I went to your funeral on Friday. I think you would’ve liked it.

The weird thing is, I kept expecting you to show up.

But your face wasn’t in the crowd. It was printed on the card that the funeral directors were handing out at the door.

Your friends and family are a cool bunch, an unsurprising fact considering how effortlessly cool you always were. Or maybe you just hid the effort well.

I read our last Facebook messages to each other last night. This is something I’ve been avoiding because I have been trying to measure out the grief into manageable pieces. I can’t afford to go under the wave. I am awake half the night with a baby at the moment so the line between OK and not OK is pretty thin.

It turns out that the last thing you said to me is, ‘I’ve missed you’ and I didn’t say it back because I thought I would be seeing you really soon.

But I’ve missed you too. I missed you after you moved and I’ve missed you every day since you died. Your death is like ink in a glass of water.

I am so sad for your lost potential, not just in your writing – which I think would’ve been blindingly brilliant – but in the opportunities for happiness.

The whole time I have known you, you have been working so hard to become a better version of yourself. You shed your puppy fat through relentless effort (and quite shamelessly encouraged me to do the same). You were getting to know your demons and politely asking them to leave. You were growing and learning and beating the f*ck out of the things trying to keep you down.

The only consolation in all of this – a small, hard, shiny gem – is that you didn’t wait to be yourself. So many of us don’t even make it that far. You were scathingly honest in your dealings with the world and unblinking in your self awareness. You were dark, neurotic and hilarious, a bit like Olive, your beloved pug.

You were a ladylike punk and I didn’t even realise how much I loved you until now.

So goodbye, my fellow Labyrinth fan. I hope you made it to the Goblin City and I hope that David Bowie is waiting for you in *that* cod piece.

I hope that wherever you are, the wine is good, the sunscreen is Factor 40 and that you never, ever have a hangover again.

Love you Amy.