I creep into the back of the church, hoping that no-one will notice me.
The church is decrepit and cold, decay dripping from its pores. My eyes focus on the coffin, perched there in awesome desolation. Was it only three weeks . . .
‘Is this seat taken sir?’ She was wearing red and yellow polka dot shorts, black tights with a tear in them just below the left knee and a blue t-shirt with the slogan ‘I See Dumb People.’ She was slim and tiny, just under 5ft I’d guess and sported sun-glasses on top of a completely bald head.
‘Err, no,’ I replied and she plonked herself down opposite me.
‘You don’t remember me do you?’ she said with a sardonic smile.
‘Yes I do, it’s . . .’
‘Danielle, I was in your English class last year,’ the smile didn’t falter.
‘Ah yes, and now you’re …?’ I really couldn’t remember her.
‘Dying sir.’
She stated it so matter-of-factly that it took my breath away. I didn’t know how to respond so I said: ‘But you look . . . ’
‘Healthy? Yeah, today’s a good day but they’re getting fewer.’
Despite the lack of hair, she was very attractive. In fact the lack of hair added to her angelic look. If she was dying, it wasn’t showing in those beautiful deep blue eyes. There was an awkward silence because I really couldn’t think of anything to say.
‘I want you to write me a poem.’
‘What?’
‘You were always banging on about poems in your class, how important they were, so I thought, yeah, Mr Roberts, he’s the man. They said you come here for lunch. I watched this film last night on telly and a man read out a poem at a funeral.’
I asked her if it was Four Weddings and A Funeral. She nodded and seemed to shrink down into the seat.
‘Ah Funeral Blues, W.H. Auden.’
‘Yeah, whatever ... Anyway it made me cry. I never cry, didn’t even when the doc told me, but this poem, it made me think about things, about what’s going to happen to me.”
Again she paused, as if composing herself. ‘I ain’t good with feelings so I want you to write a poem that I can leave for me mam when I’m dead. My mate Chantelle will read it out at the funeral’
If the girl was trying to come to terms with dying then she needed professional help – counselling - not a poem from me.
‘Much as I’d like to Danielle it wouldn’t be appropriate,’ I said.
Her gaze hardened.
‘You could do it if you wanted to. You didn’t mind doing a favour for Samantha did you? A favour that could get sir detention BIG time and loadsa lines if anyone found out. Was that "appropriate"?’
There was no way I could hide my shock and she revelled in it.
I’m 27 and Alice and I have been married three years. Little Sarah is 18 months old and there’s another one on the way. I love my wife but things had been, well a bit inactive, which had been a problem for me.
So when I first clapped eyes on Samantha I knew I was in big, big trouble. It was wrong, stupid - and against the rules. But she was something else, the complete abandon with which she flung herself at me was overpowering and, if I’m being honest, flattering. I should have resisted, God knows I should, but I didn’t. The fling didn’t last long, she quickly moved onto someone else, and eventually out of my class, away from further temptation. I’d thought that was the end of it.
‘You didn’t think anybody knew about you and Samantha, did you? Well I do, so I think this changes things, don’t you, I mean we don’t want wifey finding out do we?’
‘Oh.’ My head was spinning, I wanted to throw up.
‘You can text the poem to me. It’s got to be really special but that should be easy-peasy for you. I want me mam to know that I love her.’
I suggested, as kindly as I could, that she should try and write it herself, but if I was hoping to fob her off that easily I was mistaken.
‘Doh! If anybody should know how crap I’m at writing, it’s you.’
She scribbled her mother’s name on a piece of paper, together with her mobile number and pushed it across the table.
‘What about your dad?’ I asked.
‘That twat? Long gone.’
For a moment I noticed a crack in that tough exterior, just a flicker of emotion. It was then that I believed she was telling me the truth about her illness. She sat silently for a moment, ripping bits off a paper napkin and flinging them to one side.
‘Just send the text sir and you’ll never have to see or hear from me again, promise.’
