Unchanged since the 1950s, with no modern conveniences such as microwaves and coffee machines. Slightly dark, with café nets hanging in the windows, an old lemon yellow Formica table with chrome legs and matching chairs taking centre stage. Even though it was sizable, it was cosy in the winter, and cool in the summer. It was the heart of the home.Yet sitting there after the doctor had left, waiting for the funeral director to come, it felt cold and empty.Henry’s teapot, the old, dinged, aluminium one he favoured, sat on the bench. Maia had offered to make everyone tea and coffee, but there was no coffee in the house, and no one really wanted to drink tea out of his teapot without him here. It felt wrong. Not that we said that out loud. It was a chorus of ‘no thanks, I’m fine.’ Which, of course, was bullshit. We were anything but fine.I had lost enough people in my life to know that this was the worst time. The waiting. The in-between hours. A death had occurred, but the arrangements had yet to be made.
