In Her Wake Read online

  He needs help, but I don’t move. I sit there like a cold, mute statue and I loathe myself for it. It’s David who places a hand on Henry’s back and guides him to a chair. My father collapses into it as if he’s run a marathon, shattered by trying to make three cups of tea. I turn my head away from him; I don’t want to think about how difficult his life is going to be.

  A few hours later, as David sits in the armchair in the living room and works his way through The Times crossword, I force myself to talk to my father. I find him sitting at the leather-topped desk in his study, the room where he’s spent most of his time since retiring from general practice, reading medical journals and biographies from the Great War, and preparing my lessons. I try not to look at the portrait of my mother that hangs on the wall behind him. It bears little resemblance to her – far too regal, far too thin – and the look on her face, in her eyes, has always scared me.

  ‘How are you doing?’ he asks, as I close the door behind me.

  ‘I miss her,’ I say, as I sit down in the sagging armchair in the corner of the room. ‘It feels peculiar without her, doesn’t it? Like the house has no rudder. Does that sound strange?’

  ‘No, not strange at all.’ He leans back and rubs his face, sighing heavily. ‘I should ask you, really,’ he says. ‘If you want to see her.’

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘Her body. Do you want to – do you need to – see her one last time before the funeral? The undertaker said you could visit in the morning.’

  A shot of horror passes through me as I imagine her lying dead and grey in a mortuary drawer next to other dead, grey people.

  ‘No,’ I say, barely concealing my shock. ‘I don’t need to see her.’ I pause. ‘Thank you, though.’

  He nods and a film of tears glazes his eyes. My body tenses; the thought of him crying is almost as dreadful as the thought of seeing my mother’s dead body. We fall into an uncomfortable, stilted silence and, in search of distraction, I let my gaze fall on the bookshelf beside me. On the second shelf are a handful of photograph albums, their spines carefully labelled with gold adhesive letters. I trace my fingers over them and select one that reads Elaine and Henry, Summer 1977.

  I open the album and there she is. The photograph takes my breath. I touch my fingers to her face, then her hair, thick and blonde, the colour of honey. In the picture she wears it piled on top of her head, a few loose curls hanging down to brush against her shoulders. Her hair is so very different to my straggly tangle of mousy strands. I went blonde once. It was when I was twelve, after Henry had insisted I take swimming lessons, telling my mother as firmly as he could that me learning to swim was imperative and that she would have to overcome her fear of large groups. The next day, grumbling and griping, she bundled me into the car and drove to the hairdresser.

  ‘Why aren’t you cutting it, Mama?’ I asked.

  ‘If you’re going to take blasted swimming lessons you’ll be meeting other children. You need a good cut and some colour. Children can be so very mean. I’ve told you that. We want you looking your best.’

  And then in we marched.

  ‘We need highlights put in,’ she said, too abruptly, to the stylist. ‘Chestnut and copper. And you’re to be as quick as possible.’

  ‘It takes as long as it takes, I’m afraid,’ said the hairdresser.

  ‘Just get it done.’

  My mother, who rarely went out of the house, sat nervously tapping her foot with her eyes bolted on the door, unaware of the hairdresser conspiratorially suggesting to me that blonde would be a better choice. She made blonde sound so exotic, so thrilling.

  ‘They have more fun, you know. Apart from that mother of yours. No offence, lovey, but she could do with taking that stick out her arse and getting a bit of fun in her life, couldn’t she? Not blonde enough, maybe.’ The woman laughed and gave me a wink. ‘So? Blonde?’

  I shrugged slightly and nodded. ‘Whatever you think,’ I managed to say, through my crippling shyness.

  I can still remember the pleasure of looking at my new self in the mirror. Reflected back at me wasn’t a timid, quiet girl with mouse-coloured hair, but another girl, a girl with beautiful blonde hair that lifted her features and drew attention to her eyes. I turned to my mother. I expected to see her smile. But she was crying. At first I thought they might be tears of joy, but they weren’t. She cried all the way home, guttural sobs that shook her body and made me worry the car would spin off the road and kill us. My mother never told me what had made her so sad, so even though I couldn’t be sure it was the highlights – they were her idea, after all – I didn’t ever get them again.

  I recall for a moment how her hair used to feel as I twirled my fingers into it while she read to me, wishing aloud that mine was as soft.

