Page 6 of Maybe (Mis-shapes #1)

As my parents' friends, colleagues, and a few vaguely showbiz people lined up to offer their own private anecdotes, I trod the delicate path between nodding at tipsy accounts of the dead man’s lifesaving heroics and quizzes on the progress of my own surgical career.

Yes, I was thrilled to be emulating him, and yes, they were big shoes to fill.

And yes, it would require a lot of hard work.

The next person who told me how proud he’d be risked me screaming at the top of my lungs.

Having circled the room thrice and shaken more clammy hands than a Tory politician running for re-election, I deemed it late enough in the afternoon to edge towards the door.

Under the pretence of a trip to the gents, I'd fuck off back to the sanctity of my car. Too slow. Yet another of Sir Henry’s esteemed colleagues, jowls flushed and weak chin quivering—Michael—tapped his signet ring loudly against solid crystal, demanding everyone’s attention.

Michael was another venerated cardiac surgeon and man of forthright opinions; I was surprised he’d kept quiet for this long.

Mustard Trousers Michael, Saffron used to call him.

“Quiet, please, quiet please. A toast, if you will.”

Instantly, a hush settled over the room, and Mustard Michael treated us to the satisfied smile of a man used to having his inbred voice heard. Seemed he’d elected himself master of ceremonies; I wasn’t complaining.

“The sun has set on an amazing life,” he declared to appreciative murmurs of hear, hear . “An amazing life. We stand here today as dwarves on the shoulders of a giant, Sir Henry Fitz-Henry. Our esteemed friend, father, husband, and brilliant colleague was taken too soon. Taken too soon.”

If gravitas had a name, it would be Michael.

Somewhere on the shelves of Waterstones must be a book on eulogies, advising the speaker to repeat certain words twice for effect.

He shook his head, then bit his lip, as if struggling to go on.

“Before the afternoon draws to a close, I would like to propose a final toast to Sir Henry, a dear, dear man. And, as we raise our glasses to this beloved colossus who has gone before us, let us take a quiet moment of silence to remember the many, many ways he improved not only our lives, but the lives of his countless patients. To Henry!”

“To Henry,” came the answering cry, champagne flutes aloft. And then all assembled, including myself, obediently dropped our heads to contemplate, contemplate the great, great man.

I wasn’t typically short on self-discipline, especially for a mere sixty-second burst. Yet, out of the blue, I was suddenly struck by an overwhelming desire to giggle.

Maybe it was the many manys and the dear, dears for our great, great Henry Fitz-Henry.

Or simply the end of a very tiring week of disjointed shifts and the awful news my colleague, Luke, had attempted for a second time to take his own life.

All that piled on top of revision for surgical exams I wasn’t confident of passing, even though my whole existence had been geared towards them, as my father’s friends had reminded me the entire afternoon.

Or perhaps it was none of those, but the culmination of three months of a strange sort of bereavement.

The man we silently pondered had been a selfish, self-centred, harsh bugger, but he’d fed, watered, educated, and clothed me.

Handsomely. Occasionally, he’d even taken me fishing.

And, despite myself, I grieved his loss.

Thirty seconds in, and the burgeoning giggles had not receded.

In desperation, I chewed the inside of my cheek, channelling grim thoughts of death and dying, of worms and decay.

It couldn’t last much longer, surely. Then I’d escape and giggle to my heart’s content in the car.

Or burst into tears. Those two emotions felt awfully close to each other these days.

The stranger next to me shifted his feet. The minute’s quiet reflection must be in single figures by now. Any moment, Mustard Michael would issue a pious little cough to signal…

“Cheers, big ears!”

Like a gunshot, a raucous shout sliced through the silence. Punctuated by the sharp pssft of a ring pull, followed by the unmistakeable glug-glug of fizzy drink meeting back of throat. And, in case we’d somehow missed this coarse intrusion, a loud, satisfying belch.

“Bugger, was this a bad time? Soz, everyone. My bad.”

In horror, the assembled cast of my father’s well-heeled friends turned to the back of the long gallery, me amongst them.

My heart clenched. Oh shit. Oh fucking, pissing shit.

Guzzling a can of lager, dressed in grubby grey jeans and a fucking Hawaiian shirt, was the prodigal son.

Ezra Fitz-fucking-Henry. Swaying drunkenly against a stone pillar.

He slapped his head in mock anguish. “Am I too late? Shit! Don’t say I missed the crab vol-au-vents!”

Several things happened at once. For starters, someone at the back actually fucking screamed.

