‘Oh yeah,’ she said. ‘But none on the tree?’

‘No,’ he said, checking to make sure. She was right. They looked up, necks craned. All the branches were bare. He wrapped his arms around her waist, kissing the back of her head.

‘So pretty.’

‘Yes. Like precious stones.’

She held a seed close to her chest, cupping it with both hands.

‘What are they?’

‘I have no idea. I’ve never seen them before.’

‘You should google them.’

‘Yes.’

‘I like this one.’

‘I see that.’

She smiled and he kissed her hair again. It was soft, her skin warm as earth. She placed the seed gently inside her pocket as if it might break. Dapo did the same. He squeezed her to him and they went inside. Neither had any idea why they took the seeds, and they didn’t speak about it again. It just seemed like the logical thing to do.

In the kitchen, they hardly spoke. Misra continued to sip tea, and later went upstairs to work. Dapo sat at the kitchen table. He picked up her book, glanced at the back cover, read a few pages, put it down. He got up, paced the kitchen, checked the email on his phone, sat back at the kitchen table.

This was always the worst. The in-between. The gaping chasm between what was and what could be. He’d not long finished a solo exhibition, some paintings and sculptures and a video installation focused on the city at night – the prevalent theme of his show, trite but true. He’d long been aware that he wasn’t sure what to do next. There was the usual assortment of disparate works which always came when he was working on a big forthcoming collection, something with purpose and drive. But those fledgling pieces hadn’t announced their place in the world, and so he waited like a spider, not tense or anxious, just hopeful and clear in the knowledge the moment would come. He had to be prepared. For the last few months he’d been capable of finding that inner poise, but the walk down the garden and the discovery of the seeds changed things, he could feel it. Those markings, that strange feeling on his fingertips. The pink flesh, almost white like a prawn, the deep calm of purple skin. Those seeds contained the DNA of inspiration. He was restless because they had stirred something, and he didn’t know quite what. There was a surge of hormonal anticipation, a rush of endorphins, but he had no idea what would happen next.