The Cactus

by Sarah Haywood

  “We’re pretty domesticated here, you know.”

  “Talking of which, what do you think you’re doing smoking in Mum’s house? And leaving beer cans on the coffee table? The place looked like a doss-house when I arrived.”

  “Mum isn’t here anymore, is she? So it’s my rules now. And according to my rules, smoking is allowed in the house. I agree with you about the mess, though. I prefer a tidy place. I’ll have a word with Rob about that.” He winked at his friend, who smirked, then turned away.

  “You’ve got no respect, Edward,” I told him. “You never have. This conversation will be continued.”

  I picked up my drink and left the kitchen.

  “See you later,” Edward called after me.

  There wasn’t the slightest chance of my joining Tweedledum and Tweedledee that evening. I was outnumbered, and it was clear my brother and that friend of his were gaining considerable enjoyment from seeing me at a disadvantage. I contemplated repacking my bag and moving to a hotel, but was aware that that would be playing into Edward’s hands. Instead, I’d remain in my room, go over my reading for the funeral and make a list of the issues I intended to raise with him. It would be a taxing day tomorrow, particularly in my current state, and I had no desire to be unsettled any further by the infantile behavior of two supposedly grown men.

  4

  To say the funeral didn’t proceed as I’d planned would be an understatement. I’d ask you to bear in mind, however, that I haven’t been myself recently for several reasons, some of which you know, and some of which you may have guessed. At least, though, I can say I have a legitimate explanation for my part in what transpired. Unlike Edward.

  I woke uncharacteristically late that morning; it was after nine thirty and the funeral cars would be there in less than half an hour. I struggled to ride the waves of nausea as I threw on my clothes and ran a comb through my hair. Edward and Rob were already in the kitchen when I entered, my brother sitting at the table, legs stretched out and arms crossed. I was pleased to see they’d both shaved. That was the only pleasing thing about Edward’s appearance, though. While Rob had managed to conjure up a dark suit, albeit a crumpled one, Edward was sporting black jeans, a black shirt, a metal-tipped bootlace tie and black cowboy boots. His sleeves were rolled up, displaying his gallery of tattoos. I shook my head. Rob seemed determined to engage me in a conversation about the readings for the service, but I made it clear that I didn’t wish to play along with his charade of cordiality.

  I poured a glass of water, made a piece of dry toast and sat down opposite Edward. He put his elbows on the table and began drumming his fingers together. I noticed, for the first time, a tense look on his face, as though his usually pliant features had become ossified overnight. While I was tackling a corner of my toast, Edward suddenly pushed back his chair, went to the dishwasher and pulled out a heavy-bottomed cut glass tumbler that my mother used to keep in the rosewood display cabinet. He took a half-full bottle of whiskey from a cupboard, sat back at the table, poured himself a very large measure and drank it straight down.

  “Anyone else?” he said, lifting the whiskey bottle by the neck, a defiant look in his eyes.

  “Oh, that’s really going to help the day pass smoothly, isn’t it?” I said. “Are you intending to get drunk and make an idiot of yourself?”

  “I might get drunk, and then again I might not. I haven’t decided yet. And it’s nothing to do with you anyway, Suze. I’ll deal with it my way—you deal with it yours.”

  “Of course it’s something to do with me, Edward. You and I are representing the family. You have a duty to behave in a befitting manner.”

  “What fucking family?” he grunted, pouring himself another large measure.

  “You might want to pace yourself, mate,” Rob joined in. “I mean, long day and all that.”

  “Yeah, Rob, I’m fine. I know what I’m doing.” He took out a packet of cigarettes and a lighter from the pocket of the frayed suit jacket hanging on the back of his chair and picked up the tumbler. “I’m going outside for a fag. See how considerate I am, Suze?”

  After the back door had slammed, Rob set about knotting the tie that had been hanging loose around his neck.

  “Maybe cut him a bit of slack,” he said, “he’s finding it tough.”

  “Do you think he’s the only one?”

  “I just meant it’d probably help if you could both stay calm and support each other on a day like this.”

