They gave each other that tentative hug that familiar males do, although the Americans have a greater reticence towards male intimacy than the Europeans, where a kiss is sometimes offered to the cheek. So, a little bit awkward, but meant with a genuine warmth, he then offered Everett his condolences at the tragic circumstances of his father’s death.

Ron looked, of course, older; his eyes betrayed the look of a man who had spent the last thirty-five years staring at paperwork and the computer’s arrival had in no way dimmed the strain that produced a shade of grey around their sockets.

The death had happened two weeks ago.

The burial had taken place after a perfunctory police investigation.

His father was found, having apparently been bending down to mend a leaking pipe that had continued to leak. He was found two days later floating in the flow of water that had now alerted neighbours as it seeped out of the house and down the path.

He was bloated and unrecognisable, still holding the spanner in his hand, having suffered a heart attack.

His heart had broken.

His life reduced to nothing.

The leaking pipe remaining untended, bleeding its purpose away. His talent had finally been drowned. The police ruled out any suggestion of foul play, the scene seemed to reveal its own clarity, and their immediate decision presupposed laziness rather than any sense of conviction, or indeed much interest on their part.

Paperwork is such a curse. Ain’t it?

Ever organised the funeral from England with the express intention of not being there himself. He was, he realised, having booked his flight, actually incapable of being there. He had no desire to witness the funeral parlour’s attempt at making the body presentable and cried the whole day long while the funeral took place 6,000 miles away.

His heart ached, the relentless implanted pain of an increasing agony, and he longed for his father to be alive. To be alive as he remembered him, before disillusionment scuppered his take on life. His father’s two friends, one, his old canvas maker from Culver City, and the other, his drinking partner from Chez Jay’s on Ocean Avenue, and of course dear Ron and surprisingly Everett, his namesake, were the only ones in attendance. So, an Everett was there, not with the same intense emotional connection but with a physical presence and a name that matched. After the ceremony at the Larson Family Crematorium on Broadway in Santa Monica his ashes were scattered off the Santa Monica Pier in memory of his hazy, drunken walks from Chez Jay’s on his way home to Chautauqua Boulevard that led down to the ocean. The surfer’s shack he ended up in, one of the few on that road, was at the bottom end of the hill, so he could still hear the sound of the ocean that rolled with him to sleep at night.