Part 4... No Date

The Funeral

So the day of the clincher, how this day started I do not know, must of just gotten up early and dressed, smart. Well it was the first funeral I'd been to, but not whose I wanted to be at. We had majority of our family from up north come down, grandparents, uncles and aunts.

I dressed up in just a smart jacket, white shirt, thin black tie and I'm sure you can guess the rest. The hearse pulled up outside commandeered by 2 limos front and rear. It must have been an upsetting time seeing you're own brother's coffin outside, I believe 2 of the reefs said “Son” and “Brother” either side.

My mother was distraught, my dad was somewhat composed, me, well I was as cool as a cucumber. One thing that I've become good at since then is not showing my emotions, I can be a complete wreck inside but my appearance would be as calm as a light breeze. Anyhoo,one of the pallbearers walked lead in front of the hearse or the limo, only for a couple of miles, then it was of to Oxford Crem. I'd never known a journey to take so long, it didn't even feel real, but dreadfully it was.

The limos and hearse pulled up at the entrance, me and my parents got out, and couldn't believe that the amount of my brothers friends that turned up, excuse my language but there were shit loads and I mean shit loads. Everywhere the eye could see were just people, “he must have been popular then....”. We proceeded to walk into the crem, and the pallbearers were unloading the coffin, I'm pretty sure we were already inside when they brought it in or just lingering outside, one or t'other anyway. But by god, the music they had playing, he sure did have bad taste, “My Chemical Romance.... 'I'm not okay'”. Great I had to to listen to that while waiting for the hordes of people to arrive in the hall.

Songs were sung, not that I took part, speeches were read aloud, and the exit song was played which were “Avenged Sevenfold” something a bit more decent!! My brother had a black coffin, just because I suppose it suited his personality for heavy metal etc... Oh yeah, he had the A7X “deathbat” on his coffin if I remember rightly, thought it was quite cool. (my mum then had that tattoo done on the base of her months later!)

Yeah, she had the skull with bat's wing tattooed!

As I was walking out, people were gathered either side of the walkway, I was shaking their hands, keeping a brave face, got to the bottom and there were some flower reefs, one of which was made into a guitar and just general ones that you get. I didn't cry once at the funeral, my Auntie Lyn kept trying me, she held me tight and I just couldn't let go, try as she might, she failed.

We ended up having a buffet at our house, fair few people turned up, had beers and wine etc. on the go. Next minute me and my Uncle Paul decided to get more wine, so we jumped into his black Vauxhall Astra GTI to Sainsburys. Arrived there, few bottles of wine. Checkout, yes, obviously we came from a funeral and no one had gotten changed, I looked quite suave to be honest, So get to checkout, woman at till turns round and says, “you two been to a funeral then?”. Of all the things to say, my uncle said something but I just looked at him in bewilderment, grabbed our wine and went home.

When we got back, must of only been bout 10/20 minutes or so, pretty much everyone left except family. But by kitchen door, was a nice hole in the wall, me dad was nowhere to be seen, turns out he had bit too much to drink and emotions got the better of him. Me and the uncles and aunts ended up going to one of the local pubs to have a few drinks. Got me out of the house and in a different environment which was good to take my mind off the day. Although the tamazepam that was prescribed to my mother helped....