followed Ginny’s orders to wear something colourful. Patrick had the brightest neon-pink tie; I’d dug out one of my maxi dresses, the closest I got to bright, in grey and turquoise, more fitting for a day at the beach than a funeral.
Despite my protestations that it was bad manners and plain wrong to ignore the wishes of the deceased, Phoebe had gone full Hollywood grieving widow, the black lacy dress and pillbox hat complete with endless posing and primping until Ginny’s funeral felt less like a tragedy and more like an eBay shopping opportunity. I’d suggested a bright top and a knee-length skirt she’d worn for work experience. ‘Mum, I can’t wear that. I’m a sixteen-year-old girl, not a forty-five-year-old granny auditioning for a part as a nun.’ And suddenly, time was marching on, and we had to leave. And as always, Phoebe got her own way.
The cool wood did nothing to soothe the heat emanating from my body. I breathed deeply, trying to concentrate on the vicar’s words that would never – could never – calm my rage that Ginny had died so young. And more quickly than we’d bargained for. In fact, we’d discovered we didn’t have any bargaining power at all. Neither did Ginny, despite her resilience and determination and her endless waving away of our concern. ‘You were always such a pessimist, Jo. I’m not going anywhere yet.’
But even the mighty will of Ginny, and along with it, the big bark of her laugh, had dwindled to a whimper during April and May. The call we hadn’t expected for at least another couple of months dragged us from our sleep around five-thirty; Victor’s Welsh accent more pronounced with the emotion of delivering the news in the early hours of that June morning. The sky was already light and disrespectful in the climb towards summer, with all its promise of long evenings and conversations under a balmy sky. It felt so much more obscene than slipping away on a grey January day when the sun struggled to make it over the treeline.
I lost the first ten minutes of the service to overcoming my embarrassment at our entrance. It wasn’t until Victor walked to the front that I was able to focus on the words rather than the disapproval of everyone around me that Phoebe’s push-up bra was visible through the lace of her dress. She might as well have broadcast to the world that she’d been caught on video up to no good outside the chemistry labs at school with Ryan Baker. I had no intention of introducing her to Ginny’s dad.
Patrick sighed beside me as Victor took a moment to steady himself and began to speak, quietly at first, then with greater conviction as though he thought Ginny could hear him.
My heart squeezed with sadness, with anger, that this seventeen-year-old boy would never be carefree again. Never have that naïve certainty that whatever happened, whatever went wrong, there would always be a solution. Sometimes there just wasn’t and the good guys lost out.
There was something so gentle in his words. He wasn’t speaking to impress us or out of duty. He’d gathered up all that love Ginny had poured into him over the years and held it in his heart to give him strength to pay tribute to her. He looked handsome, even in his distress, his white shirt standing out against his dark skin, his body held with the same poise and elegance Ginny had possessed.
Next to me, in perfect contrast, was Phoebe, slouching away, her face set as though she was locked in a battle with her hands to resist pulling out her phone and checking her Instagram likes. Nothing about her suggested she understood the magnitude of losing a parent. If anything, she looked like she was weighing up the bonus of missing a day of school against the inconvenience of having to be around me when I was crying so hard I kept making little squeaks of grief. I waited for a flicker of sympathy, some sign that in extreme circumstances she could see beyond herself, recognition that losing my best friend deserved a suspension of hostility for the time it took to bury Ginny and scoff down a couple of cheese straws. But my wait was in vain.
Three more months and Ginny would have made Victor’s eighteenth birthday at the end of September. She’d been determined, wouldn’t countenance the idea she wouldn’t be here, refused point blank to discuss moving to