The chair wobbled beneath Alan’s feet as he reached up into the airing cupboard.

‘Careful, you could fall,’ said Gayle.

She reached over and held the back of the chair with one hand, then hesitantly placed her other on Alan’s calf to steady him. Her touch jolted through him like an electric shock and the chair shifted again beneath his weight before he managed to steady himself. His breathing ragged, he reached up again and pulled down a pillow from the wooden slatted shelves stacked above the immersion heater.

‘There should be one each now,’ he said, dropping it onto the carpet. ‘Here are some pillowcases too.’

He pulled out a bundle of them and climbed down from the chair, wishing Gayle didn’t have to let go of him.

‘These have seen better days,’ she scoffed, taking the pillowcases from him. ‘Weren’t these your mum’s?’

Alan smiled sheepishly. ‘I never got round to replacing them.’

‘Oh well, they’ll do for tonight.’

He hoped their visit might last longer than one night but daren’t ask Gayle what her plans were for returning home. He didn’t want to rock the boat: having his family sleep under the same roof as him for one night was already beyond his expectation and he didn’t want to ruin it.

‘I’ll change the sheets on my bed so you can have that as well. I’ll kip on the sofa,’ he said.

‘Thanks,’ said Gayle.

They were standing so close he could see tiny dark hairs feathering her top lip, the only giveaway of the brunette she used to be. She’d had brown hair when he first met her – the blonde came later, after Lacey was born.

‘You’ve got nothing to thank me for,’ he said, choked again.

‘When did you become such a crybaby?’ she teased, but he could see she was emotional too. He was about to reach out for her hand when Freddie’s voice echoed up the stairs, asking if he could have a packet of crisps from a forgotten multipack Alan had unearthed from the back of a cupboard. With no other food in the house, he’d already decided to splash out and order a pizza delivery for tea, much to the children’s delight.

‘Can he have a packet, is that okay?’ Alan asked Gayle nervously, not wanting to make the wrong call. ‘Or will it spoil his tea?’

‘Yeah, that’s fine. He’s got hollow legs, that one – never stops eating and never gets full up. Go on, say it’s fine.’

Alan cleared his throat, then shouted down the stairs.

‘Yes, that’s fine, help yourself, Freddie.’

‘Thanks, Daddy!’

It caught him by surprise, being called Daddy again after so long. Half smiling, half crying, he told Gayle it was the best thing he’d heard in ages.