All the colour seems to have drained from him. She watches as he struggles to sit up in his bed, fighting an instinct to rush forward and help him. A flash of memory comes to her – those moments while waiting for the ambulance to come, she had held his hand.

‘I’ve asked Leah to look in on you over the next couple of weeks while I’m away,’ Mark explains.

‘There’s really no need,’ Anton says, and there’s bewilderment on his face, a pleading in his eyes as he gazes up at his son. She feels the rise of his anxiety, his dignity shredded at being infantilized. ‘I don’t want to be a burden.’

‘It’s no trouble,’ she says gently. ‘Please, Anton. I’d like to visit you.’

His eyes go to hers, the lids half closing in relief or surrender. He manages a weak smile. ‘Very well, my dear.’

The first evening, she comes to him straight after work. She is still in her office clothes, her hair pinned back off her face. When she comes up the inner staircase, she is purposefully noisy, her low-heeled shoes clattering on the bare boards. She doesn’t want to startle him. When she calls his name, something stirs overhead.

He’s in his bed, cheeks sunken, although his expression seems to brighten when she comes into the room.

‘It’s a beautiful evening,’ she tells him. ‘Let’s go outside.’

She has set up chairs for them on the grass beneath the tree. There is dappled shade, and he walks forward gingerly, his feet in slippers, an old plaid dressing-gown wrapped around him, the drawstring tied at the waist. She brings out mugs of tea and finds him with his face upturned to the sun, eyes closed, the lids shaded purple.

‘How kind you are,’ he says. But he puts the mug on the grass beside his feet, and Leah watches as it grows cold.

They sit in silence, Anton with his eyes half closed, his face angled towards the house. Leah listens to the distant sounds of tennis being played in the park, the magpies yacking in the trees beyond, and wonders when Jake will be home. More and more, lately, he has been absent in the evenings, taking jobs on the bike when they come up. Often, he meets up with the other couriers for a pint afterwards. There is talk of a new short being filmed in Wicklow before the autumn, a chance of a part. He needs it. Leah knows this. She feels how unsettled he has become, restless and agitated.

‘Do you believe it’s a sin?’ Anton asks, his voice startling her from her thoughts.

‘What is?’

‘Despair.’ His eyes are fixed on hers. There’s a faint wheeze in his breathing.

‘I don’t know.’

‘I don’t know either.’

He gives a slight shake of his head, a baffled look on his face.