Then she wraps her arms, all the way around, and I can feel all her tears soaking into my chest, I want to keep them right there, as I cry into her hair. She never even said, I fucking told you so. Sabine.
Finn
Joe said that the warden wouldn’t let Da come to visit. He had asked, pleaded, but he wouldn’t budge. That Guard was still in a coma see, and it didn’t look like he was going to make it, just like me.
I wanted to visit him instead. I had been, twice already with Ma, but Dr Kennedy really didn’t think that was such a good idea. The nosebleeds were getting worse, heavier, and my breathing still wasn’t right, and I got tired, all the feckin’ time, even from just walking to the bathroom. Nurse Sarah said I could use a bedpan, some horrible grey cardboard hat yoke, and I didn’t even think it would hold all your stuff, that it would just dissolve right on through, leaving even more of a mess. No way was I using it anyway. There was a wheelchair beside the bed, to make that journey easier, from my bed to the bathroom, but I’d ask Joe for his arm instead, just to lean on, to the bathroom door, every time, even if it made my breath all jumpy, or my head all sweaty, I was not using no cardboard bowl or a wheelchair. I didn’t think I really wanted Da to see me like this anyway. He couldn’t handle seeing me with no hair, let alone looking at the sight of me now. I didn’t know what that would do to him.
I was allowed to write a letter, one that could explain it all. Ma said she’d give it to him on the next visit, but what do you say to your Da, when you know you are never going to see him again?
‘Just tell him you love him, Finney, that’s all you need,’ Ma said, barely keeping it together, and I wrapped my arms around her tight, taking in the whole of her, my Ma.
Later, when it was just me, I opened up the big black hardbound sketchpad that Nurse Sarah got me. ‘A place to write all your favourite things,’ she said, ‘it helps,’ she said, ‘promise.’ I took up my black pen and began, and it flowed, all right out of me, full of ice creams, and sandcastles, and Joe, and Ma, and I let it just keep on flowing.
‘What ya doing, bud.’ Joe came in to the side of me, coffee cup in his hand; I edged it close to him, and he laughed, really, really laughed, and gave me a big hug.
‘That’s fucking amazing so that is,’ he said. ‘A fucking legend, that’s what you are, Finn,’ he said, slapping me on the back like Da would do.
‘Will you illustrate it?’ I asked.
‘Of course I will,’ he said, taking my hand. ‘I’d fucking love to,’ he said, squeezing my hand in his.
‘I was thinking, maybe like a comic, see I’ve boxed it all out here, at the back, but we could lay it out properly, all neat like, here at the front.’ I looked to him, to see what he thought. I needed him to think that it was OK, I needed to be able to do this. Have something to show, have something for Ma, and Da when I was gone, a bit of me, and Joe, right here in this book.
‘I think it’s the best idea I’ve ever heard,’ Joe said, and I knew that he meant it. Joe always meant everything that he said. Always.
‘Right, we’ll do one per page, I think, that way I can get us all in, get all the detail like.’ He started to sketch out his ideas. ‘I’ll do a rough draft first, see if you like it, then you can change it if you want, it can be our little project.’
He started to busy himself, his hand etching out the outlines, of all my favourite things. I leaned my head back. I felt calm for the first time since I knew, for the first time since I learned that this was all going to stop for me. I closed my eyes and listened to the scratch of Joe’s pen, just as if we were at home, me listening from my top bunk as he sketched into the night.
Joe
I watched as you took your last breath, held your hand as it turned cold, watched as death crawled into you, suffocating you, to never let you go.
The funeral was like Granda’s. A fucking old man’s funeral. With a teddy on the coffin that you hadn’t seen in years and a jersey of a team you’d long since abandoned. There was none of you there.
Dr Flynn had to give Ma an injection. It blocked her feelings from reaching the surface for those few hours. She stared blankly at the priest and clenched on to me so tightly her fingerprints bruised my arm. I don’t know what she remembers, I haven’t asked.
