On Tuesday I had my first counselling appointment. My pouch has been playing up for like five days. Last night I had another bad dream. Next Friday is my uncle’s funeral. It hasn’t been the best of weeks. This prose thing that follows happened last weekend.

I wanted to make something out of this, a poem or something. But it is what it is. It doesn’t need dressing up.

***

I asked our mum:

“Do you think we would have got along?”

I expected a “maybe” or “yeah, probably…” but instead I got such
a definite “yes”–

“Oh, yeah, you would have got along great. You would’ve had loads in common, since he was so into his computers and all of that. He was
much calmer than your sister as well, much less rowdy. You would have got along really well.”

I blinked furiously as we walked into Morrisons. Surprised at
the answer, and surprised at how pleased the answer made me, that there would have been something wonderful there. Surprised at how equally sad it made me that we had missed out on it. Surprised at how important it felt for me that I now knew the answer to that question.

“it’s shit, isn’t it?” our mum said.

“Yeah,” I said. And wished far more than usual for there to be a heaven so maybe one day we could catch up with what we’ve missed out on.