Red Ink Read Online Free Page B

imaginary fluff off his jacket. Her dress is all vibrant reds and golds and purples. It’s in-your-face cheerful. She’s a giant, weeping Red Admiral in a house of gloom. Irene is staying at the house when we go so she can sort out the food for afterwards. It feels totally wrong that everyone will be chewing on Jamaican chicken drumsticks and lumps of fried plantain after a big ‘Greek’ funeral. Paul said it’s what Mum would have wanted. I said it was slapdash. He argued that it would be ‘multicultural’, so I reminded him what he had originally said – that the whole thing had to be Greek. “Make your mind up,” I told him. That got him running back to his reference books. If it had been up to Mum there would be more of an aftershow party – a laser light show, drag queens in G-strings, that kind of thing.
    I’m halfway down the stairs, stepping carefully over Kojak, when I realise Paul is staring at me with this stricken face.
    “What?” I go.
    He is looking me up and down in horror, like I’ve come downstairs smeared in mud rather than dressed all smart.
    “I bought that dress for your mum,” he croaks.
    “Did you?” I go. I give Kojak a rub behind the ears – he must be feeling it even worse today. I do the rest of the stairs and then unhook my coat off the end of the banister. I need to get my bag from the living room. “She still in there?”
    Paul’s Adam’s apple is doing a dance. “They’ve carried her into the car.”
    “Good.”
    I go into the living room. Everything is like it was, except the air seems different. Museum air. The coffin has gone. There is a bowl of apple, quince and pomegranate on the coffee table. Paul has done loads of research on all the right Greek rituals – found some really weird ones, dragged out from the dark ages. He was talking about putting a coin under Mum’s tongue to pay Charon the miser who will ferry her body across the River Styx. Loopy stuff. People who exaggerate their Irish roots are called Plastic Paddies, I heard once. Paul has become a Plastic Zorba. Just like Mum.
    The one thing I know he is doing right is the
kollyva
. I got his mum Irene to make this massive dish of boiled wheat for the wake. Sounds gross, but it’s what you’re supposed to do. I know this because Mum talked about it in The Story. Paul reckoned I’d got it wrong, that you only make
kollyva
for the days when you remember the dead, not funerals – but I set him straight on that one. Irene put almonds and icing sugar on top of the wheat. I told her it had to be decorated with a cross too, made out of pomegranate seeds.
    Back in the hallway, Paul is holding the front door open, taking big breaths. The hand that’s not on the door is trembling. I can’t look at that hand. Something about it makes me feel sick.
    “Let’s go, then.” Paul is pretending to be cheerful and efficient. I don’t want to join in with this jolly chit-chat, so I’m glad when Irene steps between us. She won’t let me escape without giving her a hug. It’s like being wrapped in a duvet.
    “You be brave now.”
    I’m almost disappointed when she lets me go, this woman I hardly know.
    Once we’re in the car, Paul pulls himself together.
    “You’re wearing your mum’s perfume. That’s nice,” he goes.
    He puts his hand on top of mine, gives it a pat. I go rigid. He moves his hand away.
    “Bit pongy though,” I say. “Gets in your throat.”
    I pull up the neck of the dress and give it a sniff. Paul looks away, starts craning his head around the driver’s shoulder to check the car carrying Mum is still there. I don’t know where he thinks it’s going to go – speeding off to do the pick-up for some bank robbers? We crawl along the high street so passersby can have a good nose to see who’s got unlucky. I try not to look at the car ahead. The cheesy wreaths spelling out Mum in pink carnations were Paul’s idea. So was the big, flowery Greek flag. The little dove in white roses was my