  “Edward and I support each other? Do you actually know anything about our family?”

  Rob held his hands up in front of him.

  “Okay, okay. Just trying to help. I remember going to a funeral with my ex-girlfriend, Alison. It was her uncle who’d died, and two of his brothers ended up having a fistfight in the cemetery just after they’d lowered the coffin. Family deaths bring all sorts of resentments to the fore.”

  “I assure you, nothing like that will be happening today. I don’t generally engage in public brawling.” I was about to continue when the doorbell rang. I went to open it. The undertaker, a Mr. Rowe, was standing on the doorstep, displaying a well-practiced expression of professional gravitas.

  “Good morning, Miss Green,” he said solemnly. Behind him I could see two black limousines: the hearse containing my mother’s light wood coffin, and a second car for Edward and me. The sharp morning sun was cast back by the oil-slick surface of the vehicles, causing me to squint as I took in the scene. On top of the coffin I could see the simple, tasteful wreath that I’d informed Edward I’d order in our joint names. Propped up on the side, however, was a hideous bubblegum-pink arrangement of carnations spelling out the word M-U-M. That could be nothing other than deliberate provocation on Edward’s part. Even he would know it was ostentatiously vulgar. He was unable to put his childish animosity on hold even for one day.

  I’m not, as you’re aware, prone to irrationality. However, as I stood on the doorstep looking at the coffin through the shimmering late-summer heat, the thought of my mother’s pale, rigid body encased in that wooden box hit me like a sudden squall. I felt myself sway, and reached out to the door frame for support.

  “There’s no hurry, Miss Green,” Mr. Rowe intoned. “Take your time. We’re ready whenever you are.”

  “Just a couple of minutes,” I managed, closing the door. “It’s a body,” I told myself. “Just a body, not your mother. An empty shell.” While I was leaning with my back to the door and endeavoring to regain my composure, Edward strode out of the kitchen, shrugging on his jacket as he went. He stopped in the middle of the hallway.

  “Well,” he said, “let’s get this show on the road.”

  * * *

  The slow, inching journey to the crematorium passed in complete silence. I could have challenged Edward there and then about the ghastly wreath, but I was determined to maintain the decorum of the occasion. An argument in the back of the funeral car would be unseemly. Edward, who took the view that the seat belt laws didn’t apply to him, was leaning forward, picking at the skin around his fingernails. I sat back on the cold leather seat and observed the parade of high-summer city life. When I was a child, I remember people stopping what they were doing and bowing their heads as a funeral procession went past. It was clear, however, that no one was paying us the slightest attention: young women showing off their tans in sundresses chatted to each other as they ambled down the street; businessmen with short-sleeved shirts and loosened ties barked into their mobiles; children tugged the sleeves of their harassed mothers or fathers, pestering them for ice creams. It was all offensively inconsequential.

  Entering the cemetery through the iron gates, I watched the progress of row upon row of headstones, some weathered granite, some gleaming marble with brash gold lettering. Many looked abandoned, unvisited for decades; others were laden with gaudy artificial flowers. In death, as in life, you can’t always choose
your neighbors. I was glad my mother’s body wouldn’t be interred in this showground of death. I began to feel a chill creeping through me, despite the increasing heat of the day. As we advanced along the baking tarmac driveway lined with municipal flowerbeds, I rubbed my hands up and down my arms, trying to get some warmth back into them.

  We rounded the last bend and the crematorium heaved into sight; a square, redbrick building, its functionality bringing to mind a power plant or electricity substation. Milling in front were about fifty or sixty people; more than I’d anticipated. Among the crowd, I spotted trusty old Margaret and Stan, standing arm in arm; my mother’s brash younger sister, Aunt Sylvia, in animated conversation with her two like-minded daughters; and my father’s brother, Uncle Harold, standing apart from the general throng. Rob must have taken a rat-run to the cemetery, as he was already there nattering to a couple of men who looked like his and Edward’s type. Spotting the cortege, people ceased their conversations and put on their best mourning faces.

