Chapter 19

There is an often used metaphor, 'a fish out of water', to describe a person in an unfamiliar environment. Less usually is it used to describe literally the appearance of an Alistair Dougan figure whose mouth was opening and closing but with no sound apparent.

"Grandad, would you be kind enough to get Mr Dougan a drink? What would you like Mr Dougan?"

My mind was racing. Much as I appreciated Bill siding so dramatically with me I didn't want to spend day after day cooped up on a boat with a man seething with resentment. While Bill went to the bar to get a lager I jumped in with both feet.

"You've heard that I'm a boy, that I'm a homosexual or that I'm a transsexual and my grandfather knows that you've heard that. As far as I am concerned I'm a girl with medical issues but if that is a problem for you let me know now and I will politely decline your offer to sail with you."

Alistair Dougan looked at me with such intensity I felt naked. "You've got balls girl, and I like that! If your 'medical issues' don't mean you will die on us and you can put up with my wife and myself, I'd love to have you sail to Bilbao with us. And by the way, when I said 'balls' I didn't mean balls I meant spunk. No, no I didn't mean spunk I meant……"

It was too late as I had already cracked up with laughter and Bill came back to find me with tears streaming down my face and Alistair red-faced to the extreme.

"Don't hit him! Don't hit him Grandpa! He's just a man with his foot in his mouth who meant no harm."

It's different for girls! For the next hour Bill and Alistair swayed between competing for my attention and talking over me as though I were a child. They did argue a lot about boats and equipment but the upshot was that on the voyage to Bilbao Alistair was going to introduce me to the wonders of modern chart plotters (like a car satnav but with depths on a chart instead of roads) while I was promised time to take and calculate regular sextant sights using the sun, moon, stars and planets.

The drinks flowed freely but confusingly I wasn't allowed to pay for any of them - something I knew that happened but had not considered how it felt to other girls. At some point between drinks Alistair phoned his wife suggesting that now was a good opportunity to meet their new crew and, casually, that he might be slightly over the alcohol limit to drive home.

That is how I met Jill Dougan, Alistair's wife, and it was clear from the outset that while she knew the talk about me she simply didn't care. There was only room for one queen bee and it wasn't going to be me. That said she was very intelligent and knowledgeable about the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao built by Frank Gehry so I asked her advice on the best book I could get to learn more. That seemed to ease the atmosphere and by the time we left the bar, an evening that started with very poor prospects finished with Jill holding my arm as we followed the men giggling at the sight of Bill and Alistair's very careful efforts to walk straight.

Friday morning I woke with a hangover and the sky was overcast. Grandad Joe's was to be my first funeral and my life's film director seemed to want all the expected elements. What I was supposed to feel nobody had told me. What I did feel was confused and embarrassed lest I let him down in the eyes of his old army and work friends who I'd heard were expected.

We had breakfast late when Litara arrived having driven direct from London. Mum was red-eyed just picking at her cereal and Dad, I noticed, touched her frequently. For all that the usual necessary processes of eating , washing, picking clothes and dressing pushed us into the day whether we wanted it or not. As organised as ever Litara suggested a slightly longer skirt than I had pick and while in London, as an alternative to the traditional black hat for a funeral, had bought me a black flower barrette. By the time the car came to pick us up I was feeling better and even Mum's face had lightened.

There were more people at the crematorium than I expected but looking around the chapel I had no idea who many of them were. A man I had never met but Mum seemed to know stood and said he and Joe served in North Africa together and Joe had saved his life in Korea. Doing my sums I realised Mum was already at school by that year. There was so much history in the lives around me I had no idea of.

After the service and the internment of the ashes our car took us, followed by a lot of other cars, to a pub Joe had regularly used and where Mum had arranged a buffet for everyone. Buying drinks and piling plates high with food seemed to quickly relax everyone so Litara and I set about doing the rounds.

First were our cousins by way of Aunt Sophie and Jack. They had all been pre-warned about me and the two boys took it cooly, Cousin Elizabeth on the other hand thought it an hilarious way of gaining a female relative to dump her own kids on.

"There's no free lunch Beth." I replied. "What makes you think I won't dump my kids on you. I think I'll adopt a dozen or so just for that."

Leaving my cousins arguing about how many if any kids was the right number we moved on to a very old woman in a wheelchair who turned out to be Joe's sister-in-law. That made her the closest person to my late grandmother I had but then I'd hardly met that grandmother before she died and I only knew her face from photos. Again she had been driven here some distance by her middle aged children I never knew existed. The idea that I knew my family was taking a battering.

On the other side of the room around a table together Joe's army friends had gathered along with, unexpectedly, Grandma Tina who was laughing. It looked as though Grandma Tina and Grandpa Joe had known each other even before my parents were married. Beside Grandma Tina with his back to me was… Bill?