by Luca Veste
There was a moment when the dreamlike quality of the morning made me think for a second that I was still asleep. That I was still in the middle of the same nightmare I seemed to have every night.
The cold, the dirt, the blood.
I waited for the shove in the back that would never come to hit me. It was the same way every morning. The absence of something seemed to only make it more noticeable. I used to be a heavy sleeper—a bomb going off outside wouldn’t have stirred me. I would have made the worst guard dog this side of Cerberus. Now, I barely slept.
I remembered looking at the time when it had said 4:32 a.m. A noise from downstairs had made me stiffen. The now-familiar whirl of anxiety and worry quickly followed. When no one came up the stairs and murdered me in my bed, I must have finally fallen asleep.
Every morning was the same. The radio would go on, and I’d wake up and promptly close my eyes again until my body would respond and move. Even against its protests of just a little more sleep.
Sometimes, I would lie there for over an hour. Awake, but only conscious. The rest of me still refusing to move. I didn’t have that luxury that morning.
It was the day of the funeral. Stuart. Dead.
It was the day I would possibly see everyone again. I’d seen Chris many times in the previous year and Nicola less often. The rest…the rest of them had become strangers. Even Alexandra, I thought. I hoped she’d be there, but also felt nervous about the idea.
None of that mattered. Stuart was gone.
He had been my friend, but I hadn’t been much of one to him.
Since the message, I’d learned that, as I thought, “not being treated as suspicious” was basically newspaper-speak for “he did it to himself.” I couldn’t imagine Stuart ending his life—not the Stuart I’d known—so surely that should have been suspicious.
Then, I remembered the nightmare and realized I didn’t know any one of my friends as well as I’d thought. Had no idea what any of them were really capable of anymore.
The body had been released to the family, and a funeral had been organized within a week. I guessed that his parents were religious and wanted to ease the path into paradise as much as it was possible.
I remembered a film about purgatory and decided if they were religious, I probably needed to stay away from them. I wouldn’t be able to deal with the barely constrained anger and sadness they’d hold.
Then, after, a gathering. A wake of sorts. I hoped to be out of there by then. I don’t think I could cope with the platitudes and questions.
I crawled out of bed, showered, and took the only suit I owned from the wardrobe while the towel was still wrapped around my waist. It was still in the plastic covering from when I’d had it dry-cleaned after the last time I’d worn it. That was a year or more ago—some wedding in the family—and I hoped it still fit. I decided to put off the inevitable dismay of everything feeling a little looser than it had before and slipped on a pair of lounge pants and T-shirt, took a formal shirt from its hanger, and went downstairs.
I spent ten minutes trying to find a black tie before discovering one balled up at the back of my wardrobe. I did a simple knot, and I was done.
The suit was a size too big. At least. It would do.
By nine thirty, I was waiting at the living room window for Chris and Nicola to arrive. The sky was gray, which seemed fitting for the occasion. I was wondering if I could wear some kind of coat over my suit—and which one of the three I owned would even be fit for the purpose—when I spotted Chris’s car turning into my small street and pulling to a stop outside.
I checked my pockets for my phone and wallet. Found my keys. Stood at the front door, willing myself to open it and step outside.
Seconds passed by. I could hear myself breathing. The light coming through the glass panes at the top of the door darkened. I could feel my chest tightening.
I didn’t want to leave. Inside the house, everything was okay. Everything was safe. My suit was uncomfortable, and I wanted to change now. I wanted to sit in my office and drink coffee and work and listen to music and forget about what lay on the other side of the door.
I could hear my own breathing.
Nothing else.
I closed my eyes, plunging myself into darkness, and I was suddenly back in the woods. I could hear Stuart’s voice. His accent and his pleading for help.
The sound grew and grew until I couldn’t breathe any longer.
My hand was on the door, but in my mind, it was against a tree trunk.
I didn’t want to leave. Inside was safety.
Outside…
Outside there were woods and trees and my friends screaming for help and blood and death and red candles.
I scrunched my eyes tighter as the silence disappeared and all I could hear and see was Stuart screaming and Chris crying and Alexandra turning the color of snow. Michelle rocking backward and forward and Nicola shaking with anger.
A knock at the door was loud enough to spring me back to reality. I breathed in and out deeply.
I could do this.
I didn’t want to.
When the second knock came, I let muscle memory kick in and I opened the door. Chris was standing on the doorstep.
“All right, mate, you ready?” Chris said, his face falling as he looked me over. He looked worried, as if I were about to break down. “All good?”
I nodded and checked my pockets again. Wallet, phone, keys. I wasn’t sure if Chris could hear it, but in the kitchen, music was playing on repeat, so when I came home the house wouldn’t be silent.
“Yeah, let’s go,” I replied, still unmoving in the doorway.
“There’s no rush,” Chris said, tilting his head to one side, studying me. “We’ll be there well before eleven if you need to…”
“No, it’s fine, honestly.” I watched him hesitate, then purse his lips. Turn away and walk slowly back up the path. I breathed in again and then finally followed him out. Turned around and checked the door was locked. Four times.
