“But she looked all right yesterday,” I said through the thick lump of emotion that had filled my throat.
“She was very, very ill.”
“But she looked better yesterday,” I insisted. “She said she felt better.” In the face of such testimony, testimony from the one person who should know, how could this woman be telling me this?
“Adele looked better but she had been deteriorating for a long, long time. We were all surprised that she survived this long.”
This didn’t make sense. No sense at all. We’d been laughing yesterday. Joking about pets called Your Hairy Butt. “She wasn’t on her own, was she?” My eyes frantically searched Nancy’s tired face. It was the most important thing in the world right then, that Del hadn’t left, started this new journey, all alone. “Adele didn’t die alone?”
Nancy shook her head. “No, I was with her. She said to tell Tegan she loved her and to tell you goodbye.”
“It should have been me, I should have been with her. I said I’d be with her.”
“She didn’t want that,” Nancy said gently and laid a hand on my arm. “She’d asked enough of you already. Adele had been holding on because she didn’t know what was going to happen to her baby. But when you came she was happy because her child would be taken care of and she could let go. That’s why she was looking better, she wasn’t as worried. She knew yesterday that she was near the end—after you had gone she said that if she passed away in the night, not to tell you until this morning. She didn’t want to spoil the last memory you had of her laughing and joking. She just wanted you to remember the laughing.”
“That sounds like Adele, a control freak till the end,” I whispered, anger tingeing my voice. If I had known, I could’ve said a proper goodbye. I could have kissed and hugged her. Told her how much I loved her. I hadn’t said that, had I? Not once in the past nine days did I say I loved her. And I never said I’d forgiven her. Had I forgiven her? I don’t know. I didn’t want to talk about things, I know that, but had I forgiven her? Even if I hadn’t, shouldn’t I have said it? Shouldn’t I have put her mind at rest?
“She didn’t suffer. She went to sleep and didn’t wake up. I was holding her hand as she fell asleep, she knew she wasn’t alone.”
“I didn’t want her to be alone,” I whispered. I thought she had months left, not days. I should have listened to what she had to say, let her unburden her mind. I didn’t want her to die thinking I still hated her.
“Thank you, Nancy,” I said, wanting to hug her, wanting to show her how grateful I was to her for doing my job for me. I couldn’t move, though, was rooted to the spot, so I crammed as much gratitude into my voice as possible.
“For everything. For being there all these months, for being there at the end, and for coming to tell me yourself. Thank you.”
“You’ve had a terrible shock,” Nancy replied. “Do you want to sit down for a while?”
I shook my head. “I’m fine. It’s not as if we weren’t expecting this to happen, it’s just sooner than I thought.”
“Is there anyone you would like me to call? Someone who can come and stay with you?”
“No. I’m fine, really. I…” My legs gave way and suddenly my knees were pressed into the faded paisley carpet and my body was bent forward, my forehead almost touching the floor. I pushed the base of my thumbs onto my eyelids as my face crumpled.
It started as a small nugget of pain deep inside but it grew and grew until it was a huge choking ball of agony. She was gone. I was never going to see her again. I was never going to speak to her again. Never going to hold her hand. Or call her a silly tart. Or have her pull my hair and tell me to stop being a hard-faced bitch. Or just sit with her and watch the TV.
The first wave of tears came spilling forth. She’d left me. I’d left her, but she’d left me. Forever. My best friend was gone.
My body lurched again as another flood of tears poured out. I’d wanted to cry like this, to collapse and break down, the day I found out about her and Nate, but hadn’t been able to. It was there, just at the back of my eyes, just at the back of my throat, just at the back of my chest. Just at the back of my emotions. Even on the day of what would have been my wedding I hadn’t been able to cry completely because it hadn’t seemed real. I’d gotten on with things. Life. Everything. Now it was all coming out, coursing through my body in painful waves, gushing down my face in a waterfall.
The next emotional block dissolved. The block that had stopped me from breaking down when I got that card on my birthday and had found myself neck-deep in memories about Del and Nate disintegrated and the shock, anger, resentment came gushing out.
