Wildflowers (26 page)

Ju
st before Christmas, I hear the best news. Cosmo’s being transferred to Briarwood, which is fantastic.  He must be so much better, if they’re actually letting him out of hospital.  I can’t wait to see Lulubelle.

I
’ve made her a Christmas wreath because I don’t suppose she’s even thought about Christmas this year, and I take it with me and just hang it on her front door.  It’s bespoke, with heather and dried hydrangea in there and I’ve also brought her a bouquet of narcissi, the little scented white ones that are called
cheerfulness,
because they make you believe that winter can’t go on forever.

It’s one of those gorgeous crisp mornings as I walk to Lulubelle’s, the air sharp and leaves crunchy underfoot. 
A perfect winter day.  If only they were all like this. 

But when she opens the door, she looks as though she’s been crying. 

‘Are you okay?’  Suddenly a hand like an iron vice clutches my heart.

She just nods and I watch as more tears stream down her face.  I reach a hand to touch her arm.

‘Lulubelle?  What’s wrong?  I thought he was getting better.  He’s going to Briarwood, isn’t he?’

‘
Oh Frankie
…’

I follow her into the sitting room, puzzled.  I don’t understand why she’s so distraught.

‘Sit down a minute,’ she tells me, taking a deep breath and bracing herself, looks at me.

‘
He isn’t going to Briarwood because he’s better, Frankie...
’  I can’t work out what she’s telling me.  ‘
They can’t do any more for him - in the hospital
…’  But she breaks off because her face is wet with tears and her shoulders are heaving.  Then as I dash over and throw my arms round her, she howls – a hideous, raw sound that comes from the deepest part of her.

As
I let her go, I see it in her face, as very slowly, the truth filters in.  Cosmo’s going to Briarwood to die.

I spend Christmas day with Alex’s family who are so lovely and welcoming.  As I already know, his Mum is highly strung, but she’s a darling and his father turns out to be Alex, only older.  Jessie of course, I see a lot of these days, and Bernie and James are as all newly-weds should be.  Soppy and in love, though I’m pleased to note they do argue, just a bit.  

The house is charmingly decorated with spruce and holly and candles, with a massive Christmas tree with presents piled underneath. 
There are ten of us round their huge oval dining table and I make them laugh with carefully censored bridezilla tales, but they all know about Lulubelle and Cosmo, and it’s the high point of the most surreal rollercoaster.

A
t Briarwood too, it’s bursting with colour - and with love.  I’ve known for a long time what an extraordinary place this is, but now, watching as Cosmo succumbs to his illness, I’m truly humbled.

The truth, quite simply, is that e
veryone here cares.  From the highest up nurse to the guy who empties the bins and washes the floors – and absolutely everyone understands.  Cosmo’s every need is met, with no shortage of kind faces or soft voices when he has brief spells of consciousness, the quietest, gentlest care when he’s sleeping, while Lulubelle is bolstered by an invisible force-field of support.  It’s awe-inspiring.

I hold myself together wh
ile I’m there with her, then go home to Alex and cry my heart out on his shoulder.  Then the next day, do it all over again.  Though in between, other parts of life try to tick along as usual. 

For example,
Honey calls.  ‘We’d love you and Alex to come for dinner.  When are you free?’  Which is so different to the orders she used to bark at me. 

Fuck
, is my first reaction, remembering Honey’s dinner parties of old.  ‘Love to,’ is what I say to her, because things have changed and I wouldn’t miss it for the world.

I
just hope it’s not with a load of her stuffy friends, but of course it won’t be.  Well, they’re her friends, but this time they’re mine too.  Nina and Will, Charlie and Mark – and us.  And she doesn’t try to be a killjoy, plus she’s decorated the house with her own gorgeous flower arrangements.

‘These are really stunning,’ I tell her.  ‘You’ll have to take on some of the weddings.’
  I frown.  ‘Abigail Culleton,’ I tell her, feeling a lead weight lift.  ‘All yours.’

She flushes pink with pleasure.  ‘Do you really think I’m good enough?’

And I nod – because she is. 

The week after Christmas flies by and the start of another year looms just around the corner.  This year we’re all at Nina’s to see it in – all of us, except Lulubelle.