  The moment I stepped out of the limousine, Aunt Sylvia scurried over and clasped me in a crushing embrace. Her intense, musky perfume caught the back of my throat and I wanted to retch.

  “Such a sad day for you both. But she’s gone to a better place.”

  I stood stock-still, waiting for the moment to pass. Eventually she released me and grabbed Edward. I wasn’t out of the woods yet, though; Aunt Sylvia was followed close behind by her twin daughters, Wendy and Christine, who administered more hugs and stale words of sympathy. I was disconcerted to see, standing in my cousins’ wake, a number of their offspring, and it occurred to me that I should have specified that there were to be no children present at the funeral.

  “This is my Leila and Cameron,” said Wendy, pointing to two bored-looking children of somewhere between eight and ten. “And these are Chrissie’s twins Freddie and Harry,” she continued, pointing to a couple of small blond boys dressed in identical suits and bow ties. “We thought we’d make a day of it, seeing as we don’t come to Birmingham so often. We’re off to Cadbury World this afternoon.”

  Fortunately, before I had chance to reply, Mr. Rowe indicated that it was time to enter the crematorium, my mother’s coffin having been hoisted onto the shoulders of the pallbearers. Edward and I followed behind to the echoing arpeggios of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons. As we processed slowly down the central aisle of the gloomy crematorium I found I was becoming increasingly light-headed. My legs felt unsteady and I wondered whether I’d be able to make it to my seat at the front. This sudden overwhelming dizziness was a shock to me; I’m not a person who’s prone to feebleness, either physical or mental. When I thought back over the last few days, however, I realized I’d eaten and drunk only the barest amount necessary to settle my stomach or quench my thirst.

  I had a vision of my blood having turned to clear liquid as the nutrients were leached from it. This thought made me feel even weaker, and I half staggered to the row of seats at the front, collapsing in the first one I reached. Edward looked at me quizzically, but I turned my face away, not wanting him to sense my momentary vulnerability. Aunt Sylvia, my cousins and their offspring, and Uncle Harold joined Edward and me in the front row, while the other mourners filed into the seats behind.

  The bearded vicar from St. Stephen’s coughed, smiled and began the service. To be perfectly honest, I couldn’t take in much of what he was saying, as I was concentrating on my breathing. In addition, a squabble had broken out between the twin terrors, who Christine was trying to separate and reprimand with loud hisses. I managed to lean forward, catch Christine’s eye and put my finger to my lips.

  “Sorry,” she mouthed, giving one of the twins a sharp shove.

  “And now for our first hymn,” said the vicar.

  We all stood as the opening chords of “How Great Thou Art” filled the crematorium. As soon as I was upright I realized that that wasn’t a position in which my body wanted to be. I felt the blood draining from my head, like water from a sponge. I contemplated sitting down, but had no wish to draw attention to myself. Instead, I linked my right arm with Edward’s, and held tightly on to his sleeve with my left hand. He was startled by this, understandably so as our last physical contact must have been decades ago. To give him his due, he didn’t shake me off as I’m sure he would have liked to have done, but remained standing as stiff as a guardsman, self-consciousness written on his face. As the hymn came to an end I dropped Edward’s arm and fell back into my seat.

  “It’s time now for our first reading, which will be given by Patricia’s son, Edward,” said the vicar.

  Edward slouched up to the lectern, coughed hackingly and began reading from the Bible in a monotonous drone. With my brother no longer sitting next to me, and the aisle on my other side, I felt even more vulnerable. I could sense myself swaying. When Edward returned to his seat, I leaned against his shoulder, my natural self-possession having by now dissipated. The vicar intoned a few more words, while I silently timed my breaths: “In, two, three, four. Out, two, three, four.” I suddenly became aware that the vicar was saying my name.

  “Susan... Susan...?”

