Chapter three

The Funeral

The church sat perched on a small little hump of a hill with steep stone steps leading up to the heavy tall wooden doors. Dire headstones landmarking the dead encircled the little building making it void of anything cheery. At least to me anyway.

A good gathering of people dressed in black hung around the front of the doors waiting for the carriage to arrive with Leonora's remains. I loitered away from them, not wishing to attract too much attention as I knew absolutely no-one here. Leonora always wanted me to meet her parents and I too also. Her father sounded like a very respectable man who owned a successful publishing company responsible for putting some of the very best British authors into print. Her mother a lady from an aristocratic family who was close friends with the royals when growing up believe it or not. Her sister was to marry a Navy man in September this year and there were a few mentions of a beloved cat named Morris in her letters who she loved dearly. A family that I could have been a part of......

I lingered on the outer fringe of the people who were smoking and gossiping, listening in on some of their whispers. A lot of them were friends of Leonora, young and stylish they stood out from the dreary crowd with some fulfilling Leonora’s last wish for there to be splashes of color at her funeral, colorful handkerchief peeped out of the breast pockets of the young men and the women sporting bright and vivid roses in their hair long with beads of jade green or lapis lazuli resting on their breasts. Despite their best effort to inject a little bit of liveliness into the dreary crowd, grief still struck them. A collection of rainbow handkerchiefs was soon being offered to the women by the men to dab away the murky mascara trails from their cheeks and to wipe tears. I still admired their spirit though to bring life into so much death.

“Friend of Leonora too?” A young and rather short woman asked me, plump with her blonde hair cut into a bob. A single forget-me-not behind her ear. Knowing of Leonora's final wish, I too decided to have a sky blue handkerchief for Leonora.

“Yes” I answered. Again, not wishing for too much fuss to be made over me, I decided to not mention of me and Leonora being distant lovers. Today is about saying goodbye to Leonora, not me.

“I can’t believe she's passed away” she answered, flicking away the ash from her cigarette “I'm absolutely devastated” Stange, I thought, you don’t look devastated. In fact, I guessed, she may be trying to flirt with me.

“Yes, it's very terrible” I replied, trying to be polite, I started to look towards the doors leading into the church where the rest of the mourners began to gather and settle. I noticed beautiful yellow carnations adorned the alter where the coffin would be sited. But the little hussy was determined to trap me.

“It’s Valerie by the way” She said wistfully, smiling at me with small white teeth peeking under her pink, glossy lips. She reached out a silk gloved hand towards me. Me still trying to be polite shook it. Her smile stretched even more and her eyes sparkled with glee, her cheeks blushing like candy floss.

“Nice to meet you Valerie” And with that I headed inside. But I was soon followed by the clicking heels of Valerie as she trotted to keep up with me. I choose one of the few empty pews at the rear of the church. I would have wished for the front of the church so I could be closer to Leonora but didn’t want to be situated to closely to her family. I doubt they needed to learn now that their daughter was sending love letters to a stranger she met at a Halloween party. I wasn’t sitting alone for long as Valerie slid herself along the bench right next to me. I flashed a strained smile at her but I wish she would disappear.

“You ran off before I could ask your name. Rude!” She said in a teasing manner, elbowing me playfully. She most definitely didn’t need to touch me.

“It's Ruben” I said. Hopefully she wasn’t too close of a friend to Leonora to know who I was.

“Ruben, what an exotic name!” She exclaimed, her cheery voice gaining a few disapproving glances from the mourners sitting quite close to us in front. I could feel my cheeks flush bright crimson from embarrassment.

“Where are you from, Ruben?” She asked, the smile now reaching her earlobes.

“Scotland”

“Oh” she said enthusiastically. It was clearly not the answer she was expecting but she remained determined to pursue me.

“Whereabouts?”

“The north-east"

“You don’t sound Scottish? "she enquired. Underneath the makeup, I began to see traces of her real age. She couldn’t be more than fifteen or so. She had round, chubby cheeks that still flushed pink and dimples in the corner of her smile.

“My father was Scottish, he died when I was young. My mother soon followed and I was raised by my mother's relatives who were English and owned an estate.”

“Oh, dear how tragic I can't imagine losing my parents at such a young age. I think I'd just be hopeless without them in my life.”

Yes, probably nobody left to spoil you I suppose. Gosh, listen to me, all this pining is leaving me bitter. I really shouldn’t be this cruel to her. After all she is rather young and she’s just a little bit awkward. I’m just not sure how to deal with her right now that’s the only problem. Maybe in years later in the future the idea of other women will be a bit more bearable in the future but not right now, not whilst Leonora is still above ground.