‘She’s the celebrant,’ I call back.
Dad appears in the hallway and shakes hands with the woman, as if she’s someone quite important. I sit and listen to them talking for a while. This woman is going to be the person who keeps the funeral service together, like a priest but without the God bit. She calls herself a celebrant, because she says we will be celebrating the life of Nana Josie. That’s OK for her, because she never really knew my nana. How am I supposed to celebrate?
I don’t see why we need her to do it anyway. I can’t understand why Nana chose this woman. She never liked people who spoke too slowly or too quietly. ‘Controlling behaviour,’ Nana used to call it. Celebrant Lady does both as she sits with Mum and Dad, filling in forms and making notes, planning the schedule for Nana’s funeral.
‘And Mira here, she wants to read a poem, or say something.’ Dad smiles at me, probably trying to make me feel involved.
‘Ah,’ sighs Celebrant Lady, without looking my way. ‘When it comes down to it, it can be very difficult for children to deal with these big emotions. I can always read it out for you,’ she says, half smiling in my direction. ‘What’s the name of your poem?’
‘I don’t know yet,’ I lie. Just because I feel like being as unhelpful as possible towards her. ‘I know the music Nana wanted though,’ I tell Dad.
‘Do you? That’s great. Tell me later,’ whispers Dad, looking sideways at an impatient-looking Celebrant Lady.
‘Well, let me have the title and author of your poem as soon as you can, and a copy, just in case,’ she says, packing away her sensible black notebook.
I can’t believe that this is actually her job. What she wants to do with her life. Plan other people’s funerals.
When she’s gone, Mum and Dad are back on the phone. It’s as if Krish and me and Laila don’t exist any more. Laila’s been plonked in front of the television in a little nest of cushions and Krish is sprawled out on the sofa, still in his pyjamas. He hasn’t moved all day.
I wander up to my room to find something to do. But there it is waiting for me . . . Nana’s easel. Every time I look at it, I can’t help but feel as if it’s calling me over. It’s something about the way it leans.
Today, it’s bending even further to the right than ever. I take out my charcoals. It’s as if I’m walking towards another human being, but I know it’s only an easel, made of wood and spattered with Nana Josie’s paint. I fix the canvas in place; it’s as if I have no choice . . . As I start to draw, I can feel something of Nana inside her easel. It must be all those hours she’s spent standing in front of it. I don’t even have to adjust the height. It fits.
It’s not like I’ve really thought about what I’m going to draw. I just pick up my mirror and put it on a shelf behind the easel, so that I can see myself and draw at the same time. This is my first ever attempt at a self-portrait, and as soon as I start, I realize how difficult it’s going to be. It was much easier to draw Nana than it is to follow every detail of my own face. I work on it for hours, drawing in lines and smudging them out again. It’s not just the shape of the face that makes you look like you – you have to try and catch what’s coming to the surface. Like the day I understood that Nana was trapped in her body. No matter how accurate you are with the lines and proportions, if you can’t catch that, you can’t bring a person to life. Finally a face emerges which has something in it that belongs to me. That’s the best I can do, for now.
I am lying in bed staring at my first attempt at a self-portrait, on Nana’s easel.
Mum knocks on the door. She never used to knock.
‘Everything all right, Mira? You’ve been very quiet today.’
Mum walks over to the easel, looking from me to the canvas.
‘That’s a very sad and sombre you,’ says Mum, wrapping her arms around me.
I nod.
For a while we just lie there together, looking at the girl in the picture, who is me.
‘She looks like I imagine you’ll look, when you’re older . . . maybe sixteen, but this terrible sadness will pass,’ says Mum, moving the mirror back to the dressing table.
‘I just looked in the mirror, and tried to draw what I saw,’ I tell Mum.
Now that I’ve finished, the easel’s straightened up. It’s not calling me over any more.
When I turn the light off, there is nothing sitting in the corner of the room watching me. It’s just Nana’s easel with my first attempt at a self-portrait sitting on it. It’s as if it’s peaceful, now that I’ve done what it wanted. Can there be such a thing as a peaceful easel? Pat Print would say there could.
