The Story of Us by Dani Atkins

finding it extremely hard trying to look anywhere except at the waiting trestle stands positioned by the altar. It wasn’t much better looking at the blown-up portrait of Amy that was displayed on an easel directly beside them. I don’t know when the shot had been taken, but it was a lovely photograph, with Amy’s skin sporting a soft tan and her hair blowing around her face like a honey-gold cloud. She was laughing at the camera and her eyes were shining brightly, and whoever had taken the picture had captured her in a way that was so achingly familiar that looking at the image was an actual physical pain.
    It was inevitable, I knew, that the Travises would have picked this church for Amy’s funeral. It was the local church, closest to where they had once lived, and it was the one where Amy herself had been christened as a baby. It was also the one where, in three days’ time, Richard and I had planned to be married. I only hoped that my mother, who kept looking at Richard and me with such wistful sadness, would have enough restraint not to voice her regret at the cancellation to anyone today.
    I turned around and surveyed the sea of sombre-clothed people behind us. So many of those present today had also been on the guest list to the wedding. How many of them were thinking of the very different ceremony they had been planning to attend? Bright-coloured clothes, with flamboyant hats, instead of black suits and ties; a choir singing out in celebration, instead of in sorrow; a service that produced smiles full of joy, instead of hearts full of grief. How many of them blamed Richard and me for being indirectly responsible for Amy’s death? It wasn’t a difficult equation: no wedding, no hen party, no crash, no funeral.
    I swallowed the lump in my throat, which felt almost golf-ball sized, and stared intently at the column of late arrivals snaking in through the large oak doors. The pews were full, so I guessed most of them would have to observe the service from the rear of the church. I scanned the row of those already standing up against the back wall, my head going from left to right. The shock at seeing him there was so startling that I actually heard the small bones in my neck crick as I whipped my head around to check that I hadn’t just imagined it. Standing tall and immaculately suited against the wall of the church was Jack Monroe.
    I knew he’d seen me, had probably even noticed my look of wide-eyed surprise, but the only acknowledgement he gave was the merest inclination of his head. After a moment’s hesitation, I nodded back. I turned around, about to mention it to Richard, but caught one look at his face and decided against it. Richard was not doing well. I knew from the moment he had picked me up that morning that he was only just holding it all together. There was a tightness around his mouth, as though every facial muscle was being held in rigid paralysis, lest it give away any trace of emotion. Once we were alone in his car, I had questioned anxiously, ‘Are you all right?’ He had looked at me bleakly.
    â€˜Not really. Are you?’ I shook my head, yet still I was surprised at his reaction. ‘I just don’t do well at funerals,’ was his eventual explanation, and as I’d never been to one with him before, and hoped not to again for a very long time, I had to accept his answer.
    As much as you think you are ready for it, nothing prepares you for that moment when a shuffling silence descends on the church, the organist begins to play the first straining notes, and the pall-bearers begin their slow procession up the aisle. I reached down for Richard’s hand and gripped it with ferocious intensity, trying to focus all my attention on the bones of our entwined fingers and skin, instead of on the shiny black casket with the gleaming silver handles, being held aloft on the shoulders of the six men, walking slowly past Amy’s friends and family.