Getting Over It by Anna Maxted Read Free Book Online Page B

coffin is then lowered into the grave. I note Uriah nodding surreptitiously to the fourth pallbearer, who grabs a rope before Cousin Stephen can make a hash of it. Is it my imagination or are those gravediggers closer than they were? Vultures. We sprinkle dirt on the coffin—Luke manages to hurl a large clod of earth containing a stone at 110 miles per hour, which goes pank! as it hits the casket and makes a slight dent. I keep my arm around my mother on the pretext of lending her loving support, but really to prevent her throwing herself into the grave. I doubt she will, as her black Jaeger dress cost—according to Tina’s informed guess—approximately £250. But after the ring episode, I’m taking no chances.
    Nana Flo stares silently down at the coffin, shaking her head. I’m relieved that Nana’s sister has flown in from Canada, although she’s having difficulty reaching her as every time she takes a step, a dragonish fire-breathing relative blocks her path crying, “Great-aunt Molly! When was the last time we saw you!” I release my mother for one minute to comfort Nana Flo and the next thing I know is, my mother has bowled up to the minister and declared, “We won’t be using you again! And don’t think you’re getting a tip!” Even Luke is shocked. And, for one unholy second, the Molly botherers stop nattering.
    The blessed Uriah swoops to the rescue. “Mrs. Bradshaw,” he croons, “you must be frozen, might I fetch you a blanket?” Her attention-hungry head swivels and I am reminded of a cartoon hero bravely distracting Godzilla from crushing a child by waving and jiggling his juicy self as a decoy. “You may,” she says graciously. The minister sneaks off. Uriah orders a minion to fetch a blanket. Luke, and a million others, spark up and start yapping. I could almost believe that we were burying a stranger and that my father decided to stay at home, like Homer Simpson shirking church.
    Then I see Nana Flo. She is standing tensely over the grave staring blindly at the mud-splattered coffin. Uriah waits a decent while before slinking up to me and saying, “Whenever you’re ready we’ll take the cards off the flowers for you.” One second, I say. I run over to Nana Flo, touch her shoulder softly, and say, “The funeral director asked if you would like him to take the cards off the flowers yet.” My grandmother seems to drag herself back from somewhere far away. Her head turns slowly like a tortoise. She says in a bright hard voice, “Yes, thank you, that would be lovely.” I nod, retreat, and tell Uriah to go ahead.
    Uriah’s men go to work and I gaze unseeing into the middle distance. I stand as still, cold, inanimate as a maypole, while a sweep of blurry faces whirl and dance and chatter around me. Eventually, a gentle hand on my arm forces me to snap into focus. “Helen,” says Lizzy softly, “everyone’s going back to your mother’s house. Do you want me to stay here with you for a little longer?” I blink, and see that most of our guests are revving up their cars, the cards are gone from the flowers, and the gravediggers are inching toward the abandoned grave. Uriah, in the distance, is helping Nana Flo into the black limosine. Another plane drones noisily overhead and I am furious at its blithe intrusion. “Let’s go,” I say to Lizzy. She takes my arm and we walk in silence through the mass of past lives to the cemetery gates, where Luke and Tina are waiting. My mother is snug in the plush car and content to meet me at the house. I squeeze into the back of Tina’s yellow Ford Escort—a secret obsessively kept from her fashiony friends—and we roar off. And that, is the end of my father.
    “All this way for a sausage roll” is one indiscreet but apt verdict on the aftershow party. Our Canadian relatives—having secured free bed, breakfast, lunch, dinner, entertainment, electricity, fluffy towels, and hot water from my mother—have repaid her by dragging their slothful