Hello Stranger

I was almost done when the emotions lost their fight and burst free of me up on that podium. The tears streamed and I choked on my words, taking long moments to compose myself. It should have scorched me, the weaknesses in my armour coming to light. But no. It was ok.

It was ok because I felt it there through that room. Something I’d been trying to forget for an eternity.

Love.

Love from so many people from such a genuine place in their hearts.

People I’d known since I was a boy, cheering me on through my journey along with my mother.

People I’d known from our local street when I was growing up, waving at me every morning.

People Mum had laughed with down the local shop, catching up on sunny gossip.

People from the hospitals, who’d she’d shared so much darkness with on her journey.

Love was everywhere. All around me.

And at the centre of all that love was Chloe. My beautiful jitterbug. The one who loved me most with all her heart.

Mum’s friend Amy took to the podium after me and told her own little story. She told the room how she was just a nervous little teenager when Mum came into her world. How Mum had helped her through shyness, and fear, and shitty relationship breakups, and had always been there with a smile.

The whole room was smiling along through their cries, all of us remembering the twinkling rock that was my mum, and again, I learnt something right there and then – I learnt just what a funeral truly means.

It’s not about the fluffy bullshit of her spirit hovering above her coffin, or about people wallowing in the loss. It’s not about the crappy rigmarole of assigning her body to the flames and handling all the cruddy documentation.

It’s about reflection and celebration. Celebration of an amazing person and what she meant to the world.

The funeral director ushered me out of the hall before everyone else, and I had Chloe’s hand firmly in mine. She stepped out alongside me, standing close as the first of the guests made their appearance and gave their condolences directly.

Again, there were so many faces in line to speak with me. So many words. All of them so powerful and so true.

Chloe didn’t move, she stayed steady right by me. She smiled her smile and listened along with me, and that’s when I learnt yet another lesson – my freckle-faced jitterbug was a strong little cookie. A rock, just like my mum. A smiling beacon with twinkling eyes and a giggling smile, but a pure cornerstone underneath.

Jesus Christ, I fucking loved her.

The final guest offered their condolences and joined the small crowds gathered around the car park, and Chloe squeezed my arm before she spoke, staring up at me with those pretty blue eyes.

“Where is the wake?” she asked, and I cringed inside.

“I, um… didn’t arrange one. I didn’t think there would be many people here.”

“Oh,” she said, and I figured that even she was resigned to the impossibility of scheduling a wake in the blink of an eye, but no. Her optimism was still a gemstone shining through loud and clear.

“We can do it,” she told me. “I mean, it’ll be tough, but we can do it. Your place is plenty big enough, we just need some drinks and some food and some… I dunno, stuff, but we can get it. We can.”

I managed a tiny laugh at her. “I don’t think there will be many caterers set to provide a reception banquet with twenty-five minutes to go, sweetheart.”

Her shrug set my heart on fire.

“We can do it. We can call in at a store on the way back to your place, and stock up a trolley with some lunch stuff, and we could do it.” She paused. “I could do it.”

I should’ve said she was crazy for even considering it, racing like a whirlwind to cater for a whole houseful of people. But I couldn’t. I couldn’t say it because it wasn’t true. If anyone could do it, it was Chloe Sutton – and she’d do it with a smile on her face.

I could feel her happiness when I cleared my throat and called everyone’s attention. I directed them to head across town to my house and I handed Amy the keys to let everyone inside.

Then we were off, Chloe and I piling into my car and whizzing straight off to the local supermarket, and I was smiling. Even in my abject pain of grief, I was smiling. Smiling along with her.

“Sandwiches,” she laughed. “I can do some pretty good sandwiches.”

I remembered only too well, the image of Mum, of the three of us, tucked into that nook at the top of Mum’s mountain. Mum munching down on that ham sandwich. “They will be the most delicious sandwiches on the planet, I’m sure.”