I wake with an acid taste in my mouth and a dull ache in my belly . . . I know what’s coming and I actually want it to come right now. That way, by the time it’s Nana’s funeral, it will all be over. Today I feel like lying in bed, doing nothing, seeing no one.
‘I’ve got a job for you today,’ says Mum, opening a box full of programmes for Nana’s funeral. There are hundreds of them.
‘Are there that many people coming?’
‘It’s hard to know, Mira, but Josie wanted glitter, so glitter she must have.’
For the cover of the programme Nana chose a photo of her by the sea in Suffolk. She’s throwing a piece of wood into the waves for Claude, her Newfoundland. She wanted us – me, Krish and Laila – to sprinkle glitter on the waves in the photo. So that’s what we try to do, but it’s impossible with Laila ‘helping’, because she either keeps trying to eat the glitter or just splodges it on to the cards. Mum says it doesn’t matter, but I think it does. Nana would have liked the idea of Laila joining in, but not if she made a mess of the cards. After ruining about five of them, Mum finally realizes that it’s just not going to work, so she takes her off to the swings.
Krish sits in silence, carefully sprinkling just the right amount of glitter on to each wave. I have mixed the glitter to be the colour of the Suffolk sea on a warm summer’s evening . . . silvery-blue.
You know that there’s something wrong when Krish is this still and quiet.
‘I’ve done twenty – how about you, Krish?’
That should wind him up enough to get a reaction. But Krish just counts his pile, without looking up.
‘Fifteen,’ he shrugs, as if he doesn’t care.
‘Are you all right?’
He doesn’t answer, but just carries on gluing and glittering.
Glitter is sprinkled all over this house, but there is nothing here to celebrate.
Aunty Abi, Aunty Mel and Piper arrive to take Krish off to buy a suit. His first ever suit. I see that Mum’s already decided that I’m going to wear what Nana bought me for my birthday, because she’s washed and ironed it and hung it on the back of my bedroom door. I wonder if she saw the blood. I suppose I have to wear it now because if she didn’t see it there’s no excuse not to wear it.
When Piper sees Krish and me, he barks and jumps all over us, licking our faces like he’s really missed us.
‘Can we take him for a walk?’ Krish pleads, jumping up and down in excitement. It’s the first time I’ve seen him anything like his usual lively self since Nana died.
‘After we’ve got your suit,’ says Abi.
‘Boring!’ sighs Krish.
Krish hardly ever wears anything except sports clothes or, if he’s being really smart, jeans. So going shopping for a suit is not exactly his idea of heaven. I would love to go out and choose something to wear, something I really like, but I wouldn’t go today, not to try things on . . . just in case. One thing that does make Krish happy is the fact that Aunty Mel has taken the roof off her beaten-up old sports car. As they drive off, Krish waves like the queen, probably to make me jealous. Irritating though he is, I’m actually pleased he’s more his old self again.
I lie on my bed for most of the day, flicking through Nana’s giant art books . . . her art books and her collection of catalogues from all the exhibitions she ever went to in her life . . . she left them all to me.
&
nbsp; The phone rings. Mum’s voice is shrieking at the same unbearable pitch as the smoke alarm. Suddenly the atmosphere in the house is charged. To make matters worse, Laila sets up her wailing. I jump off my bed and listen from the landing.
‘What do you mean, run off? How long ago?’ Mum fires question after question down the phone. I run downstairs to see that Mum’s face has turned Payne’s Grey. Dad’s rocking Laila, too fast, backwards and forwards, straining to hear what’s going on over Laila’s wailing. Mum’s holding her hand over her mouth, trying to calm herself down. She looks as if she can’t believe what she’s hearing.
‘OK! Sam and Mira will come over to look with you. If we don’t find him in an hour, we’ll call the police.’
Dad hands Laila to Mum.
‘Abi’s on her mobile,’ says Mum. ‘They’re looking over the Heath for him.’
‘Get your shoes on, Mira,’ orders Dad.
Suddenly we are speeding towards the Heath. This is the second time in a month I’ve been in a car with my dad in a total panic. Pat Print was right: a lot can happen in a month. We’re taking the same route that we always took to the hospice and that’s what gives me the idea.