As I go for a run that morning, th
ere’s the strangest feeling in the air.  The sun is rising, casting it’s pale glow over a frozen world and glancing up, I see clouds the shape of angel wings, lit a delicate gold in the dawn sky.  Somehow I know it’s a sign.

The morning passes quietly.  Then that afternoon, I go over to Briarwood
and in the car park, bump into Maria and Pete.  He’s got his arm round her and she’s wiping away tears.

‘Are you just going up there?’ says Pete
, on the verge of tears himself.  ‘Only, it’s not good, Frankie. Not good at all.  She sent us away.  Sent her Mum away too.  Said she wanted us to remember how he used to be, not… Poor little mite.  Makes you think, doesn’t it, why it can’t be a hairy old bloke like me instead of a kid.’

‘
So he’s worse?’ I whisper, terrified of the answer.

Maria nods. 

‘He’s just slipping away,’ says Pete, the tears rolling down his face.  ‘God… What the hell’s she going to do?  What are we all going to do…’

I nip up the stairs as fast as I can and find his room, creeping over to stand beside Lulubelle.  Only when I’ve been in there a few minutes do I realise how quiet it is,
and why.  Every last machine has been switched off.  Unable to speak because of the lump in my throat, all I can do is clutch her hand.

I
leave her just once, briefly, to text Alex.  It’s not a decision I make consciously, I just know.  New Year’s Eve or not, I’m not leaving without her.  I don’t care how long we’re here, but unless the miracle happens and somehow he turns a corner, for as long as she’s holding his hand, I’ll be here holding hers.

As we sit, leaning against each other, I watch his chest rising,
the movement so slight, it’s barely visible, as though he’s gone already and his frail, empty body is shutting down.  I think about how many hours she’s spent here over the years.  Willing with her incredible strength, breathing her life-force into him, anything to make him better, which worked before, just for some inexplicable reason, not this time.

At one point she says, ‘you can go if you like
Frankie.  I’ll be fine.’

But I know she won’t be.  How can she be? 
I shake my head.  ‘Only if you want me to.’

Silently, we keep our vigil, our eyes on Cosmo, drinking in the detail of his hair, his skin, his hand curled in his mother’s.  Last precious moments
seared onto my mind forever.  On the wall behind us, the clock is ticking but for us, time has become meaningless.  All that exists is Cosmo. 

And that’s how the year
comes to an end.  In the last minutes, as Cosmo’s breathing slows, then stops altogether, a light goes out forever.

My memories of what followed are shaky.  I must have called Alex, who called Pete because when we left Briarwood several hours later, they were waiting patiently in the car park
for us.

I learn
also that at a time like this, there are no right, no wrong things to do.  For now, all that matters is Lulubelle for whom life has become a living hell.

Ironically, the shop becomes a refuge of sorts, where I can lose myself in the mad world of wedding fever, but I’m infinitely glad Honey’s there to take the strain which she happily does
- only she soon realises what she’s up against.

‘That bloody woman phones every Tuesday morning without fail,’ she tells me. 
‘About the most trivial detail that I really don’t need to know.’

I nod knowingly.  ‘Mrs Culleton?’

Honey looks at me astonished.  ‘How did you know that?’

But it’s not just her. 
A new year always begins with an influx of rabid brides – not the foaming-at-the-mouth rabid, but the sort that can’t talk about anything else and to whom the tiniest detail suddenly takes on earth-shattering importance - Willow being a case in point.

‘
Yours from the very start,’ I tell Honey.  ‘There’s nothing like a baptism of fire, after all.  She’s having nine bridesmaids and the parents are divorced which always complicates things, plus she’s as bossy as you are – sorry, used to be.’

Which all in all, should make things
interesting – for me and Skye, at least.

It takes just one meeting to have
Honey tearing her hair out.

‘The wedding’s August and she’s read in some magazine that you can get any flowers you want any time of year, if you pay for it
…  So she wants narcissi and peonies –
in August, Frankie
…’ Honey cries.  ‘
What am I going to do
?’

‘Tell her no,’ I say calmly, realising that actually,
in the grand scheme of things, it doesn’t matter, does it?  ‘She’ll have to have something else.’

