He could sit in his chair and listen to the cricket, but his thoughts yap away at him, like Poppy does at next-door’s cat. It never used to be this way. His life used to be led by the slow hand of the clock. He didn’t have to think: his wife did that for him. When the clock stopped, he put in new batteries and everything worked again, tickety-boo. He can’t recharge his old life, though. He can’t put batteries in Ellen.

What will you do, Georgy-boy? he thinks to himself. Will you sit in your chair and starve, fade and stink, or will you get up and do something for yourself?

He thinks of Ellen, that Fats Domino number she used to sing on sheet-washing day, something about noise and pots and pans. She loved that song. She’d play it so loudly he couldn’t hear his radio, and he’d let her because of the way her feet moved in her slippers and the sun came shining through, just like Fats promised.

My God, what’s happening to him? He’s going pulpy and soft like an over-ripe pear. He gets up and paces. Up and down the living room, in and out of the kitchen, up and down the garden path. Think, George, think. What now? What next?

‘She’s not coming back,’ he tells Poppy, who’s been faithfully following him on his road to nowhere. ‘She’s really gone, and it’s just you and me now.’ Poppy looks at him as if he’s an idiot. She’d figured this out ages ago. She loves George, she really does, but he can be so dense at times.

George paces for another half-hour before hunger makes up his mind for him. ‘Come on, dog, we’re going out.’ Poppy runs to the door and sits to have her lead put on. She’s surprised when they don’t take their normal left turn at the end of the road. She’s never been the other way before. The high street is busy, and her legs are little, and George keeps walking faster and faster. At one point he starts running and Poppy pants to keep up with him.

‘Fucking buses.’ Poppy is scooped up and tucked under his arm as he drops change noisily into a tray next to the driver.

‘Do you have a bus pass?’

‘No.’ George is indignant at the thought.

‘Then it’ll be five-fifty, please.’

‘Daylight robbery.’

‘Don’t get on, then.’

But George needs to get on. He’s hungry and he can’t be seen in the village. He tosses more coins into the tray, tutting with each clank. The bus pulls away before he’s settled in his seat and he and Poppy almost go flying. She yelps in alarm and he holds her on his lap where she whimpers quietly.