‘Maybe he’s gone to the hospice.’
‘Why would he do that, Mira?’
‘I don’t know. He’s been very quiet since Nana died.’
‘It’s worth a try, I suppose,’ Dad says, picking up his mobile to call them, but right at that moment his phone rings.
‘Uma . . . where? Mira thought he might . . . Ran all that way . . . Have you called Abi? Good. I’ll pick him up.’
Dad smiles his ‘you know best’ smile at me and we drive, a bit less dangerously than before, to the hospice. When we arrive in reception, Headscarf Lady gives Dad and me a huge hug . . . It feels like we’re coming home.
‘He’s upstairs, with Jo. He ran all the way from the other side of the Heath. Can you believe it?’ Headscarf Lady says, buzzing us up.
I can. That’s no further than one of his competition runs.
When we get to the Family Room, Krish is playing table football with Jo. He looks worried when he sees Dad, as if he’s going to get told off, but Dad just scoops him up and holds him in his arms, as if he’s Laila’s size. It would look ridiculous now, if Dad tried to carry me like that.
‘We would have brought you, if you’d asked us, Krish.’
‘I wanted to see Jo,’ sobs Krish.
‘That’s all right, mate,’ says Jo, patting Krish on the back. ‘We just had a few things we needed to sort out.’
Dad sits on one side of Krish and Jo on the other, each with an arm around him. He looks tiny sandwiched between them, almost disappearing into the folds of the sofa. As Dad and Jo talk, Krish’s eyes grow heavy and he falls fast asleep. I don’t think he’s slept since the day he gave Nana his painting.
‘Looks like he’s out for the count,’ smiles Jo.
Dad shakes Jo’s hand, pats him on the back, hoists Krish up over his shoulder and carries him along the corridor, down in the lift and out past Headscarf Lady.
‘Bless him!’ she says. ‘He must have tired himself out with all that running.’
Dad settles Krish into the back seat and he stirs for a moment, opens his eyes and nestles his head into the curve of my shoulder. Normally, this would really irritate me, but not today
Just as we’re about to set off, Dad adjusts the rear-view mirror and, as he does, he catches sight of his own face and stares at himself, smoothing his fingers over the map of lines fanning from the corners of his eyes.
‘I’ve aged more this month than any other time in my life. There are whole years where I’ve aged less than this, Mira,’ sighs Dad.
Me too, I think to myself.
Krish has been bugging me all day. I want to tell him to get out of my room, but after yesterday I can’t risk upsetting him.
‘Why did you run off like that anyway?’ I ask him.
‘I didn’t think about it. I just ran.’ Krish shrugs.
‘What did you want to talk to Jo about?’
Will you two get into bed,’ Dad yells up the stairs. ‘It’s a big day tomorrow.’
When Krish finally leaves me in peace, I turn the light off, close my eyes and try to think of nothing. I am beginning to drift off when I hear the door open and somebody creeping on tiptoe around my room. In the half-light from the hallway I see Krish heading over to the easel. I don’t move an inch, but I clearly see him place Nana’s charm on the little ridge where the canvas sits.
I whisper his name. ‘Krish.’ He jumps and stumbles, crumpling himself and the easel into a great clattering mess on the floor. It’s strange that Krish is such a good runner, because he often falls over; like Laila’s spinning top, he’s only got his balance when he’s moving fast.
‘Why did you take it?’ I whisper.
‘She never actually gave me something, like she gave things to you,’ I hear Krish’s tiny hurt voice cutting through the darkness.
The light switch snaps on and I shield my eyes from the blinding brightness.
‘What on earth is going on in here?’ shouts Dad, staring at Krish as he tries to untangle himself from the easel.
‘Nothing.’
I jump in quickly, before Krish has a chance to answer. ‘He just fell.’
‘Please go to bed,’ Dad pleads, picking up my portrait and having a good look at it.
‘Is this you?’
I nod.
‘It’s good . . . makes you look older than you are though,’ says Dad as he bends down to pick up the easel. Then he drops down on to his knees and starts rummaging around on the floor.
