Things I Want My Daughters to Know_ A Novel - Elizabeth Noble [8]
And she was right.
Amanda and Jennifer joined hands on either side of Hannah’s hips and pulled her into a hug, which Lisa joined, her arms encompassing all three of them and squeezing tight.
Like sisters throughout time, whatever battles raged between them, it was always, always, all four of them against the rest of the world. They emerged from Hannah’s room a few minutes later, holding hands, Amanda dressed in something Hannah found in her wardrobe, her hair pulled back from her face, and her tears dried.
THE CHURCH WASN’T TOO BAD. AMANDA SAID THEY LOOKED LIKE extras from some cheesy musical, or a girl band scoring nil points at the Eurovision Song Contest, all dressed in their bright colors—Lisa in yellow, Hannah in pink, Amanda wrapped in orange and red, and even Jennifer in a sky blue shift dress. They stood ramrod straight in the front pew, flanked by Mark—changed now into a purple linen shirt—and Stephen, who remained resolutely and ostentatiously dressed in black, but who had at least left his BlackBerry in the car. They got there early, so that they wouldn’t have to watch everybody else file in, and they didn’t turn around. They knew it would be full. Mum had a lot of friends. Friends they would eventually have to talk to, they knew, at the wake. But not now.
It was the committal that made them break “the big rule.” Barbara had chosen a humanist site, about three miles from the church where they held the service. She said she couldn’t bear to be cremated, with that supermarket conveyor belt effect, and the vaguely comical curtain that opened and closed, and that she didn’t want to be put in the ground in a churchyard. So she was going to decompose gently, in a biodegradable coffin, and go back to the earth—and eventually, have a tree growing on top of her that they could come to, if they wanted to, and visit her. In an expanse of green with grass and butterflies, she said, instead of some depressing, gray field of marble and granite. She said it would save them a fortune in flowers. Jennifer remembered the night she had told them that. Remembered being jealous that she’d sorted everything out with Lisa. Why not her? Mark had squeezed Barbara’s hand, all serious and po-faced. Then he’d whispered to her, “Christ, you want flowers as well! Is there no end to the demands?”
Which was how the four of them, along with Mark and Stephen, came to be standing, alone except for the officiant, on a hot August afternoon, with the heat haze shimmering all around them, in a field, in front of a strange and beautiful woven willow casket containing their mother, reputedly resplendent in emerald green Ben de Lisi, listening to Van Morrison sing “In the Garden” on a tinny tape recorder. Where every one of them cried exactly as much and for as long as their broken hearts dictated.
“GOD, MARK, YOU’RE GOING TO BE EATING CORONATION CHICKEN for the rest of the month!”
A bunch of Barbara’s local friends had catered the wake and cleaned up, storing leftovers in clear Tupperware containers. They’d done a beautiful job. It had looked for all the world like a party—a wedding, maybe, or some family reunion. There were truckle tables set out on the lawn, draped in yellow crepe paper, and jugs and vases with roses cut from the garden dotted between the large bowls of rice and potato salads, French bread, and heirloom tomatoes. There were trays of oatmeal biscuits, and small bowls of strawberries, with dishes of clotted cream, sweaty in the heat. People had drunk Pimm’s and real lemonade. It had all been beautiful. Instead of the low, respectful hum usually heard at funerals, there had been laughter and stories, and, from inside the house, a soundtrack of Simon and Garfunkel and the Mamas and the Papas. The men were not shifting uncomfortably from foot to foot, hands in pockets; the women did not have red-rimmed eyes. It was exactly how