A Bird on My Shoulder (19 page)

This, the most English of Australian landscapes, overlooking green, slumbering hills, was where Julian had wanted to be.

The village itself was quiet on that seemingly ordinary Friday morning as cars made their way to the church; people were walking their dogs, the pub sign was on the pavement as usual. It was just another day. I left George, Meg and Charlotte in the car with ML and raced into the small grocer's shop.

The shop, just opposite the pub, also doubled as a post office. A bell tinkled when I opened the door, and the owner heaved himself off a wooden stool with an odd air of resignation. Yellowing ceilings were obscured by bundles of garlic, large orange gourds and clumps of fading lavender.

‘Nice day for it,' he said, with no realisation of the irony of his remark.

‘A packet of mints, please,' I said. This was a last-minute idea I'd had in case of emergency – a way to distract the children during the service if they began to get restless.

The hearse was drawing up to the front steps of the church as we found a parking place on the grass. We sat for a moment – I wanted to wait for the coffin to be taken inside. Then, accompanied by friends and family, the children and I entered the church as Joan, accompanied by a cello, violin and flute, continued the opening hymn, Psalm 23. As I passed each pew, I gratefully drank in each loving, familiar face.

The service went on for some time. Charlie, restless at the best of times, went outside, pacing quietly in and out of my line of sight. The children soon fled through an open side door during another desultory hymn to play on a gnarled old tree; a long branch, stretched out like a loving arm, delivered them repeatedly back to the ground.

I listened keenly as Oliver gave his eulogy and spoke about both his parents, and all the opportunities he and his brothers had been given, particularly the chance to be raised in Papua New Guinea and to follow Julian in his love for sport and adventure of every kind.

‘My father was a gentleman in every way. He was also a gentle person and he treated the people of Papua New Guinea
like he did everyone else, with respect. As I speak there is, in Port Moresby, another large gathering of people who feel as we do.

‘News of his cancer was an undeserved curse for Dad. He had just remarried and was otherwise in high spirits and good condition physically. However, he battled his cancer, giving no heed to the suffering the drugs bestowed upon him. And in his struggle we can see his love for all of us; right up until he left us he did not give up fighting, his iron will unrelenting and his spirit indomitable to the last.'

The cadence and beauty of Oliver's final line was almost my undoing. I stared at the floor, my chest tight, conscious that the priest was waiting for me to stand and deliver a few lines I had prepared.

Eventually, I nodded to him that I was ready and stepped forward to say a few final, inadequate words.

•••

Julian's sons, his nephews Mark and Simon, and brother, John, carried his coffin to the grave, where the basalt earth, so rich and pungent, yawned into a perfect, deep rectangular hole. A small earth mover was discreetly hidden behind a shed, waiting, presumably, for the mourners to disperse so the somewhat unseemly shovelling could begin.

Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.

I pulled Charlotte away from the edge of the grave; staring intently at the coffin, she seemed about to topple in. Meg allowed a fistful of soil to fall from her tiny hand.

Gradually, there was a sound of cars pulling away, heading to a gathering back at the farm. We were the last to leave.

Tears fell slowly as we drove home. For whom or what I did not know as they were unaccompanied by any change in my somewhat numb state; but I was glad of the relief they brought, draining me just a little of a deep and long-gathered sorrow.

That night, when the children were asleep, I felt drawn outside. Dressed in Julian's old oilskin coat to protect me from the light rain, I felt in the pockets, which were still stuffed with twine and a box of matches. I stood, shivering in the dark. Above me the clouds seemed to hurry past as I stared into the empty spaces between the stars. It seemed that so much of me had travelled with Julian into that vast eternity, that nothing, nothing could deny me connection with him.

21

I will tell you everything, my darling, in the quiet

whispering hours where only you can hear me.

In the weeks following Julian's death I lived on heaven's edge.

While my logical mind could comprehend that he had died, the remainder of my awareness was foggy and indistinct.

