HER FATHER MEETS her on the platform at Stockport. She sees him through the window before he sees her—always the momentary shock at his hesitancy, the white of his hair. As she gets off the train she sees his head twisting this way and that, searching for her.

“Dad,” she calls, and he turns towards her, holding out his arms.

He smells of soap, and the sharpness of her mum’s washing powder.

“Let me take that.” He moves for her suitcase.

“It’s fine. It’s not heavy.”

“Shush. Give it here. Got your ticket? There’s turnstiles at the back now.”

The car is parked where it always is. “Now”—he lifts her case into the boot—“your mother’s made shepherd’s pie. She’s worried about you, love.”

It is raining, a light drizzle. The leaves are brown; autumn is already making itself felt up here. Her mother is in the kitchen when they arrive, the windows steamed up, the dog jumping up to say hello.

“Come here.” Her mum presses her to her chest. “You’ve lost weight,” she says, tut-tutting as she hugs her.

They eat shepherd’s pie and broccoli, fruit and cream for pudding, and then afterward go into the living room and sit in front of the TV.

“What would you like to watch?” Her father turns on the TV, hands her the three remote controls with a small flourish. “You decide.”

“I don’t mind, really. What would you normally watch now?”

She sits beside her mother. They watch an episode of a period drama.

When the commercials come on, her father goes into the kitchen and comes back with tea and chocolate.

He hands her hers with a wink. “Aldi,” he says. “They do these lovely little bars.”

SHE GOES TO bed when her parents do, at half past nine, and lies down in her childhood room, in her old single bed. There’s a photo on the wall of her and her dad on her wedding day, standing outside in the park—the afternoon light. That green dress.

Her mother pops her head around the door on her way from the bathroom.

“Anything you need?”

“Thanks, Mum, I’m fine.”

“Hot water bottle?”

“I’m OK.”

“I know, but it’s nippy tonight. And I just thought, for your tummy . . . after everything.”

“I’m fine. Thanks, Mum.”

“All right, love. Night night.”

“Night, Mum.”

Her mum closes the door softly, and it strikes Hannah, not for the first time, that her parents, whose sphere of life has always seemed so small, so constrained, have mastered the art of kindness. She used to lambast them—the newspaper they read (the Daily Mail), the telly they watched (soaps and nature programs). Their politics. Their religion (Church of England). Their horizons, always so narrow. Their naivety. Their class.

And yet they are kind.