Last One Standing

Last One Standing

Sometimes comfort can be found in the strangest of places.

Rose liked the seaside. She liked it in the autumn, when the wind nipped your fingers and skies were grey. She liked to walk along the promenade in late October or early November when it was cold and the winds drove the waves over the barriers. It had always been a sort of game to run at the barriers, taunting the waves, only to jump back, laughing, as they hit the shore, the spray reaching us as they did. And once it was over, when our cheeks were too red, our hair too wind-blown and our fingers too cold, we’d go home for hot tea by a hot fire and sit up talking late into the night. We always went to my house, sat in my room and sat by my fire.

I can picture us now. Obviously we didn’t drink the tea until we got older. Fifteen going on sixteen. I can picture Connie sitting on my sofa, her feet leisurely sprawled across my coffee table. I can remember myself half laying, half sitting on the sofa, occasionally Connie’s leg being my headrest. I remember Mary sitting on my beanbag next to the sofa, the opposite side of Connie to me. And I can remember Rose. She would sit on the cushions, always my green one, the blue one and the shoddily made patchwork one that had taken me hours to put together that Rose loved even more for it. She would sit on the floor, on the cushions; her legs bent underneath her, and either rest her head on the cushion next to me or on my stomach.

That’s one of the things I will always remember about our friendship. The intimacy. Female friendships are often rather intimate, but ours was very much so. Not a sexual sort of intimate, although we would often joke about it, calling each other our 'wife', but a close, comforting intimate.

Connie, Mary, Rose and myself had all come from mix-matched backgrounds, our heritages reaching the corners of the earth. Connie was New Zealand born, having moved to Wales with her alchoholic mother when she was seven. Mary’s parents were the sorts of people who, in society’s eye, should have never married, much less have children. They loved each other, of that anyone was sure of, but they were from different classes, different worlds, and Mary’s father had either severed or lost ties with his aristocracy. Rose was adopted. She knew her Canadian mother had died during child-birth and that her father, a French farm owner, had no wishes to contact his daughter, just as said daughter never wished to set eyes on him. Me, I grew up in changing depths of suburbia before my family, all of English/Irish blood, found our money and ended up as what my mother would only ever deem ‘comfortable’. Rose would always joke that I was the only ‘uncomplicated’ one of the lot of us. I suppose I would have been had my father had not been the unfaithful fool I now know he was.

Over the years, particularly through our teens, friendships changed. New girls came and went, boys joined our group and there were, inevitably, boyfriends, some more worthwhile than others. However, no matter what the size of our ‘group’ was, there was always the four. Connie, Mary, Rose and Jade. The closest four. We had other close friends, but compared to the bonds we four shared they were acquaintances. The four of us faced so much together. We got through problems with boyfriends, Connie’s spate in foster care while her mother was in rehab, Mary’s disastrous ‘introduction to her grandparents world’ as she had called it that nearly tore her family farther apart. We faced my run in with an eating disorder that I wouldn’t have been able to get through had it not been for the others. And we faced Rose’s ‘don’t talk about it’.

Rose’s ‘don’t talk about it’ happened when we were sixteen. Rose found out about her adoption and her father’s wishes not to have anything to do with her. It rocked her badly. Badly enough for her to land herself in the psychiatric ward with slit wrists. At her wishes we spent a good few months talking through it and never bought it up again unless she did herself. It was one of those things that unless you knew (or got a magnifying lens to her wrists and studied them), you wouldn’t. You would never have guessed that the usually cheerful girl with a dirty laugh who wanted to own a big labrador and call it 'Sammy' had once been trapped in such a dark pit of loneliness and self-loathing. It stunned you when you found out because it seemed so out of character.

The four of us attended the same university, slept in the same Halls and went to the same parties. After our first year we shared the same house along with three others from our newly extended group. We moved to the same part of London after graduating and drank our coffees in the same coffee shop. My coffee shop.

We thought we would grow old together. We thought we would be one another's bridesmaids, children’s godmothers. Connie, Mary, Rose and Jade. Friends since we were eight, friends until we died. Only we didn’t count on it being that soon.

We had booked our holiday to Chicago months before it happened. We were going to spend Halloween there. Connie’s fiancé, Roger, had organised it for us, using his generous staff discount he got from the holiday company he worked for.