At the same time, a young woman to my left dropped a glass, sending a slash of red wine flying across her pale jacket.

Frozen to the spot, Mustard Michael made an anguished, blustering sort of noise.

Then his ruddy face turned a ghastly shade of beetroot, as if any second he’d keel over to join my father in the great, great operating theatre in the sky.

An image flashed before my eyes: me, crouching over him, performing mouth to mouth resuscitation on his fleshy, rubbery, wet lips.

And amidst the chaos, stood the catalyst of it all.

Ezra, my stupid fucking devil of a brother, drunk as a skunk and about as welcome as a wasp at a picnic.

Slouching there in his bloody Hawaiian shirt and laughing his fucking gorgeous head off.

A riot of colour, a riot of sound. A joker.

An aberration. A messed-up circle in a room full of squares.

“Seeing as Mustard Michael isn’t going to do the honours, I’m Ezra,” he yelled on the off chance the folk in the fucking college next door hadn’t heard the uproar. “ Salvē, comrades!”

Funnily enough, no one returned his greeting. It didn’t stop him pressing on.

“For anyone who doesn’t know, Henry had another child. I’m guessing that’s most of you?” He waved his beer can. “My invite must have got lost in the post. But it's me! Ezra Fitz-Henry. Oldest son! Perpetual failure! The cross my dad had to bear!”

Mustard Michael was not as perimortem as I’d thought. “Get him out of here,” he barked. “For God’s sake, someone call the police. Or campus security. Hey, you! Server! You, over there in the short black skirt and fishnets, call for fucking security!”

Ezra’s unhinged gaze swerved towards the voice. “Hey, Mikey, my old mustard! Long time no see! Hardly recognised you!”

Having drained it, Ezra tossed the can over his shoulder before advancing on him. “Trust you to notice a pretty pair of legs! You always did have wandering eyes and hands, didn’t you?”

With a dangerous grin, he surveyed the crowd until his own eyes landed on my mother. “Isn’t that right, Janice? This is fun, isn’t it, Lady F-H? You know what they say, can’t have a fun eral without a little fun .”

“Get out.” A sturdy ship of a woman, dressed in twinset and pearls, barged Michael out of her way on route to poking her finger in Ezra’s chest. “Get out at once.”

“Nah, you’re all right, love,” said Ezra. “He likes ‘em a bit younger, don’t you Mikey?”

Too late, I recognised the stout woman as Mrs Mustard. “Disgusting boy. Getting yourself into a state like this. You should be ashamed of yourself. Get out! Go on! Shoo!”

Ezra slid past her like she wasn’t there, heading for my mother.

He let loose a low whistle. “Looking foxy in black, Lady J. You had some new boobs? Very tasty. What do you think, Mikey? Fancy a bit of that?” He followed up with a lascivious expression and an obscene gesture involving his hand in the vicinity of his crotch.

“Now you’re single and ready to mingle, Lady J, how about you and me find a little quiet corner around the back of this fucking maze of a building?

I’ll feed you a stiff pink gin, we can see about unfastening a few of those dinky buttons down the front of your blouse, and I’ll introduce you to my stiff pink?—"

Oh, fuck. I was going to have to do something.

Mustard Michael had it coming, to be honest. More than once his hand had wandered down my mother’s back at random social gatherings, including today’s.

But my mother wasn’t, no matter how poor her relationship with Ezra.

“Okay, Ezra, out.” Grabbing him by the arm, I hauled him away. “With me, now.”

If I’d learned anything during my endless hours working in the Emergency Department, it was de-escalating drunken dramas. Rule one: remove the antagonist from the scene. If Ezra hadn’t been so sozzled, we’d have had a far more unseemly battle. As it was, he was barely standing.

“Never mind that,” brayed an indignant someone behind us. “The police should be here, sorting this out.”

Oh, just fuck off. “It’s quite all right, everybody,” I shouted over my shoulder. “Nothing to see here. No need for the police.”

Despite the firm grip on my brother’s arm, I sounded a lot more in control than I felt.

Manhandling troublemakers in a packed Emergency Department surrounded by fifteen colleagues and burly security guards within yelling distance was one thing.

Managing an unpredictable drunk brother losing any chance of his rightful inheritance was a different kettle of fish entirely.

Still laughing like a drain, Ezra wriggled against me; I gripped him tighter. “No you don’t. I know you hated him, Ezra, and my mum too, probably, but you’re not doing that.”

“You forgot you,” he slurred. “I hated you too, just so you know. Still do.”

“Trust me, right now, that feeling is mutual. Now, keep walking.”