“You couldn’t find a suit that actually fit?” Chris said, waiting for me before getting into the driver’s seat.
“Har har,” I replied, giving a tight smile to Nicola in the passenger seat, who returned it. I opened the back door and slipped into the car. Chris followed suit, as I moved a few papers from the back seat and took care not to brush against Chris’s suit jacket hanging in the back. His shirt was more creased than mine, but he still looked as well put together as he always did. His stubble more designer than scruffy, his hair intentionally floppy, his build solid rather than the approaching middle-age paunchy that others our age showed.
The car smelled of a mix of expensive aftershave and perfume. I was aware that the only aroma I added to it was Lynx Africa and Head & Shoulders shampoo.
“Morning,” I said to the back of Nicola’s head. She didn’t move, staring ahead now, dressed in a black dress, I assumed, from the limited view I had. “How’s things going?”
“They were okay until this happened,” Nicola replied, her clipped, southern-money tones still apparent even after all these years spent in the North of England. She had moved up here at around eight or nine years old but hadn’t managed to lose the accent. I would have normally tried to joke around with her, but it didn’t seem the time. Never did anymore. “Let’s get this over with.”
Chris nodded at her, but I could tell he wanted to say something more. As if I’d interrupted an argument that had been ongoing. I imagined I was close to the truth. Not that they would ever dream of airing such grievances in front of anyone else.
I couldn’t picture them arguing all that much anyway. They’d been together so long that I thought by now they would be immune to the usual niggles that happen in relationships. I wouldn’t know, of course, given my history of arguments with partners. One and out was apparently my motto. Althoug
h, if I took my parents as an example, they could have blazing rows every day about something as small as whose turn it was to wash the dishes—always mum’s according to my dad—or something political.
I wondered if that was something my mum missed and made a promise to myself that I’d call her at some point. It had been a while.
The houses faded away, replaced by fields of dirty green and blackening wintertime trees. Roads became smaller, more winding, as we left the town where I lived and drove toward the address we’d been given. A church on the outskirts of Manchester. Some town I didn’t know.
The silence was broken by Chris pressing a few buttons and music filling the car. Nicola reached across and turned down the volume almost as soon as he did so. I shifted uncomfortably in my seat, opened my mouth to speak and then thought better of it.
I knew what the atmosphere was about. How could I not?
In the years since we’d first met and become friends, there had been very few moments of discomfort. Of awkwardness. Car journeys had once been filled with the laughter and joy of being together.
Now, the weight of where we were going and the memories of the past year seemed to have destroyed that part of us.
The radio broke into news, then a song came on. An older one, not on the usual playlist I would have thought. A nineties hit I couldn’t quite name but seemed to know the lyrics to. I remembered the band easy enough. I’d seen them play live a few times a year ago. All of us somewhere in a field, pretending we were kids again. Jumping up and down and singing along to every word.
Nicola reached across and snapped the radio into silence.
“I can’t listen to that anymore,” she said, her hand shaking a little as she brought it back and out of my sight. “Sorry.”
Chris didn’t answer, staring straight ahead at the road, as it began to open up again and more buildings came into view. I kept quiet as well, as the name of the song came to mind, the band…where I saw them play live the last time.
Nothing else needed saying. The conversation was over. We all knew why.
I watched as the time approached ten o’clock and began to brace myself for what was to come. The possible questions I’d be asked, the people I’d see.
The GPS on the dashboard came to life after we passed the only road we’d seen for fifteen minutes and began blurting out directions that Chris took in silence. Within a few minutes, we were pulling up outside a church on a street I didn’t know, in a town I knew even less. I could feel the tightness in my chest again as I thought about leaving the car. Walking outside, in a place I didn’t know. It was hard to ignore, but I caught Chris’s eyes in the rearview mirror, and my heart slowed down again. I was safe. I wasn’t alone. We were early, so we settled into the car, which also helped.
“Had to be Manchester, didn’t it?” Chris said softly to himself. I sniffed in the back seat, while Nicola shook off her seat belt and leaned forward in the seat.
“It’s not technically Manchester, Chris,” she said, pulling up a bag, opening it, and rummaging inside. “Don’t worry—I won’t tell anyone back home that we were here. Not that people on the Wirral care all that much.”
“You never did understand,” I said from the back seat, hoping to lighten the tone. Chris may have moved over the water of the River Mersey to the Wirral—a mile from Liverpool city center, but because it was separated by the river, it may as well have been a different country—but that didn’t change things. We still shared a ridiculous aversion to the major city down the M62. “Remember when we met him? I don’t think he realized how long we would go on about it.”
Chris laughed quietly, then shook his head. “Remember the arguments we’d have? Always about music. Didn’t matter what it was, he thought Manchester was the epicenter of great music. You’d have thought Oasis were the second coming, the way he talked about them. Listening to the Happy Mondays like they were any good.”
“That’s what it always came down to,” I replied, smiling a little at the memory. We were all nineties kids, entering the new millennium. Britpop had been our culture. “Not the Beatles versus the Stones. It was Oasis versus Blur, and we hated both of them.”