They let Da come, but he wasn’t allowed to sit with us. He had to sit down the back, chained and wedged between two Guards with batons and stay the fuck away muscles. They wouldn’t let him talk to us after, either. They just shuffled him back into their van as he screamed and wailed and cursed. They wouldn’t even let him touch the coffin. How was he supposed to say goodbye?
I wish I’d asked you what you wanted.
I wish we’d played songs you could dance to.
I wish we’d brought balloons, and colour and fun.
If we’d had you cremated, I’d still have part of you here. I could have done something cool with your ashes. Like skydived, or brought you on Space Mountain, or sprinkled them over Principal Kelly’s car in the school car park. You would have laughed your head off at that.
Why the fuck did I let you have an old man’s funeral?
Finn
Joe had a playlist made, of all our favourites, and played them through his phone, put on shuffle, so we didn’t know which one was coming up next, wrapped up like a surprise. Dr Kennedy must have known what Joe was doing, because he brought in his Bluetooth speaker, and didn’t care when we turned it up loud and filled the whole place with our booming beats.
I wished that I could get up and dance with Ma, but I was so, so tired and weak. I got Joe to prop me right up with some pillows, extras and all brought in from the nurses’ station, and the back of the bed up as high as it would go, so at least it looked like I was sat up.
The smell of chips was still in the air; I had mine with extra vinegar, and a battered sausage dipped in curry sauce, and Joe ran across the road after, to get us all big ice-cream cones, with extra sauce and sprinkles. Not the same as Mr Whippy, but not too bad either. I joked with Joe after, that it was just like Ma’s favourite film, The Green Mile, me eating my last meal and all that, but I don’t think he got it, well, he didn’t laugh anyway, and he just clenched his fists and stared straight ahead, not saying even anything at all.
The priest was called in. To read my Last Rites, last right to what, I wanted to know. But the priest was so nice and kind and gentle and it made Ma feel better, I could see some of her pain being lifted away with the words that the priest said to her and to me. But it didn’t do anything for Joe, that I knew, because he kept his back to us, and his face was harder than ever, and he looked just so much like Da.
Da was allowed to ring after, and Ma and Joe left, and the nurses made sure it was just me and him, put a ‘Do Not Disturb’ sign right on the door, to make sure that we were not interrupted. We talked about memories of us, and us all, of funfairs and parties and Christmas and the flats, not once talking about what was going to happen to me.
‘I wish I could be there, son,’ he said. I could hear his voice crack and he coughed to shake it all away.
‘But you are here, Da,’ I said, and I hugged my Transformer closer to me, and the cracks were getting louder and his voice was getting harder to hear, but then I heard them call ‘Time’s up,’ on the other end of the phone, and the last words from my Da ever to me.
‘You were always the very best of us all.’
Joe
I had it wrapped. Ready for your birthday, for when you came home. Now, a year on, I take it out from its hiding place, from behind the pots and pans in the corner press, dismantling the woven seal of protective cobwebs as I do. One of its foiled corners jabs at the inside of my thumb, reminding me to beware, reminding me that this still holds the power to hurt. I make my way to our bedroom, your parcel held tight to my chest, trying to feel the essence of you, straight through the layers of dust-shiny packaging. Up onto the top bunk, still exactly as you left it, Ma too terrified to box you up yet, to close anothe
r lid and leave you in darkness.
I take the T-shirt you slept in from underneath your pillow, all ordinary, grey, balled at the armpits from too much washing; not one thing about it represents anything about you at all. I hold it up tight to my face and inhale, trying to fill myself with the scent of you, but it’s long gone – all I smell is the Lynx spray of me, and Ma’s burnt toast from this morning’s breakfast, and the memory of your scent is tainted anyway, forever replaced with clean, and bleach, and antiseptic, that sticks right at the back of my throat.
I’ve been sleeping up here more recently. Trying to keep myself connected to you, what you woke up to every morning. I try to feel you through touching absolutely everything you’d pinned to the wall and the celling. And it works. Sometimes.
I can hear Sabine chatting to Ma before I see her. In hushed tones, trying not to reach me.
