Chapter 25
TWENTY-FIVE
ORLA
I am writing these pages not in my own home as usual, but three doors down, in the kitchen at number eight.
I was woken at five by a knock on my door and realised almost immediately what must have happened, so I called out of the window that I was on my way, dressed hastily and ran downstairs, picking up my bag with this notebook in it before I opened the door.
Anna was standing on the doorstep as if the last movement she’d made was to raise her hand to the knocker. She looked frozen, although the morning was already warm. I reached out to her, and she took a step forward, almost falling into my arms.
Is it over? I asked.
I felt her head move against my shoulder as she nodded. She told me that he had died early this morning, and that Laurel was with him. She asked me to wait at her house until the children woke up.
You don’t have to tell them, she said.
They’ll know, I thought.
She said, I’ll come back as soon as I can and get them. I just want to see, first…
I understood. She needed to see Gray’s body before she decided whether the children should – to say her own goodbyes in order to know what form theirs should take.
She has probably never seen a dead person before. I am twenty years older than she is and I have only once, when old Mr Isaacs passed away ten years ago.
We are both lucky, I suppose. Many women our ages and younger will have seen death over and over, laid out bodies, drawn down blinds, comforted the bereaved and been comforted themselves. She may want to spare her own daughter that experience – that rite of passage, I suppose it is – until later.
I followed her to her house, and she let me in. Help yourself to coffee, she said.
So I did, and now I am sitting in her warm, silent kitchen with Augustus on my lap, waiting for the first sounds from upstairs.
I will answer the children’s questions as best I can, prepare them for the news their mother must break to them.
I will wait here, I suppose, for the district nurses to come and remove the hospital bed that was installed upstairs and restore the room to a normal place to sleep.
I will offer to help with the funeral arrangements.
I will cook meals and portion them into Tupperware for Anna’s freezer.
I will do what I can.
And at some point I will have to ask Anna whether Gray’s solicitor received my message and whether she got there in time. Whether or not the change he wished to make to his will was made in time, and what that means for the family.
They have made this house into a beautiful home – a showpiece.
I remember Gray showing me around when it was completed and ready to be photographed for Architectural Digest. He was so proud of what he and Anna had created, and rightly so.
They were happy here, I know, before life and death got in the way.
I hope they will be happy again. I hope that, in time, the children will recover from the loss of their father and Anna will recover from her husband’s betrayal of her.
I hope she will realise that it was right for him to tell her – that it was the only thing he could have done, that the secret could no longer be kept.
I can hear footsteps upstairs now. It is time for this day to begin again – for the Graham family to face this next chapter in their lives and whatever it will bring.