Mum's List

by St. John Greene

  “How lucky is that?” I smiled, feeling relieved we had someone so experienced to help us.

  “Meant to be,” she said, leaning across the table to hand me some forms and leaflets.

  As she did so a silver four-leaf clover, dangling on her necklace, swung forward and glinted right under my nose. My mouth fell open.

  “Oh,” I think was all I managed to say.

  Martin looked at me and politely explained to the lady that Kate loved finding four-leaf clovers, and was very good at finding them. I could barely hear him. My focus was on Kate, the fuzzy vision of Kate in my mind’s eye.

  “Look what I found!” she said triumphantly, thrusting her hand out to me.

  She had three freshly picked four-leaf clovers in her palm and her eyes were twinkling like sapphires.

  “Isn’t that amazing?” she grinned.

  “Not really, you’re so good at finding them,” I laughed. “I don’t know how you do it!”

  “I haven’t found any for ages, though, Singe,” she said softly, and it was true.

  Kate used to find loads of them when she was a child, camping at Llantwit Major. Scampering off after a picnic, she told me how she would search for hours, scouring the grass, picking up bugs and chasing butterflies as she did so. She always covered the lucky clovers with tape to flatten and preserve them and she kept them in a special little pot.

  When she was older she found plenty more on walks in the country, and by the riverbank behind our house. She left them in their tape parcels all over the place—in her handbag, the car, her dressing-table drawer—sprinkling luck all around her world, or at least trying to. It had been a good few years since I remembered her finding one, and it was amazing that she had found three, one after the other, while she was walking the dog by the river.

  It happened on the day her grandmother died, and it was just after Kate’s cancer treatment had ended in the autumn of 2009. She regarded the three clovers as a positive sign, and I was heartened to see that even on the day she was mourning the gran she loved so much, and when she was still weak from her drug treatment, she managed to be so positive and optimistic. It was endearing, and inspiring.

  I tried to pull my focus back to the advice I was hearing, and I told myself the silver clover necklace was a positive sign. That’s how Kate would have seen it, and that’s why she wanted me to take Reef and Finn hunting for four-leaf clovers. “Would love the boys to find their own four-leaf clovers,” she wrote on the list, adding later, just to make extra sure: “Find four-leaf clovers at usual sites.”

  Of course I would. I wasn’t bitter. The clovers didn’t bring Kate the luck she deserved, but they gave her hope, and that was important. I would make sure the boys grew up with hope in their hearts too.

  It turned out there was good news on the financial front. After visiting Social Services, Martin and I went to the banks, where we discovered Kate had squirreled money away in a total of twenty-seven accounts and investment funds. I run my own adventure activity company, Training Saints, and if I’d had a good month with the business or a dividend had been paid from the shares Kate got from the insurance company she worked for, she stashed some savings away. We both agreed that you couldn’t take it with you, and we always spent as much as we could get away with. These were savings to be spent on holidays and having as much fun as possible with the boys.

  I also learned that, thanks to Kate’s sensible investments and insurance policies, the mortgage would be paid off and I’d get a lump sum on top of my widower’s pension. This was a massive weight off my mind, and I felt as if I’d left several bags of stress behind when I left the High Street that day. I wouldn’t have to work flat out to do all the things Kate wanted me to with Reef and Finn. The money would buy me more time with the boys, and as Kate knew all too well, you couldn’t put a price on that.

  As I drove home, my mind started flitting back and forth, thinking over Mum’s List then darting into the future, where I envisaged ticking so many things off the list. We could extend the house to accommodate a dining table and create a playroom, complete with the secret passage the boys wanted. I could arrange to have Reef and Finn christened, make a good job of creating their memory boxes and even begin planning some of the bigger trips. Maybe we could start with snorkeling in the Red Sea? Kate and I had booked and canceled that trip three times when she was ill, always hoping she’d be well enough to travel, but being disappointed time and time again.

  “Your daughter was amazing,” I said to Martin when all this good news sank in.