‘Joe,’ she says opening the door, in a question. She looks all uncomfortable, half in, half out of the room, shielding her body with the door jamb, not wanting to encroach on me, or my space, if I didn’t want it.
‘It’s all right,’ I call, and I move myself over, to make room for her. She’s up in an instant, connecting herself to me, arm to arm, hip to hip, her hand reaching for mine.
‘He should be here,’ I say, turning my head to look at her, and she coils her fingers tighter around mine. ‘He should be brushing us off to go out with his mates, smoke his first fag, get his first shift, or whatever the fuck he wanted.’ I release it all, in one long breath, and Sabine just pulses my hand tighter, letting me get it all out.
Ma had a cake and all. That chocolate caterpillar log that you used to love from Tesco. Put in thirteen candles, I watched as she blew them out, closed her eyes to make a wish, a wish that I knew would never materialise. I try to imagine what you’d be like. Would you even want a caterpillar cake any more? Would you act too cool for school in front of your friends? Would you stay out too late, me sent after to drag you back home? The trying to picture all this is too much. I’m finding it too hard to remember you as you were; it’s enough as it is, I don’t need the added weight of this too.
‘He should be fucking here,’ I say again, and I take my hand from hers and wrap it back around his present. Squeezing it tighter, crushing my ribs, feeling the weight of him, of it all, pressed tight on me. I can feel Sabine releasing me, unwinding my arms, and my hands, and placing her head on my chest, beside your present, breathing with me in and out, whispering into me, into my heart, words of calm, words of still, and I can smell the fresh vanilla of her hair, and I release.
‘Open it,’ she says, positioning herself beside me again, nudging her elbow gently into my side, but I’m not sure that I want to.
‘Open it,’ she says again, more forcefully this time. I pull myself up, she leans into me, and I begin to tear at the paper, until the black hardbound sketchbook is there looking right at me. Daring me to open it up. My hand hovers for a while, feeling that magnetic pull of you, trying to ignore it. But your force as always is too strong, and I open that very first page.
*
Ma is there, trying to carry on as normal, to act as if today is the same as any other day. Sure who would remember significant dates, significant memories, who still holds compassion and kind words and thoughtfulness a year later. She wipes down the counter, with a methodical, rhythmic action of her hands. She catches me and smiles a little, at least knowing that I’ll acknowledge or understand her pain.
‘Ma,’ I say, placing the sketchbook on the counter, drying it first with the back of my sleeve. She wipes her own hands on the calves of her trousers and pulls it closer to her.
‘What’s this,’ she asks, taking quick glances my way, but afraid to take her eyes off the book, his book, at the same time.
‘Open it,’ I say, me and Sabine shooting excited glances, waiting for her to catch sight of you again, but she is hesitating, not liking the unknown of it, not liking the surprise of it. Not liking surprises any more, at all.
‘Go on,’ I say again, nudging it even closer to her. She pulls back the front cover and immediately lets a cry out, pulling her two hands up to her face, then touching you gently, not quite believing it. You are looking straight at us. I used colour for this one; black ink would never ever do you justice, the colour of you always too bright, too hard to capture.
‘Joe,’ she says, but keeping her eyes on you, running her finger over every shaded line of your face, your hair, your eyes. ‘Joe, he’s here,’ she cries, drinking in every ounce of you. We sit opposite her in silence, watching her turn page after page, getting to discover you all over again.
‘We’re doing it, Ma,’ I point down to the book, ‘all of it, it’s his bucket list,’ I say, my voice cracking, ‘me and Sabine,’ I take her hand in mine, ‘and we want you to do it too.’ She runs straight around the counter and hugs us both to her so tight. The book bent back on the last page, on her, in all her grief. Hair straggled by her face, fag held loosely by her side, and the deep-edged sadness of her face and the gouged-out hurt of her eyes, as if someone else is carelessly wearing her skin. I’d forgotten I’d even drawn it, captured just a week before you died. Raw and powerful and true, with the angry bold lines of my charcoal. A thought bubble hovers over her, showing how it used to be. Of Ma holding you close, tussling your hair, laughing, joking, haunting us. Your words are there underneath:
Ma. Don’t ever forget.
