It was the Thursday of the hearing and bloody early when Dad dragged me out of bed. He’d told me what job we had to do and I wouldn’t say I was looking forward to it exactly but I was pleased it was finally being done. We were off to the coast with Mum’s ashes and we were going out in a boat to scatter them at sea. Dad said it was important that we said goodbye to her in our own way, on our own terms, not in a courtroom with a bunch of strangers.
We picked Jon up in the middle of town. It might seem a strange trip to take him on but it was agreed that he must come when I told him what we had planned and he said that he’d never seen the sea before. I thought about some of the facts he’d told me over the last few months – that the Pacific Ocean occupies a third of the world’s surface and covers more space than all the land put together. He told me that if you dropped Mount Everest into the Marianas Trench (the deepest part of the sea) its tip would still be covered by a mile of water. I thought about how awed he was by the idea of the sea and I hoped he wasn’t going to be disappointed with a few square miles of the grey Irish Sea on an unremarkable winter’s day.
Dad had spoken to people at various markets and made a few calls and eventually found a retired fisherman called Norman Hindle. Norman lived in Oakholme, a small coast town about an hour to the north and west of us. He said he would be happy to take us out a mile or two in his boat. When Dad explained the purpose of our trip Norman refused to take any payment so Dad asked around and found out he had young grandkids and loaded the boot with wooden toys.
Dad was in a strange mood on the journey. When we got out of the town and the rush-hour traffic disappeared he asked if we wanted some music for the drive. He turned the radio on before either of us answered him. I couldn’t remember the last time we’d had music in the car. His shoulders were relaxed and his arms hung loosely from the steering wheel and he tapped along when a familiar song played. I thought I’d seen it all when he glanced over his right shoulder, dropped the Volvo down a gear and flew past two trucks and one car on the dual carriageway.
We arrived at Oakholme just after ten o’clock and followed the directions Norman had given. We pulled into a parking space overlooking the small harbour. As we came to a stop we could see a yellow boat, moored to the harbour wall. A grey-haired man was bustling around on the deck. We all clambered out of the car and as our doors slammed shut the grey-haired man looked up and waved a greeting to us. We all waved back at Norman.
The urn had been sat next to Dad on the front seat for the journey. It was a cheap-looking wooden box, made from balsa wood, the type of wood my dad sneered at and could hardly bring himself to touch. I had no idea how we’d ended up with it. Was Dad given a catalogue to choose from? Was there a choice of colours and materials? I never remember it being discussed. Dad carried the urn carefully in a green shoulder bag, his right hand holding it against his side like he was carrying a bomb. It was a strange walk down to the boat. Dad with Mum’s ashes held against his side, me and Jon behind and only the sound of the sea gently wallowing into the harbour wall and the odd screech from a local gull.
Norman was brilliant. He acted like he did this kind of trip every day, like it was nothing unusual and there was nothing awkward about the whole thing. He welcomed us on board, gave us a quick safety chat and handed out life jackets. He told us how far out we would sail, in what direction and how long it would take. When we stopped he would ask if we were happy with the spot. He told us the conditions were favour-able. The sea was, and should remain, calm. He said he understood that it was a difficult trip for us and he was pleased to be able to help in any way he could. He made a few last-minute checks and we were ready to go.
We sailed out from the coast for about twenty minutes. Me, Dad and Jon wandered around the boat, stared back at the coast and further out across the water. We looked down at the cold grey sea and watched the gulls above, shadowing our progress, expecting easy pickings. I wondered what was happening in a courtroom miles away. When Norman was happy we’d gone far enough he killed the engine and asked, ‘Any good?’ Dad looked to the empty horizon and back to the coast, towards Oakholme and the wooded hills and the little white houses that stood in line along the harbour and said, ‘Yes, I think so. Luke?’ I agreed that it seemed as good a spot as any. Norman told us that objects in the Irish Sea had been carried by tides as far north as Greenland and south to the tip of South Africa and that seemed to settle it.
Dad took the urn out of his bag and pulled the lid off. He kissed the box once on its side, held it out over the edge of the boat and gently poured some of the dust into the sea. He stood still for a few seconds, watching, and then passed the box to me. I copied him, kissed the box, and tipped until it was empty. It needed a hard shake at the end, just to get the last few flecks out from the corners. For a few seconds the ash in the water clung together like bubbles in a bubble bath then a wave broke it into two different groups and already now they were slowly drifting in different directions. Norman had retreated and was stood by the cabin of the boat. Jon was standing behind us, and me and Dad were leaning over the edge, watching the sea and ash sway below us.
And then it happened. It came out of the silence and calm as definitely as an aeroplane crossing an empty sky. The first thing I noticed was a shift in Norman’s posture. His body tensed and he straightened his back. He was suddenly alert, nose in the air, like a dog catching a scent on the wind. The noise followed almost immediately. It was an immense, deep, terrifying roar. Like an army charging. The noise rushed in on us and I was suddenly aware of one half of the boat being higher than the other and then the other half rising quickly to catch up. In a second we were high and flat, on top of a huge wave, heads in the sky, above all the other water in the sea. For that second it felt like we were on top of a mountain with our heads touching pure air. Everything in the world seemed to hang in the balance. We fell as quickly as we had risen and crashed back to normal sea level. Dropping like a car off a cliff. The little boat rocked hard as we landed. It pitched left then right and only gradually calmed itself, eventually settling. We all stood with bodies braced and watched the wave roll away, further out into the sea.