“That was always a class thing anyway,” Chris said, sweeping a hand through the hair that was becoming more gray every time I saw him. In the past year, small flecks had become strands had become blocks. “Working class people liked Oasis, the middle class liked Blur.”
“I never understood why he thought going to university in Liverpool was a good idea. He must have known he was going to get grief about where he came from.”
“He wasn’t bad for a Manc.”
“Depends what your definition of bad is,” Nicola muttered to herself, quieting us instantly. “Let’s get this over with.”
I followed them up the path to the church, a few people near the gravestones on grass near the entrance. The temperature seemed to drop a few degrees the closer we got to the building, as always seemed to be the way. A woman around our age was standing in the doorway, looking at us. “Hi, you must be friends of Stuart?”
I cleared my throat and stepped forward. “I’m Matt. This is Chris and Nicola. We were friends of Stuart.”
Her demeanor changed in a split second, her features softening, a tilt of the head. There had been an attempt to hide the dark rings under her eyes with makeup, but they were still noticeable. “Of course, I’m Stephanie. Stuart’s sister. Come inside.”
I let Chris and Nicola go first, struck by how alike Stephanie was to Stuart. I was trying to recall if he’d ever said he was a twin but couldn’t remember that far back. I was sure he would have told us, but she looked so like him that I couldn’t believe they hadn’t shared a uterus at some point.
I wondered if I was the first person to think of the word uterus when entering a church for a funeral and suppressed a giggle at the thought.
I was nervous, I realized. My thoughts were racing together, crashing into each other, an uncontrollable train. I knew what was coming. The memories it would bring up, the feelings that would follow.
It had to be done.
Home is safe. Let’s stay there. Come on. It’s not that far away.
The church was even larger inside than I’d expected it to be from the outside. High ceilings and stained-glass windows that took up most of the walls. We were led into a vast open space—pews on each side, stone pillars in random places—which seemed to stretch back farther than I’d imagined was possible. Various exits to other parts of the church, places the people were conversing and standing around. I heard soft chatter and scuffling feet on the hard floor and clinking jewelry. I followed Chris and Nicola in, stopping at the edge of the hall.
Chris was always much better than I was in these types of situations, but even he seemed a little reluctant to be his usual self in the church. I knew the feeling. We were out of place there. Old friends who didn’t know the Stuart who these people would.
We knew a different version than the one who had been driven to do what he’d apparently done.
There were a few introductions to various family members, all looking as vacant and washed out as the next. Stephanie introduced us to a few, then went to speak to who I assumed were her parents.
“I remember Stuart saying you met in university?” Stephanie said on her return. She had guided us away from the larger group of family members and toward an empty pew halfway down the aisle. “Were you all in the same one? Is that how you all met?”
“No,” Chris replied, taking the lead, thankfully. “A few of us had known each other since high school. Grew up in the same village. We didn’t meet Stuart until university and he just slotted in, I guess. He was a good guy.”
“He used to talk about your group of friends like they were some kind of gang. The Avengers or Justice League or…you know?”
We didn’t share in her laughter but smiled in tu
rn. “I wouldn’t go that far,” Chris said, as I continued to glance around, trying to spot any sort of familiar face. “We all just got on really well, that’s all. And I suppose we all brought something different to the party. We’ve all grown up since then.”
“He talked about you all,” Stephanie said sadly. “Not much recently, but he didn’t talk about anything at all I suppose. I don’t think he was in the greatest place the past year. That should’ve been a clue. I guess you don’t realize these types of thoughts are going on in people’s heads.” Then she excused herself to speak to more people who had arrived.
The whole encounter left me feeling on edge, yet it was as if it was only the opening act for me that morning. Like something more was waiting for me.
It was another half an hour before Stuart arrived. Six men carrying his coffin on their shoulders. I recognized one of his cousins but bowed my head as they came closer. Then, we were sitting down, as an older man pontificated from the pulpit up front.
Vicar or priest…I could never remember the difference. Or if there was one.
Stephanie was on her feet, reading from a piece of paper, as her parents sat at the front—straight backs and dead-eyed stares. She talked of Stuart’s life, as if she were describing someone I’d never met.
That’s all it comes down to, I guessed. When you’re gone, someone will read facts from a single sheet of paper in front of a room of people.
It was up to you how you filled it.
She didn’t talk of the Stuart we’d known for all those years. A different Stuart in so many ways.
She didn’t talk about what we had done.
She didn’t talk about the silence that followed it. Or the sleepless nights since. She didn’t talk about the teenager and his body being moved.
She couldn’t. No one apart from Chris, Nicola, and me could do that. She couldn’t recount the moment in those woods when Stuart grabbed hold of me, when we realized the lad’s body had disappeared.
I wondered if Stuart had been thinking about that moment while the train came toward him.
It was safe at home. It was safe inside. I had to get out of that church. I could feel my hands shaking and slapped my knee when it started bobbing up and down. Chris gave me a look of concern, and I had the urge to shout out. To tell everyone around us the real reason Stuart had taken his own life. “Excuse me,” I whispered, standing up and sliding out of the pew. I received a tut from an older woman in a black hat but barely heard it.