The night before we flew out my long-term partner, Andrew, dragged me away from my packing and whisked me off to our favourite restaurant to our favourite table. I knew something was up by the way he was acting. I knew what was happening when he got down on one knee but I’ll never forget his words for more reasons that you’d expect.

‘Jade, I know you and the girls are going on holiday tomorrow and I’m sorry if I mess that up by saying this. I love you Jade, and I can’t wait any longer. I couldn’t live with myself if I didn’t say this and you went away and something awful happened. Will you marry me?’

Andrew did mess up our holiday plans but I didn’t mind. I was getting married. The girls were ecstatic. I promised them and Andrew that I would stay London and fly out to meet the others in a couple of days. I’d still be there in time for Halloween and most of the holiday but I still had time to be with my fiancé beforehand. I couldn’t stop saying it. Fiancé. It was like a dream come true.

I’ll always remember seeing the girls off at the airport. Although we were parting (albeit for only a few days), it felt like our little group was growing stronger. We had all finally found our feet in the world. Connie finally had her ‘name’ in the interior design world. And she had Roger. Mary had her career, a leading psychology consultant and head of her own department. Rose had her books and her big Labrador, Sammy, just like she’d always wanted. And I, I had my business and I had my Andrew. Everything was going perfectly. We were all so happy with the hand fate had dealt us all. Happy. It was nice while it had lasted. I had no idea how we were going to be so mercilessly torn apart in a matter of hours.

I was with Andrew when I got the call. Mary’s mother was hysterical, as were Connie’s and Rose’s when they called me later. They had landed safely and were getting into a taxi to go to the hotel when another car collided with theirs. Apparently the taxi had been leaking fuel. Connie was on the pavement, Mary just behind her and Rose in the car. The doctors said that Connie and Mary were extremely lucky. Rose had no chance.

Mary was comatose for over a month before she came around. She’s in a wheelchair for the rest of her life. She doesn’t want anything to do with any of us anymore. I haven’t seen her since just after it happened. Her skin is badly scarred from the explosion. She hardly leaves the residential hospital she lives in. Connie has been ventilator-dependant ever since. Her family is battling for the right to turn it off and to let her die. She has no quality of life, her mother says. I hate to say it but I think I may agree with her. Connie is in a permanent vegetative state, kept alive by machines. It’s horrible seeing her lying there. She isn’t the same person. She’s just a shell. The doctors said Rose was unrecognisable.


Today is the 26th of October. A year to the day. I chose not to be with her family. They’ve gone to Chicago to see where it happened. I didn’t think I’d find any comfort in that city. I doubt I ever will.

Wales is where we belong. It’s where my memories of them are. Especially the beach. Today is one of our classic autumn days. The wind is nipping my fingers and the sky is grey. It’s cold and the wind is driving the waves over the barriers. In my arms is the shoddily made patchwork pillow that took hours to make but Rose loved. I imagine that if I concentrate hard enough I can see us running at the barriers, taunting the waves, only to jump back, laughing, as they hit the shore, the spray reaching us as they did. That game belongs in a different life.

Andrew didn’t want me coming out here, in the cold, on my own. He says I’m in no state to be out in this horrible cold, this unforgiving weather. He doesn’t understand. He tries to though, but he doesn’t, can’t understand. This is where I’ll always remember them. On the beach. Rose liked the seaside.

And now that it’s over, now that my cheeks are too red, my hair is too windblown and my fingers are too cold, I’ll go home for hot tea by a hot fire and sit up late into the night. I’ll sit and think about how we always went to my house, sat in my room and sat by my fire and picture us all. Connie with her feet on my table, me lying on her leg, Mary on the bean bag and Rose, always on the green cushion, the blue one and the patchwork one I now hold against my swollen stomach, resting her head on my stomach. I’ll remember the intimacy and how we were going to grow old together and be each other’s bride’s maids and children’s godmothers.

There’s only Andrew to drink tea with now. He tries to understand, he really does, but he’s part of my other life, my ‘now’ life, not the one I’ve just revisited. I sit here crying thinking of the others, the beach and how they won’t drink tea with me, won’t be there late into the night. I’ll think of how they weren’t my bride’s maids and how they aren’t going to be my child’s godmothers.

I’ll come back to the beach next year, and the year after that, and the one after. I’ll take the patchwork cushion and then go back and drink tea. Sometimes comfort can be found in the strangest of places.