‘But she might find another florist,’ wails Honey.

‘She’ll never find one who’ll give her narcissi and peonies in August, and if they tell her they can, they’re lying.  What I’d do is show her David Austin roses and stephanotis.  She won’t be able to tell the difference.’

It’s starting all over again
.  The same that happened to me. The madness that consumes you once you start letting the pressure get to you… and I don’t want to go there again.  Not ever.  There’s more to life than weddings. 

The days that follow, I spend with Lulubelle, just getting her through each day.  I make her meals, sit in Cosmo’s bedroom with her, look at all her photos dozens of times, holding her tightly when she cries. My heart feels like it’s broken into thousands of pieces, but I know it’s nothing compared to what she’s going through.

And all the time,
though I don’t tell her, I can’t shake the feeling that Cosmo’s here.  In her cottage.  That even though we can’t see him, his presence is all around us.  Sometimes, I even think I can hear him, feeling him grab my hand, trying to drag me outside for a game of football.

Then days later, the strangest thing happens. It was the day I saw angels’ wings again, unmistakeable, a shimmer of gold in the evening sky and I knew that Cosmo had left us.

‘He’s gone,’
Lulubelle says, when I get there.  She looks pale and strained and utterly exhausted. 

‘
You’ll think I’m mad, Frankie, but the last few days, he’s been here...  I’ve felt him everywhere around me, everywhere I go.  So strongly that I couldn’t believe I couldn’t touch him…  Yesterday when I woke up and came downstairs, the TV was switched on.  To his favourite channel.  I didn’t do that.  I went back to bed and he was there, curled against me.  I felt his hair tickle my face, I could smell him…but when I woke up again, he’d gone.’

She sounds frantic
and utterly broken, as her loss hits her anew, yet again.

She stands there, her hands in fists, a distraught look in her eyes.  ‘He’s gone Frankie… what do I do now?’ she whispers
, then she crumples.

There’s nothing I can say, so I just hold her tightly
, letting her cry, for as long it takes.

‘Have you told her no yet?’ I ask Honey. 

‘Not yet,’ says Honey.

‘Look, you can’t let a bride bulldoze you.  Especially not at the first meeting.  Come on! Think of your inner lawyer, my friend.  And if she goes to another florist, so be it.  There are plenty more brides booked in.  Take it from me, Honey.  Brides can be trouble.’

Isn’t that what Mrs Orange said to me?
  Did I listen?

Lulubelle oscillates between awe-inspiring fortitude and the depths.  There are times I fear that she’s lost the will to live.

‘
It hurts Frankie
…
like I’ve been torn open and someone’s ripped out my heart.  I should be with him...  He’s alone.  What if he’s frightened? Or there’s no-one with him to hold his hand or hug him...’
 

Her huge, tormented eyes show her anguish – but e
ven in her darkest moments, somehow, whether it’s one of those memories she’s stored away or something more instinctual, she finds a shred of something to cling to.

Cosmo’s funeral is in the same church that Pete and Maria were married in.  Lulubelle asks me to put a few flowers in there, so Skye and I take
the earliest spring flowers - snowdrops, daffodils, primroses wound together with moss and twigs. 

The service is simple, the church packed
with people crammed in, standing at the back.  It’s a moving, heart-breaking service.  After, everyone drifts away to Pete and Maria’s.

The mood is sombre, but there’s no positive side to a child dying. 
Lulubelle holds up magnificently and when it’s over, Alex and I offer her a lift home, but she refuses.

‘I’m staying here for a bit,’ she says
, starting to wobble.  ‘I’ve got to think.  But I’ll call you.’

Across the room, Pete’s watching her.  He winks at me
and I realise it’s his turn now, to keep an eye on her.

After Cosmo’s funeral, I go for a walk.  Alone.  I hadn’t known what to write when I left my posy of snowdrops on his grave, but now, under a velvet sky full of stars, it comes to me.  I want to thank him.  For showing me that life is full of love and hope and goodness, even when there’s the most unbearable sadness.  And those, more than money and fame and celebrity, are what make people precious.  Glancing up at the stars, I wonder if he’s looking down on us, his spirit borne by those golden wings, finally free.