"Mum? Mum?"
I'm in the bathroom and by his side within seconds. My mother is a mess, crying uncontrollably, kneeling beside him, holding my dad's hand and stroking his hair. I put my arm around her gently and move her to the side, so that I can get access to my dad.
I touch his face. It is still warm.
Turning him gently on to his back, I put my head against his chest, desperately searching for a heartbeat.
Nothing.
I pull up his vest and put my ear against his white hairy chest.
A pulse, very faint, but still there.
I put my cheek against his nose and wait. A few seconds later, I feel the slightest current of warm air against my cold skin.
"He's still breathing mum!"
She looks at me and cries aloud, then leans over and whispers something in his ear that I can't quite make out.
I look at his head, a deep gash showing on the side of his temple, dried and caked blood covering the side of his face.
Suddenly the bathroom at the top of the stairs is filled with a pulsating yellow light coming from the street outside, and a few seconds later the doorbell rings.
"The ambulance is here mum. I'll let them in."
I rush down the stairs, and open the door. When I point to the top of the stairs, two paramedics rush past me, and by the time I follow them up, they are already kneeling by his side and at work.
"Is he okay?" I ask one of the paramedics.
"He's still breathing, but his pulse is faint and irregular. We need to get him to hospital immediately."
A few minutes later my mother and myself are in the back of the ambulance, sitting on a green bench holding hands while the paramedics attend furiously to my father. A drip. Oxygen. The works.
We're only a few minutes from the hospital when my dad opens his eyes.
My mother and I both stand up and reach out to him.
He tries to say something, but we can't hear what he says because of the oxygen mask. I grab his hand and lean closer. He tries to say something again, but I still can't hear. The sound of the engine, and all the machinery in the back of the ambulance creating such a din that it drowns out his words.
I squeeze his hand.
"Dad, I'm here with mum. We're right here with you…"
He turns his head a little towards us, and I see the corners of his lips turn up into a smile.
"I love you dad. I love you!"
He smiles back, and squeezes my hand, acknowledging that he heard what I said.
Then his eyelids close, and his body relaxes.
"I love you dad…" I whisper in his ear one last time, but this time he doesn't hear.
He is gone.
Chapter Forty One
The Funeral
.
There are not many people in this world who can claim to have been through the death of the same father twice. And it is no privilege.
The pain the second time around is every bit as great as the first, perhaps more. To have lost someone, then to be given them back, so that you have the opportunity to get to know them even better, to get closer, to bond with them on a new level…and then to have them taken away once again…Words cannot describe the feeling.
Instead there is just a dull, empty pit.
I would like to say that I am a grown man, that I know what life is about, and that I possess the secret of why we exist and what we are here for. That I can accept the passing of a friend and father, and it being part of the great cycle of life. An inevitability. A natural, unstoppable moment in the sequence of existence.
But I can't.
The fact is, my dad just died. So I handle it the best way I can and I cry like a baby.
Tears shed more freely than before, for a father that helped me through not only one life, but two.
--------------------
The suggestion to hold the wake at the Riverside was my mum's. A good choice, one that we all knew would make my dad smile.
So I drive down to the pub to discuss the arrangements on the Thursday evening, four days later and Gavin, the owner, meets me in the car park and shakes me warmly by the hand.
"I'm sorry. He'll be missed by us all," he says, his sentiments obviously very genuine.
He walks me into a private room at the back of the pub, and sits me down. Coffee appears, and we begin to look at menus, costs, and table decorations, the latter of which I decide against, because I know my dad would hate anything pretentious.
When it was all done, Gavin says he has something to show me, and I follow him to the back of the pub, to the edge of the river, each of us carrying a glass of whisky.
"James," he says, as we stand overlooking the water, the river black and still, and almost invisible in the dark of the night. "I've known your dad for about five years now, ever since I took over the lease of the pub from the last landlord. The number of times we've sat down here together talking about Old Ralph…" He takes a sip of his whisky, and I join him. "How long is it that they've been chasing each other for?" he asks.
"About twenty years, give or take a year." I answer.
"Wow. That must be some kind of record."
"Probably. I've always wondered how long catfish are meant to live for."
"If it is a catfish…?"
"My dad was quite sure it was."
"Who really knows? But one thing is for sure, they've known each other for longer than most people do, or most husbands and wives ever stay married for," he pauses. "Look, there's something that I was wondering about, James. When did your father die?" he asks, quite matter-of-factly.
"Early Monday morning. The death certificate says 4.52 am. Why?"
"James, something strange happened on Monday morning,…down here. Perhaps it's coincidence, perhaps not, but I know how I would like to think of it."
