The Funeral

I’m in my parents’ backyard. I’m not sure how I got here. Everything up until this morning has been photographically memorized and stored, but as soon as I stepped foot inside the church, my mind just blanked. I can’t tell you which words were uttered or which songs were sung, and haven’t the faintest idea as to how many people were there or how many hands I shook, how many condolences I received. I’m pretty certain I can’t even remember the coffin itself. It doesn’t bother me now, but I know it will soon enough.
        Marlon Monaghan, eighteen years old. Tuesday December 2nd and I just lowered him into the ground, the only person I could ever love. I might as well have joined him. Surely, it cannot constitute as being buried alive, not when I feel like this. Eighteen years old. I can’t help but wonder what his God has to say about that.
          The kitchen door opens behind me, creaking hinges audible over the whispering crowd inside the house. It’s a strange thing, funerals. Eerie. He was so full of life. How anyone can think that keeping their voices down is the proper way to pay their final respect is beyond me. I should be shouting at the sky, really, just to set an example. Maybe then they’d learn.
        ‘Sis?’
        Of course my mum sent Angel.
        I don’t do anything. Can’t be bothered. I just stand there, listening to her as she carefully treads closer.
        ‘I thought you’d quit,’ she says, stopping behind me to my right. I look down at the cigarette pack in my hand.
        ‘I have.’
        ‘I see,’ she says. I don’t know what to make of her tone, but soon decide it doesn’t matter anyway.
        ‘They’re his,’ I say and look back up at nothing in particular. I’ve yet to say his name out loud. I’m very aware of that.
        ‘Ah.’
        ‘Ah, indeed.’
        I turn the pack absentmindedly in my hand.
        ‘I thought he’d quit,’ she presses on. I nod.
        ‘He had.’
        ‘I see.’
        I look back down at the pack. Then at my black shoes on the white snow.
        ‘Won’t you come back in?’ she asks from behind me. I shake my head.
        ‘I’m good out here.’
        ‘You’re freezing.’
        ‘Am I?’
        She takes my hand and closes hers around it, forcing my fidgeting with the cigarette pack to come to a halt.
        ‘You’re practically blue,’ she reasons. I look down once more. Against her skin, mine does look shockingly pale.
        ‘I am, aren’t I?’
        I don’t make any motion to move, though.
        ‘Come inside, won’t you? Please.’
        My head nods without my full consent.
        ‘I’ll come inside in just a second,’ I say, finally looking back over my shoulder at her. For a moment I just examine her face. She notices and looks puzzled, but doesn’t ask. I’m glad. I wouldn’t want to tell her she’s right, anyway. Not now. She’s worried enough as it is. I don’t want to send her guilt-tripping, too.
        ‘I’ll be inside in a second. Promise.’
        She nods and gives my hand a little squeeze. Then she lets go of it, turns around and walks back inside. I face front, trying to figure out what it is I was looking at before, but can’t determine it. I turn the pack over in my hand once more, stop, then sigh. It’s freezing out here. I really should go back inside.

It’s dark when we arrive. I give the cab driver twenty-five quid and ask him to keep the change. He thanks me and smiles, hiw yellow teeth visible in the rear view mirror, but I don’t return it. I can’t even begin to conjure up a smile. Instead I just nod. Then I exit the vehicle, shut the door and take a deep breath, elated to be out of there. I don’t know what it is with cab drivers and chit chatting. It took all my effort to not tell him he just picked me up from my husband’s wake.
        I cross the road and the snowy sidewalk, stopping in front of our building.
        ‘My building,’ I correct myself, going through my pockets to find my keys. ‘Me, my, mine.’
        I find them in the right inner pocket, unlock the door and enter the hall. I try not to pay attention to the mail box, but can’t help but catch a glimpse of his name on it out of the corner of my eye as I pass it on my way to the stairs. It’s been springing at me lately, on the mail, on the phone. I stop in front of our door on the third door and take it in again. I want my insides to plummet from it, but really, I feel nothing. I’m just hollow. How did it get to this?
        I unlock our front door and enter the flat.
        ‘My front door,’ I mutter, stopping in the hallway with a hand on the door handle, ‘my flat.’
        I take in the sight of it. Then the smell. His scent still hangs in the air. It’s intoxicating and excruciating and sends my insides plummeting like I wanted before, only I don’t want it now, I just want him back. I just want him back.
        I close the door quickly as if to not let his scent escape. Then I turn the lock. I wonder how long I can keep it here. Forever, I hope. Forever would be good. I spend the next fourteen minutes just chanting that to myself. Forever, I hope. Forever would be good.

Tuesday turns to Sunday.

