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we’d bring the house down. And if not, well, what kind of terrible person is going to criticize a eulogy?
    â€œThank you all for coming today,” I said, looking at the rows and rows of faces. So many people were crowded into the room that even those lined up against the wall were standing four rows deep. I saw my mom clutch the tissues in her hand and take a deep breath. Max and I then proceeded to tell our favorite stories about Dad. It had been hard to narrow them down, but I took special joy in telling everyone about the time Dad was asked to bring the “gifts” up to the altar at Christmas mass. Dad was Jewish—he only went to midnight mass with my mom every year because it meant a lot to her. After more than two decades of marriage, Mom decided to kick things up a notch and volunteered herselfand my dad to walk the wine and Eucharist down the aisle to the priest. Dad was excited to have a special part in the ceremony—he’d been passively participating for years, sitting, then standing; standing, then kneeling; up and down, up and down. He couldn’t wait to bring the gifts to the altar, because who doesn’t love presents? On the night of the mass, just seconds before they walked down the aisle, Dad looked puzzled as they handed him a metal bowl with a cloth over it. “Ohhh,” he said, slightly disappointed. “ These gifts.” He recovered from the disappointment that his role was not to play Santa Claus, and after he deposited the bowl of wafers with the priest, he gave a thumbs-up on his way back to the pew while the other churchgoers looked on. Many of them knew my dad and that he was Jewish and playing along for his family.
    Laughter echoed through the room as Max and I took turns, growing more confident in our eulogizing abilities with each crazy story. It gave me a thrill to see people crying from laughter—those were the tears Dad would have wanted. When Max and I finished our speech, a friend of mine from high school, Jen, threw her arms around me. Like plenty of people I grew up with, Jen’s parents were almost entirely absent from her life. A nanny had raised her. A chauffeur had driven her to school and ballet class. Her father, a big-time financier, stopped by our high school graduation but left before she even walked the stage to get her diploma because he “had a meeting.” “It should have beenmy dad,” she said. “It’s not fair.” (Before you judge her for saying something so awful, let me vouch for Jen and say her dad really was a trash can.)
    I gave Jen a squeeze and told her to look around. There were wet eyes here and there, but for the most part, people were talking, hugging, even dancing. “Dad would have been proud of you,” Max said as the last of the visitors filed out of the room. I waited for his typical sarcasm to follow, but it never did.
    By the time I got back to the apartment, most of the people who had come to grieve my father were standing in the grand foyer, sipping Lillet and Macallan 18 and pillaging a table topped with so much food, you would have thought we were holding a charity gala. Everyone wanted to hug me. Some of the hugs were warm and comforting, others were tense and awkward. Even though the party was going strong, I was starting to feel the fatigue of the previous few days weighing down on me. I retreated to the formal living room—one of the places in the house I never typically hung out—and hoped nobody would notice.
    â€œLizzie, why are you crying?” asked Elaine. She had graced us all with her presence, able to leave her hectic schedule of bridge tournaments and dinners on Worth Avenue in Palm Beach. I couldn’t believe it; she legitimately looked puzzled.
    â€œI’m just tired,” I said, barely able to look at her. We’d never been close, and I was always fine with that. But I’dnever actually hated her until now. She was wearing an