  He was very relieved about our financial situation, always having worried that we were frittering our money away on extravagant trips and adventures, concerned that we never saved for a “rainy day.” Well, when the rain clouds burst open in spectacular style over our lives Kate was well prepared after all—and she’d had plenty of fun in the sunshine too.

  Unexpectedly, Martin put his arm around my shoulder and gave me a squeeze.

  “Thank you for giving her such a good life,” he said. There was a momentary pause, before he cleared his throat and added: “You showed her the world, and thank God you did.”

  I felt my face color and my eyes fill with tears. It was such a generous thing to say. I had whisked his daughter away from him before he was ready to wave her off into the big wide world. I had worried him sick and caused him untold grief during Kate’s youth. Even in recent years Martin and I had had our issues, never really seeing the world the same way despite him and Christine being the most dedicated and devoted parents, in-laws and grandparents you could wish for.

  “Thank you,” I said. “That means such a lot. It’s a massive thing to say. Thank you.”

  I thought about that word grief. The so-called grief I caused Kate’s parents back then seemed so trivial compared to the real grief we were all experiencing now. Intense teenage passion matched by deep parental angst is small fry compared to this, I thought. Death shakes the ground beneath your feet, making you see the world from different angles. I was only just beginning to grieve.

  I was very proud that Kate and I had always lived life to the full, and that she dearly wanted me to keep on living that way, teaching our sons to do the same. Having her dad’s blessing was incredibly moving. It was like having a green light switched on before my eyes, allowing me to really get cracking on working my way though Mum’s List.

  I called a builder friend of mine that same night, buzzing with anticipation.

  “I know exactly what I want,” I told him. “Come round and see what you think.”

  Kate and I had discussed extending the house many times. It was on our own “to-do” list, but we had no idea when we’d be able to afford it. Reef was on the way when we bought the house. I’d only just set up my business and I was still developing the activity and training courses like power boating and snorkeling that I now run for various companies, schools and colleges. With Kate taking maternity leave from her office job as an insurance underwriter, money was a bit tight.

  The previous owner of the house had had about a dozen dogs, so we had our work cut out just to get the place habitable. I think people thought we were mad to take on a property that needed so much work, but we could both see beyond the chewed window frames and dog hairs and were prepared to put in the work to build our dream home. With three garages to store our huge stock of sports and sailing equipment and jet-skis, not to mention space in the yard to keep a boat as well as to eventually extend, we knew we’d hit the jackpot.

  “The only real problem is there’s no space for a dining table as it is,” Kate said when we moved in. “I want us to be able to sit round the table and eat family meals together.”

  This was before Reef was born, even before we’d bought him a high chair. I teased her something rotten, because from the moment she fell pregnant Kate turned into a proper little earth mother.

>   “What happened to the old Kate?” I laughed. “What happened to ‘let’s dial a pizza’ Kate? What happened to ‘let’s curl up on the sofa with a TV dinner’ Kate?”

  I’d known Kate nearly twenty years before she became a mum, and it was fascinating and very endearing to see her maternal side burst into life and spread like wildfire. We discussed knocking down the conservatory that linked the garages on either side of the back of the house, replacing it with a wraparound two-story extension. That would create enough room for a big kitchen and dining area. On top of that we wanted to install a downstairs wet room, which would come in really handy when we came in damp and bedraggled from jet-skiing or diving. Upstairs, Kate and I agreed we would create lots more bedroom space.

  “You know I want at least two children,” Kate said, stroking her blossoming tummy. “But ideally, three. We’ll have to take that into account when we get round to doing the extension.”

  “Steady on! The first one isn’t even here yet!” I chuckled.

  I couldn’t believe Kate was already thinking about the next child when she was still pregnant with the first, but that was Kate all over—an enthusiast if ever I knew one.

  Now I relayed all of these plans to the builder, but instead of building several bedrooms as Kate and I had discussed, I decided to create one large room for the boys to share, which could be split down the middle with a dividing wall when they were older.

