Weak at the Knees (6 page)

“Come on Danni, it’s time to go.”

Hugo comes close, joining my reflection in the mirror. I’m applying lipstick, but as I look towards Hugo and then back at me again I decide against it and smudge off the red paint with the back of my hand. Who gives a toss what I look like anyway? We say nothing, because there’s nothing left to say. We make our way to the front door and out to the car. Hugo lets me into the passenger seat. As we’re driving along I spend most of the time staring at the road ahead, but for a split second I look across and am acknowledged with a sympathetic smile.

Hugo’s been wonderful these last few days. He’s been there for me unconditionally, knowing instinctively when to speak, when not to speak, what to say, what not to say.

He’d liked Amber from day one, accepting her as an important part of my life. He was never jealous of our friendship and never got angry when he was excluded from any of our exclusively girlie activities, like going to the movies on a Saturday afternoon or to Brent Cross for a spot of retail therapy, or like playing tennis outdoors, whatever the weather, as part of Amber’s bid to get fresh air at least fifty per cent of the time. Although, not only would I have gladly let him join us for that activity, I’d have even more gladly let him take my place. And Amber would have improved far more quickly, because Hugo is brilliant at tennis, he even played for the county at one point. But Amber wouldn’t hear of it. She’d wanted
my
presence on the tennis court in the fresh air and it was non-negotiable.

Fresh air, non-negotiable; fresh air, non-negotiable; fresh air, non-negotiable…. You know how if you say a word, any word, over and over again enough times, you start to forget what on earth that word is, what on earth that word means anymore? Well, I’ve started saying fresh air and non-negotiable over and over again and they’re both starting to become nonsensical to me. I shake my head trying to rid it of those two goddamn words which have started to whir uncontrollably round my head like a washing machine on fast spin. I keep shaking vigorously, until eventually I do manage to shake those words right on out of me but they’re immediately replaced by a vision. And this vision won’t leave me alone. It’s a vision of somebody who will never breathe fresh air again, non-negotiable. 

*****

Stereo sound slowly filtered into my silent, sepia world, bringing colour back with it. I ran over to Mrs. Slater who was lying on the floor, crouched down beside her and helped the doctors place her head between her legs. When she came to and saw me her eyes were wide and helpless and she started wailing like a pained, wild animal. Deep, raw, high-pitched shrieks: “NOOOOOOOOOOOOO, NOOOOOOOOOOOOO, NOOOOOOOOOOOOO.”

I wrapped my arms around hers, her hysteria making me feel strangely calm. Gradually her wails calmed into heaving, gasping, muffled sobs.

“Perhaps you might like to come and see her now,” asked one of the doctors gently.

Mrs. Slater nodded that she would and then looked up at me with questioning eyes. Oh God no, I thought to myself. I don’t think I could bear the thought of seeing Amber now, not like this. I was about to say that I didn’t think I could handle it, but was preempted by Mrs. Slater whispering “please Danni. I’d really like you to be there. I think Amber would too.

I nodded my acceptance and Mrs. Slater and I gripped one another’s hands tightly as we followed the doctors through the double swing doors. We hadn’t been allowed beyond those doors before. But that was before. We were led to a small room. As we stood at the door tentatively the doctor said “she’s ready for you now.” What do you mean “she’s ready?” I cried inwardly. Amber’s never going to be ready again.  She’s never going to be ready again, is she? IS SHE? ANSWER ME THAT! But nobody did, because nobody had heard, because I hadn’t trusted myself to speak aloud.

As Mrs. Slater pushed the door ajar I started trembling all over, fearful of what I might find. And as we walked in I kept my eyes averted from the bed, not wanting to see what or who lay there. Then Mrs. Slater said “doesn’t she look peaceful?” and I was forced to look over. Against all the odds, Amber did look beautiful, angelic almost. She must have been wearing her lucky Levi 501s and a turquoise t-shirt when she’d arrived at the hospital, because somebody had put them back on her. A white blanket was loosely draped over the lower half of her body, but that was bearable because at least her clothes were bright. All blue. Her favourite colour which complimented her hair perfectly, although you wouldn’t know it now because they’d wrapped a beautiful brown and gold silk scarf round her head. I wondered whose it was.   

Oh Amber, you do look peaceful. So peaceful that perhaps you’re putting it on, and any second now you’re going to open your eyes and break out into one of your heart-warming, mischievous grins. Go on. Do it. I won’t run screaming, like I’ve just walked into a scene from the horror flick
Carrie.
I promise you. Go on. Do it. Dare you. But she wasn’t going to. There was no rise in her chest, no flare of her nostrils. All of her was so very, very still. Mrs. Slater was stroking Amber’s face, speaking quietly to her.  I moved to a chair by the other side of the bed and looked at her hand, contemplating. Part of me was scared to touch her. Afraid of how she might feel. But Jesus, if you’ve loved someone as much as I’ve loved Amber, if you’ve done so many things together, shared so much with each other, then you can damn well hold her hand just one more time, because you’ll never forgive yourself if you don’t. So I put her hand in mine. There was nothing nasty about it. It was all perfectly natural and death wasn’t as scary as I’d thought it would be. It’s just that I didn’t expect to experience it so soon, so young, so here, so now, so with my best friend who has moved onto a different place now. A place I can’t reach her.