Next came the outpouring caused by seeing her lying in that hospital bed. The horror of finding out she was a sliver of the person I knew; the shell of the woman I loved. I’d hated myself at that moment. Hated myself for letting her down, for ignoring her, for rejecting every reach for help she’d made. I’d abandoned her. When she needed me most I’d turned my back on her. And she’d dwindled to that. To nothingness. I’d wanted to cry then but hadn’t.
Then came the tears for what had happened to Tegan. I could’ve saved her from all that pain, all that violence, if I’d opened just one of Del’s letters. Every bruise and mark and welt on Tegan’s thin little body was scarred on my soul. I’d fought those tears when I first bathed her because I had to be strong, I had to hold it all together. Now, though, every ounce of strength was gone and all that was left was a big pool of sobbing.
I didn’t feel better. Each sob didn’t release pain, it brought more of it. More of the things I’d hidden from, had pushed away, pushed down, pushed behind me were cascading out in an embarrassing mess. Mess. I was making a mess. And I couldn’t stop.
Tegan was still asleep.
She’d hardly stirred in an hour and I’d had to stare hard at her chest several times to check that she was still breathing. She was so peaceful in sleep, probably the calmest she’d been since we’d got here.
I’d been lying next to her for what felt like an eternity. I didn’t want to wake her. If I woke her, I had to tell her. I had to let her know, and that was going to be…I didn’t know how I was going to do it.
I’d calmed down. I wasn’t calm, just calmer, no longer hysterical. I hadn’t realized until I started crying how unbalanced I’d felt, how I’d spent two years on the edge of hysteria, always wanting to let it out but unsure if I started if I’d be able to stop. Now I’d stemmed the flow of tears, had washed my face, had bathed my eyes in enough cold water to take away the redness and puffiness.
Tegan opened her eyes suddenly, making me jump. She always did that. She could be fast asleep then her blue eyes would be open and staring intently at you.
“Why are your eyes red?” she asked. So much for taking away the redness with cold water.
I brushed her hair off her forehead, exposing the soft white skin on her forehead.
“I’ve been crying,” I replied.
“Why?” she asked, tilting her head deeper into the pillow.
“I’m sad.”
“Why?”
I inhaled deeply, felt the tightness of emotion compressing my lungs. “I’m sad because of your mummy.”
“Mummy?” Tegan sat up. “Are we going to see Mummy today?”
I shook my head. “No, sweetie,” I said.
“I want to see Mummy.”
My jaw trembled as I watched the little girl with disheveled hair and creased pajamas who sat asking me with big confused eyes why I was keeping her mother from her.
“Tiga, when your mummy said you were going to live with me, where did she say she’d be?”
“In heaven with Jesus and the angels,” Tegan replied. Just like that. As though heaven was only around the corner, and Jesus and the angels could be found hanging out in the local park.
“Did she say why?”
“Because she was ill and Jesus and the angels would look after her.”
“I’m sorry,
sweetie, your mummy’s gone to be with Jesus and the angels.”
Tegan shook her head. “No, she hasn’t. She’s in the hospital.”
“She was yesterday. But today she’s gone to heaven.”
“When is she coming back?”
“I’m sorry, Tiga, she’s not coming back.”
“I DON’T BELIEVE YOU!” Tegan shouted and I recoiled at the volume of her voice. She scrambled out from under the covers and leapt off the bed. “I don’t believe you. I want to see my mummy. I want to see my mummy.”
“I’m sorry, you can’t,” I said quietly.
“I want my mummy,” she screamed. “I want to see my mummy!”
I sat on the bed, frozen as Tegan stood in the middle of the floor, her pajamas hanging off her thin body, flinging her arms up and down and stamping her feet, screaming.
I didn’t know what to do. Try to hold her? Leave her to scream it out? Run away and hide? That was the strongest urge: to bury my face in the pillow, to cover my ears and wait for all of this to go away. I didn’t know what else to do. Nancy had offered to stay while I told Tegan but I’d said no, she’d done enough already, I couldn’t impose upon her anymore. Now I wished she had stayed. She would have known what to do.