I love you.
*
‘Pat, I’m off,’ Ma shouts over the counter, into the back room.
‘What? Annie, what the fuck,’ Pat says, running out, leaving the blare of Match of the Day filtering through.
‘You’ll just have to take over,’ she says, throwing the stale, stinking dishcloth beside him on the counter.
‘But I’m watching the match,’ he complains, nodding his head towards the haven of the back room.
‘Sure put it on out here,’ she says, walking herself out of the door.
‘Annie,’ he shouts after her, ‘Annie come on,’ he shouts again, but she’s out and linking her arms with us, me and Sabine. Ned is out by the door, hopped out of his seat to reach his lighter that fell on the ground, quickly hopping back in when he sees us coming. Ma holds the door for him.
‘All right there, Ned,’ I say, tapping him on the back of the chair.
‘Leaving so soon, Annie, Pat won’t be liking that,’ he says, laughing at the state of it all, thinking it is absolutely hilarious, truth be told.
‘Well, Pat can fucking lump it,’ Ma says, giving Ned a wink. He grabs her arm on his way in the door.
‘How you holding up today, love, birthdays are a tough one.’ We all do a double take, and Ma wraps her hands around his neck fiercely, planting a kiss right on his cheek. I actually see him blush, embarrassed now, pushing her away.
‘Ah would ya get off that now, Annie, a good memory for dates is all,’ but he can’t hide the curl of the smile at his lips, the glow it has given to Ma.
‘Right so, Joe, where to first,’ she asks. But I’m already leading them down to Mr Whippy, following his music-box sounds, getting ready for page number one.
Finn
I thought that it was nearly time to go, and I ran my fingers through the bucket of sand, straight all the way from Dollymount Strand. Picking it up, and sprinkling it right through my fingers. Tickling the inside of my palm.
‘I wish it could have been the real thing,’ Joe said, choking the words out, but I didn’t really care about that at all. I could smell it. Feel it. Remember it, and all right here from this bucket Joe brought.
And I thought that it was nearly time to go, and I tried not to think about how Da couldn’t come or how I didn’t get all the things done that I wanted to do, or how I would never again see Ma or Joe, and I just hoped that they would all be OK.
And I thought that it was nearly time to go. I could feel my breath leaving, getting lighter and lighter, and Ma and Joe’s warmth, either side of
me, and I hugged my Transformer close up to my chest, and I grabbed one last fistful of Dollymount sand, and the taste of sweet ice cream was still fresh on my lips, and yes, now I was ready to go.
Breath in.
And out.
Breath in.
And out.
And out.
And out.
All out, surrounded by love.
Joe
People are still afraid to say that you died. That you are dead. They say you passed away, as if you are just gone somewhere unreachable, that you are still here.
Sorry for your loss, I hear over and over. What does that even mean? Your loss? It gets stuck right in the knot of anger balled tight in my chest, because lost is tied to hope, which is connected to found, as if you will be returned to me at some point, so how can I ever let you go, if you are still there, holding on, waiting for me to find you.
They say that time heals, but that’s just so fucking wrong. There’s this big gaping hole that will never be filled, that will never be healed, but it does become more bearable, I will give them that.
I’m stood here now, with Ma and Sabine, all stood at the mural that I painted of him, right after he died, all big and bold, at the side of our tower. He’s looking at us, all strong blacks and greys, with ‘Just Joe’ signed down at the bottom-right corner. There are flowers here too, and candles, signatures and messages from all over the flats, and his school, and I couldn’t think of a better reminder of him.
‘You ready, love,’ Ma asks, turning to the very last thing on our list, and the lightness we all feel now. The loss of you more bearable, the passing of you more comfortable, as we still have you right here; every time we enact this, you come bursting through, refusing to be forgotten or ignored. The vividness of you breathing life and energy into the rest of us that you left behind.
Boys Don't Cry Page 14