  ‘Well, I wish I had eyes as beautiful as yours,’ she would whisper, before kissing the tip of my nose. ‘Pale green, the colour of sea-glass. Just like my grandmother’s. So unfair you got them and I didn’t.’

  Something my mother and I do share, however, is our skin, milk-white and translucent, so translucent you can see the network of blue and purple veins that pump our blood.

  Though not hers anymore, I think and my stomach seizes with a fresh bout of missing.

  I flick through the rest of the album and there, on the last page, is a photograph I can’t remember seeing before. She’s on holiday, sitting on a towel on a beach. The yellows and reds of the heat and sand are exaggerated by the seventies’ camera film. She wears a white bikini, its thick belt with a black plastic hoop buckle rests on her hip. Her hair is held loosely off her face and is flecked with grains of sand. She leans back on her hands, smiling brightly, her freckled nose ever so slightly wrinkled. I carefully lift the photograph from beneath the protective film and take it over to my father.

  ‘When was this picture taken?’ I ask, laying the photo on the desk in front of him. He picks it up and squints and the faintest flash of a smile dances across his face.

  ‘Long before you were born. In Greece.’

  ‘She looks happy.’ I trace my fingertips across her face. ‘I thought she didn’t like to go abroad?’

  He hands the photo back to me without a word.

  ‘I’m sorry you have to be without her,’ I say, in absence of anything more suitable.

  ‘I’ll manage.’

  ‘You’ll need help with the garden. Maybe a gardener could come in once or twice a week? It would break her heart to think of it becoming neglected.’

  ‘The garden will be fine,’ he says. ‘I can look after it perfectly well.’

  I shake my head. ‘It’s not only raking the leaves and mowing the lawn, you know. I mean, you’ve never pruned a rose and there are hundreds of those.’ I wait for him to say something but he doesn’t. ‘She’d hate the roses to suffer,’ I say softly.

  I turn my head to look out of the window. An evening haze has settled in. Night is approaching and soon it will be tomorrow.

  Tomorrow we bury her.

  ‘Bella?’

  I draw the curtains closed and look back at my father. ‘Yes?’

  ‘There’s something I need to say … to tell you. It’s … important…’ His voice is quiet and there’s a gravity about it that feels at odds with his grief. ‘I … well…’

  ‘Yes?’ I say again, as his hesitation fades to silence.

  His face has become wracked with sadness and he shakes his head. ‘No … no, not now … It can wait.’ His words, each syllable, are as heavy as lead, and his head collapses into his hands.

  For a moment or two I simply sit there, waiting for him to regain himself. But he doesn’t. There is no movement.

  ‘Dad?’ I ask softly. ‘Are you OK?’

  He doesn’t respond and I stand for a moment wishing I knew what to say to him, what to do, wishing I felt able to help him.

  ‘Would you like anything for supper?’ The offer sounds thin and insufficient.

  ‘Thank you, but no,’ he says, finally raising h
is head to look at me. ‘I’m not hungry.’

  I’m shocked by the raw pain that hangs in his eyes. I don’t want to be in his study any longer. I need to get out.

  ‘Goodnight then,’ I say.

  He doesn’t respond and I close the door behind me, feeling relief as I do. I stand outside his study for a while and find my mind wandering back to the photograph of my mother, the one on the beach. I should have pushed him harder about that. She hated the idea of going abroad. I’d always wanted to travel, and I’d been desperate to escape the walls of The Old Vicarage, to experience the world beyond. One day, on her birthday, shortly before I was due to leave for university, I’d bought her tickets to France. She’d cooked a special meal for us and after we’d finished our apple crumble and custard, I slid the card containing my gift across the table towards her. The tickets had cost nearly all of the money in my savings account, money I’d been given by Henry instead of presents for birthdays and Christmases over the years, money I’d never had the opportunity to spend.

  ‘Happy birthday,’ I said. My stomach fizzed with adrenaline.

  But when Elaine opened the card I saw her face drain of colour.

  ‘They’re for the Eurostar, Mum. We’re off to France. To Paris.’

  Henry stood to clear the plates without a word.

  ‘I know you’re nervous. I am too. But it’ll be great. We’ll go to the Louvre and visit the ‘Mona Lisa’. We can walk down the Champs-Élysées and have a meal in some fancy restaurant where the waiters wear bow ties.’

