“Was he cremated?”
“Why does it matter?”
“I dunno. Just interested. Because you said you’d been to one cremation, and I was wondering, you know … ”
“I’d give Laura a couple of days before you start pumping her with questions like this. It’s not the kind of life experience that lends itself to idle chatter.”
“That’s your way of telling me to shut up, right?”
“Right.”
Fair enough.
The crematorium is in the middle of nowhere, and we leave the car in a huge, almost empty car park and walk over to the buildings, which are new and horrible, too bright, not serious enough. You can’t imagine that they’re going to burn people in here; you can imagine, however, some iffy happy-clappy new religious group meeting for a sing-song once a week. I wouldn’t have my old man buried here. I reckon I’d need some help from the atmosphere to get a really good head of grief going, and I wouldn’t get it from all this exposed brickwork and stripped pine.
It’s a three-chapel multiplex. There is even a sign on the wall telling you what’s on in each, and at what time:
chapel 1. 11:30 mr E barker
chapel 2. 12:00 mr K LYdOn
chapel 3. 12:00 —
Good news in Chapel 3, at least. Cremation canceled. Reports of death exaggerated, ha ha. We sit down in the reception area and wait while the place starts to fill up. Liz nods to a couple of people, but I don’t know them; I try to think of men’s names beginning with ‘E.’ I’m hoping that an old person is getting the treatment in Chapel 1, because if and when we see the mourners come out, I don’t want them to be too distressed. Eric. Ernie. Ebenezer. Ethelred. Ezra. We’re all right. We’re laughing. Well, not laughing, exactly, but whoever it is is at least four hundred years old, and no one will be grieving too much in those circumstances, will they? Ewan. Edmund. Edward. Bollocks. Could be any age.
No one’s crying in the reception area yet, but there are a few people on the edge, and you can see they’re going to go over it before the morning is over. They are all middle-aged, and they know the ropes. They talk quietly, shake hands, give wan smiles, kiss, sometimes; and then, for no reason I can see, and I feel hopelessly out of my depth, lost, ignorant, they stand, and troop through the door marked chapel 2.
It’s dark in there, at least, so it’s easier to get into the mood. The coffin is up at the front, slightly raised off the floor, but I can’t work out what it’s resting on; Laura, Jo, and Janet Lydon are in the first row, standing very close, with a couple of men I don’t know beside them. We sing a hymn, pray, there’s a brief and unsatisfactory address from the vicar, some stuff from his book, and another hymn, and then there’s this sudden, heart-stopping clanking of machinery and the coffin disappears slowly through the floor. And as it does so, there’s a howl from in front of us, a terrible, terrible noise that I don’t want to hear: I can only just tell that it’s Laura’s voice, but I know that it is, and at that moment I want to go to her and offer to become a different person, to remove all trace of what is me, as long as she will let me look after her and try to make her feel better.
When we get out into the light, people crowd around Laura and Jo and Janet, and hug them; I want to do the same, but I don’t see how I can. But Laura sees Liz and me hovering on the fringe of the group, and comes to us, and thanks us for coming, and holds us both for a long time, and when she lets go of me I feel that I don’t need to offer to become a different person: it has happened already.
Twenty-six
It’s easier in the house. You can feel that the worst is over, and there’s a tired calm in the room, like the tired calm you get in your stomach when you’ve been sick. You even hear people talking about other stuff, although it’s all big stuff—work, children, life. Nobody’s talking about their Volvo’s fuel consumption, or the names they’d choose for dogs. Liz and I get ourselves a drink and stand with our backs against a bookcase, right in the far corner away from the door, and we talk occasionally, but mostly we watch people.
It feels good to be in this room, even though the reasons for being here aren’t so good. The Lydons have a large Victorian house, and it’s old and tatty and full of things—furniture, paintings, ornaments, plants—which don’t go together but which have obviously been chosen with care and taste. The room we’re in has a huge, weird family portrait on the wall above the fireplace, done when the girls were about ten and eight. They are wearing what look like bridesmaids’ dresses, standing self-consciously beside Ken; there’s a dog, Allegro, Allie, who died before I came along, in front of them and partially obscuring them. He has his paws up on Ken’s midriff, and Ken is ruffling the dog’s fur and smiling. Janet is standing a little behind and apart from the other three, watching her husband. The whole family are much thinner (and splotchier, but that’s the painting for you) than they are in real life. It’s modern art, and bright and fun, and obviously done by someone who knew what they were about (Laura told me that the woman who did it has had exhibitions and all sorts), but it has to take its chances with a stuffed otter, which is on the mantelpiece underneath, and the sort of dark old furniture that I hate. Oh, and there’s a hammock in one corner, loaded down with cushions, and a huge bank of new black hi-fi stuff in another corner, Ken’s most treasured possession, despite the paintings and the antiques. It’s all a mess, but you’d have to love the family that lived here, because you’d just know that they were interesting and kind and gentle. I realize now that I enjoyed being a part of this family, and though I used to moan about coming here for weekends or Sunday afternoons, I was never bored once. Jo comes up to us after a few minutes, and kisses both of us, and thanks us for coming.
“How are you?” Liz asks, but it’s the ‘How are you’ that has an emphasis on the ‘are,’ which makes the question sound meaningful and sympathetic. Jo shrugs.
“I’m all right. I suppose. And Mum’s not too bad, but Laura … I dunno.”
“She’s had a pretty rough few weeks already, without this,” says Liz, and I feel a little surge of something like pride: That was me. I made her feel like that. Me and a couple of others, anyway, including Laura herself, but never mind. I’d forgotten that I could make her feel anything and, anyway, it’s odd to be reminded of your emotional power in the middle of a funeral which, in my limited experience, is when you lose sense of it altogether.
“She’ll be OK,” says Liz decisively. “But it’s hard, when you’re putting all your effort into one bit of your life, to suddenly find that it’s the wrong bit.” She glances at me, suddenly embarrassed, or guilty, or something.
“Don’t mind me,” I tell them. “Really. No problem. Just pretend you’re talking about somebody else.” I meant it kindly, honest I did. I was simply trying to say that if they wanted to talk about Laura’s love life, any aspect of it, then I wouldn’t mind, not today, of all days.
Jo smiles, but Liz gives me a look. “We are talking about somebody else. Laura. Laura and Ray, really.”
“That’s not fair, Liz.”
“Oh?” She raises an eyebrow, as if I’m being insubordinate.
“And don’t fucking say ‘Oh’ like that.” A couple of people look round when I use the ‘f’-word, and Jo puts her hand on my arm. I shake it off. Suddenly, I’m raging and I don’t know how to calm down. It seems like I’ve spent the whole of the last few weeks with someone’s hand on my arm: I can’t speak to Laura because she lives with somebody else and she calls from phone boxes and she pretends she doesn’t, and I can’t speak to Liz because she knows about the money and the abortion and me seeing someone else, and I can’t speak to Barry and Dick because they’re Barry and Dick, and I can’t speak to my friends because I don’t speak to my friends, and I can’t speak now because Laura’s father has died, and I just have to take it because otherwise I’m a bad guy, with the emphasis on guy, self-centered, blind, and stupid. Well, I’m fucking not, not all the time, anyway, and I know this isn’t the right place to say so—I’m not that daft—but when am I allowed to?