribble a note in the journal I keep tucked in my three-ring binder, recording thoughts at a moment’s notice. To be a corpse carrier—is that all there is?

###

At school, after the latest Corpse Assigning Ceremony, my bestie Trina and I watch the older girls attempt to carry on with their newly assigned cadavers. Most of the corpses are bigger than they are, trailing awkwardly behind them. Some of the girls gather in the halls like they used to, attempting to flirt with boys. “Show me yours,” a boy says to one of the girls.

“Okay!” she chirps, snapping her gum.

She produces her assignment’s certificate, points out features.

Trina rolls her eyes, muttering. “Some girls will do anything to get a boy’s attention.”

“Mine’s a 65-year-old male,” the girl intones, breathless. “He died of natural causes.”

The boy shrugs. “Is yours preserved?”

The girl nods. “Yeah. I got lucky.”

“The truth is,” Trina hisses, “her mommy and daddy paid extra for that!”

I scan the hallway. I notice the girls from down-and-out families; their corpses aren’t preserved, and will start to stink soon. They will likely drop out of school, get menial jobs where no one minds your stench. Other girls seem to walk smaller, like their corpse is dragging them down.

“Our corpses are a gift!” a girl in tight yoga pants raves to a friend. “We’re soooo lucky to have this form of enlightenment. I mean, boys don’t know what they’re missing!” Her shirt has a cartoon dog on it, with the mantra, Nama-stay. Her corpse is blonde, thin, and lithe, and fastened to her body piggy-back style, obviously with some help.

“Let’s go to class,” Trina says, “and leave these hosers behind.”

In biology, I make a note in my journal when the teacher isn’t looking: Only 1 year left ‘til my corpse assignment. Is that what I really want? Do I even have a choice?

In the few remaining weeks of school, I notice that most of the girls with new corpses are quieter. Only a brave few carry on as if nothing’s changed, making out with boys in the hall, with a dead body slung over their shoulder.

“Gross,” Trina growls after we pass one such couple.

I have to agree.

On our walk home, I’m distracted as Trina carries on about the injustices of being female. But my mind’s on logistics, and spatial conundrums: how does one have sex while carrying a corpse? I mean, I imagine it can be done. It must be done all the time. If not, how would children ever be born? How would I have ever come into this world? But I wonder if there are unspoken and socially-sanctioned cheats, like, it’s okay for women to put down their corpses for a hot minute, just so they can fuck. I imagine my own parents, my mother’s soft white body under my dad’s, my mom’s assigned cadaver resting beside her in their king-sized bed as my parents grunt and moan. I shudder, wishing I’d chosen another image.

The next day at school, Trina points out something I hadn’t noticed before: All our teachers are men. She says: “There are no role models for us. At least, not here. How are we supposed to know how to be strong women if no one’s modeling how to go through life with your corpse?”

The girl is right, so right. And her life isn’t fair—her mom disappeared one day when Trina was a toddler. And her grandmother died young. Trina had no one, only her dad. At least I have my mom, and my grandmother, though Grams, a future corpse, has checked out and is only waiting for the end.

“You should come over more, and hang out with my mom. She’s strong,” I offer. Trina doesn’t seem convinced.

After school, we go to Trina’s house, and watch television when we’re done with our homework. None of the women on TV carry corpses, and we begin to wonder what’s real. We look it up on the internet. It appears that corpse carrying is a regional custom turned into law, something only we local women do, or are forced to. “If we leave this town,” Trina says, “we can break this cycle. We can be whoever or whatever we want, without those awful things literally hanging around our necks.”

Together, we dream about our futures. Trina wants to go to art school, move to the big city, and be a painter, a famous one. My dreams aren’t as exciting or flashy. I think about my talents, and they are quiet ones: research and writing. “But still,” Trina says, “so what if your dream is to live a quiet life? You should be able to do that without hauling around a corpse your whole life, for fuck’s sake.”

Plus, I tell her, it would get in the way of, well, you know.

Trina nods knowingly. “Yeah, girl. Preach.”