"What?"
"I came out here on Monday morning, to throw some scraps into the river…We always feed the fish with our scraps, it encourages the fish to stay round here…and I found Old Ralph. Dead. Floating on the water."
"How do you know it's him."
"I don't. But I'm pretty sure it is. He's the biggest and the oldest looking fish I've ever seen. He's massive. A real beauty."
"What killed him?" I ask, a bit taken aback.
"Old age?" he looks at me, and shrugs his shoulder. "I don't know. Maybe best not ask. If you think about it too much, it's a bit strange isn't it?"
"Not really. Actually, it doesn't surprise me. In some ways it makes perfect sense…" I realise. Equals until death, and all that. Neither the victor. "So what have you done with him?" I ask.
"Well, if you don't mind, I was thinking of having him stuffed, and I wanted your permission to hang him in the pub. Sally and I, that's my wife, and a couple of the regulars who knew your dad quite well, we were talking about it the other night, and we came up with the idea of naming the corner of the pub where your dad used to sit ‘Charlie’s Corner’. It's got a good ring to it, don't you think? We want to hang Old Ralph in the corner above the window, and put a photograph of your dad in a frame underneath it. With some words."
My eyes start to mist over. I'm touched.
"I think we would all be very proud. And I know my dad would be too. If you don't mind though, can we read the wording before you frame it? I just want to make sure that you don't imply that my dad caught the fish. He would hate that. Ralph was his friend. A good, life-long companion. It's no coincidence that they both died on the same day. The question is, who died first? My dad, or Old Ralph?"
"I'm glad you like the idea. I've already sent the fish off to the taxidermists, and I'm hoping that we'll be able to unveil him along with Charlie's photograph at his wake? Would that be okay with you?"
"I can think of nothing better. Thank you."
I give him my hand, and I shake his in gratitude.
"So," I say, raising my glass to the river. "Let's drink a toast to friendship. To the fish and the fisherman. To my dad, Charlie Quinn,
and to his best friend, Old Ralph!"
"Cheers!"
We both swallow the whisky, and after glancing briefly at each other and agreeing without speaking, we toss our empty glasses out into the middle of the river.
In the still of the night there are two quiet splashes.
One for Ralph, and one for my dad.
--------------------
The funeral is set for 11.30 am on the Friday morning. It's a grey day, depressing, no sunshine. Low dark clouds drift across the sky above, threatening us all with rain. The dullness persists throughout the morning, and eventually it begins to drizzle. Horrible.
We all gather at my mother's house, and when the hearse arrives with my dad, my mother, myself and my dad’s only surviving brother, Peter, climb into the second car. The rest, distant cousins, family and friends, fill the cars behind: one more black limousine, and five family cars.
The cortège makes its way slowly through the streets where my dad used to walk, past the local shops, the corner pub, and the British Legion, where he sometimes played darts with his friends.
Then we hit the main road and we pick up speed.
The service at the local church, where I used to go to Sunday school as a child, tries to be a celebration of my father's life, but I can find little to celebrate. My dad is dead. The service passes me by in a haze of emotion and I find it hard to concentrate. After an hour, following some words of comfort and a small sermon from the minister, some hymns which were my dad's favorites, and a eulogy delivered by my uncle, we file out to the cars, and head off to the cemetery.
Tears fill our car, and I sit with my arm around my mother. Thoughts of my dad fill my head. There is only sadness. I can think of nothing to smile about this morning.
Déjà vu does not apply here. There is no 'feeling' that I may have done this before. I have. Five years ago.
More than anything since I arrived in this world, I find this the hardest to deal with. Images of my dad's last funeral flash constantly through my mind, and I know what is to come. The focus of all our attention, a single wooden box, covered in flowers and riding alone in the car in front.
There is one large difference this time around. He is to be buried not in Kingston, but in a small cemetery in Twickenham. Apparently, business has been too brisk since the time when my father first died. This time around, Kingston is full up.
As we pass through the gates to the cemetery and drive around the gravel path to the back of the graveyard, I try to be a man. I try to swallow my emotion and to hide my tears. Why?
Because that is what we are told to do. That is the image that we expect of a man. A real man does not cry.
The cars come to a stop, and we filter out of the black limousines, and form a line behind the coffin. My uncle and I help form one side of the pall-bearers and we carry my father's body to the grave. The hole in the ground where he will spend the rest of his days. The place he will rot, and turn to dust.
Dust-to-dust.
None of us believe that we will ever die. We are all immortal. When we visit graveyards, we see the headstones, the markers of past lives, lived and gone, shadows on the edge of time, and still we fail to believe that we will ever end up in the ground ourselves.
