FORTY-SEVEN

 

Catena left a final message on Maria's social media accounts, telling her friends and colleagues the time and date for her funeral. They'd just about blown up the internet with all the messages – condolences, regrets that they couldn't attend, and a whole load of memories about how wonderful Maria had been.

All the stories Maria had told about the archaeological digs she'd been on around the world were just the tip of the iceberg. Everyone had their own memories of Maria, and, more than once, Catena found herself laughing out loud before she remembered that her godmother was gone and laughter was hardly appropriate right now.

Maria had insisted on having her funeral in a function room at the crematorium, with a non-religious celebrant, with as little food as possible after to deter the vultures, or at least that's what she'd said. Catena wasn't sure who she'd meant, but every seat in the function room had been filled, so there'd been people standing up the back.

The funeral home had brought out enough food for everyone at the wake, with so much left over, Catena had been forced to take a lot of it home.

Not that she could bring herself to eat anything. Nor had she been able to write a proper speech that did her godmother justice.

Every time she'd sat down to try to write something, she'd managed little more than a sentence or two before dissolving into tears.

Luckily, enough of Maria's colleagues, some of them students she'd mentored who were professors in their own right now, were more than capable of giving good speeches, telling Maria's story with more enthusiasm than Catena could muster.

In the end, she'd had to stand up beneath the projector screen, ready to play the slideshow of photos she'd scanned from Maria's collection, and said all she could: "Maria was my godmother. I loved every day I got to spend with her, and I will miss her every day from now on that I can't."

The slideshow flickered on the screen above Maria's coffin, while people came up to lay their flowers on the polished box.

Catena wasn't the only one crying by the time they all wandered out to where the food was set out for the wake.

Most of the people didn't stay long afterwards, and she was soon left with just her family and a few stragglers. Her eyes too blurred by tears to see straight any more, Catena just wanted the ordeal to be over. Maria was gone. She'd said her goodbyes, and now all that was left was the big, gaping hole in her heart where her godmother used to be.

Her mother packed up the leftovers to take back to Maria's apartment – Maria's no longer, with the reading of her will set to happen next week – and guided Catena home.