My life seemed concentrated in a small area just above my head, a hovering cloud like a cartoon bubble, while the rest of the world loomed into sharp and breathtaking focus. I saw, perhaps for the first time, the way the wind drifted through the patient trees, and noticed as if I had never heard it before the sibilant softness of the children's sleeping breaths as I stroked their hair. In, out. In, out.

When sadness came I retreated to our bedroom to be close to Julian. It felt like a chapel, the air still heavy with a sense of sacred stillness.

I did not feel the overwhelming devastation I had expected. I was not even sure whether this was grief; certainly it was not of the textbook kind. I read repeatedly that the first stage of bereavement was denial. Was I in this state? I certainly didn't feel as though I was denying anything. My mind was clear – I knew exactly what had happened and yet I could hardly feel anything. I told a friend, ‘I don't feel too bad. I think I'll handle grief pretty well if this is all it is.'

Normal life went on around me and I was apparently taking part. Shopping, caring, cooking, and talking to friends, fielding with confidence their anxious enquiries. ‘How are you,
really
?' ‘Really? I'm okay, I think.' I could not put into words the sense of a strange and soundless force that seemed to linger on my inner horizon, the fears that hovered around my heart late at night when I was alone and the house was quiet. For several weeks, I managed to dispense this unease with a glass of wine or a conversation with a friend.

Lovingly prepared meals appeared in eskies on the doorstep, ute-loads of firewood were stacked on the veranda, and friends volunteered to whisk the children away for a few hours of fun and brought them home, tired, fed and happy. For several weeks our family was borne along on a tide of thoughtfulness. We were given a lemon tree, a rose, a box of lavender and rosemary ready to plant from neighbours we had never even met.
Just thinking of you
, the note said.

•••

The first cracks in my unconscious armour came in dreams.

Julian and I were standing in our kitchen. He towered over me as he always had, talking in his deep English voice, mild irony infusing every word. He was quite matter-of-fact about being dead, saying he was getting bored with it – there were so many tests that he had to pass, apparently, before moving on. To where, he did not say. I listened, bemused. He sounded a little mad, a little too esoteric for the very practical man I married.

‘There are so many things I'd like to do now,' he said.

I was staring at him, listening intently, but all the time I was thinking,
Oh my god, how am I going to explain this to everyone? Jules has come back to life!

He continued, ‘It's all a bit tedious but I'm hoping they'll send me to Eastern Europe.'

Julian had always been a great traveller and adventurer so what he was saying made sense. I could well imagine that the wanderlust which had characterised his life might also define him in death. But who were ‘they'? Who was sending him away?

I then noticed that he was dressed in unusually dapper clothing – a flamboyant silk shirt and a velvet jacket. Even a cravat. He was also talking as if to an imagined audience, never meeting my eye.

‘Aren't you coming home?' I asked him.

Julian looked around and I followed his gaze to the dishes in the sink, the clutter on the kitchen table.

‘No, I don't think so,' he said dismissively. ‘It's time for greener pastures.'

•••

The moment of my long unravelling came on Christmas Day, the first without Julian, only ten weeks after his death. First anniversaries, I knew because I had read about them, could be poignant and painful reminders of what was missing, but as yet I had felt very little real emotion.

The day began well enough with presents and laughter and the gradual arrival of relatives throughout the morning. I remember at one point looking around at all the smiling faces, feeling the kindness and warmth of our gathering. The children were particularly excited to have so many people and presents, and, despite Julian's absence, were still young enough to revel happily in the attention and affection of their extended family.

It was as I was gazing contentedly around the table, feeling so nurtured by the presence of other adults, that I felt a deep visceral pain, as though a large knife had suddenly sliced into my heart. And in that seemingly ordinary moment, grief hurtled into my life with unimaginable violence.

•••

Amid brief periods of relative peace, my whole being was ravaged by sudden waves of extraordinary pain. These waves, which felt almost like labour contractions, gave me barely enough time to snatch a breath before I was once again dragged into a vortex of overwhelming sorrow. Sadness assaulted me, left me confused and disorientated; just when I thought I had reached firmer ground, that the worst was surely over, this extraordinary force would take me under again to the deep, the lonely deep.