Only when we stand on the edge of the hole, and look down onto the coffin of someone that we have truly loved and laughed with, do we ever start to realize that one day, we too will end up down there. All of us. No exception.
The cause of death?
Birth.
I have done this twice. I am angry now, my thoughts becoming strange and a little bitter. Why, why does this have to happen…?
This is the third person I have had to bury in five years, and two of them have been the same person. And the third, …no, even to this day the memory remains so painful that I cannot allow myself to think of it…not at all! So, as I have done for so long now, I completely blank the other funeral from my mind, and focus instead on my father, and today. Who I will now bury today for the second time …
…And now it's my turn to say something at the graveside.
I calm down, step up to the edge of the deep hole and think of my father.
I speak without hearing what I say, but conscious that I want to say something that would make my dad proud. I am his son. He is my father, and here I am to say, in a few words, what he meant to us all.
Impossible.
I say some words that I had prepared in my mind, and hope that I have done him proud. I finish up by telling them all the story of Old Ralph. Two friends that died the same day.
By now it is raining harder, and we are all standing around under black umbrellas, hiding ourselves from the sky.
The world is grey. My emotion is grey. My heart is grey.
At the end of the short service, we mingle with the other mourners who have come to the graveside, shaking hands and hugging each other. I find I cannot cope any longer, and I sneak off to catch myself. I need some space.
I walk in a daze, getting slowly drenched in the rain, but finding the cold water refreshing and exactly what I need. For a few moments I cry like a baby, the release welcome and needed, and as my shoulders shake with the flow of emotion, I steady myself on a gravestone. No one hears me. My tears are lost amongst the pillars of past lives, each one marking a human story, most long forgotten, past and gone.
When the sobs subside, my mind begins to clear, and sight begins to return to my tired eyes. The rain is getting lighter now, and I turn to walk back to the car.
I stop.
I hesitate.
A feeling, a tingling sensation on my neck. A sense of something that I should do…
Something urging me to pay attention…
I turn around and look back at the headstone where I have just stood and rested in my moment of grief, looking down at the black granite stone, and reading the light blue, chiseled lettering:
"Martha Turnstone.
Born 3rd April 1939
Died 4th June 2008
Mother and friend, and
Sorely missed by
Daughter Sarah."
Sarah's mother!
A sudden overpowering sensation of my father by my side, a warm feeling of love, of his presence. A moment, where, stupid though it may sound, I feel almost as if his hand is upon my shoulder.
And then I hear his voice, coming to me from deep within, a memory taken from only a few months back, when we last spoke of Sarah.
"Listen Son, if there was anything that I could do to bring you together with the woman who could make you as happy in your life as I have been in mine, then I would. I would do anything for you son, even if it was the last thing I did..."
I walk back to my father's grave, and look down onto the casket below.
"Thanks dad." I say.
And for the first time today, I smile.
Chapter Forty Two
Hope
.
In the weeks following my dad's ‘first’ death, my mother turned in on herself, and began to lose interest in everything, except mourning my father. She locked herself in her home, didn't eat, and shut herself away from her friends.
I have been here before, the last time my father died. For three years she was a shadow of her former self and if it hadn't been for the understanding and constant attention from her friends and neighbors, the local nurses and home helps, and whatever I could do for her too, she would have died soon after my dad. I'm sure of it.
I am also mourning my father. But the strange experience in the graveyard when I felt his presence and his hand upon my shoulder…it has given me something to hold on to, something to focus on.
Hope.
The hope that I will find Sarah, and the knowledge that my dad has led me to her, is a great comfort. I feel as if he is with me now, by my side, watching over me, and waiting for me to find Sarah and start the rest of my life.
The unfortunate thing is that I cannot tell my mum about this. Even though it would give her great co
mfort if she knew what he had done, it would generate more confusion than it was worth. Instead, the best I can do, is to be there for her as much as I can. When my father died for the first time almost six years ago, she behaved the same way. After three years of isolation, and being withdrawn, constantly tearful and weak, she only began to take an interest again, when one night we persuaded her to go to an event organized at the British Legion. A bingo night.
It sounds really sad, very unimaginative, but there was something there that night that she latched onto. She lost herself in the excitement, in the thrill of the balls coming up with her chosen numbers, and the company of a hundred other silver or purple-haired ladies, most of them in the same situation as her. The thing is, it worked. So I didn't mock it. But this time around we won't wait for three years. I'll give her several months to mourn, then I'll take her to an evangelical Bingo night. Out of her front door, back into the world, and with other people again. Even if I have to kidnap her to do it.
Who Stole My Life? Page 34