Page 20 of The Meet Queue-t
“It’s not that!” I insist. “It’s just—you’ve seen my track record. Who says I’m in a place where I could handle . . . anything?”
“I’m not asking you for that, Tessa.” When I open my eyes, he’s looking at me like he can see right through me. “This isn’t me trying—”
“I know.” My words are too sharp, but that’s the only way I know how to protect myself. “That’s not it. I just don’t want to, okay?”
He nods once, slowly, something in his face shuttering. “Okay.”
I wait, but there’s no more. He doesn’t try to convince me, doesn’t say anything at all. The lump in my throat drops to my stomach, and I cup my elbows. I’m not entitled to anything from him, just as he’s not entitled to anything from me.
I take a deep breath through the tightness around my chest and refocus on Westminster Hall. The reason I came. This is what I’m here for, not some history buffin a tight-fitting turtleneck whose glasses keep sliding down his nose. Closure, then home. Back to my safe little life.
The thought doesn’t give me the comfort I hoped for, and I chew on my hoodie sleeve.
Oliver doesn’t look at me again.
Our section of the queue gets closer to Westminster Hall. The great doors arch above us. Soon we’re going to be there and I’m going to see the coffin. The awkwardness of it hits in full force. I didn’t know what to do with Mum’s coffin at the crematorium. I just stood and looked at it and wished it didn’t exist, because once she was cast into ash, I couldn’t bring her back.
Volunteers check our bags and warn us not to use our phones inside, and then we’re on the steps leading up to the hall, two lines of us leading down either side of the great room. Rafters splay across the ceiling, dark and aged. There’s a sense of sombreness here that I didn’t feel outside, a sense of ancient sorrow and tranquillity.
In the centre of the room, on a red carpet, is the coffin.
Although the room is enormous and old enough I can feel the history seeping through the doors, the coffin is all I can look at. It’s draped in purple and flags, with a giant golden cross standing in front. Four Queen’s Guards stand in vigil, heads slightly bowed.
Inside that coffin is the body of the Queen.
Emotion unexpectedly sweeps through me. All around, people are grim-faced, uncertain. No one ever knows what to do when they’re confronted with death and grief. It’s a private thing, but there’s nothing privateabout this. She gave her life to the country, and so the country gets to see her in death.
Beside me, Oliver is silent, his face pale and drawn as he takes it all in, this moment in history, creeping onward just like the queue.
Here you go, Mum, I think, casting the words into the ether. Who knows, maybe they’re together up there, in Heaven. I don’t know if I believe there’s a solid place where the dead can gather, but in the days after Mum first passed, it was the only thing that kept me going. The thought that my twenty-three years on the planet with her weren’t all I was ever going to get.
People are weeping. Quietly, because it would be inappropriate, somehow, to give over to unrestrained grief. A few people bow solemnly to the coffin as they pass and the gesture spreads through the crowd until everyone is bowing. Opposite, on the other side of the line, a woman presses her fingers to her lips in a kiss. A small child stares with round eyes.
It’s an incredible experience, the grandeur and the unification—the sense that we came together with a purpose no matter our origins. No one here is causing trouble. It’s a bubble of respect and love and breathlessness.
I follow the prompting of the crowd around me and bow.
All too suddenly, the queue moves on until we emerge back out into open air once again. It’s the fresh, dewy sunlight of a new day, and the feel of it on my face is like waking up.
“Beautiful,” someone around me whispers. I tip my head up to the breeze, loving the way it toys across my face. That was . . . a lot. There are so many feelings inside me, I don’t have the space for them.
When I think of my mum, though, there’s still that ache in my gut, the one that makes me feel like I’ve been punched. I did this for her, and it was an amazing experience to be part of, but she’s still gone.
I gasp, leaning against a building. All around, the world keeps spinning, people keep moving. They’re walking and driving and cycling to work as the end of the week begins, but I’m trapped in limbo as I suck in a breath. One after the other.
This was meant to make me feel better. It’s mybirthday.
But I don’t want to celebrate my birthday. I want Mum back with me. I want this stupid nightmare to be over.
Heads bob past as more members of the queue move into the light, just as I did, and people slowly disperse. The sense of wonder and awe is still hanging over us, but it’s dimmed now, and the real world is washing through. I search the faces for one I recognise, but the person who has been beside me this entire time is gone. Oliver has gone.
I shouldn’t have expected anything else. Of course he’s gone. He suggested we could stay in touch and I threw that back in his face. But somehow I hadn’t thought he would leave immediately. I thought I’d have a few moremoments with him. I hadn’t thought this would be the end.
New grief spears me.
“Hey, girl.” Thelma taps into view, clacking that stick against the ground. “That was a lot, huh?”
“Yeah.” I wipe the back of my hand over my eyes.