  She didn’t speak. The only noise was the sound of Henry scraping food off the plates with a knife.

  ‘I paid for them myself. From my savings. I want to do something together. Just you and me. Before I go to university.’

  Elaine’s eyes grew wide. Her body shook. I watched as her hand began scratching at her arm, her nails digging into her skin, raking over and over and over, so hard that welts and scratches began to appear.

  ‘Mum. Stop it.’ I reached for her hand, trying to still it. ‘You’re hurting yourself.’ But still she scratched. Harder and harder. Blood seeped out of the self-inflicted wounds.

  ‘Mum! Stop it. Please.’

  Elaine looked at me as if she didn’t know who I was. ‘I can’t go,’ she said. Her voice was flat and gravelly, and shivers cut through me. ‘I can’t … go.’

  ‘It’s OK,’ I said. My heart hammered with growing panic. ‘It was a stupid idea. Please don’t do that to your arm. It wasn’t supposed to upset you. I didn’t think. I’m sorry.’

  Elaine rounded on me with an anger I wasn’t expecting.

  ‘Promise me you won’t go. Not ever. You can’t do that to me. Promise me now.’ She grabbed my hand and dug those scratching nails into me. ‘Promise me, Bella!’

  ‘Yes, I promise,’ I said quickly, as her vice-like grip squeezed harder and harder. ‘I promise!’

  Then she pushed away from the table. Her chair clattered backwards onto the floor and she ran from the room. I looked over at Henry, who avoided my eyes as he placed the plate he was holding on to the worktop and followed her.

  And there I was, left alone at the table, with only the relentless ticking of the clock on the wall to break the oppressive silence. I picked up the tickets and tore them into tiny pieces, while the walls of the kitchen inched slowly inwards as if trying to suffocate me.

  TWO

  Henry Campbell – 28th July 1977

  ‘You’re exquisite,’ he said as he kissed her taut brown stomach, his tongue picking up the fine layer of salt left on her skin from their swim.

  She laughed and reached down to run her fingers through his hair, her nails lightly raking his scalp and setting his body on fire, overwhelming him with a sudden need to be inside her.

  ‘Mrs Campbell,’ he whispered, drawing himself upwards, grazing her body with feathery kisses as he went. ‘I must be the luckiest man alive.’

  ‘Yes,’ she said, looping her arms around his neck, trailing her fingertips over his shoulder blades. ‘You most certainly are. You’re the luckiest man who ever lived.’

  They kissed again, this time with more urgency, their skin growing damp with sweat where their bodies met. The heat in the room was intense. The air still and heavy. He’d already paid far more than he could afford for the room, and the hotels with air conditioning were out of his budget. She had assured him the room in the quaint, whitewashed guesthouse perched on the cliff top overlooking the harbour was perfect, but he could see by the way her face fell ever so slightly when they arrived that the room was a little disappointing. She had smiled, of course. Told him not to be so silly. That it didn’t matter. That it was about the two of them being together, and anyway they didn’t need anything more than a bed. But he could tell, and it pained him.

  After they’d made love, they lay tangled in the sheets, her legs, tanned and smooth, entwined with his, her honey-coloured hair soft against his shoulder.

  ‘Do you think there’s a baby inside me right now?’

  Her question took him by surprise. ‘What?’ he said with a laugh.

  She propped herself up, a hand supporting her head, and stared at him intently. ‘I’m serious, Henry. Do you think it’s possible? Do you think there’s a child, our child, growing inside me right now?’

  ‘Gosh, I doubt it, darling. Statistically speaking, it’s highly unlikely.’

  Her face fell and she snatched at the sheet, pulling it across herself as she rolled over, turning her back to him.

  ‘Lainey?’ He reached out to her, but she recoiled from his touch, shimmying herself further away from him, curling an arm over her head as if cowering.

  ‘Hey,’ he said gently, rubbing her shoulder. ‘What’s wrong? What did I say?’

  For a moment she didn’t move and then, very suddenly, she snapped her head round to face him. Her eyes were narrowed and burning. ‘Statistically speaking?’

  ‘Well, you know, it’s … well, you’ve just had a period and, these things … they take time usually.’

