• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

There was no difference in what Graham had to do with Lizzie when compared with what he did with an adult, except that the scale was different; the liver was a miniature, the kidneys were tiny, the intestines as if seen in a telescope viewed the wrong way round. When he lifted the pluck out, he did so effortlessly and, when he put this in a stainless steel bowl that I carried over to the dissection bench, it was almost as if it were empty. I don’t think that Graham’s face altered at all while he did all this; it remained set, as if carved out of stone.

Ed Burberry was normally a happy participant in the gossip and banter, giving as good as he got, but today he was similarly subdued as he went through his routine. I helped him by weighing the organs and was able to see how it wasn’t just in size that Lizzie’s organs differed from an adult’s; the aorta – the main artery – was pink, not yellow and cracked, the heart was compact and stiff, not soft and flabby, and the lungs were pale pink, without any sooty dirt. Even I could see the damage that had been done to Lizzie. The chest had been filled with blood because the aorta had ruptured, while the ribs were all broken and the lungs lacerated.

After twenty minutes, he was finished. He thanked us both and left without another word to go back to the alcove to dictate his report. While he did this, Graham reconstructed Lizzie and I cleaned up, once more in silence. In another thirty minutes, it was all over, the dissection room clean, as if it had never happened. Little did I know that the day was about to get tougher.

Lizzie’s family, understandably, wanted to come and spend time with her. Mr and Mrs Dawes arrived, your average-looking young family. I could see Dad was trying so hard to hold it together for the sake of his wife. Even though I had by then experienced a fair few viewings, this was going to be difficult. Clive took charge of it but I was in attendance, and realized that I had a lot to learn from the experience; yet I was finding it hard to know how to react, let alone where to look. ‘I’m sorry for your family’s loss,’ just sounded lame as it came out of Clive’s mouth. Even I knew that no words would help this family.

Mrs Dawes entered the waiting area looking really shaky and was immediately made to sit down by Mr Dawes. He looked up at us and apologized for his wife’s behaviour. Apologize? I thought she was holding it together well, considering. It was only the fact that her knees would not bear the weight of her body at that moment that gave away the signs of what she was going through. Clive spoke to them both in a soft manner, and told them where Lizzie was resting, gesturing towards the door that led to the viewing area. Mr Dawes thanked Clive and helped his wife up out of the seat. Clive slowly opened the door to where Lizzie was laid out, and her parents entered the room. It was only a couple of assisted steps that Lizzie’s mum had taken before her legs completely buckled and she fell to the floor, beginning to cry uncontrollably. It was the most painful, heartbreaking sound I have heard. For the rest of the afternoon, all that could be heard though the mortuary was Mrs Dawes wailing and asking why. I have never felt so helpless.

As I sat in the pub that night, it was only very gradually that I came to terms with what I had seen. It was the first time that I fully appreciated what death can mean. I also had feelings about my own grandfather. I knew how much he loved me, and how much I loved him, and had done so for as long as I could remember. What if this had happened to my family? How would they interact twenty-eight years on? I could not get my head round it.

TWENTY

Clive ended up spending most of the weekend in the mortuary with Lizzie’s family. Her grandparents had been allowed to come and visit her, but there was obviously a lot of tension between the parents and the grandparents and their relationship had broken down. The two-hour slot for viewings at the weekend