At first she didn’t let on that there was anything wrong with her. But that particular morning I knew instinctively she was suffering because her movements were lighter than normal, as if the very sound of her feet as she moved around the flat could hurt her. She picked at her lunch and as it was a Sunday I had gone to a bit of trouble over it. Fresh hake with baby potatoes and a salad filled with colour, a salad like my mother would make. I was suffering a little from the night before, I had drunk a couple of beers after Jenny went to bed and I could really have done without the fish but it had been in the fridge for two days and I didn’t feel right letting it go to waste like that. I fried it in a dollop of butter even though I would have preferred a heavy fry with black pudding and eggs.

Migraine was a bit like depression in my book. My natural reaction was to tell Jenny to get some fresh air in much the same way you’d tell a depressive to get out of bed and take control over themselves. But life wasn’t like that and Jenny wasn’t a depressive, she needed sympathy and understanding, and I did my best to be patient, I told her the pain would go away. And I did it all not with a heavy heart but with a lightness, a lightness that I’d discovered in myself since we’d been together.

Jenny picked at the fish and said she wasn’t hungry.

She needed darkness and I led her to bed. I stroked the centre of her back. I removed her T-shirt. I rubbed the back of her neck willing the pain to slide down from her head and move through her body and to her hips and down to her feet and then out through her toes, out of her body completely, utterly and then she would be free of it.

Free of its anger, its force. I pulled at her hair lightly and I gently stroked her head. I heard her utter a sound and then she fell asleep and I put my arm across her back lazily almost and I drifted asleep.