Chapter 28
TWENTY-EIGHT
ANNA
I didn’t speak to Orla for a week after Gray’s funeral.
I didn’t speak to anyone, really, apart from the children and my sisters, who rang every day to make sure I was okay.
The melting-away of well-wishers that I’d been warned might take place once the funeral was over had indeed happened, and I welcomed it. I didn’t want to see anyone.
The truth is, I was embarrassed. I had done that unforgivable thing and Made a Scene.
Possibly even worse than that – Made an Exhibition of Myself.
I was embarrassed by what had happened. I still couldn’t quite piece it together – I’d fainted, or collapsed, or passed out, I wasn’t sure which.
If it hadn’t been for that, I’d have been able to hold it together, I was sure.
I’d had a few drinks, but I’d been fine.
But collapse I had, and – the details were hazy, but not hazy enough – Orla and Laurel, of all people, had come to my rescue, got me in a taxi and put me to bed.
When eventually I’d come round, finding myself with a filthy headache and my underwear still on but my dress and shoes removed, I’d been too mortified to get myself up and show my face at the pub for Gray’s wake.
I’d found Orla downstairs, drinking tea in the kitchen, and thanked her for her help but assured her that I was fine, that one of my sisters would drop the kids round and probably stay the night so there was no need for her to wait. Laurel, to my relief, had already left.
Two days later, I slipped a card through Orla’s letterbox thanking her for her help and apologising for my behaviour, but I didn’t knock on the door: I was still deep in the Fear, dreading to know what she thought of me.
But when someone lives three doors away, you can’t avoid them forever. The kids’ school had broken up for the summer holidays. Lulu had taken herself off to a cheerleading taster camp with her friend Aisha, but Barney had a day-long cricket coaching session and needed to be dropped off.
I was parking the car against the railings of Damask Square on my return when Orla’s door opened and she stepped out of her house.
‘Good morning.’ Smiling warily, I climbed out of the car.
‘Anna.’ Orla reached out her arms to me and I found myself stepping into her warm, fragrant embrace. ‘Thank you for the card. You didn’t have to. I’ve been thinking about you, but I thought you might need some space.’
It was typical of her to have guessed that space was exactly what I had needed.
‘Would you like to come in?’ she asked gently.
‘I…’ Suddenly, the prospect of the morning on my own, with nothing to do but wait for Cathy or Sarah’s call, felt unthinkably bleak. ‘Yes, please.’
‘I bought some pastries from the new Turkish place that opened next to Imran’s shop,’ Orla continued, leading the way into her kitchen. ‘They’re really rather good. Have you had breakfast?’
I hadn’t, so I found myself seated at Orla’s kitchen table – which was littered as usual with recipe books, sketch pads, packets of seeds for the garden and two drowsy cats – accepting a coffee and a borek.
‘How have you been?’ she asked. ‘The days after the funeral’s over… it must be hard. Lonely.’
A lump coming to my throat, I nodded. ‘I’m all right.
My sisters are looking out for me, and the kids keep me busy, and Mum’s coming down again this weekend.
And there’s all the stuff – you know, the admin stuff.
Insurance and making sure all the direct debits are going through and things like that. I’m keeping busy.’
Too busy to be hitting the gin at eight in the morning. But I didn’t say that, and Orla didn’t ask.
‘There was something, Anna…’ she began uncertainly. ‘I wanted to ask – but there didn’t seem a right time, with Gray’s death being so sudden in the end.’
‘It was sudden.’ I sighed. ‘Only five days after he went into the hospice. I still wonder if that was the right decision, but I couldn’t…’
‘I doubt it would have made much difference,’ Orla said. ‘Surely not? And better quick than the alternative. But still – a shock.’
I nodded. Already, those days were a blur – a blur of pain and panic and avoiding Laurel and feeling utterly helpless in the face of what was happening.
‘What was it you wanted to ask?’ I sipped the last of my coffee, turning the cup round on its saucer as if I was trying to read my fortune in the few grounds that drifted across its base.
‘Oh, Anna. This is difficult. Before he left here, Gray asked me to do something for him. A favour. And I… I’m afraid that was just before the ambulance arrived to take him and there wasn’t time that day. I fear I let him down. I wanted to talk to you about it.’
‘What did he want?’ I asked. ‘Whatever it was, I’m sure we can fix it.’
‘It’s…’ She hesitated, and then her words came out in a rush. ‘He wanted me to ring his solicitor. He wanted a last-minute change to his will. I did get hold of her, the next day, and she said she would contact him. But I don’t know if it ever happened.’
His will. I remembered sitting in the café with the children and the prospect crossing my mind that Gray might change it – alter it in favour of Laurel. I hadn’t let that worry take hold at the time, but now it did, as if it had been waiting to pounce, biding its time.
Frantically, I tried to sort through the jumbled memories of those days. If Claudia James had visited the hospice, I’d have known, surely? Someone would have told me, if I hadn’t been there at the time. And besides…
‘I don’t think he could have done,’ I said slowly. ‘He was – by that stage, he was sleeping so much. He was on a high dose of morphine. I doubt any lawyer would have judged him to have capacity to change something like that.’
‘That’s what I was afraid of,’ Orla said sadly. ‘I’m so sorry, Anna.’
‘You don’t have to be sorry.’ My hands were gripping my coffee cup so hard I worried it would shatter. ‘Orla – tell me. Was it to do with Laurel? Was it to leave her something in his will?’
‘No!’ If I’d doubted her honesty, the expression of absolute horror on her face would have erased my misgivings. ‘God, no, Anna. Nothing like that. He wanted to make a bequest to a charity.’
‘To a…’ I released my hold on the cup, hearing it rattle on the saucer.
‘Well then there’s nothing to worry about.
It’s easily done. I can just make the donation myself.
I expect our accountant will have something to say about the most tax-efficient way to do it, but it’ll be quite straightforward.
Assuming he told you what charity it was, that is. ’
I thought of the donations Gray had made while he was alive.
He’d been a sucker for signing up for direct debits when chuggers accosted him on the street or knocked at the door, and each month a steady but substantial trickle of money had left our account.
Plus at the end of the tax year he’d made more substantial donations: to Shelter, to Centrepoint, to Cats Protection.
When he’d done an Ironman triathlon a couple of years back, he’d raised money for Kidney Research UK.
Any of those were welcome to an additional chunk of cash, so long as it wouldn’t leave me unable to fund the children’s university fees.
‘I…’ Orla began. ‘I’m not sure. I remember what he said. I wrote it down, just in case.’
She reached into the worn leather satchel that hung over the back of her chair and took out her purse, unzipped it and extracted a scrap of paper, glanced at it and handed it to me.
‘YMCA?’ I read. ‘Really?’
Orla shrugged helplessly, raising her palms to the ceiling. ‘That’s what he said. At least, that’s what he ended up saying. He started with the Y and then YC and then YA and then he started singing the song – you know.’
I did. Almost involuntarily, I found myself doing the hand gestures.
Orla smiled. ‘Gray did that too. I wasn’t sure – it seemed unlikely that that was what he meant. But it must have been, mustn’t it?’
‘I suppose so,’ I agreed. ‘And – thanks, Orla. I’m glad you told me. I’m glad everything’s all right, between – you know. After the other day.’
‘Take care of yourself, Anna. Remember I’m here.’
She hugged me again and I thanked her for the coffee, then went back next door and straight into Gray’s office.
I sat down in the leather chair at his desk and switched on the computer.