Five(68)

“You cut up dead people?” Robi will say, in astonished disgust.

“I’m retired. But, yes, I did, and the appropriate term is autopsy, which I did in hospital, to help people find out why someone died,” she will say by way of explanation to Robi.

“Do their fingernails keep growing? Because when I said Mummy was dying Oscar said that people’s fingernails keep growing after they die and she was going to have really, really long nails,” Robi will say, shivering very slightly from the thought.

“No. They just look that way, because the skin shrinks a little when someone dies, so it makes hair and nails look longer, but they’re not actually growing,” she will say.

“Can dead people still hear, because Oscar said she could hear everything we were saying even when she was asleep? And I tried asking her but she couldn’t answer, so I don’t know if she heard me or not,” Robi will say.

“There is some research to suggest that as people move toward death their sense of touch and hearing are the last things that stop working,” she will say.

“So she heard us say, ‘Bye’ in the morning?” Robi will ask. “Before she died? That’s true?”

“Yes, she did,” Mrs. Worth will say as her heart breaks for her grandsons. And for Livvie.

“Okay, good,” Robi will say.

She will notice that Rafi is quiet, but she will not press him. There is another, longer silence, and she will start to say, “Why don’t I go find your dad now,” when Rafi will ask, “Is it true about heaven?” accusingly, not looking at her, throwing another pebble at the crate.

Mrs. Worth will consider this, carefully, and then say, “We can’t know for sure because they don’t come back to tell us. But I’ve spent time with thousands of dead people in my life, in the quiet, in the morgue. I think they go to the memory of the time where they were the happiest they’d ever been, and they stay there. I’m pretty sure your mum has gone to a day with you two and your dad and Horatio, laughing on a beach or at Christmas.”

“And she’s buying dog clothes?” Robi will add.

“Most likely,” Mrs. Worth will say.

“And drinking white wine?” Rafi will say.

“Hopefully not too much, but she’s allowed,” Mrs. Worth will say.

“And a half-caf cappuccino with almond milk?” Robi will say.

“And then telling the waiter she doesn’t want the chips that come with her food but then eating all of Dad’s?” Rafi will say.

“And doing the laundry?” Robi will add.

“I’m not sure about that,” Mrs. Worth will say, uncertainly.

“No, I mean the laundry from when we were babies, because our socks were so cute she said, she told me once, it’s true,” Robi will say, suddenly worried, desperate to be right that his mother is holding his baby socks, wherever she is.

“Yeah, she’s got a whole pile of baby socks next to her, and those brownies you made her that time,” Rafi will say, and rub his little brother’s head. “Don’t worry.”

“Okay,” Robi will say, and walk off to gather more gravel to throw.

“Is what you’re saying true, or is that some crap like Santa because he’s little?” Rafi will whisper to her quietly, behind his hand, his other hand curled in a tight fist.

“How old are you?” Mrs. Worth will ask.

“Eleven,” Rafi will say.

“Ah. You’re very astute. I suppose you’re old enough now to know. The truth is, I haven’t seen any studies that contradict my theory, and while I can’t prove it empirically, I believe it, because I died for a few minutes three months ago when I had my heart attack and that was my observation,” she will whisper back to him.

“Okay,” Rafi will say, suspicious, but deciding to accept her reply.

“May I have some of those?” she will ask, and the boys will give her some pebbles, and the three of them will throw them against the crate for a bit.

And then she will hear, “Hello, Mum,” behind her. Both boys will rush to their father at the sound of Nicholas’s voice, and he will hold one under each arm.

There is so much to say, but he knows she needs time, and he needs time, and they have already wasted too much.

“Why don’t you come inside?” Nicholas will offer.

And as the four of them turn to walk up the garden path to the house, Livvie will be watching them from high above on a pink cloud, her highlights done, her gels topped up, two pairs of baby socks and a doggie tuxedo on her lap. She will see them enter her house, as she takes a sip of her half-caf cappuccino and smiles.

And so, a tidy resolution, a mother and son reunited, an old woman’s hardened heart (remember how hardened it was from her childhood trauma?) softened by a near-death experience and the presence of young, motherless children (motherless, don’t forget, so moving) who have helped her see the error of her ways so that she could learn to forgive. And be forgiven. Complete with a whimsical view of a happy, rose-colored afterlife. Isn’t that lovely?

Later tonight, Officer Tempest of the British Transport Police, who is currently standing on the tracks with her colleagues, preparing to remove a man’s severed forearm from where it fell after the train hit him, will watch a late-night film with a similar plot to Mrs. Worth’s story, while she drinks a large quantity of vodka. She’s been on the job for five months, seen four dead sheep, investigated three near fatalities and two separate cases of elderly people who died in their sleep on a train, and has now attended her first dismemberment.