When the service was over, I felt exhausted and mentally drained. Numb to what was happening around me but crippled by the pain of my reality. I needed to get out and get some fresh air.
Brodie was being buried in the graveyard of the church, so the ordeal wasn’t finished yet, but we’d got through this first part. That was something.
We stood first and followed the vicar as he led us through a side door. He was wittering away to my father about the impressive turnout, but I zoned him out. The rest of the congregation followed, and we all headed to where the grave was situated, pre-dug and covered with a cloth that lay around the hole to try and make it look less harrowing. God forbid we should see it for what it was, a hole in the dirt that we were about to lower my brother’s body into. It didn’t matter how much you dressed it up, that’s what it was.
I took my place at the edge of the grave. Despite staring at the ground for the majority of the day, I found it hard to look there now. So, tentatively, I lifted my head, feeling the soft wet drizzle of the English rain mist over my face. Seemed like the weather mirrored the mood of the day. It was sombre, gloomy, and looked like the heavens were about to open at any minute to drench us to the bone. The perfect day for a funeral.
I scanned the faces coming out of the church; Jensen, Chase, a few aunts and uncles that we only ever saw at Christmas, and then I went cold. Zak Atwood, Finn Knowles, and Ryan Hardy strolled out like they belonged there. Ryan was holding hands with Danny Winters’ little sister, Emily, and they all wore the same fake, sorrowful expression on their faces. I wanted to march over to them and tell them to leave.
Why had they come?
To gloat?
The reason we were here at all was because their friend had murdered my brother.
I gritted my teeth, taking deep, fortifying breaths as I realised they had to know where Brandon was hiding. They were probably the ones protecting him. Coming to give a fake show of support and then heading back to Mathers to tell him all about it. Let him wallow in the pride he felt at taking another man’s life. The thought sickened me.
They weren’t welcome, and I wanted to tell them to leave, but when my mum whispered, “Are you okay, Harper?” into my ear, I snapped my head away from them. I wouldn’t give them the satisfaction of knowing how they got to me, or of telling Brandon how truly broken I was.
“I need this bit over with, Mum.” I kept my breathing deep and steady, needing that panting rhythm to keep me sane. “This is the part I’ve been dreading.”
The pallbearers positioned Brodie’s coffin over the grave and the vicar said his final words. Dad pulled me into him as they lowered Brodie’s body into the ground, and Mum came behind us so we could shelter from the hurt together.
People around us snivelled and cried into their tissues. I wanted to tell them to shut the hell up. What were they bawling over? Tomorrow, they’d go on with their lives as if nothing had ever happened. It might’ve been a bad day for them, but it was a bad fucking life for us. Their fake tears and weak support were no help. If anything, it drove me more insane, thinking this day was all about their grief and their feelings. We barely saw most of them from one year to the next. This had zero impact on their lives, and they needed to stop acting like it did.
Then came the ashes to ashes part, and the vicar led the tradition of throwing a handful of dirt onto the casket below. I didn’t want to do that. I couldn’t bear the thought of it. Why would I want to throw mud down to say goodbye to someone so precious? Instead, I took a white rose from the flower arrangement I’d had made in the colours of Brodie’s favourite football team, spelling out ‘brother’, and threw that down.
“He’s always with you, Harper, love.” Dad repeated his sentiment from earlier, and I wiped away the deluge of tears that drenched my face and soaked through to my collar.
“I know, Dad. I feel him.”
I didn’t.
Not since the day he’d left me.
I felt nothing but pain.
I’d stayed awake night after night, willing him to come to me or speak to me in some way, but it never happened. My other half was gone, and I was all alone.
I stood back and watched my dad take a handful of soil and drop it carefully down, and then it was my mum’s turn. She grabbed the soil, but when it came time to let go, she couldn’t do it. She broke down right there at the graveside, sobbing as my dad caught her and pulled her into him. In that moment, watching my parents huddled together on the ground in their combined grief, my own misery was replaced with fury, and I turned to look at the traitors standing at the foot of the church drive. They were huddled together and no doubt picking over the pieces of my brother’s death like the vultures they were.
Why should they get away with it?
They were as guilty as he was. They had blood on their hands and they needed to know.
Staying focused, I stomped over the uneven dewy grass of the churchyard. Finn Knowles looked up, and when he saw me charging towards them, he said something that made them all stop and turn to watch.
“We’re so sorry about Brodie,” Finn blurted out once I was in front of them. “If there’s anything we can do-” He sounded contrite, but I knew it was bullshit. His eyes were sincere, but his actions were useless. As pointless as his words.
“If you wanted to help you wouldn’t have come here today.” I was shaking but trying not to show it, so I folded my arms over my chest to stop them from seeing me tremble. How could they stand there knowing what they’d done? “Are you spying? For him? I know you know where he is.”
Ryan stepped forward and went to touch my arm, but I pulled away. I didn’t want anything to do with them. The bloody Renaissance men, as they liked to call themselves. What a joke. More like Satan’s spawn. The devil’s lackeys. Evil really didn’t give a fuck and neither did they.
“If we knew where he was, we’d tell you,” Finn said, then turned to look at the others, probably willing them to back him up.
“I don’t believe you.” I stood firm. I would never believe a word that came out of their mouths. Not where Brodie was concerned, and certainly not when they were trying so hard to hide the truth about Brandon fucking Mathers. “You’d do anything to save one of your own.”
“No, we wouldn’t. Not with this. What happened was… awful.”
I scoffed and shook my head at Zak Atwood’s woefully inappropriate description of my brother’s murder.
“Awful? You want to know what’s awful? The fact that you came here today thinking you deserved a place in that church. Neither of you deserve to be here. You’ve got blood on your hands and you know it. You might not have been there that night, when Brodie died, but you had a hand in it. You could’ve stopped him at any time, and you can stop him now. Don’t act like you’re all innocent.” I looked each one of them in the eye, but apart from Emily, they couldn’t look back. “If you really want to help, tell the police where he is, or better yet, tell me. I’d rather see my own form of justice served, anyway.”
Emily stepped forward, rubbing Ryan on the arm as she did, as if he were the one who needed consoling.
“Harper, I don’t know you that well, but I know what it’s like to lose a brother. I think I understand a bit about what you’re feeling right now.”