We imagine our future boyfriends, or maybe girlfriends, and think about how beautiful our lives together could be if we weren’t carrying corpses. I close my eyes and dream about the perfect boy, imagining what it would be like to kiss him, how warm and soft and sweet.

“Promise me one thing, girl,” Trina says, resting her curly head on my shoulder. “That no matter where life takes us, somehow we’ll stay friends ‘til the end.”

I envision us old and white-haired, sitting in side-by-side rocking chairs after both our spouses have died, watching the ocean in peace at the last of our living days, after we’ve had the lives we’ve always dreamed of, Trina the world-renowned artist, and me, a bestselling novelist.

That night, I make a note in my journal: Future plans—run away with Trina.

###

Over the summer, things get weird. The news blares that more and more towns and states have passed laws requiring that young women are assigned a corpse. “We have to get outta here, Lana,” Trina says. “Run away with me. We have to get somewhere safe, as far away as possible, before this thing spreads like a disease.”

I nod. Running away was only ever a fantasy; what did I really know about living on my own? I had no job, and didn’t know if I could get one, at least one that could pay for an apartment.

“We’ll figure it out,” Trina says. “We could crash at my cousin’s out of state. He’d be okay with that. We could waitress in his restaurant, get tips.”

I ask her for some time to think, to prepare.

“Tick tock,” she says. “We’re not getting any younger.”

At home, Mom seems different, like the smiles are fewer and far between. Her face seems more worn, ravaged by worry and struggle. I try to cheer her up, gifting ideas like buoyant balloons. “Mom, Trina needs a role model. Someone who can show her how to be strong and live a satisfying life while carrying a corpse.”

Mom finally smiles, but it’s a bitter one. “I don’t think I’m up for that, honey.”

“But Mom! Trina’s thinking about running away.”

She doesn’t answer, only pours herself a glass of wine and goes back to stir-frying vegetables, steam glistening on her forehead as her corpse appears to sleep peacefully on her shoulder.

I don’t tell her that Trina wants me to come, and that there’s a part of me that wants to go. But there’s a part of me that can’t leave the others behind. Least of all, my mother. If she can be strong, and live her whole life carrying a corpse, why can’t I?

Weeks later, Trina and I fight. She tells me that I’m weak and calls me a baby, and that I’ll regret it forever if I don’t come. She leaves that night on a bus. I tear up my journal, burying it in a hole in the yard with my dreams. I never see Trina again.

###

The next year at school, I’m dreadfully lonely. I throw myself into writing weird stories, though I have no one to share them with, and I neglect my homework. First semester, I manage to get Cs across the board. Not bad enough to cause my family heartbreak, but not great enough to ensure a college scholarship and a scintillating career.

As Corpse Assigning Ceremony approaches, there’s an epidemic of broken arms, broken legs, and broken spines—girls hurting themselves to get out of corpse-carrying. But that doesn’t relieve their duty, the law says. Only decrepit old age does, or death. Then there’s a flood of disappearances of girls in my grade—a rash of run-aways. Then, finally, the suicides.

Our town is ripped apart.

At candlelight vigils, mothers carrying corpses scream at each other. We carried corpses all our lives, some howl, and we never once complained. The others scream back: What we wouldn’t give to relieve ourselves of this burden.

At home, Mom no longer gets out of bed. My father refuses to talk about it. He has moved into Jason’s old room since Jason left for college. At night I help cobble together supper with my sad cooking skills, with dad ruining meat on the grill, if we don’t get takeout. Tonight I chop some random limp veggies from the fridge, broccoli and carrots past their prime, and make a salad, then I bring a bowl to Mom’s room.

I open the door slightly. The curtains are drawn, the room is dark. Mom’s whimpering in her sleep. She shares the bed with her corpse, whom I’ve never taken a good look at. I’ve always avoided wanting to know about it, or the process of corpse carrying; I just naively assumed it was something normal, something women have always done, never mind the person whose body it once was. I took for granted that someday, it would be my destiny.