  Kate and I had dreamed about having a little girl one day. We had already chosen a name: Coral, but when it became clear we weren’t going to have any more children, we named our little terrier Coral instead.

  “At least we’ve got our Coral,” we both laughed. “She’s pretty, even if she isn’t quite the daughter we imagined!”

  I told the builder I wanted to make sure there was enough room in the garden for the boys to play, as Kate had instructed, and I thought about how we could add on a secret passage that could take them into another play area in the loft. The dining area, I insisted, had to be big enough to have a proper big wooden dining table with at least six chairs so we could enjoy family dinners as Kate wanted, and we discussed installing a giant fish tank that could divide the dining area from the sitting room. Finally, with Reef’s disability, having a downstairs bathroom was a priority rather than a luxury, and the ground-floor wet room was an absolute must.

  The boys got very excited when they heard about the plans.

  “Will it be ready soon, Daddy?” Finn asked. “How many sleeps until we have a big, huge, massive bedroom?”

  “Will we get new duvet covers?” asked Reef. “Please can mine be Ben 10?”

  “Boys, it will take a little while,” I said. “It’s a big job, and we also have Mummy’s funeral to organize first.”

  “Is Nanny helping you?” Reef asked.

  “Do we have the day off school?” Finn asked.

  “Yes to both,” I smiled. “We’ll make sure we make it a lovely day when we can remember Mummy and say good-bye.”

  I had placed a death announcement in the local papers, and I read it now. Seeing it in black and white newsprint made it seem real and final, and it sent a shiver through my core.

  GREENE Kate. A lovely wife and awesome Mum. You will always be with us on our adventures through life. We will so much miss our best friend and soul mate. Acres and acres. Your loving husband Singe and Infinity Elves, Reef and Finn.

  Kate had called the boys elves in Lapland, and she tagged on the word “infinity” because that’s what she sometimes did when she told me she loved me. “Infinity acres and acres,” she said. I couldn’t top that, so I always replied: “infinity acres and acres” back. Now the boys had the fitting nickname “Infinity Elves.”

  The next day, Christine accompanied me to the funeral parlor to pick out a coffin. I didn’t want to put Kate in a hard wooden box, and when the funeral director showed us a beautiful seagrass casket Christine and I immediately agreed: “That’s Katie . . . we’ll have that one.” It was woven like a picnic basket, and Kate loved picnics. Even the word seagrass appealed to me. My star sign is Pisces and Kate’s is Aries. I imagined the fish of Pisces and the ram of Aries joining sea and grass together.

  Kate and I hadn’t discussed her funeral in great detail. It was just too morbid, and she told me she trusted me to know what she would have wanted. One of the few instructions she gave was on the list: “Would like drawings (any ones from school etc), pictures of boys and clothes with me, Christmas cards, birthday cards.”

  I didn’t really want to see Kate in the funeral parlor. I wanted to remember her screaming her head off as she did a bungee jump, not lying cold and silent, but I felt I had to pay my respects and, besides, I had to deliver the items she wanted placed around her body.

  I think I sort of brainwashed myself when the moment came. I could barely look at her, and what I saw wasn’t my Kate, not really. I can barely remember her image, as I just didn’t allow myself to take in what I was seeing. It was a replica Kate. A copy of my Kate. A dead Kate I didn’t recognize, because I couldn’t see the sparkle in her eyes.

  The funeral was arranged for Tuesday, February 2, at Worle Crematorium. As the day approached all I could think about was Reef and Finn. They had to be there, of course, but I was concerned about how they would cope. I decided the best policy was to just let them take it in their stride and keep a close eye on them. I allowed them to listen when I made arrangements, so they knew a bit about what to expect, and I told them they would look “wicked” in smart new clothes.

  “Can we have Blue Man at Mummy’s funeral?” Reef asked after hearing me discuss music with the vicar.

  “’Course we can! She’d have loved that. What a great idea!”

