The next few days were spent in a twilight zone of waking and broken sleep.

My daughter wanted to see James, so the day after we had gone to see him we arranged for us to take her to the funeral home. We prepared her as best we could but ultimately she desperately wanted to see him so there was nothing more to say.

She stood at the back for a few minutes, gathering herself for the unknown. This was the first time she had ever seen someone dead and the first time someone so close to her had died. Once she was ready we all held hands and walked to the front to see him. We were all so upset again but we had to see him one last time. This would be the last chance before the funeral.

We left Daisy with him and sat back out in the reception area in silence and waited for her to finish being with him. She joined us after a while and we thanked the funeral director and left James in his care and made our way home.

The funeral arrangements had been made but I was trying to find a function room of suitable size because I had a feeling that there would be a lot of people attending the wake afterwards. After a few failed attempts we were lucky to find a very large ballroom/venue that would be able to deal with the numbers I was thinking we would need. Another job ticked off. There were other jobs still outstanding though. The order of service booklets to proof, death notices to read for the local paper, probate appointments to attend, financial institutions wanting more information, utilities to inform, accountants to contact, colleagues and friends of James to get back to. In some ways I was glad of the distraction of all the organising to do as it gave me a purpose and kept me from falling deeper into this new darkness that had engulfed us.