The April fool
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I keep thinking it was a late April fool's joke. It'd be just like my dad to get the dates wrong. He'd be sitting there trying not to laugh while all the time goading us further and further into his little set-up. Sometimes I used to toy with him in return. His jokes were rarely that well masked. It was often easy to see where he was leading you. There'd be some line or other that he'd be trying to get you to say. With a little effort, you could catch him off guard by giving some unexpected response. It'd be fun to lead him in circles, watching him trying to get you back to that line so he could take his joke a little further. By then he'd probably know you were onto him, but he'd still do his best to get you to a point where he'd deliver his punchline. I'm still waiting for this one.
Sixty-two isn't a real age. I mean sure, anybody who lives longer spends at least a year there, but it's one of those ages you just pass through. It's not a milestone. Milestones have a zero at the end or, at the very least, a five. There are a few random ones early on, but mostly the numbers at the front are higher. The ones starting with lower numbers are just checkpoints. Have yourself a party and a pat on the back, eat your cake, then move on. Sixty-two isn't a milestone or a checkpoint. It's one of those things you pass through on the way to somewhere else. It's just a number. And in the grand scheme of things, it's a low one too. Dad's should have been higher.
There's a period after something like this where nothing seems real, not least the event itself. I'm still on the fringes of that. It feels more real than it did, but still not enough for my brain to process it. It still can't have happened because there was no warning. Stuff like this is foreshadowed. There are signs that point to it in advance. I'm a writer of stories. I know this stuff. Good stories tie up the loose ends. This isn't a good story. There was no happy ending. There was just an end. I still struggle with that.
Dad would be laughing. He'd start a joke with a laugh. By the time he got to the end of one, he'd be in stitches. He laughed louder at his own jokes than anyone else ever did. So other people's jokes—or 'funnier' jokes, as the rest of us would call them—could have him laughing so hard his face would turn as red as a beetroot. He should be laughing now. He should show up, finish his joke, then carry on with his story. I'm still waiting. I won't be mad if he turns up. I want him to. Months later, I still look at the spot on the sofa where he'd sit and wait for him to come and fill it. I wish he would every day. I know he won't.
My dad, Terry Faulkner, died peacefully in his sleep at some point during the morning of Monday the 13th of April 2015, aged sixty-two, of natural causes. There is no punchline.