4 am

The Queen has died, aged 400.

She picked up the newspaper and read the words that were squashed in between the bold headline and the giant picture of the Queen’s face that smothered the rest of the front page. Queen Fringilla died last night, just eleven days after her four hundredth birthday. Having survived Napoleon Bonaparte, two world wars, breast cancer and Covid-19, she unfortunately choked on a plankton bone in her rattan and pickle sandwich. Despite on-site palace paramedics performing the Handsome manoeuvre within seconds of the incident, they were unable to dislodge the bone. The bone punctured her earlobe, and they were unable to resuscitate her. She was pronounced dead at 08:43 PM. Her guinea pig Amanda now ascends the throne, unless the Prime Minister proceeds with his threats to change the constitution. The chef was put on immediate grass-cutting leave until investigations as to how the bone made it into the sandwich have concluded.

Sally reread the words three times, but no matter how many times she read them, she remained utterly confused. If anything, she became more confused with each read, as new nonsense jumped out from the page. For example, she hadn’t noticed at first that the Queen’s tiara was not, in fact, made up of precious diamonds and sapphires, but tiny little model cars with their miniature xenon headlights glaring out.

“Are you gonna buy that, love, or just stand there hogging the pavement from my actual paying clientele?” the newspaper seller barked at her, roughly, interrupting her confused brain.

“Sorry, sorry”, she stuttered, folding the paper in half and tucking it under her arm, so she could fish for a Euro in her purse. When she finally looked up to pay, she found a burly man with rough stubble on his weathered face, a ring in his left eyebrow and tattoos that ran up both his arms and down his neck, disappearing into the white, silk and lace wedding dress he was wearing.

“Have a nice day”, he said gruffly, but smiling serenely, like a bride.

Sally nodded at him nervously and walked towards the platform, forcing herself not to run.

“The next train will be on the forty-second of March”, the crackly station speakers announced to the people waiting on the platform.

Sally laughed – a small, barely audible chuckle. The station announcer must be in a jokey mood this morning, she thought. After all the delays over the last few years, she guessed it was his way of trying to make light of it and the complaints he had to deal with every morning from irate commuters late for work - again.

She looked around, in camaraderie, to see who else appreciated the humour. Instead, she found everyone on the platform was frozen stock still. It took her a split second to realise that no one was moving a muscle, and she felt like she was looking at a black-and-white photo. Yes, black-and-white, because there was no colour anywhere. She looked closer at a woman standing like a statue just half a metre along from her. Despite a gusting but warm wind, the woman’s light cotton dress did not billow around her legs, nor a strand of her long, straight hair blow against the breeze. And her immaculately painted nails and lips were a shade of carbon grey.

Sally’s smile vanished from her face like a light being switched off. A cold chill shivered down her spine, and goosebumps sprang up on her forearms, which she instinctively tried to rub away, crossing one arm over the other as if hugging herself.

At that moment, a single empty carriage rolled silently into the station and came to a halt right in front of where she was waiting on the platform. The door opened automatically, and she found herself stepping up into the carriage, alone.

“Mind the giraffe”, the station announcement said.

Sally took a seat in the empty carriage, as the doors closed behind her and the train silently rolled out of the station. She retrieved the newspaper from under her arm, unfolded it and flicked it to straighten out the words.

The Queen has died, aged 400.

She read the front page again and was studying the tiny headlights on the model car tiara on the Queen’s head when she was interrupted.

“Your breakfast, madam”, a throaty, smoker’s voice coughed. She looked up to find the newspaper seller in his tattoos and wedding dress proffering a silver tray towards her.  On the tray was a red paper Costa coffee cup with steam wafting out the top, and two small fluffy kittens playing with a ball of pink wool. He set the tray down on the small table that jutted out from the carriage wall below the window.

“Thank you”, she said, unsure if she was meant to pay for coffee and kittens or show her Oyster card.

The kittens jumped onto the newspaper now half-resting in her lap, and somehow managed to wrap themselves up in it, like fish and chips. The wedding dress newspaper seller picked up the ball of wool and wrapped the parcel of kittens up with it, tying a neat bow to finish it off. And then he disappeared through the door at the end of the carriage to - well, she didn’t really know where.

Within seconds, the kittens had torn their way free from the newspaper and jumped onto the blue velvet seat opposite. Sally looked at the shredded newspaper, the Queen’s face now sliced into three sections with air holes dotted through it. It looked like she’d been used as target practice.

The train carriage rattled silently into a tunnel, plunging everything into darkness.  The darkness went on and on, as the train rocked gently along the rails. Sally felt the silence, the unlit carriage, the continual cradling motion and the purring of kittens making her drowsy. She let her head loll back against the headrest of the seat and closed her eyes.

Down, deeper and deeper, her body and mind fell into the abyss of slumber. Her shoulders relaxed, her jaw unclenched, her mouth slackened, and her arms went limp, folded in her lap.  

A hand gently rubbed her cheek. A burly voice whispered, “you have arrived at your destination.”

She opened her eyes slowly, blinking twice, to let the daylight flood her mind again. She was no longer on the train but standing on a pink cloud of cotton wool, and she felt as light as a feather, like she might simply float away like a dandelion puffball. A creamy, silky silhouette was hovering in the distance, reaching out a hand for her to take. They drew closer to each other without moving. Sally noticed the gold band on the slender finger. The same gold band she wore on hers. Their fingers entwined as Sally’s body melted into the silhouette.

* * *

My mothers, Sally and Francisca, were the kindest people I knew. They taught me that love is eternal. And so, although today is, once again, terribly painful and sad for all of us gathered here today, we must not mourn. We must celebrate love. More than anything, we must celebrate the love they had for each other. Their harmony. Their unity. It comes as no surprise to me that they both somehow managed to time their deaths to fall naturally at o four hundred hours, on the anniversary of their wedding day, albeit twelve years apart. They are reunited again. Rejoice. I will miss them more than words can say.

Adam let the tears roll openly down his face, twiddling nervously with the small ring piercing in his left eyebrow, as he always did. He coughed once, then quietly returned to his seat in the front pew. And in the hushed silence, the vicar committed the body to God and pink clouds of cotton wool.