Salma took out her phone from the sealed plastic bag. This was Moni’s idea, a compromise to keep the phone in the room while at the same time hemming in its smell. The smell which Moni was imagining, as mobile phones do not smell. And yet somehow Moni had convinced her of this and she had dunked it in the water. Now, drawing the slim, smooth object out of the bag, Salma too caught a whiff of something. She pushed the phone back into the plastic bag, sealed it and lay down on the bed again.

When she closed her eyes, she saw the envelope. It was meant to be white but had gone beige with handling. There were smudges on it and it was crumpled at the edges. It was addressed to her, her full name including Miss, written in Amir’s handwriting. She saw with less clarity the documents that were in the envelope. They were both official. Originals, not copies, stamped and authenticated. There was a doctor’s report on Amir’s mother’s mastectomy. There was the registration of the court case involving the convoluted sale of the piece of land which belonged to Amir’s father and his cousins. The envelope contained proof to Salma and her mother that Amir had not lied to them. Yet Salma had torn this proof up. In fact, had not even bothered to tear it up properly but scrunched it and shoved it into the kitchen bin. Pushed it among onion peel and chicken bones, the smear of tomato paste left over in a tin, the slither of courgette peel. Then she had forgotten it. How dare he intrude on the day she had just come back from the dressmaker, the day of the final fitting for her wedding dress. The gorgeous swirl of white taffeta, the silky veil, the embroidery on the bodice. How dare he grubby such a day, paw at it with his muddied circumstances, with his need to prove himself!

And after the wedding, another memory, even more pathetic. Amir had wanted the envelope back. Bureaucracy demanded the original copies. He had called and called her mobile phone – her first – until she changed her number, and then he had shown up at her parents’ door. All this, and she didn’t tell him that she had thrown the envelope away, that he needn’t bother.

In the bin.

I’m sorry, I’m sorry. She ran out of the cottage. She held the phone in her hand and the rain did not matter. She had remembered what she had excelled at forgetting. I’m sorry.

He said, ‘I was angry with you at the time to the point that I fantasised about strangling you, hurting you as much as you’d hurt me.’

She listened to the venom in his voice and did not reply.

‘All those so-called friends sneering at me, saying hard luck buddy, with a twinkle in their eyes.’