I felt a sense of increasing disconnection from the world which deepened when I started seeing spirits everywhere, the same shadowy forms that had appeared on the night that Julian died. Driving the children to school, I would see figures walking on the side of the road, then suddenly disappearing; I might be standing in a circle of people and would intuitively move aside to allow room for someone who had just arrived – yet when I looked around no-one was there.

This was the world of the newly bereaved, a life on the border of madness. Heaven's edge indeed.

I had not realised until then that people in crisis have such a profound effect on everyone around them. It was a shock to realise that I could no longer make people laugh, cheer them up or support them in the ways I used to. Even my closest friends approached me hesitantly, not wishing to say anything tactless. It was as though some strange unspeakable stigma was now
attached to me. I sensed that some people were afraid of me, of what to say and what I might say in return.

•••

I found myself increasingly enthralled by the apparent simplicity of other people's lives. For so many, it seemed, there was no great struggle, no agony to be endured, no feverish questions of identity or ultimate meaning that lay unresolved. Their lives continued as normal; they laughed and argued, made plans for the future. How, I wondered, were they living through this experience so unscathed? Had their worlds not stopped as mine had?

‘How are you?'

‘Not so bad,' I would say with a frozen smile.
I must hide this bloodied heart.

I began to avoid people whom I intuited were not strong enough to deal with the reality of how I was feeling when I had no energy to pretend. I protected myself and others by hiding away, weary with the burden of not feeling great.

Every day was a private Everest.

This effort consumed my days. It was a valiant struggle to keep the void hidden, to show others that I was coping as they all so desperately wanted me to. I never realised grief could be so complicated, so layered, such a delicate nest to build so high up in a wind-battered tree.

As the one most obviously afflicted, I had unknowingly been conferred the power to reduce others to tears, to prompt them into confessions, to unearth, simply by my presence, moments of anger or resentment. Every encounter had its own unspoken conversation, the one I now listened to more attentively than the words that were actually being uttered.

Even if the people I spoke to were only wearing a mask of tranquillity and contentment, it was an enviable one.

•••

One morning I had stopped outside the bank, trying pathetically to remember the pin number for our account. There were so many details of everyday life that seemed to have been washed away. A woman I knew, an acquaintance and neighbour who had children the same age as mine, walked up the steps to greet me.

‘How
are
you?' she asked in a tone of woe, the mournful emphasis seeming to invite a long and heartfelt response.

‘I'm okay,' I answered in a non-committal tone, trying desperately to remember her name.

The woman put her hand on my arm sympathetically. A hammer began to hover over my fluttering heart.
I am not strong enough for pity today.

She had dyed her hair several warring shades of gold and aubergine and leaned forward, her face glowing with tiny sparkles of silver make-up, badly applied like a teenager. Her
voice was unsteady, as though she was listing like a ship in a storm.

‘I was sorry to hear your news,' she began, then changed her expression to a pained smile. ‘It must be a relief though.' She looked at me searchingly. ‘I mean, I wish . . . it's so difficult.'

I nodded.

‘I know it must be hard for you but . . . it's simpler isn't it?'

I stared at her.

‘I mean death is simpler, isn't it? It's not like divorce, they don't forgive you for that.'

I began to rummage in my bag. She clutched my arm.

‘I wish I was in your shoes,' she said. ‘You're so lucky.'

Her previously caring expression had completely fallen away, leaving her face strangely hollow. Without another word, she turned and walked quickly away.

•••

A few weeks after Julian died, the actress Ruth Cracknell came for tea. Her daughter, Anna, was a friend of mine and she had suggested we meet, thinking perhaps that it would be an encounter we would both enjoy. The previous year, Ruth had published
Journey from Venice
, a memoir about her marriage and the death of her husband, Eric Phillips.