First Born by Will Dean

Author:Will Dean [Dean, Will]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton Ltd
Published: 2021-12-09T00:00:00+00:00

I find Mum trying to iron her black dress on the corner of her mattress with a travel iron and a damp towel. I leave the door open so there’s more air.

‘Did you sleep, sweetie?’ she says, looking up through a cloud of steam.

‘A bit. You?’

‘A little. Your dad’s gone out to get us breakfast. You need anything ironed?’

‘No, thanks, Mum.’

Behind her are a row of metal hangers with Dad’s white shirt and his black suit and a black tie. ‘Your father polished his shoes,’ says Mum, her smile unsteady.

‘I’ll look smart,’ I say.

‘I know you will.’

We eat croissants and takeaway lattes, Mum and Dad on their bed, me standing in the hall in my robe. A woman asks Mum if she can borrow Mum’s travel iron after she’s done with it and Mum offers to iron for her and the woman laughs out loud.

It’s not easy getting ready to say goodbye to the person closest to you in the world. You always imagine important days – interviews, weddings, funerals – to be dignified events where you get to prepare and act at your own pace and in your own way. But money buys that comfort. It buys you options, time and space. It cushions you and gifts you the ability to make choices. Mum and Dad and I have had to prepare for KT’s cremation in a communal bathroom at the end of the hall. We have to pack at the same time as we get dressed. We have to console each other surrounded by suitcases and flight documents and backpacking gap-year students.

The storm is blowing strongly outside but everyone we talk to, and everyone writing about it on Twitter, says it’s no Sandy. The view is dark. Looks like the end of the world out there.

Mum and Dad reignite their old argument about whether we should go directly from the crematorium to the airport, or come back here first to pick up our bags. Dad wins again. We’ll come back to pick up our cases.

Mum’s wearing her hair in a bun with a black net around it. She’s wearing H&M plastic pearls and a handbag we bought together in Camden Market when they came down to visit my new flat for the first time. She looks smaller than usual.

Text from Bogart DeLuca. Did you know your sister had a life insurance policy?

Yes, I knew. How do I play this? Do I confront him and ask him who he is? No, not now. Instead I reply, Have you taken this to Martinez?

We leave our suitcases with the hostel staff but they don’t give us a numbered ticket or anything like that, they just pass Dad a Post-it note with the words ‘3, Raven’ written on it in Sharpie.

Three.

Raven.

That is what we are now. Dad goes out to hail a yellow cab and Mum and I wait in the dry. She is trying to be strong.

‘It’s toughest for you, I think,’ she says, opening her eyes wide to prevent tears forming.

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