July 2006
Dad rings to tell me my mother has died. He wants to know if I wish to go to her funeral.
He asks me out of duty, I think, rather than with any realistic expectation that I will say yes. And I decline, of course. We’ve not spoken since the eighties. According to her sister – with whom Dad last had contact about a decade ago – she ended up moving to the south coast, and quitting journalism to work in advertising.
Over the years, I have felt, of course, the absence of a maternal ear, that background pulse of unconditional love. But I have not felt the absence ofherin any meaningful way.
I feel fear blow through me when Dad tells me how she died, though. Not for myself, but for my daughter. For the dark cloud that might now forever be hanging on her horizon.
In the end, I’m not sure what impels me to stand opposite the church a fortnight later, watching the funeral cortège roll in. Perhaps a part of me, even now, wants to try to understand. To gain some eleventh-hour clues as to who she was. One final attempt to make sense of her.
If you couldn’t love me, couldn’t you at least have cared?
But even that question feels wrong, when I think of my own daughter, the ferocity of my love for her a fire that could never burn out.
So maybe the more fitting question is,Why couldn’t you love me?
I recognise none of the tiny group of mourners. I try to guess which – if any – of them are her family, friends, lovers. It’s not easy. They all look like strangers. I’m not even sure I could pick out Mum’s sister now.
And then, for the first time in more than two decades, I see my mother. Or at least, the coffin she is lying in.
After everyone has filed inside, I remain standing in the dappled shade of a horse chestnut tree, just gazing at the church. I try to imagine what they are saying about her in there. Exactly which of her qualities they are eulogising, the parts of her personality they say they will miss.
I picture her blank eyes. The numbness. The never feeling. The never loving.
I wonder if anybody has mentioned that she was a mother once, too.
After an hour or so, they start spilling out on to the pavement again.
And that is her life over. Just like that.
I watch everyone milling around, dabbing their eyes and hugging each other.
And I try to feel something, because surely it would be normal to muster up some kind of sentiment or flicker of emotion – even if it is only relief, or anger? But I just feel numb.
One by one, the mourners disperse. And then the road falls quiet again, the only sound the silky trill of a blackbird singing a final hymn.
Later, Lawrence arrives to pick Emma up for the weekend. I don’t tell him about my mother, or where I’ve been today.
As soon as they have left I stare into the mirror that hangs in my hallway. I look blank and pale, in a way that seems ghostly, not quite human.
I need to feel something. Any fucking feeling at all.
Apparently, I have, over the course of a single afternoon, acquired my mother’s capacity for utter detachment. And that is not something I can bear for one second longer. So I head for the kitchen, where there is still a bottle of tequila left over from Ingrid’s birthday last year.
I need to feel something.
48.
Josh
July 2006
It’s late for visitors, or delivery drivers. After ten. But my doorbell goes anyway.
When I open the door, Rachel is standing on the front step, eyes a little glazed.
I can see straight away that she is drunk. And I can’t help smiling. Because drunk Rachel is actually one of my all-time favourite Rachels.
