“And another thing, mate. I need a big favour. There’s a place that makes reinforced cardboard coffins, one hour south of Adelaide. Can you pick it up, put in on a plane and I’ll meet you at Coolangatta Airport? It’s a cluster fuck.”

Steve’s step-daughter Angela had stepped out on to Highway One five nights ago, walking back to Byron Bay, when a BMW came around the corner and cleaned her up. Massive head injuries. She died in Royal Brisbane yesterday. Tasmin, his partner of six years was in shock and sedated. They’d met in London in the late 70s when punk was the go, then gone their separate ways until Steve tracked her down in Wales. Thought lightening might strike twice. She had a daughter. Beautiful black hair, pretty like her mother, long fingers and light brown skin from her Jamaican father, who’d split. Angela liked animals and climbing trees. She was almost 17 and wanted to be a nurse.

The fear in Steve’s voice travelled from his three bedroom rental in Byron Bay down the line to my house in the City of Churches. We’d worked together yonks ago, renovating houses around Balina and Lennox Heads. Steve was Brixton tough, not to be messed with but the fear was there, crackling like a broken power line. Would Tasmin leave him? They’d almost saved enough money for a deposit on a fibro near Brunswick Heads. Tasmin doted on her only child. He’d proved he wasn’t a fuck up and everything was turning up frangipanis until the BMW.

“I’ll send some money down.”

“Don’t worry about it. Sort it later,” I said.

I measured the old 1994 Mitsubishi station wagon to see if would fit. Just. My wife and me covered the white coffin in bubble wrap, rammed both seats forward as far as they’d go and slid it in the back. I drove hunched over the wheel like a short-sighted pensioner with Kate pressed against the glove box. A 90-minute drive to the airport. I dropped her and the coffin outside the Virgin terminal.

I’d rung Virgin in Sydney and a woman politely said it was ‘unprecedented’ and up to the desk staff when we rolled up. The problem was the size but also, reading between her silences, a coffin represented death and that made people uncomfortable. Coffins meant planes falling out of the sky with air masks popping down and people screaming.

We carried it through the whoosh of the automatic doors and placed it gently on the large baggage conveyor. The eyes of fellow travellers turned from the digital flight departure screen to the coffin. I knew what they were thinking. A smorgasbord of remembering departed loved ones, of hearses and standing around graves; the last goodbye. The coffin broke the fog of neon lights and loudspeakers calling passengers to their departure gates.

The Virgin desk was deserted except for a young woman in her mid 20. Her blonde hair pulled back headache-tight in a pony tail. Pretty, petite with a slight overbite. She eyed us warily as we approached the counter.

“Hullo, we’ve booked two return tickets to Coolangatta on the 10.40 flight,” I said, “under the names of Kate Montgomery and Mark Farquhar.”

“Good morning Mr Farquhar and Ms Montgomery. I have those tickets here. Only carry-on luggage? Good. I’ll be with you in a jiffy.”

Her badge said ‘Becky’. No surname. Just Becky. She printed out the tickets and handed them over the counter with a dental ad smile.

“Just one more thing,” I said, as if remembering a minor omission. “There’s been a death in the family and we need to fly the coffin with us. I understand I’ll have to pay more. It’s light and bulky like a surfboard but not as much fun.”

Becky blanched for a second. She knew it was coming. Knew it like when the dentist reaches for the drill after the anaesthetic. Her face fell as if she too had recently suffered a bereavement. She eyed the coffin with a combination of pity and consternation.

“It’s most unusual, Mr Farquhar. I’ve only been in the job a couple of weeks. Would you please wait here a moment while I call my supervisor.”

Becky picked up the phone and turned her head away. I faintly heard the words, ‘coffin’, ‘empty’, ‘about five kilos’, ‘two metres long’, ‘yes’, ‘no’, ‘yes’, ‘I understand’, then hung up.

Kate edged her way to the counter. She could read between the single syllables. This would need a woman’s touch.

