Page 92 of Her Last Breath

‘Can you pull some strings for me, please? I want access to Burnley Cemetery and I need you to ask your cousin to arrange a special taxi. And an emergency carer to help with Mum.’

Thirty minutes later, Jane and her mother were being driving through the streets of Burnley. They were in the back of the car, the female carer and driver in the front, a screen dividing them. Her mother asked if they could see a few places on their way. The house Maeve had grown up in. The old cinema where she had met Jane’s father, now a carpet shop. St Agnes Church.

‘It was a different time then,’ her mother said, as the sights of Burnley in the evening whizzed past the taxi windows. ‘Money was always something we had to really work for, but there weren’t all these problems. There was a real sense of community.’

Jane hated that word, it was loaded with shame and guilt for her.

‘It was a good time, a happy time,’ Jane acknowledged. ‘I know what you mean, the drugs just weren’t there then. I always felt safe, even when I was walking home on my own all those years. Can you imagine that now?’

Jane sounded just as ancient as her mother, thinking back to the good old days. If things were getting worse, did that mean she and her colleagues were failing at their jobs?

‘We kept an eye out. You thought you were going to school alone, but I knew you were safe, because you passed the homes of people we knew. There would always be someone to look out for you if needed. And you also had Ed at first.’

His name didn’t feel like an accusation this time. Just a fact, this young boy who was part of their lives once.

‘And in school the dinner ladies used to report back to you, I remember that.’

Jane had once accidentally tipped over the mashed potato tray, causing a mess and disrupting dinner for the other children. Her mother was already in the street hollering blue murder as soon as Jane turned the corner, the gossip network revealing her misdemeanours before she had even left the school premises.

‘Most of them are long gone now. Your teachers as well. Apart from Mrs Fox. Remember her?’

‘The bane of my life,’ Jane groaned.

‘I think she would say you were the bane of her life.’

They both laughed, remembering the cheek Jane used to give her French teacher.

‘Remember when you no longer had her for classes?’

Jane groaned.

‘You saw her in Kwik Save with me, and she asked how you were getting on. What did you say to her, do you remember?

‘Mum, don’t,’ Jane said, laughing at the memory.

‘You said, “Fine now, miss, that I don’t have your boring lessons to go to.” I nearly died of the shame.’

They were both laughing now as the taxi abruptly pulled them to a sobering stop. The care worker helped Jane as she got Maeve into a wheelchair, Jane holding back her shock at how light her mother was. Wrapping a blanket around Maeve’s knees, Jane spotted the graveyard warden waiting for them, carrying an electric lamp.

‘I’m Bilal,’ he said. ‘Sameer’s cousin.’

‘Hi, Jane,’ she said as she wheeled her mother after him.

Bilal was the warden for the Muslim part of the cemetery, but he had keys to the main gate.

‘Thank you for doing this,’ she said.

‘No worries, family first and all that. Plus, you’re a copper, so doubt I’ll be getting into trouble for any of this.’

Jane followed his lamp as it cast swathes of light in front of them. She kept her eyes away from the Victorian mausoleums and dark shadows, focusing instead on pushing her mother’s wheelchair.

‘You need help with that?’ he asked.

‘I’m OK, thanks,’ Jane said.

Bilal told them to wait a moment when they got to Ed’s grave, walking ahead of them to leave his light beside her brother’s gravestone. He walked back to them, indicating they should go alone. Jane took her mother slowly to where Ed was buried, thinking they hadn’t been here at the same time since the day they buried him.

‘Oh, my beautiful boy,’ her mother said through tears, as Jane brought her to a stop at the foot of Ed’s grave. The tombstone was granite, his name, dates and a prayer written in bold gold lettering, which glinted under the light of the electric lamp. Jane reached down and squeezed her mother’s shoulder. Maeve reached up her papery hand and gripped Jane’s. They stood there in silence for a few moments.