I kept repeating that I was sorry but Tegan didn’t hear me. She just screamed and screamed, stamping her feet and flailing her arms about. On and on. “I WANT MY MUMMY, I WANT MY MUMMY, I WANT MY MUMMY, I WANT MY MUMMY.”
Trampling clothes and papers and other items littering the floor, I crossed the room to her.
“I WANT MY MUMMY, I WANT MY MUMMY, I WANT MY MUMMY, I WANT MY MUMMY.”
I slipped my arms around her even though she fought me, hit out with her tiny fists, each of them connecting with my body but not hurting.
“I WANT MY MUMMY, I WANT MY MUMMY, I WANT MY MUMMY, I WANT MY MUMMY.”
She bucked and twisted, as wild and vicious as a cornered animal, still screaming, but I held on to her until her rage subsided and she went limp in my arms—her head flopped onto my left biceps, finally exhausted from crying and yelling and begging for her mother.
“You’ve still got me,” I said, holding her close and gently stroking her back.
“Don’t want you,” she whispered in a tiny, hoarse voice,
“want my mummy.”
chapter 10
The handle to the door of my former bedroom turned and the door slowly opened. I watched as more of the corridor of my parents’ house came into view and Tegan stepped in. She was dressed in a calf-length, black satin dress with a full skirt, embroidered bodice and long sleeves that my mum had bought her. She had shiny black patent shoes on her feet and white socks that ended mid-calf. Mum had also tied black ribbons into the twin bunches in Tegan’s hair. The black was tragically striking against her whey-colored skin and pale gold hair, it brought out the dark strands of color in her royal blue eyes, gave her a regal air. Her beauty brought a lump to my throat instead of a smile to my lips because she wasn’t going to wow people at a party but was attending her mother’s funeral.
Since we didn’t need to be in town anymore, the day after Adele…the day after it happened, Tegan and I packed up and moved to my parents’ house in Ealing, the outskirts of west London. The plan was to return to Leeds a few days after the funeral. After today.
Tegan had reverted to the fearful silence that had shrouded her when I’d taken her from Guildford. This silence, however, was splintered with sadness and the worry of what would happen to her now; what she would do without her mum.
Despite not speaking to me, I always had to be in her sight and if I left her company for too long, she’d seek me out, apprehension smudged onto her face, until she could touch me. A brush of her short fingers on the back of my hand, a slight stroke of my hair, a nudge against my abdomen, just to make sure I was real. Solid. There. I’d find her sitting outside the bathroom if I went for a shower. The day I nipped down the road for a bottle of water and to make some calls, I’d returned to find her sitting beside the front door, clutching her knees to her chest, her eyes like two chips of dark sapphire on a snow plain as they stared into the distance. She’d curled her arms around my thigh and rested her head against it when I walked in, and I accepted that I couldn’t leave her alone again.
We slept in the same bed. If we were watching TV she’d climb into my lap, put her arms around me and rest her head against my chest; she’d often fall asleep like that. We were virtually inseparable. The silent duo, because I didn’t feel much like speaking either. My usual way for dealing with things was sleeping, and right now all I felt like doing was escaping into another realm, especially when I was arranging a funeral. A funeral for my best friend. For the woman I couldn’t remember saying a proper goodbye to. Every time I thought of that, my stomach would clench in on itself until it was a tight, solid ball of pain. I didn’t get to say goodbye. I couldn’t remember the last expression on her face—did she smile? Did I smile at her? When I’d looked at Adele in the hospital, I didn’t see the ill person; she was transformed into a cream-skinned, curly blond stunner with steel-blue eyes and a killer smile. Had I seen that smile before I left? I couldn’t remember. I couldn’t hold on to the image of her because I’d not been seeing Adele as she was, but simply a memory of the woman she used to be.