“Ah Ms Montgomery, Mr Farquahar, there appears to be a slight problem. It’s the size of the … you know. According to our policy, the casket, if that’s the right word, has to be transported by a cargo flight and that might take a week.”

“Do you think, Becky, we could make an exception,” Kate said. “There’s a bereaved mother waiting at Coolangatta airport with a dead daughter lying in a morgue. Can’t we work together to lessen her pain?”

“The problem Ms Montgomery…”

“Call me Kate, everyone does”

“The problem Kate, is the size. The coffin is over the legal size which can be carried by a commercial passenger plane. We’re not allowed to carry objects over 200 centimetres in length. I’m sorry, I don’t make the rules.”

I butted in over Kate’s shoulder. We hadn’t got up early this morning, hauled the fricken coffin to the airport to be told by overbite girl that it wasn’t going with us.

“But the coffin measures 200.66 cms, Becky,” I said, trying to keep the razor out of my voice. “It’s over by .6 of a centimetre. That’s nothing in the great scheme of things. It’s half a fingernail. It’s the size of my blood pressure pill I take every morning. Please, have a heart.”

Becky stood back from the counter but kept her finger near the security button under the desk. Calling security would be a strong negative on her monthly performance report, if, after the investigation, it was found she’d failed to use the negotiation skills Virgin taught her during training. Skills she knew she had because at 25, she had to put up with bullying by her older sister, her mother’s death by cancer and a boyfriend who forgot her birthday last week.

Kate pulled a photo from her pocket. It was Christmas two years ago and Angela and Kate had their arms around each others shoulders with the Byron Lighthouse in the background. Angela was smiling and throwing a peace sign. Kate was trying throw a Shaka but hadn’t quite got it right.

“That’s Angela,” Kate said softly. “She was two weeks shy of turning 17 when she was hit by a car a few days ago. She died in hospital. She only really had her Mum and they were like sisters…”

Becky moved her finger off the security alarm button to look at the photo.

“She’s pretty” Becky said. “About the age my younger sister died. Car accident near Robe.” She took the photo and stared at it for a moment. “Drunk driver”.

“That must have hurt you terribly,” Kate said. “Were you close?”

I looked at the flight information screen. We had 20 minutes to board and the two women were walking down memory lane and I could almost hear the violins.

“She used to borrow my dresses and I’d never see them again.” She tried to laugh but choked on it.

“You can understand Becky, why we’re so keen to get that little white box to Coolangatta. It’s not for Angela’s body. It will go on display in the local community centre so her young friends can write something on it. Messages of love. Doodles. A way to deal with the grief. Kids that age, well … death happens to other people, not one of their own.”

Becky looked at the coffin and pressed the conveyor belt button. She affixed the destination and identification bar code. She could lose her job over this. She’d talk to the baggage handlers after lunch. She wrapped orange tape with the words ‘fragile’ around the base and pressed the conveyor button again until the coffin disappeared behind the black plastic straps.

“Jesus Becky, you’re a dead set legend,” I said. “I’d kiss you if kissing strangers wasn’t against the law.”

“You’re quite welcome, Mr Farquahar.”

Kate reached over the counter and squeezed her hand and held it a moment longer.

We walked down the concourse to Gate 5. Through the window we saw three male baggage handlers in their early 20s, hurl suitcases and bags in to the rear of the plane. A Samsonite suitcase fell from the cargo door and crashed on to the tarmac. One of the baggage handlers laughed and hurled it in to the hold. The coffin appeared on the last trailer. The three men stood around it and one threw a mock salute but his mates didn’t laugh. They picked it up carefully and placed it gently in the hold and there was a lot of finger pointing saying it had to be stowed carefully. Padded and strapped vertically to the hull.

The gate attendant called the flight open and we made our way on to the plane. I opened the inflight magazine and started reading about the semi-tropical paradise of Byron Bay, the hippy Mecca of the east, then put the magazine back and held Kate’s hand.