28

Where we say goodbye to Grams

I slid along the front pew next to Dad and turned the order of service over in my hands. There was a picture of Grams in her blue cardigan on the front—the one she had taken off at Mr. Burnley’s when she was playing Monopoly. It was the picture she had asked for. I passed it to Mr. Burnley, who was at the end of our row, and he smiled.

The minister stood up and said lots of nice things about Grams. Then he did this little wrap-up of her life. It was like a sports roundup on TV when they review the goals of the season, but instead he spoke about all the best things she had done. Some of them I knew about—like her winning the marmalade competition at the Women’s Institute in 2016, because I’d had to test about three thousand different recipes. Some of them I didn’t—like that she had once taken three cricket wickets for Hampshire. I hadn’t even known she’d played cricket. I also discovered that she’d stopped driving because she got a disease called glaucoma in her eyes, not guacamole, the Mexican food, which makes more sense.

I liked hearing new things about her, but it also made me feel sad.

I wish I’d asked her more questions.

Dad gave my shoulder a squeeze before he got up to speak. He left his crutches resting on the pew, took a piece of paper from his pocket, and placed it on the lectern. Just looking at him standing up there on his own made me want to cry. My chin started to do that wobbling thing it does just before the tears come. I thought I was probably going to dissolve into floods, but then Hilda stopped scratching her nicotine patch and put her hand on top of mine and I felt a little better.

She’s not your regular kind of grandma, Hilda, but she’s doing okay, by the way. I won’t say “brilliant” because Grams might hear, and I wouldn’t want to get smited. I still think she might have had a hand in the seagull incident.

Dad cleared his throat, straightened his tie, and took a deep breath. “I’m a very lucky man to have known Iris. It’s thanks to her that I have experienced love and happiness in my life, through her daughter, my Molly, and through her grandson, my son Fred.

“Iris taught me what it means to be a family. When my Molly died, I didn’t know what to do. Some of you will remember I was in a pretty bad way. But Iris opened her heart to me and took me in. She taught me how to be a father. She showed me that it is not the blood that flows through our veins but the love in our hearts that brings us together.”

His eyes went all watery and he looked at me. “One thing I’ve learned is that even though people are no longer with us, it does not mean we have to stop loving them.”

Hilda gave my hand another squeeze and her bangles jingled.

I closed my eyes for the next part because I didn’t want to look at Grams’s coffin as it was carried out. I told myself she wasn’t really inside. She was somewhere else. Somewhere where she had twinkly edges.

When I opened my eyes again, I was surprised to see Ben and Charlie standing at the front of the church. They both gave me these small smiles, then turned and nodded to the minister.

The first few bars of a song started playing over the speaker system. (The church in Andover is a little more modern than Three Saints in Wales.)

I recognized the tune immediately.

Ben and Charlie started the singing.

“One more step along the world I go . . .”

Soon everyone in the congregation was joining in.

Dad leaned in and whispered to me, “Your friends suggested you might want this played. When I listened to the lyrics—about traveling on this journey through life together—it seemed perfect.”

“It is,” I whispered back.

And then I heard Charlie and Ben ribbiting.

Dad stared at them and then at me with this baffled look on his face. I couldn’t help but laugh. And that’s when I realized what Grams had been talking about. My definition of family had been wrong. It’s a bit like pigs not knowing about the stars. I needed to change my viewpoint to see what had been there all along.