  Finn clapped his little hands excitedly. We had seen the Blue Man group perform at Universal Studios in America just a few months earlier, and Kate and the boys were enthralled by their theatrical comedy show. The performers were dressed like aliens with blue hands and faces, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen the boys sit still for such a long time, eyes glued on the stage. Kate laughed so hard her sides hurt. It was brilliant to see. I wanted to remember her laughing, not silent and still.

  On the day of the funeral the crematorium was absolutely heaving with people. Everywhere I looked there were literally hundreds of friends and relatives including lifeguards and paramedics, parents from school, police officer pals, rec center colleagues, old neighbors and many faces I hadn’t seen for years.

  The car park filled up in minutes, and the roads outside were blocked with cars. Someone told me the local buses had been diverted, which Kate would have really enjoyed. It felt like everybody Kate had come into contact with had turned up to say good-bye, and if they weren’t there in person they’d sent messages from all over the planet. I wasn’t at all surprised. Kate was such a lovely, popular person. You couldn’t not like Kate; in fact you couldn’t help but love her.

  I looked around the packed pews and felt incredibly privileged to be her husband. I could feel emotion rising up my throat, and when the music started I lost control. First up was “Can’t Help Falling in Love” by Lick the Tins, and I burst into tears. We played that song at our wedding after first hearing a version of it in a Heath Ledger film we watched together called 10 Things I Hate About You. Our wedding day was amazing. I had cried tears of joy as Kate walked up the aisle, resplendent in her ivory wedding gown. The line about “take my whole life too” just cracked me up. Kate was my whole life then, and she still was now.

  “Shush!” Reef said, giving me a steely glare that jerked me firmly back into the present. “Oh, for goodness’ sake, Daddy, stop crying.”

  That shut me up for a bit. Reef sounded like a bossy teacher giving me a proper telling-off. Kate would have cracked up laughing at that. Others in the congregation laughed when ABBA’s “Does Your Mother Know?” rang out. It was my che
eky reference to our teenage romance, when Kate was always sneaking out to meet me. It was part of the soundtrack of our lives and was one of Kate’s all-time favorite songs. I could just see her blasting it out of her car stereo, even when she was a mother herself.

  Nobody but me and the boys had much of a clue what the instrumental Blue Man music was all about, but it took me right back to their stage show with Kate giggling her head off nonstop. It was probably the last time I saw her laughing uncontrollably, and it was one of the unexpected highlights of our American trip. How could that have possibly been less than three months earlier?

  I looked at Kate’s seagrass casket in disbelief. Then I cried again, just as I’d cried when I saw Kate stand beside me at the altar on our wedding day. She looked so beautiful, and now I had a too-vivid image of her in the casket. I knew exactly how she looked and what was inside, having helped pack the coffin before the lid finally went on.

  Kate was dressed in her favorite black suit, which I had picked out of the wardrobe for her. I thought she would want to be smart. She was wearing dangly earrings and a dolphin necklace to remind her of Florida, and a pair of gloves she had asked for, to keep her hands warm. In her hand was a crystal. She liked the idea a crystal might bring comfort, if not healing. She didn’t really believe in alternative therapies, but she was prepared to give anything a try that might extend her life. Kate wanted something the boys had worn to be placed in with her, and I had rolled up some of their T-shirts and little socks that still carried their scent. I added one of Finn’s tiny baby-grows and placed all the clothes neatly and gently around her, while Christine added one of Kate’s tiny silver christening bracelets.

  I had also made sure Kate had half a dozen of the boys’ pictures, some notes from Reef and Finn signed “Infinity Elves,” several happy family photographs plus the Christmas and birthday cards she had requested on her list. I put my own message in there too, which ended with: “You’ll never be forgotten, acres and acres.” Finally, I placed five shells all around Kate’s body. They came from five of our favorite dive sites, representing the world we shared and treasured: Australia, the Caribbean, Llantwit, Torquay and the Maldives.