Page 31 of Four Weddings and a Funeral Director

Mort

‘It’s good to be back in the old digs.’ Gramps set aside his rolly suitcase and cast a squinty eye around the funeral home. ‘Even if it does look … different. Although my vision isn’t what it used to be. What happened to the organ?’

‘The termites,’ improvised Mort. ‘Lily found me the pianola as a temporary replacement. Elsie does the job, but she lacks a certain gravitas.’

‘Elsie, hmm?’ Gramps thumbed the middle C key that Lily had written her note on.

‘One of Lily’s names. The girl names everything. Her car, large appliances, that plant that Jorge had dropped off as a thanks for all the cake, novelty kitchen sponges … She’ll name her pot of tea if she thinks it’s going to take a while to drink.’

Mort had spent his whole life trying not to get attached to things, and here was Lily giving the local pigeons a cohesive backstory told in three parts, complete with character charts and star signs.

Gramps lazily thumbed out ‘Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star’ on the pianola. ‘Sounds like you’re in love with her.’

Mort spluttered. ‘Why would … What gave you that idea?’ Mort folded his arms indignantly. ‘Absolutely not!’

‘Definitely love,’ diagnosed Gramps, letting the last note of ‘Twinkle, Twinkle’ linger.

Then he tapped the long rectangle of photo booth pictures that Mort and Lily had taken a few weeks back, which Mort had stuck under the lid of the pianola.

All right, so Mort had kept the picture, but so what?

He needed proof of the switcheroo in the event of a legal claim.

And besides, he looked quite fetching in the third photo, and it never hurt to have an updated head shot available.

Gramps ruffled Mort’s hair, something Mort had always felt should fall under cruel and unusual punishment. ‘I’ve seen enough partners sobbing over their dead lover’s corpse in my time to know love when I see it.’

Mort scraped his hair back into its usual messy state. ‘Really selling it there for me, Gramps.’

‘Oh, pshaw.’ Gramps settled on the chaise longue, propping his moccasins up on the coffee table. A gift from a casket company a few years back, the slippers had little coffins etched into the soles – even in retirement Gramps was still living that funeral planner life. ‘What’s life, without love?’

‘It’s plenty,’ countered Mort. ‘It’s the bills paid and a roof over my head and movies when I want to watch them and ice-cream when I want to eat it.’

And none of the risk. None of the fear of losing someone.

Gramps grabbed the guest book and started flipping through, frowning as the book started its transformation from morbid to mawkish, with glittery stickers and googly eyes, and a surfeit of the sparkly ink that had for some reason started spurting from the once-solemn pens that Mort kept by the book, like a weeping statue of Mary, if Mary were suddenly into disco.

‘Yes, but those things aren’t all they’re cracked up to be when they’re done alone.’ Gramps flapped the guest book at Mort as evidence.

‘I’m not alone. I have … friends,’ snapped Mort. Well, sort of. ‘And I have you. And besides, there’s nothing wrong with being alone.’

‘Of course not,’ said Gramps. ‘If that what makes you happy. When you’re alone because you’re afraid of getting close to anyone, now that’s a problem. Now, where am I sleeping tonight?’

Mort could hardly ask Gramps to sleep in the casket bunk beds or on the chaise longue – Gramps’s back was held together by pins and painkillers.

Besides, the upstairs had been least affected by the switcheroo, and was therefore the safest bet, although Gramps might have a few questions about the linens-filled glory box that had suddenly appeared at the end of the bed (which itself suddenly sported a canopy that Mort had had nothing to do with).

Mort sighed. ‘You can take my bed. I’ll … figure something out.’

This was not going to work.

Gramps was snoring at a volume that was surely registering on the local earthquake tracker apps. A 5.0-level snore, maybe more. Something that would trigger a tsunami warning and send the oarfish racing up to the shores, warning of the end times.

Mort lay pretzelled up on the bench seat in the kitchen area upstairs (he’d wanted to remain close enough to Gramps to intervene in case the switcheroo reared its pink sparkly head), cursing Gramps’s clearly haunted plumbing, cursing Airbnb for renting out the only other nearby cottage to Lily’s clients instead of leaving it free for Gramps, and cursing his own excellent hearing.

He should have at least some hearing damage by now.

Damn his passion for unamplified classical music and his short-sighted commitment to earplugs.

Clad in his pyjamas (torn black tracksuit trousers and an even more torn black T-shirt), Mort slunk out to his balcony, wondering if the double glazing on the doors would provide some respite from Gramps’s nasal chain sawing.

‘Can’t sleep?’ came Lily’s voice from next door.

Mort started. Why was she out here? Why, when he was so vulnerable in his stupid shredded clothes and with bed hair that had him looking like the most pitiful rooster in the pecking order? He smoothed his hair, hoping he looked vaguely human. Then he cast a glance over at Lily, who …

He burst out laughing. For Lily was dressed in a Cinderella nightie that barely skimmed her thighs. But never fear, she was not to be caught in a state of undress: beneath the nightgown she wore a striped pair of thermal long johns. And fluffy slippers shaped like raccoons.

‘What?’ said Lily. ‘If you can’t handle me at my comfiest, you don’t deserve me at my sparkliest.’

‘Fair,’ said Mort.

‘I’m sleeping, not presenting a case in the Supreme Court. And even then, attire shouldn’t matter. The substance of the argument should.’

‘Spoken just like Elle Woods. That was a compliment,’ added Mort.

Lily toasted with a cup of peppermint tea. ‘I would never take it as anything else.’

‘You look … adorable,’ Mort admitted. Then flinched as a particularly loud snore rattled the door.

‘Is he always like this?’ whispered Lily.

Mort shook his head ruefully. ‘It depends on the night, and whether he’s remembered his CPAP machine. But this is … quite the display.’

‘Even the poodles out front are cowering,’ said Lily, grinning. Then, after a moment’s consideration, she said: ‘Do you want to come over?’

Mort, as usual, found himself looking for something to say.

Or rather, let’s face it: an excuse. A way out.

He knew, he just knew, that if he went over to Lily’s right now, he’d embarrass himself so fundamentally that he’d have to sell the business and move to a small town in the deep south that didn’t have internet access and therefore couldn’t watch the viral video that would inevitably result.

‘I should keep an eye on Gramps to make sure he doesn’t die.’ Mort’s tone sounded as half-hearted as it felt.

‘Oh, come on. We’ll know he’s dead if the window panes stop rattling.’ Lily tossed a cookie crumb his way. ‘And if the worst happens, he’ll be in a good spot for it.’

‘You are a ghoul,’ said Mort, trying not to laugh.

‘The sweetest ghoul around,’ said Lily, placing her hands beneath her chin in an angelic gesture.

‘All right, all right. Unlock the front door.’