So there it was, I was being blackmailed by a 17 year old terminally ill girl.
I had little choice, so I sent a poem the next day, but a week later she turned up again at the café. This time she looked dreadful, those beautiful eyes had disappeared, devoured by a haunted, desperate look, redrawn by her illness. She was dressed in shabby, grey jogging bottoms and a plain green sweatshirt.
‘I’ve got one more favour to ask.’ No confident demanding this time, more a mournful plea.
‘Danielle, this really must stop, you need to find someone to talk to.’ I hoped I’d found a middle ground between being firm and not sounding callous.
‘I don’t want to die a virgin.’
This girl had already stunned me once and now she’d done it again. I gawped at her and quickly cast my eyes around the café to see if anyone had overheard.
‘I know you think all us girls off the Mason Estate are thick slags, but I ain’t. I don’t want Tyrone in the back of his crappy Corsa, I don’t want it to be like that, I want it to be in a posh hotel, bathrobes, champagne, chocolates, that’s what I want.’
‘But why me?’
‘You’re dead fit, all the girls say so, not just Samantha. And anyway, sir’s got previous.’
‘Danielle . . .’
‘I’ve got your text, and your poem, it could easily be misread you know. Do you want me to send it to your wife? Shall I do it now?’ She pulled her mobile out of her pocket and I jolted upright.
‘No!’
‘You don’t have to fancy me, I know I’m not a babe like Samantha, but you can pretend can’t you?’
Despite the ultimatum, there was genuine sadness in her eyes.
‘Danielle, please . . .’
‘If I don’t hear from you, then Chantelle will be told to reveal all at me funeral.’
With that she walked out and I realised with horror that I was tempted. It would be so easy, any my shameful secret would be safe. I would be safe.
When I thought about my beautiful family I buried my head in my hands. Oh what sordid thoughts lurked just below the surface! Was I that close to the beast?
My marriage and career were already threatened because I had indulged myself without a thought for the consequences. And I thought I could rescue it all by taking advantage of a misguided, dying teenage girl. What a complete and utter shit I was.
-------------------------------------------
So, here I am.
"Is this seat taken?"
I ease myself down onto the hard, wooden pew.
I could have stayed away, but here I sit in this horrible place, expecting my world to collapse. Chantelle steps up with ‘Danielle’s’ poem. She looks like The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, but plumper and with purple hair. There are tears everywhere and a woman I presume is Danielle’s mother is sobbing uncontrollably.
Chantelle finishes the poem and sits down without saying a word about me. I breathe a heavy sigh of relief as the service ends and everyone files out after the coffin, heads bowed, tears being wiped away.
As she passes, Chantelle hands me a letter. I wait until the church is completely empty before opening it.
Dear Mr Roberts
Read some poems on the internet and they’ve helped me learn a lot about what’s right and what’s wrong. It was wrong of me to blackmail you, and it was right of you to turn me down. It shows that you are a good person deep down, see? You can teach an old dog new tricks. I just wanted you to know, you can stop worrying; Chantelle knows nothing about all this and I made Samantha promise never to tell anybody about you and her. A deathbed promise, cool hey dude? I’ve wrote this poem for you, but whatever you do, don’t you go writing red lines all over it.
Poems for tossers they said
But they aint the one joining the dead
I think your words will make everyone cry
But hey, what a way to say goodbye
It dont do no good to be bad
In the end it just makes you sad
So choose the right way
And make Danielles day
When you might be led astray
Think back to my funeral day
Danielle xxx
I walk out of the church and gratefully suck in the sparkling air of a glorious spring morning. The sky is crystal blue and the birds are chatting. A few feet away, they are burying Danielle, my pint-sized poet, accompanied by anguished wailing.
I am off the hook for now but of course there’s no guarantee that Samantha will keep silent. Do I have the balls to choose the right way, Danielle's way, and confess my shame to Alice?
© Patrick O’Connor 2012