I enter, put the bowl down on her dresser, and open the curtains just enough. A slice of light cuts across the bed, illuminating the face of my mother’s assignment. He’s young, or was, when he died, about sixteen years old. He was perfectly preserved, no lines in his face. He looks a lot like my mom, like a young male version of her. High cheekbones and dark brown hair, pale skin, with an eerie sheen, artificially heightened by makeup to look fresh forever. It takes my breath away to see him lying so peacefully beside Mom, and to see her so ill, unable to cope with life. I hunt through her nightstand for clues, for her assignment’s certificate of origin. Way at the bottom, beneath packets of tissues, tubes of lotion, pill bottles, and candy wrappers, I find it. It reads:

Martin J. Helms
Twin brother of Justine R. Helms
Aged 16
Died of aneurysm
Assigned to Justine R. Helms to the fullest term of the law
Under no circumstances may this corpse be abandoned

 

My mother’s assignment is her twin. My mouth goes hot and dry, and I feel sick. I’d heard that most girls are assigned randos, people they don’t know, but my mother has been carrying her brother all these years.

From here, my life could go one of three ways. I could go on as usual, accepting the rules, and receive a corpse when I’m old enough. I could pretend like it doesn’t bother me, like it’s not crippling. I could go about my schoolwork, and go off to college. I could fall for the first boy that shows me some sympathy, the first boy that tells me, You’re so brave for accepting your assignment with so much grace. We could make tender love, me putting my corpse aside for a brief moment behind closed doors. We could move back home so I’m closer to Mom, and get married, dancing our first dance with a cadaver slung over my shoulder, its weight straining my beautiful lace gown. We could have kids, born a few years apart, a corpse nestled beside me in the hospital bed as I scream in labor, then again as I nurse my newborns. When the kids are old enough, I could ignore the encumbrance strapped to my body as I attempt to hold down a job, one that helps with our finances while I write a novel in the evening, after the kids have gone to bed. I could try so hard, but could keep quiet as I struggle—let everyone think that I’m strong. I could put on a brave face until I can’t anymore, watching the boys and men move around me unfettered, while my daughter inherits my burden. After so many years, I could get tired, so tired, and the light in my eyes would go dim. I’d quit my job, and stop writing. I’d begin to drag my feet, and fade, living even smaller because I have no energy to carry on. My mother will die, and my husband and children might drift off, and I’d be numb, all alone with my corpse until I’m old, too old for anything else. Then I’d become a future corpse, sitting catatonic with nothing left to give.

Or I could lift my mom’s credit cards from her purse, and buy us some bus tickets to a place where the law hasn’t caught up, where we can walk away free and live without being weighed down. I could sit Mom by the window, and we could watch the road spill out before us, through miles and miles of open prairies, past blue-tinged mountains, past small towns with white picket fences. I could feed Mom little by little, rebuild her strength, and tell her stories of all the things we’ll do when we get to our new home. I’d tell her about the modest house we’ll have, with a garden, and the feeling of being able to breathe. We’ll make up new names for ourselves, start fresh. I’ll get us three rocking chairs, one for her, one for me, and one for Trina, whom I swear I will find. I wouldn’t tell Mom that we’d be fugitives, outlaws, and our faces would glare from posters at rest stops on the way. But something tells me she’d already know that, and would make her peace with it.

Or I could go back to school and whisper in the ears of the girls who are still left, and tell them, We don’t have to do this anymore. And they’d whisper in the ear of the next girl, and the next girl, and the next, that no matter what, we won’t take what they’re giving—we reject our assigned corpses. Outside the ceremony, we’d stretch our arms, linking up tight, forming a chain of girls blocking the door. The chain would stretch across town, into the hills, and beyond, girls linked as far as the eye can see.

Perhaps there’ll be flashing sirens, the wail of alarms.

Whatever. Let them come for us.

Dad calls out from somewhere in the house, piercing my daydream. He announces that he ruined the meat on the grill because he wasn’t paying attention, now he’s running to town for takeout. He tells me he’s sorry, asks me to keep an eye on my mother.

Once his car’s out of sight, I drag Mom’s dead twin brother out of bed, hauling him over carpet, tile, and grass to the furthest corner of the backyard—Mom’s abandoned garden—a spot that’s overgrown with weeds, a place everyone forgets.

Then I get a shovel, and I dig.