In the here and now, Tegan stood in the corner of the room, leaning her right shoulder against the wall, staring at me, waiting for me to finish getting ready. My dress wasn’t anywhere near as beautiful as hers—it was a simple, straight, ankle-skimming linen creation with a V-neck and short sleeves that I’d grabbed in a dash to Ealing Shopping Center. I hadn’t brought enough clothes with me for a long spell in London and I certainly hadn’t been prepared for a funeral.
“I like your dress,” I said to her.
Tegan said nothing, although her impassive blue eyes remained on me.
“And I like your hair bunches. My mum used to put my hair in bunches too. But I had three—two at the front, one at the back.”
Her eyes never left my face.
“I used to have different colored ribbons tied to each bunch. So did my sister, you know, Sheridan. My mum would plait them and then tie a ribbon around them. Remember how I used to plait your hair?”
Nothing. Her blue eyes watched me but her mouth didn’t move to reply.
I looked down at my shiny black shoes, trying to control the expression on my face. It was hard enough coping with everything else, and the funeral would be a nightmare, but it’d be a million times worse if Tegan continued her campaign of silence against me.
It wasn’t her fault, though. She didn’t know how else to be. What do you do when you’re five years old and your mother dies? And in her place is a strange woman who you haven’t seen in two years, claiming she’ll take care of you?
I stood, painting a smile on my face as I reached my full height. “What do you think of my dress?” I asked.
Her eyes roamed from my face to my feet, then back up to my face, but didn’t betray her thoughts, and since this question required more than a nod for an answer, she didn’t tell me what she thought.
“Do you like it?” I rephrased.
She nodded and turned the corners of her mouth up, nearly managing a smile. I almost wrapped her in my arms as a thank you for acknowledging me, for taking this small but significant step on our road back to verbal communication.
“It’s not as pretty as yours,” I stated.
The corners of Tegan’s mouth returned to a flatline but I remembered the twitch of her lips when she smiled at me. That would keep me going for a couple of hours. “OK, I’m ready, finally. Let’s go.”
chapter 11
Adele Brannon
(formerly Lucinda-Jayne Hamilton-Mackenzie)
died recently after a valiant battle with leukemia.
She is survived by her daughter, Tegan Brannon.
The funeral will be held on July 31, at 4 p.m.
St. Agnes’s Church, Ealing. br />
In the gray brick Catholic church Tegan sat motionless and impassive beside me, watching the people who stood in the pulpit, talking about her mother. I wasn’t sure she knew what was going on—I’d explained that a funeral was where you said goodbye to someone who’d died, but like everything I’d said to her since her cry in the hotel room, she’d given no sign of understanding what I was talking about. Nevertheless, now she was silent and still, as though she sensed the gravity of the occasion.
I, on the other hand, couldn’t, wouldn’t sit still. My body, hot and coated with a film of sweat under the black linen dress and matching jacket, wouldn’t stop fidgeting. The wooden pew beneath me, smoothed shiny by hundreds if not thousands of bums over the years, was unsuited to long periods of sitting, but even if it had been a comfy armchair, I wouldn’t have sat still. To sit still would be to agree with what had happened. I would be telling the world that I approved of Adele being taken away from us. That this dying business and the accompanying funeral were acceptable to me.
The church vibrated with the presence of hundreds of people. Hundreds. Hundreds of them had come to pay their last respects—Adele had thought she’d be lucky if enough people to make a football team turned up.
“I tell you, leukemia sure helps you find out who your friends are,” she’d said with her characteristic laugh. Her humor had stayed at the edge of the gallows in those last few days. Always saying things that only the terminally ill were allowed to get away with. I usually laughed, but some of the things Adele came out with horrified even me. “I don’t blame people for not coming to visit, though. Who wants to sit in a hospital room and be reminded of death?” she’d continued. “Besides, how do you react when you find out someone you vaguely know is knocking on heaven’s door? You can’t mourn them when you don’t know them, can you? And what do you say when you visit? ‘Sorry we didn’t get to know you, now it’s too late’?”