along the sides. It hurts. I can’t look at his picture; it slices me too deep.
His mother cries, his dad sheds a tear, his brother doesn’t. His brother sits with a stern expression on his face looking more bored than anything. Why are they even here? They disowned him! Sure I know that they sorted this funeral out and the wake, because Caleb and I aren’t married, therefore I’m apparently lucky to even be here, according to a harsh whisper from his mother to his brother.
Lucky?
How can anybody be lucky to be at a funeral? What a warped mind she must have.
I don’t care. I don’t care about any of them.
It's emotional but I contain my emotion and the urge to cry uncontrollably by focusing my thoughts on other people in the room, the flowers and the vicar, and only the odd tear falls. The pain is indescribable but it’s also shadowed by a numbness I’ve never felt before. I feel like I’m on the outside looking in, my soul scratching at the surface, wanting to leave my body and go with him. It’s an almost desperate feeling of loneliness and nothingness, almost as if there’s no longer a heart in my chest and only a gaping pit of despair. My skin tingles and my eyes blink away the tears that blur my vision. I don’t want to miss this. I’m sadistic but I need to see it. I need to feel it.
Until the moment the curtains close and the coffin goes on the conveyor into the furnace, only small tears fall, tears that aren’t sure what emotion it is they carry in their watery depths. Grief, pain, sorrow, anger… I feel it all and yet I feel nothing.
Confusion?
Why is this happening? I shouldn’t be here. We should be at home feeling my bump and talking about what colours to paint the nursery.
I realise this is it, this is real; he’s leaving me. I will never see Caleb’s face or hear him talk again. I want to jump onto the conveyor, make them stop and beg the funeral director to take the body back so I can have a few more days looking at him and talking to him, but I know it’s not possible. The dam breaks and the tears fall, tears of sorrow, tears of loss and grief and every emotion that solidifies just how lonely and distraught I feel.
I can’t even say goodbye. I’m scared if I try to connect with him in the slightest way, I’ll start screaming and I won’t stop. The sobs are already bad enough. Will this pain ever end?
He goes up in flames and that’s it. It’s time for the wake but I don’t go to that. Instead I travel back home with all of my friends and go to our local. We sit and chat about memories while I sip an orange juice and try to join in. After a few long minutes of forcing conversation, I find a quiet corner and slowly die inside.
I had the man every woman wants.
And now I don’t.
It feels like the end.
Just… The End.
I wish I could drink my sorrows away. This isn’t getting easier. Sasha and Tommy have left to go back to University and their lives. I know I should move, but I can’t. The most I can do is lie in bed and pretend I’m somebody else. Pretend he’s here beside me.
They can’t stay any longer, plus they feel like they’re not helping.
I’m a lost cause. I have nobody.
Well… I have nobody I want. I only want him. His family haven’t called and I don’t want them too. I have enough to deal with. I have bills to pay that I can’t afford and I’m having a baby in twenty-one weeks.
TWENTY-ONE WEEKS!
It’s been a week since the funeral and my mum still hasn’t been in touch. What’s worse is that Caleb’s bank account was emptied by his parents (I assume) so there’s no way for me to pay the bills. I should go to work but what’s the point? I still won’t be making enough to cover everything.
I’m stuck in a rut and I don’t want to claw my way out.
Sasha was right - if you let yourself spiral into darkness, you’ll never find your way back.
“Why’d you leave me, Caleb?”
I can’t cope. I’m going to lose everything. I’m going to have to give up the house.
So I do the one thing I never thought I’d do.
I call his parents. I beg