Page 59 of Diamond in the Rough

“Don’t think about it.”

“And scared, he would’ve been scared.”

“You’ve gotta stop torturing yourself. There’s nothing you could’ve done. If—if it was smoke inhalation, it would’ve been like falling asleep.”

Jake glared until his eye twitched. “Suffocating on toxic fumes. That’s if it was the smoke, but if it was the flames—”

“Stop it.”

Jake held his face in his hands.

“Carl’s family are arranging the funeral,” Sam murmured.

Jake didn’t reply, and Sam went on.

“Next Friday. St Alban’s Church. Turns out he didn’t even have a brother called Tom. He’s got a mum and a sister though, Emma. I spoke to her on the phone. Did you know her?”

“No,” Jake mumbled.

“She’s arranging it. It’ll be a small gathering at the church. Carl hadn’t spoken to his family for quite some time, some rift between them. Did you know about that?”

The sting returned to Jake’s eyes, and he rubbed harshly at his face. “No. It’s the kinda thing I should’ve known, isn’t it, but I didn’t. He knew everything about me, and I knew nothing about him. I can’t—I can’t go to his funeral.”

“Why not?”

“I can’t sit there and pretend this isn’t my fault.”

“How is it your fault?”

“It just is. It should’ve been me. It was meant to be me.”

Sam pinched the top of his nose. “You’re going to the funeral. You need to say goodbye.”

“I don’t want to say goodbye.”

“No one does, but we have to.”

****

It was the first funeral Jake had ever been to. Two weeks after the fire. Two weeks of silence from Maddox and being stuck not knowing what to do. He didn’t even have work to distract himself. He’d been at Sam’s house, staring blindly at the TV.

Sam elbowed his side, and Jake snapped to attention. He turned to the huge double doors of the church and looked at the coffin. When it passed him, his nostrils pulsed of their own accord and he thought he could smell burned flesh.

Rachel linked arms with him and sobbed into a tissue, and Sam stood on the other side of him, ever watchful, looking at Jake with unmasked concern.

He’d worn his work trousers and shirt but had had to borrow a suit jacket from Sam. It was too big, and Sam’s scent clung to it. Jake didn’t feel like himself; he didn’t feel like anything.

The people sitting closer to the front had vaguely familiar features to Carl, similar noses, the same sandy blond hair Carl had before he started dying it. Emma had greeted Jake with a soft smile, but he’d been unable to return it.

He zoned out and kept his head low. Rachel tried to catch his eye, but he refused her and instead tucked their linked arms close to his body, giving her a squeeze.

The vicar fell silent at the sound of a revving engine outside the church, so loud Jake felt the vibrations. It stopped, and the vicar bobbed his head before opening his mouth to continue. The door at the end of the church swung open, thumping the wall.

Everyone turned and glared at the late arrivals. Two of them. A woman with straight blonde hair, and a skinny man with his tied back. Jake recognised him immediately. Billy cast his amused gaze over everyone in the church.

“Sorry,” he said before taking a seat.

The woman sat beside him and failed to control her smirk. Jake stared at them, and they stared back, but there was nothing hidden in their gaze, only glee. He thought back to the day Billy had walked into Stationery Corner. He hadn’t even spared Jake a glance, but he’d turned in Carl’s direction, flashed a look at him before abruptly leaving.

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