‘You’ll never guess what I’ve found . . .’ Dad stands up triumphantly and hands me Nana Josie’s charm. ‘Shall I take it and fix it on to your bracelet so you can wear it tomorrow? It must have been there all the time,’ he says as I hand him the bracelet to fix the charm on to.
‘It must have been,’ I say, looking over to Krish, who’s refusing to meet my eye.
Dad kisses me and Krish goodnight, and practically skips down the stairs.
The sound of waves fills every sense in my body, as if the sea is flowing in and out of me. I hear a little girl humming . . . in and out flow the waves in even patterns . . .a sweet lullaby . . . in and out softly sighing shhhhhhhh. The girl floats towards me. She’s holding her fingers to her lips. Shhhhhhh sound the waves in and out, somewhere inside me, but still she floats on, the waves appearing and disappearing from my sight, a little girl of about four years old.
‘Who are you?’ I call to her, but I know who she is. She has Jidé’s face, his eyes, his expression.
‘Shhhhhh,’ answer the waves. She holds her finger to her lips and hums.
‘What’s your name?’ I whisper.
‘Shhhhhhhh,’echoes the sea.
The girl’s lips are sealed.
Then I catch sight of it under the waves, Jidé’s bright orange cloth shining through the grey water, floating towards me. I follow it through the wave, grabbing at it, until it’s safely in my hands. Shhhhhh, sighs the sea. Then the little girl takes her finger from her mouth, smiles at me and sings.
The first thing I do when I wake up is look for Jidé’s piece of orange cloth. It was the kind of dream that follows you from night into day. Of course when the sleep wears off, I realize it’s not real . . . but I discover something that is.
It had to be today of all days. I take the charcoal and draw a pair of moon-shaped earrings on my self-portrait. Something good has got to come out of having periods.
At breakfast Dad takes hold of my hand and attaches the charm bracelet to my wrist. He struggles with the catch for a few moments before he finally closes the clasp. I look up at him and see that his eyes are full of tears.
‘Your nana was very proud of you, Mira.’
Krish keeps glancing my way with a worried look on his face. He thinks I’m going to tell. I shake my head to reassure him. I won’t tell because I think I
understand how he felt.
‘Oh, for God’s sake,’ shouts Dad, dusting off his suit, ‘there’s glitter everywhere.’
I laugh. By the time we’ve had breakfast we’re all covered in glitter . . . it feels like Nana’s joke. She wrote a note in the hospice to say that nobody is allowed to wear black for her funeral so I suppose it is right that I’m wearing my butterfly skirt, all pinks and greens and sequins . . . Nana’s birthday present to me. I’m beginning to think of this as my period skirt. After today, I will never wear it again.
Krish is wearing his new blue linen suit with an Indian collar, the one Aunty Abi and Aunty Mel bought him, before he ran away. If my brother wears blue, his eyes sparkle. He keeps fiddling with his tie, like it’s strangling him. I think he feels about as comfortable in his suit as I do in my skirt.
Me and Krish have been given ‘roles’ for the funeral. I’m going to read a poem from a book Nana gave me, and Krish is handing out our glittery programmes with a biography of Nana’s life in it.
Nana’s body is being cremated at Golders Hill Crematorium. Dad says it’s the same place where Grandad Kit was cremated. Grandad Bimal says he wouldn’t mind ending up there too, when his time comes, because he would like to follow in the footsteps of the maharajas whose names line the walls.
‘If it’s good enough for them, it will be good enough for me!’
Getting cremated means your body gets burned and what’s left is just ashes, but you get the ashes back. I remember Nana laughing when she told us that she wanted her ashes sprinkled in her garden in Suffolk because they would ‘improve the soil’. I think the ashes are just for the living people because it’s so hard to think that there is nothing left of the actual person’s body, and so people just want something to hold on to . . . and ashes are better than nothing.
We are all standing outside the chapel. Quite a lot of people I have never seen before are meeting each other and hugging.
Dad can’t speak to anyone. He’s trying to ‘hold it together’. He keeps looking at his watch . . . waiting for the funeral car to arrive.
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