I remember the night my Dad died.

Today, I want to talk about my Dad. On Wednesday it was 4 years since he died. I think about my Dad often. Look at his photos, light a candle. But, I rarely allow myself to think about the night he died. The memories are locked up tightly in a box up high to the right of me. If I stretch my arm up to the right hand corner of my ‘presence’ or my ‘aura’ or my ‘bubble’ I can feel the box. But I don’t open it. It is too painful. This week the memories have rippled to the surface and seeped out. And so to help me deal with them I felt it would help to write them down.

·       I remember the phone call from my Mum to say he had collapsed. 6 o’clock, Friday night. We’d just sat down and poured a drink.

·       I remember being stuck behind the slowest driver in the world. My husband overtook him in the end. The ten minute journey took forever.

·       I remember as we drove up to the house my husband saying “oh god”. I hadn’t seen him at that point.

·       I remember the cold, the darkness. He was lying on the drive outside the front door.

·       I remember my mum repeatedly calling an ambulance, which took an age.

·       I remember my Dad saying “I’m dying”

·       I remember him rolling over him car keys causing the automatic locking system and lights to keep flashing on and off.

·       I remember his ear phones wrapped around his neck and could hear the music playing.

·       I remember trying to give him mouth to mouth out of complete desperation. He pushed me away and said “no Sofie, don’t.” This is the last thing he ever said to me.

·       I remember the neighbours quietly joining us, supporting us.

·       I remember the ambulance turning up, just one man and a car, and my mum saying “should we complain about the wait time?” and me thinking “for god sake just let him get on with his job”.

·       I remember him calling for another ambulance and sending us to get overnight clothes.

·       I remember looking at my mum and exchanging a glance which said “he won’t be coming home though”. We just knew.

·       I remember phoning my brothers to tell them. My eldest was on his way from Norfolk with his family, for an early Christmas get together. They spent the journey not knowing if he would be alive or dead by the time they got here.

·       I remember my other brother’s voice breaking when I told him he had to meet us at the hospital as he said “ok”.

·       I remember my dad’s eyes rolling and him foaming at the mouth as my mum and I screamed at him in the streets to hold on, to keep fighting. I take a little comfort in the fact that the last thing he would have heard was our voices fighting for him and telling him we love him.

·       I remember the paddles, trying to bring him back.

·       I remember knowing he was gone.

·       I remember the ambulance arriving, and as they took him away, they didn’t put the sirens or lights on.

·       I remember meeting my family in the dreary, bleak, beige bereavement room.

·       I remember my eldest brother and his family arriving, my teenage nieces not really knowing what was going on. They shouldn’t have been there.

·       I remember the Dr coming in to prepare us, telling us that his heart was incredibly weak.

·       I remember going to see him. I believe he waited until we were all there together.

·       I remember his face was yellow and peppered with bruises from where he fell on the gravel.

·       I remember families around us looking at us with such pity.

·       I remember crying and my shaking my head at my nieces who burst into tears.

·       I remember the Dr telling us there was nothing more we could do, and how matter of fact my mum was.

·       I remember going to see him again, in a different room, I had to ask my husband if he was dead or alive at that point. He had to tell me again that he was dead.

·       I remember the touch of his skin, I will never forget that feeling.

·       I remember driving home and the first thing I said was “who will walk me down the aisle?” I am thoroughly ashamed at this.

·       I remember pulling his glasses out of my coat pocket and saying “what do I do with these now?”

·       I remember us all sitting around the table and my mum saying “how will I cope financially?”

·       I remember every light in the house flashed on and off repeatedly for a few seconds. This has never happened before or since.

·       I remember a toy from A bugs life,  which my dad had bought me when I was at Uni and poorly, which I hadn’t seen for at least ten years and which hadn’t worked for longer, was in the spare room where I was sleeping. At 3 o’clock in the morning it went off, laughing manically. I have been unable to make it work since.

·       I remember the next day I phoned all friends and relatives. I noticed an answer message flashing (neither of my parents knew how to work it) I pressed the button, and it was my Grandmas voice, who died 2 years earlier, almost to the day, calling my dad’s name. I’m convinced she was letting us know she had him, they were together.

I remember the night my Dad died. And now, back in the box you go.