There’s a knock on the door. Only, I don’t realise it’s a knock until the third one by which time my ind has finally started to pick up pace. I open my eyes and look in the direction of the bedroom door. It’s far away, too far. The front door’s even further. Maybe if I just wait, silently, maybe then they’ll go away. I’m not home. I’m not in.
        Silence.
        I’m not here, I’m not in.
        Silence.
        I’m not here, I’m not in.
        Silence.
        Then there’s another knock. Louder this time as if the persecutor has read my very mind. I groan and roll over, get to my feet and cross the bedroom and the living room. As I enter the hallway, there’s another knock.
        ‘I’m coming,’ I say, only I don’t really say it, it’s more of a murmur. A floorboard creaks under my foot and the knocking finally comes to a halt. I reach the door and peep through the hole. It’s Angel and she knows what I’m doing.
        ‘Just open the door, S.’
        I unlock it and do what she says. She enters without my asking her to. Walking past me in the hallway, she stops five feet away, looks through the door to the living room and the one to the kitchen before turning her attention back to me. I don’t know exactly what to make of her expression. I could swear she looked positively surprised by the look of the place for just a moment, but it’s gone now.
        ‘Mum called,’ she says. I shut the door and lock it again.
        ‘I know.’
        ‘Six times.’ Her voice picks up authority.
        ‘I know.’
        ‘Well, is your phone not working?’
        She looks through the door to the living room, undoubtedly at the technology in question.
        ‘Yes.’
        She turns her attention back to me. I expect her to say something else about it, something more, but she doesn’t. She just stands there, looking at me, up and down. It’s not until she says the funeral was six days ago I realise I should probably have changed out of the black dress.
        ‘Have you seen yourself?’
        I don’t answer. I can tell she wasn’t expecting me to, anyway. She’s got that look on her face, comprehension. It’s mixed up with something else I can’t quite make out. Pity, maybe? Probably. I’m not sure. Something’s going on behind her eyes, but I don’t know what. It’s weird because I used to.
        ‘Let’s get you out of those clothes,’ she says. She doesn’t move until I nod in agreement.

I’m in the bathtub. It’s ridiculous, really, but I can’t move, can’t even force myself to do it, to just try. The bedroom no longer smells like him. Hasn’t done so in four days. The living room followed in line two days ago and the hallway this morning. As for the kitchen, I don’t want to go there. There’s photos all over the fridge. Until I conjure up the courage to actually look at those, the bathroom is the only room I’ve got left. It’s my favourite, too. I’m in the bathtub, fully dressed, his shampoo in my hand, quite close to my face. I’m so happy I could die. I think I’ve finally found a way to eternalise him.

‘S. Just… sit down. Please.’
        Angel is on the couch, I’m not sure how she does it. I couldn’t sit down if my life depended on it. Couldn’t sit down if his did, but it doesn’t and it won’t because he’s gone, all gone, and there’s nothing I can do about it. I walk back towards the bedroom, stop halfway there and turn around again, head for the hallway instead. I don’t know what to do with myself, I have no clue at all. What did I do before he came into my life? I’m not sure. It doesn’t matter, either. He did. And he left it again. Left me here, on my own, what the fuck was he thinking? He said he loved me, said he would never harm me. He wrote ‘lovers’ on my arm and promised me he’d never leave.
        ‘Where the fuck are you now?’ I shout, and let my fist collide with the wall. I let out a scream of agony and shake my hand wildly about, tears streaming from my eyes once more. Angel’s on her feet in no time, but I move away from her when she tries to move closer. She’s right, so right. We’re nothing alike, we haven’t been in a while.
        ‘S.’
        She doesn’t give up, but takes another step towards me, stretching out her hand.
        ‘Don’t touch me,’ I demand, backing further away. She opens her mouth, but shuts it again, the stops dead on the spot. Nothing alike, not any more, not even in looks. How can she be so functional? How can she look so whole? She’s not supposed to. She’s not supposed to because we’re one, two halves of one whole, and when I’m broken, she’s broken. It’s always been ike that, it still is, yet she’s not looking the part, not properly. She can’t look like me and loo like that. She just can’t.
        ‘Seraphina.’ There’s a slight tremble in her voice. I pick up on it effortlessly. ‘Just… just tell me what I can do.’
        Her eyes pick up whatever it was that was in her voice, and it comforts me somehow. That and the fact that she’s not moving. I cross my arms in front of my chest and back up against the wall, tears still streaming from my eyes. I’m just about ready to tell her she can’t do anything when I break apart. I lose all control of my breathing and bury my face in my hands as my back glides down the wall, leaving me in a sitting position. She storms over and throws her arms around me and I don’t do jack shit. I just let her hold me as close as she can, and let go of all sense of pride as she strokes my hair. I open my mouth repeatedly to tell her, but I never get a good enough grasp on my breathing for it to work, so I eventually give up. It doesn’t work anymore. That’s all I want her to know. Two days and it smells nothing like him any longer. I’m losing touch with it, he’s slipping away, out of my hands. It was a product, I know that, a stupid fucking product, but it was working, I could swear it was, until it wasn’t and now he’s gone, just gone. He’s nowhere in the flat, nowhere at all. It’s like he never was. All that’s left is my stupid scent, all over the place, corrupting his, killing it.
          I take in her perfume with about as much hatred as I do love – at least she doesn’t smell like me.

I wake up on the couch. My head’s resting on Angel’s thigh, her hand on my hair, and all I can think is that I need to get out. I can’t stay here, I simply can’t.

I step onto the edge and look down. There’s ripples on the water from the falling rain and I’m grateful somehow. Something about it suiting the occasion. Something about it confirming that this is the right thing to do. The gravestone will read ‘they lived happily ever after’. I’ll be with him forever. Forever. Not just his scent, not just his memory, him and forever. I can’t believe I didn’t think of this sooner.