  He was holding out his arm, gesturing to the lectern. I fumbled in my bag for my copy of Thomas Hardy’s poem, “If It’s Ever Spring Again.” Finding it, I got to my feet and climbed the two steps to the platform where I was to give the reading. As I teetered, I cursed myself for wearing heels; a solid flat sole would have given me much more stability. I placed my sheet of paper on the lectern and looked at my expectant audience. All attention was on me, apart from that of the twins who were rolling on the floor at Christine’s feet, and the two older children who were playing computer games on handheld consoles. I was having difficulty making out individual faces, as the scene appeared to be smudging before my eyes. I turned to my piece of paper.

  “If it’s ever spring again, spring again,” I began.

  “Yes!” one of the computer-players yelped in a pause between my lines.

  I looked up, fleetingly, found that the audience had become one great blur of color and turned my attention back to the poem. The words were now swimming around the page.

  “I shall go when I went there. Sorry, I shall go where I went. Excuse me... I shall go where I went when...”

  My vision had become pixelated. All I could see were tiny dots of light and dark pulsing in front of me, and all I could hear was a high-pitched buzzing noise deep inside my head. I was engulfed by a wave of tiredness that I no longer had the strength of will to fight. Sleep seemed like the most delightful, the most enticing thing in the world. My eyelids closed and I succumbed to it.

  * * *

  I gradually became aware of Aunt Sylvia’s voice clucking away from a great distance. I wondered vaguely what she was doing in my flat in the middle of the night.

  “She’s as white as a ghost. She needs to get the blood back to her brain. We’ve got to get her head between her knees. Carry her to the edge of the platform and sit her up. I’ve seen it happen before. It’s the grief. She’s overcome, poor thing. It takes some people like that. You grab her top half and you grab her legs. That’s right, hoist her up to the edge.”

  I felt hands under my armpits and around my ankles, and was conscious of being lifted and bumped about. Despite having some awareness of what was happening, I found myself unable to move or speak. I was maneuvered into a sitting position, my knees were parted and my head was pushed down. The thought, Oh, God, I hope nobody can see my underwear, passed through my head. I could feel someone’s arm around my shoulders and again hear Aunt Sylvia quacking.

  “It’s all going to be fine, Susan. You’ve had a funny turn. It happens to all of us. Take your time. Breathe deeply. Wendy’s gone to get you a glass of water. Don’t worry, you’ll be back to normal in a minute. Just take your time.”

  Consciousness was returning to me now, but I didn’t want to open my eyes. I had no desire to confron
t what had just happened, or its aftermath. I lifted my head slightly and closed my legs.

  “Look, she’s coming round. Susan, love, can you hear me?” Aunt Sylvia shouted in my ear. “It’s Auntie. You’re in the crematorium. It’s your mum’s funeral and you’ve just fainted on the stage in front of everyone. Can you hear what I’m saying?”

  Mustering all the dignity that was left to me, I opened my eyes and said, “I’m fine. Absolutely fine. I’ll just go back to my seat. Carry on with the service, please.”

  I looked up and saw Edward, still sitting in the front row, arms folded and a wry look on his face. He raised his eyebrows, unfolded his arms and clapped silently. An easy chair was produced from somewhere and I was helped to it by Rob and Aunt Sylvia. I was given a glass of water, asked several times if there was anything else I needed and then the service continued. Edward offered to read the Hardy poem; I’m sure he loved stepping into the breach left by my feebleness. There were prayers, another hymn—for which I remained seated—and then the curtains closed on my mother’s coffin to the strains of her favorite song: Doris Day singing “Que Sera Sera.” As the song finished Edward leaned across to me.

  “So,” he said, “what was it you were saying about making an idiot of oneself?”

  * * *

  With the receding of the tide of nausea and dizziness to which I’d been subject to all morning I was left beached with my humiliation. It was a relief to me finally to close the door of the funeral car on the interminable solicitous inquiries concerning my well-being. My place of sanctuary, however, didn’t remain such for long. Within moments, salmon-pink fingernails were tap-tapping on the window, the door was yanked open and Aunt Sylvia launched herself onto the seat next to me. Deaf to my protestations, she insisted on accompanying me to the wake; anyone with a modicum of sensitivity would have realized that a person who’s just fainted at their mother’s funeral would need time alone to compose themselves.