After You

‘I’ll do the lot. I’ll go the full-plucked ruddy chicken if it shows you what you mean to me.’

‘Oh, my days, Bernard.’

‘I mean it, Josie. That’s how desperate I am.’

‘And this is why our family doesn’t do romance,’ muttered Treena.

‘What’s a crack, back and wax?’ asked Thomas.

‘Oh, love, I’ve missed the bones of you.’ My mother put her arms around my father’s neck and kissed him. The relief on his face was almost palpable. He buried his head in her shoulder and then he kissed her again, her ear, her hair, holding her hands, like a small boy.

‘Gross,’ said Thomas.

‘So I don’t have to do the –’

My mother stroked my father’s cheek. ‘We’ll cancel your appointment first thing.’

My father visibly relaxed.

‘Well,’ I said, when the commotion had died down, and it was clear from Camilla Traynor’s blanched complexion that Lily had just explained to her exactly what my father had planned to endure in the name of love, ‘I think we should do one last check of everyone’s glasses, and then maybe … we should start?’

What with the merriment over Dad’s grand gesture, Baby Traynor’s explosive nappy change, and the revelation that Thomas had been dropping egg sandwiches onto Mr Antony Gardiner’s balcony (and his brand-new replacement Conran wicker-effect sun chair) below, it was another twenty minutes before the rooftop grew silent. Amid some surreptitious scanning of notes and clearing of throats, Marc stepped into the middle. He was taller than I’d thought – I had only ever seen him sitting down.

‘Welcome, everyone. First, I’d like to thank Louisa for offering us this lovely space for our end-of-term ceremony. There’s something rather appropriate about being this much closer to the heavens …’ He paused for laughter. ‘This is an unusual final ceremony for us – for the first time we have some faces here who aren’t part of the group – but I think it’s a rather lovely idea to open up and celebrate among friends. Everyone here knows what it’s like to have loved and lost. So we’re all honorary members of the group today.’

Jake stood beside his father, a freckle-faced, sandy-haired man, who, unfortunately, I couldn’t look at without picturing him weeping after coitus. Now he reached out and gently pulled his son to him. Jake caught my eye and rolled his. But he smiled.

‘I like to say that although we’re called the Moving On Circle, none of us moves on without a backward look. We move on always carrying with us those we have lost. What we aim to do in our little group is ensure that carrying them is not a burden that feels impossible to bear, a weight keeping us stuck in the same place. We want their presence to feel like a gift.

‘And what we learn through sharing our memories and our sadnesses and our little victories with each other is that it’s okay to feel sad. Or lost. Or angry. It’s okay to feel a whole host of things that other people might not understand, and often for a long time. Everyone has his or her own journey. We don’t judge.’

‘Except the biscuits,’ muttered Fred. ‘I judge those Rich Teas. They were shocking.’

‘And that, impossible as it may feel at first, we will each get to a point where we can rejoice in the fact that every person we have discussed and mourned and grieved over was here, walking among us – and whether they were taken after six months or sixty years, we were lucky to have them.’ He nodded. ‘We were lucky to have them.’

I looked around the faces I had grown fond of, rapt with attention, and I thought of Will. I closed my eyes and recalled his face, his smile and his laugh, and thought of what loving him had cost me, but mostly of what he had given me.

Marc looked at our little group. Daphne dabbed surreptitiously at the corner of her eye. ‘So … what we usually do now is just say a few words acknowledging where we are. It doesn’t have to be much. It’s just a closing of a door on this little bit of your journey. And nobody has to do it, but if you do, it can be a nice thing.’

The group exchanged embarrassed smiles and, briefly, it seemed that nobody would say anything at all. Then Fred stepped up. He adjusted his handkerchief in his blazer pocket and straightened a little. ‘I’d just like to say thank you, Jilly. You were a smashing wife and I was a lucky man for thirty-eight years. I will miss you every day, sweetheart.’

He stepped back, a little awkwardly, and Daphne mouthed, ‘Very nice, Fred,’ to him. She adjusted her silk scarf, and then she stepped forwards too. ‘I just wanted to say … I’m sorry. To Alan. You were such a kind man, and I wish we’d been able to be honest about everything. I wish I’d been able to help you. I wish – well, I hope you’re okay, and that – that you’ve got a nice friend, wherever you are.’

Fred patted Daphne’s arm.

Jake rubbed the back of his neck, then stepped forward, blushing, and faced his father. ‘We both miss you, Mum. But we’re getting there. I don’t want you to worry or anything.’ When he finished his father hugged him, kissing the top of his head, and blinked hard. He and Sam exchanged small smiles of understanding.

Leanne and Sunil followed, each saying a few words, fixing their eyes on the sky to hide awkward tears or nodding silent encouragement at each other.

William stepped forward and silently placed a white rose at his feet. Unusually short of words, he gazed down at it briefly, his face impassive, then stepped back. Natasha gave him a little hug and he swallowed suddenly, audibly, then folded his arms across his chest.

Marc looked at me, and I felt Sam’s hand close around mine. I smiled at him and shook my head. ‘Not me. But Lily would like to say a few words, if that’s okay.’

Lily was chewing her lip as she stepped into the middle. She glanced down at a bit of paper she had written on, then appeared to change her mind and screwed it into a ball. ‘Um, I asked Louisa if I could do this even though, you know, I’m not a member of your group. I didn’t know my dad in person and I never got to say goodbye to him at his funeral and I thought it would be nice to say a few words now that I sort of feel I know him a bit better.’ She gave a nervous smile, and pushed a strand of hair from her face. ‘So. Will … Dad. When I first found out you were my real father, I’ll be honest, I was a bit freaked out. I’d hoped my real dad was going to be this wise, handsome man, who would want to teach me stuff and protect me and take me on trips to show me amazing places that he loved. And what I actually got was an angry man in a wheelchair who just, you know, killed himself. But because of Lou, and your family, over the last few months I’ve come to understand you a bit better.