It was raining, of course. The kind of rain that doesn’t fall but sinks into you, deep into the marrow, until you feel as if your bones are heavy with it. The funeral procession moved in slow, stilted steps, a stream of black umbrellas bobbing like oil slicks under the bleak sky. I kept my distance, partly because I didn’t know the man well and partly because something wasn’t right.
The air had that strange thickness, you know? The kind that makes you question if you’re really there or if you’re just a projection of yourself watching it all happen. It was around then, as I stood back by the gravestones, that I saw him.
The man was several feet away. His umbrella wasn’t black like the others. It was dark, yes, but there was a shimmer, like oil in water, a trick of the light. He wasn’t standing still but swaying, his movements barely perceptible, as though he wasn’t quite there. The strangest thing? No one else noticed him. I scanned the crowd, their blank faces etched with some combination of grief and detachment. But him? No one even glanced in his direction.
I knew I shouldn’t stare, but I couldn’t look away. His face was half-hidden under the shadow of that umbrella, but there was something about him. Something I felt I should know. Like an echo you can't quite place, but you’re certain you’ve heard before.
His hand. I remember his hand. He gripped the umbrella tightly, knuckles pale against the rain. And I swear... there was something on his wrist. A mark. A scar, maybe. But then I blinked, and it was gone. I blinked again, harder this time, trying to clear the fog from my mind. Maybe the rain was playing tricks on me.
But then he moved. And it wasn’t the kind of movement that drew attention. It was subtle. Almost too subtle to notice, like the space between breaths. One moment he was there, and the next, he wasn’t. He wasn’t walking away, just fading in and out of the scene like he was never really part of it. It hit me then: he wasn’t supposed to be there. He wasn’t there.
But I could see him. And somehow that made it worse.
Why could I see him?
My breath caught, something cold tugging at my chest. I turned away, pretending to be interested in the names etched into the gravestones. Ancient names, people long gone. Maybe they saw him too. Maybe I wasn’t the first to notice. Maybe—
I caught movement in my peripheral vision again, closer now. The same figure, the same umbrella. But now he wasn’t in the crowd. He was right next to the grave. His head tilted just enough for me to catch a glimpse of his face. A flicker of recognition hit me like a punch in the gut, but I couldn’t place him. And that’s when it hit me: I knew him, not from life but from somewhere else.
And then I remembered.
He had been there before. At another funeral. My grandfather’s. I was too young to understand then, but I remember now. The same umbrella. The same shadowed face, always lingering at the edges of grief, where no one was paying attention. Always just... watching.
The realization came slowly, like molasses dripping down into my mind: he was there for the dead. But not in the way you’d think. He wasn’t the grim reaper or some cliché specter of death. He wasn’t there to take them. He was there to witness something. To ensure something.
I wasn’t scared. Not yet. Not until I saw the way he was looking at the casket. It wasn’t a look of sorrow or even of indifference. It was as though he was measuring something. Calculating. And whatever equation he was solving, I wasn’t sure I wanted to know the answer.
I started walking toward him, a force pulling me even though my body screamed to turn away. As I neared, I noticed something strange. The rain—it wasn’t hitting him. It was falling around him, sure, but not on him. Like the air itself bent around his presence.
And then he turned.
Full face. Bare. Familiar, but not. It was a face that had seen things—known things no living soul should know. His eyes locked with mine, and for a brief moment, I saw it all. Every death he had attended, every soul he had watched depart, every secret whispered between life and whatever lies beyond. I felt time stretch, bend, and break all at once.
And then he spoke, though I never saw his lips move. His words echoed inside my head, clear but distant: “You weren’t supposed to see me. Not yet.”
My throat tightened. What did he mean? Why could I see him? What had I done?
The crowd shifted as the casket lowered into the earth, and for a second, I lost sight of him. My heart raced, searching, desperate to find that figure in the midst of mourning. But he was gone. Vanished as though he’d never been there at all.
Except I knew. I knew he had been. And I knew I would see him again.
And the worst part? I wasn’t sure I’d even mind.
It was in that moment, as the rain continued to fall on everyone else but me, that I realized something. Time: we think we have it—more than enough of it. Enough to wait, to delay, to avoid the things that make us uncomfortable. We put off the conversations we should have, push aside the choices that demand courage, and turn away from the truths we can’t bear to face.
But we don’t have time. Not really.
He—the man with the umbrella—wasn’t there to remind me of death. He was there to remind me of life. Of every moment slipping through our fingers, unnoticed until it’s too late.
There are shadows that walk beside us, unnoticed in the hustle of our lives. But every now and then, we get a glimpse of them. And when we do, it’s a reminder: we’re all heading somewhere, but we don’t know when or how we’ll arrive.
So what do we do in the meantime? Do we keep pretending there’s time? Or do we stop, face what we’ve been avoiding, and live fully in the moments we’re given?
I wish I had seen his full face at the funeral yesterday. Did you see it?
Maybe you will. And maybe, when you do, it’ll be a reminder to live, really live, before the time runs out.