March 2025, at the crematorium
He's gone, the notification read. I didn't even know he was meant to go. I scroll through my inbox and click on the last exchange we had just two weeks ago. I could write to him and I imagine those two ticks would still appear.
The lockdown years kept us apart but before I left home you took us out just like you used to do when we were kids. I recently learnt how to drive and I would have loved to take you around for once. But it was you driving me and my brother this time. We went to a cyber cafe where you watched us play for a few hours, standing at a safe enough distance like an engineer observing a nuclear reactor. I think watching us you might have recognised yourself in how we loved what you loved. How you unlocked new worlds in the way an adult can for kids they're looking after. You would take us out on your boat the next time we were back you said. I'm not sure what happened to the boat after you left.
The months grew into years and I flew home when the world deemed it was safe to do so. I was driven up to your grave. The sky was bright yet pale and flat, the way it is in our part of the world. The people that did the graveyard tried to landscape a water feature in into it but it was quite sad, definitely not large enough for a boat. I stood there and said some words I don't remember now. I haven't cried yet, even to this day, because it still doesn't feel real. We all think about you even if the family doesn't have the words to talk about what we think. Your nephew did, though. He said that you were always kind to him. I was surprised he remebered because he must have been younger than six when you looked after him. He's tall now and very smart.
I've been to two funerals this trip and in a way I felt glad to be back, to be here for it. I could think of nothing worse than when all you recieve is a text message when you wake up. One line to change your world. Then everything you want to ask gets pulled through the eye of a needle and strung out in characters on a screen, what kind of response could come back? Something that also was strung through and collapsed into words that had no hope of unfolding, like letters permanently glued shut. I was here this time, though. I drive now and did what I could for the people around me.
I prepared myself to see the body and his widow stood next to me saying that I should not be sad because he had a wonderful life and it was a celebration. She smiled and I believed her. It was not a brave face but a true, loving look she gave me. I nodded. We spent some time in the waiting area seeing people who we haven't seen in many years come through. We sat and caught up on life, sipping water out of the packaged water, the ones with the plastic little straws. They played a slideshow of photos from his life and as he grew older you could see other people at the wake grow older with him too.
A few days later we were again at the funeral home. Another one had left us. Again we meet people who we haven't spoken to in years, a regrouping after a storm. Two different branches of our social tree shaking and two beautiful leaves falling. Perhaps at their time.
Some weeks pass and life resumes its rhythm. We don't look back, it's not in our nature. The urgency to meet now gone, the tree spreads out and we do our own thing. I try to walk without headphones these days, to avoid being hit by cars but also to let the thoughts speak. It's hot, as usual and I was hiding under the umbrella. I open the trunk of the car and as I close the umbrella I feel my phone vibrating. I'm not so good at multitasking so I missed the call in trying to do everything at once.
I get into the car and check my phone. It's from many timezones and just as many oceans away. He's gone, the notification read. I call back. We're trying to speak through two tin cans attached by a wire stretched across the world. There's so much to say but it will wait. We hang up after a few minutes and let the silence return.