Ashes

Look like stars.

We arrive at the church before anyone else. I could faint when I see the coffin. It feels like at any minute my Dad will walk in to join us, hair rumpled with his wrinkled smile stretched across his ageing face. I wish this wasn't his funeral. Minutes later, guests begin to turn up. They all wear black and morbid faces. My Mum is the only one that is even close to smiling with the occasional quirk of lips. I don't really understand. Aunt Octavia is crying before the ceremony begins, sobbing into her black dress. It doesn't help the mixed emotions running through my veins. Anger. Depression. Chaos. Anything that isn't positive technically. The ceremony begins half an hour later. I listen intently to the speakers, willing the tears not to fall down my face and then it's my turn to speak. I stand up, breath out and cough quietly in case my voice is shaky. I stand behind a wooden podium, looking over the faces of the many he loved some of which are tear streaked with dark makeup.
"I'd like to thank you all for coming" I say, which is extremely cliché. "Richard Butler was the greatest man I knew, he was my Dad and my best friend." I take another shaky breath.
"When he was killed..." I correct myself after receiving a glare from my Mum. "When he died, I felt like my life would never be the same again, I proved myself right." I am awarded a few pitiful nods.
"Life without my Dad has been hard, I expect him to wake me up in the morning and he doesn't, I expect him to hug me before I go to bed and he can't, I expect him to take me to the Chinese every Friday, and then I remember that he never will again." I let the first tears fall yet my voice remains steady.
"I appreciate all of the support we are getting from everyone and I sincerely hope that if anything is ever to happen to yourself or your families, who I have grown to respect and love, that I can do the same. Thank you all again" I finish and rush away from the podium, hoping it isn't obvious that I'm really upset. I quickly sit down next to my Mum again and sob quietly against her shoulder. She grabs my hand and squeezes it. I think the gesture is supposed to offer support, but I am reminded of my Dad. His greying hair, usually messy. His rosy cheeks when he came in from work. His blue-grey eyes that reminded the younger version of the woman beside me of the stars.