Page 66 of An Unholy Affair
He glanced right. Betsy was fidgeting on Steph’s lap, her chubby arms extended towards him. Panic flared—a Pavlovian response to memories from childhood, when the previous vicar would lecture restless children about staying quiet and knowing their place.
Reaching across his mother, he took his niece. Betsy stood on his legs, grasping his cheeks as if to commandeer all of his attention.
‘Dack-Dack,’ she said solemnly.
Her sweet innocence felt like a punch to the chest.
‘Dack-Dack, no cry.’
‘Jack?’
He glanced up. Eveline was smiling at him, her hand extended to welcome him forward to give the eulogy.Fuck!
‘I’ll take her,’ his mother said, drawing Betsy into her arms.
‘Nana.’
His mother’s face softened. ‘Yes, Betsy. Nana.’
Jack stood, sucking in his stomach as he passed the coffin to avoid touching it. Eveline moved to one side like a proud parent, letting their offspring shine but being ready to catch them if they fell.
His hand went to the pocket with the hip flask in it first, then to the one with the notes he’d made. Pulling them out, he stared at the paper. He didn’t want to raise his head and drown in the sea of black before him.
‘Thank you for coming,’ he began, his voice strange and thin. ‘We’re here today to celebrate the life of my—’
‘Dack-Dack!’ Betsy cried, excitedly.
Jack tensed and looked up, expecting to see his mother shushing her grandchild with disproportionate levels of disapproval. But she was opening her handbag and inviting Betsy to dive in like it was a lucky dip. He glanced at his sister and Steph. They looked bemused, and Emily gave him a thumbs up to continue.
‘Er, we’re here today to celebrate the life of Nigel Newton,’ Jack continued, beginning with when his father was born and where he grew up. Writing the eulogy had been a stark demonstration of how little he knew about his father’s life, and how much he hated him. He didn’t want to stand there and tell people what a total shit his dad had been. But equally, he didn’t want to lie and pretend Nigel Newton was an outstanding man who would be missed by everyone who knew him.
So his speech read like it had been bought off the shelf at a Poundshop and tweaked with the help of AI. There wasn’t even one mildly amusing anecdote. Both his mother and Emily had declined the opportunity to do a reading, and when Simon offered, in a childish fit of pique, Jack said no.
The hip flask weighed heavily in his pocket, like Sauron’s ring of power, demanding attention.
He cleared his throat. ‘My father was a keen churchgoer, and Saint Saviour’s was at the heart of his life. I’m sure he would have been pleased to see so many of you here today.’Christ, this is a load of crap. ‘And celebrating his life. I hope that you can give my mother—’ He glanced over to see his mum utterly ignoring him, as Betsy re-applied her lipstick with age-appropriate accomplishment. Emily and Steph were red-faced as they tried not to laugh.What’s going on?
‘I hope you can support my mother in her time of grief.’
‘Nana! Funny Nana!’ Betsy shrieked.
A ripple of amusement swept through the congregation and Jack’s heart lifted a little.
‘Thank you for coming,’ he said, then quickly went back to his seat, his hand touching the pocket where the hip flask lay.
Jack watchedfrom the side of the room as Finn made his way through the crowds of people towards him, a glass of red wine in his hand. Estelle and Henry’s parents had thrown open Foxbrooke Manor for the wake. Now, one of the drawing rooms was filled with people helping themselves to pastry-based finger food and expensive booze.
‘Exchange this for my empty hip flask?’ Finn asked as he reached Jack’s side.
Jack took the flask from his pocket and swapped it for the glass in his friend’s hand. ‘You knew it would be empty?’
‘If it’d been me, I would have tried to lick the insides.’
‘Cheers,’ Jack replied, then downed the wine in three gulps.
Finn patted him on the arm. ‘You did good. Now you can relax.’
‘That’ll happen when I’m out of here. Do you know any of these people?’