  She shook her head with contempt and he watched tears forming in the corner of her eyes. ‘Always the doctor, aren’t you? I wasn’t asking for medical facts, I was dreaming, enjoying the moment, and you ruined it. All you needed to do was dream with me, but you ruined it.’

  He hesitated, unsure how she had gone from being consumed with love to being this upset so quickly and without apparent reason. He hadn’t seen this before. In fact, this was the first time he’d seen her lose her temper. He watched her face, wondering if she might soon smile and laugh and tell him not to look so serious, that she was playing with him, but instead he saw tears rolling down the sides of her face.

  ‘Hey, shush, shush, my angel,’ he soothed. ‘I’m sorry. I misread your question.’ He moved over to her tentatively, wiped the tears from her cheeks with the tips of his fingers. When she didn’t move away, he pulled her into him, cradling her head and stroking her hair. ‘I’m sorry, Lainey. You’re right. I was thinking like a doctor, and I can see now you didn’t want that. I’m a fool sometimes. And you know what? I can’t think of anything more fantastic than the idea of a baby, our baby, inside you right now. What a honeymoon that would be. To arrive as two and go home as three.’

  He felt her body relax and she hooked her arm over his chest. ‘Oh, yes,’ she whispered sweetly. ‘That would be wonderful. To arrive as two and go home as three.’

  His body flooded with relief and he kissed her forehead.

  ‘It’s all I’ve ever wanted,’ she said then, her fingernail tracing a figure eight on his skin. ‘A baby to care for. It’s what I need, and until I have one, until I’m holding my very own child against my breast, I can never be truly happy.’ She kissed his neck. ‘You understand that, don’t you, my love?’

  ‘Of course,’ he said softly. But he didn’t and as he held her closely he tried to ignore the unease that pooled in the pit of his stomach.

  THREE

  The following day I am woken b
efore eight by shafts of sunshine streaming in through the window and across the bed. For a moment or two I don’t remember it’s the day of her funeral, I don’t even remember she’s dead, but then the realisation hits and in an instant I’m reimmersed in cloying grief.

  David is already up, his side of the bed barely rumpled, just a dent in the pillow where his head has been. He never sleeps past six. It’s something I’ve had to get used to. I don’t like it. Not because I care when he gets up, but because it – no, he – makes me feel lazy. He makes no effort to hide his disapproval whenever I sleep late, and by late I mean anything after seven-thirty. Well, you’ve missed the best of the day, he’ll say, as he shakes his newspaper with a reproachful tut. My mother was the same. She liked me up bright and early, breakfast eaten, teeth brushed, our first lesson under way by half-past seven. I sometimes wonder what it must be like to lounge around in bed all day, mooching and daydreaming to my heart’s content. Even while I was at university, I never did it. Too conditioned, perhaps, to try it. But one day, I will. One day I’ll lock the door to keep him out and lie there doing absolutely nothing until it’s time to go to sleep again.

  I climb out of bed and walk over to the window, tying the belt of my dressing gown as I go. Dread gathers in the pit of my stomach as I look out on the day. It’s beautiful. I can hear the birds singing, hidden from view in their treetop shelters. The sky is a deep cobalt blue with not a wisp of cloud in sight, and I can already feel the heat of the sun forcing its way through the single-glazed panes. The weather doesn’t make sense. It should be raining. Rain would be better, rain and dark skies, a miserable down-in-the-dumps day. My mother would have liked that. She adored the rain. Rain rinses the world of its sins, Bella. It wipes the slate clean. I look down towards the lawn and I can see her, clippers in one hand, cut roses in the other, face turned up to the sky, eyes closed as raindrops wash over her skin.

  The sun shines beats down on my back as we walk slowly and silently into the church. I note the painfully sparse congregation as I take my seat and my stomach pitches. What was I was expecting? I have no idea. Certainly that there might be a few relatives present. My parents never told me why they’d become estranged from their families, but I’d hoped, naïvely perhaps, that her death might be enough to heal the rifts, if only for one day. I’d got used to not having grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins a long time ago, but it breaks my heart to look around the church and see these duty-bound acquaintances scattered in pitiful ones and twos checking watches, looking bored. My mother didn’t believe in friends. The three of us, she would always say, is all we need. But looking around the church I know now she was wrong.