It was him, of course, but it wasn’t. This Peter was purple-lidded, sombre, bird-fragile. Their Peter had been born hilarious, a sprite – his ears were even slightly pointed at the top, kinks in the cartilage. They’d come from his great-grandfather on Josh’s side, Corinna said, a recessive gene; there was a photo on the wall at Russell Road. The shape of his face, though, had come from her – along with his eyes, which were like five-pence pieces, round and silver-grey.

At the desk in the corner, the nurse finished making a note, pushed her glasses back on her head and stood up. ‘Hi, I’m Rachel,’ she whispered. ‘I’ll be with him ’til the morning, little man. Here.’ She lifted a chair from a stack in the corner of the room and brought it up to the bedside. ‘Don’t be afraid to hold his hand. And talk to him.’

‘He’s on a ventilator?’ Will hadn’t told her.

The woman nodded. She looked at the machines, checked the levels in three pouches suspended from a rolling stand behind the bed head. ‘All under control. I’m going to nip to the loo, give you a moment.’

Robin heard her whisper a few words to the guard outside then the soft tap-tap of her shoes as she receded through the ward. She stood for a moment, then sat down. Peter’s left arm was at her eye level now, the hand protruding from a cast that reached to his shoulder. She looked at his fingers curled on the blanket. He was ten, for fuck’s sake.

‘Look, Rob.’ Corinna’s voice in her ear, full of wonder. Against her palm she’d held Peter’s newborn hand, a wrinkled pink starfish, nails like mother-of-pearl washed tissue-thin. She’d been crying tears of painful joy, riding the tidal wave of maternal hormones. ‘God,’ she’d said, trying to laugh, ‘how could I have made something so perfect?’

‘You I understand,’ Robin had said. ‘Him, though?’ She’d tipped her head at Josh, sitting across the bed. He’d been half laughing, half crying himself.

She reached between the rails and slipped her fingers under Peter’s. She hoped that deep down, wherever he was, he might sense her, curl his hand round hers, even if it was only an automatic motor response, like a baby’s. Nothing – the fingers stayed inert. ‘Pete, sweetie, it’s me, Auntie Robin. I …’ Her throat seized up. She remembered the way the skin had folded on his tummy when he was new. Like one of those Japanese dogs with the faces like wrinkled plush blankets, and just as soft. She remembered Rin bending over him at the changing table, singing ‘How Much Is That Doggie in the Window?’ as she eased his legs into a fresh suit, Lennie standing solemnly by to watch, the big girl at nearly four.