I stroked her hand, warm flesh on cold. I looked back up at her face, a face that would never again smile or frown, blush or kiss, and the shock of it all burst a dam somewhere deep in the depths of my belly, unleashing a tidal wave of emotion. The shock of the roller-coaster ride from my mum calling me in Cannes barely sixteen hours earlier to seeing Amber lying so scared and poorly in that hospital bed, to seeing her lying so still and lifeless here and now. I’d never seen a dead person before, let alone touched one. I’d never even considered how it might be, let alone imagined that my first time would be with my best friend at the age of twenty-six.

This time I couldn’t hold it in or keep it quiet. I started blubbing and snorting and wailing incomprehensibly, speaking to nobody in particular, but from time to time looking at Mrs. Slater, Amber and the ceiling, towards the God who had let me down. Let Amber down.

“What am I going to do without you?  WHAT AM I GOING TO DO WITHOUT HER? I HATE you! I hate you for taking my best friend from me. Why did you do it?  She was the sweetest gentlest most giving person I know and she was so magnanimous she always put everyone else before herself. Always…… And I told her I’d shave my head too so that we’d both be bald together and she wouldn’t feel so stupid. Now she’ll never know what I look like without any hair and we’ll never be able to go to Australia together... OHNOHOHOHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO…”

Mrs. Slater came round to comfort me and I comforted her and together we said goodbye to our last vision of Amber.

*****

Hugo and I are stuck in gridlock thanks to post school drop-off traffic in Hendon. Seeing as the local school is a secondary one, the same one that I went to, there’s no excuse. Pupils should be getting there under their own steam at this age, surely, as opposed to being chaperoned by their parents? I walked alongside fellow classmates past the crematorium twice a day, five days a week, watching smoke puffing out of its chimney umpteen times. “There goes another one,” we’d say. Laughing about it made it easier to stomach. Thankfully Amber and I went to different schools and never did this walk together or shared that joke together. Thank God. I feel sick enough as it is that this is where we’re heading.

When we enter the little chapel an Ella Fitzgerald track is playing. It’s Amber’s favourite Gershwin number:
Someone to Watch Over Me
.

There’s a saying old, says that love is blind

Still we’re often told, “seek and ye shall find”

So I’m going to seek a certain lad I’ve had in mind

Her coffin is laid out to the left and is strewn with blue petals. In fact, beautiful arrangements of blue flowers have been hung throughout the room. A glorious mix of chunky blue hydrangea blooms, irises, delphiniums and cornflowers. The scent is heavenly. If Amber had been standing next to me instead of Hugo she would have commented on the wonderful display, congratulating whoever’s idea it was. I say hello to and kiss Mrs. Slater and then I spot Mr. Slater, the short dark stocky man who abandoned his wife and daughter twelve years ago. Thank God he appeared to have left his Brazilian bimbette behind. 

“A bit late now, don’t you think?” says a female voice, close in my ear.

I turn to see who is speaking to me, but the only person who is that close is Hugo.

“Did you hear some woman saying ‘it’s a bit late now, don’t you think’?” I ask him.

“No,” he replies, “can’t say I did.”

“I said it’s a bit late now, don’t you think? Can’t you hear me Danni?” I quickly flick my head from right to left, trying to work out who’s talking to me, but nobody is there.

“Amber?” I whisper. “Amber, is that you?”

I get no response and Hugo looks at me like I’m crazy, but I don’t care. I
know
that was Amber talking to me. I just know it. She doesn’t speak to me again, but it doesn’t matter because I can feel her encompassing me, warming me with her presence.

I go through the motions of saying hello to Mr. Slater. I express my sympathy, all the while agreeing with Amber that it is a bit late now, thinking what a heartless bastard he is and wondering whether he even had the slightest clue as to quite how much he’d upset his daughter. Even if he does and even if he’s feeling guilty beyond belief for those lost years, for the time he can’t make up, for the forgiveness he can never receive, I don’t care. I’m on Amber’s side in this, unconditionally. Because Amber was my best friend and I loved her.

*****

The service starts and the priest speaks beautifully about Amber. I start crying when he talks about her wonderful spirit and personality, how she’d achieved so much in her short life, how loved she was by all who knew her, what a wonderful daughter and friend she’d been to so many, how sorely she would be missed and how tragic it was that her life should be cut so short. Despite the fact that I’d been so angry with God for letting me down, for betraying me so blatantly and for not saving my best friend, I feel soothed by the priest’s words. I want to hate him, but I can’t. I can’t because if I turn my back on him now, I think I’ll feel even more lost and alone.

  Then my mind takes off on its own journey of memories with Amber, of innocent childhood playing. Mucking about on the climbing frame in her back garden, skipping with ropes, annoying her dog Pele, climbing trees, walking to the local shops to buy something for her Mum, going to the park, playing tennis, making Victoria sponges – hers were always much better than mine. Even though we used the same ingredients and went through the same procedure, putting the mixture in the same oven, mine would always end up sunk and misshapen whilst hers would look just like Delia’s.

Hugo nudges me, telling me it’s time.

“Danni Lewis, I think you wanted to say a few words?” the priest repeats. I must have missed it the first time.           

I get up and go to the podium. I stand there and see everybody. Mrs. Slater, Mr. Slater, loads of family members that I’ve met at some time or another, my parents and lots of Ambers’ school friends, some of whom I know. Annalise and Nicki are both there. Simon Shufflebottom is with them. I wonder how he found out. Then I look to my right, to where the coffin is lying, the coffin strewn with blue flowers. And my voice chokes. I’ve prepared this huge big tribute to my best friend Amber but now that everyone’s looking at me I’m frozen to the spot and can’t seem to make my lips move. I look at Hugo who’s got this concentrated expression of encouragement on his face, willing me to do it. And I try. I start. In a weak, quivering voice that keeps cutting in and out.