It's not my grief
There are two other celebrants in the room, as guests settle into their seats, music playing gently in the background. One sits in the front row, just an arm’s reach away. He is tall and handsome and suited, a visitor from Auckland, the city I have abandoned. The second is at the back of the room twiddling with the technology, my script at his side. He is also suited, a silver fox whose voice you’ll hear on the radio, honeyed and inviting. Today he is the funeral director, alongside a woman I’ve got to know well these last few months, as we bow reverently to the casket at the front of the chapel, eight, nine, ten times together. One is open; one is homemade, a lilac so pale and cool; one is adorned with a sword; one is smooth and curved. I am thankful there are none that are tiny, a task I’m unsure I could carry through. I am in the middle of the eulogy when he walks in, catching my eye. He is also suited, this special man that knows my family, has held my parents as they lay silently