‘They don’t come from seeds. Well, they do, but most people grow them from bulbs.’

I suddenly remember planting bulbs with Mum when I was very young. We’d put them in pots and soil and leave them on a high shelf in the shed over the winter. Then, in the spring, when they were starting to sprout a thin, green finger, we’d put moss all around the bottom and a few stones and give them to Dad’s parents on their annual visit, and to Nanna for her birthday in February. I ask Grandad what they were.

‘Hyacinths.’

‘Higher synths?’

‘Yes, very pretty purple ones they were, mostly, though they come in all colours. And the smell. Very strong. You wouldn’t want too many in a room at once!’ Grandad smiles.

‘Can you grow them outside?’ I continue.

‘You can, but they’re not as easy as daffs.’

‘Where could I get some?’

‘Ah, now that I can help you with.’

*

After lunch, we go to Grandad’s shed. It’s completely different from our dark and spider-infested cave. His is bright, with a long bench than runs beneath big windows along one wooden wall. It smells of wood sap and dried earth; like everywhere else in their house, it’s warm, like a hug.

From underneath the bench, Grandad pulls out a cardboard box that’s full of small, brown spheres. They look like onions.

‘Now, you’ve probably only got a few weeks left before it’s too cold to plant these,’ he says, placing a dozen or so in a paper bag. ‘Push them quite deep into the ground – about twice the length of your index finger. You don’t want the frost to get them or they won’t flower. Your mother will enjoy seeing these come up.’

‘Yeah. Thanks Grandad.’

Back in Mum’s old room, I put the bag of bulbs carefully in the bottom of my backpack.

That afternoon, Mum and I drive home in comfortable silence. The radio, on low, is playing cheerful, forgettable pop songs. The tub on my knee is once again full of flapjacks (Nanna did a new batch while we were having lunch) and I munch away, two at a time, for most of the two-hour journey. I find it easier now to see why Mum does this long drive at least twice every week. I feel somehow fuller than I did on Friday morning. And it’s not just the flapjack.

When we pull up at home, it’s started raining again. As Mum goes to open the front door, she almost trips on something that’s poking out from under the doormat. ‘Get that for me please, love. It’s probably a phone book or something. Straight in the bin.’

But when I pull it out it’s got my name on it. I empty its contents onto the kitchen table. An A Level Biology textbook.