On him too.

They had always operated as a team, taking pride in the strength of their partnership. Whatever they took on, they gave it their combined two hundred per cent attention. There were no short measures with them. All or nothing. And that was what increasingly was worrying him.

He wanted a child as much as Martha did, he really did, but he didn’t want to lose who they were in the process of creating a baby. He’d read up online how easily it could happen, and it frightened him.

‘We won’t become one of those awful couples that destroy their relationship by being obsessed with wanting a baby,’ Martha had said before they found that things didn’t fall into place as easily as they had assumed they would. She wasn’t used to failing and he knew that was how she now viewed their inability to conceive at the click of their fingers.

How long before blame was apportioned?

And why did it worry him so much that he might be the one who was at fault?

Having a family had always been a part of the deal for them. When they were getting to know one another, they’d each raised the subject of children quite early on. Better to flush out the dealbreakers sooner rather than later, had been their mutual take on dotting the ‘i’s and crossing the ‘t’s before committing to a serious relationship. He could remember how relieved they had both been when they’d tackled the subject and each heard the answer they’d wanted to hear.

They had married four years ago and had agreed to establish themselves as a couple before taking the step of becoming parents. They had everything planned, everything neatly figured out.

But then with all that had happened in the last few years Tom had suddenly not been so sure it was a good idea to bring a child into a world that could so easily be tipped on its axis. Previous generations had worried about war or a nuclear bomb destroying mankind, now it seemed that it could be something far more insidious.

His mother had caught the virus in the early stages of the pandemic, before anyone really knew just how bad it was going to be. She had spent five awful weeks in hospital on a ventilator before she died. During that time neither Tom nor his sister, Lynn, had been able to see her in hospital. Their father hadn’t been able to either. She had died alone, with only the kindness of an exhausted nursing team to watch over her.

Fifteen years older than Mum, Dad had always joked that he’d be the first one to check out. He’d been heartbroken at her death and he still hadn’t recovered from losing her. In poor health anyway, and at Lynn’s insistence, he had moved to live nearer her.

Tom felt guilty that his sister had so readily taken on the responsibility of keeping an eye on their father, but geography had rather dictated things. The family home had been in Harrogate, where Tom had grown up, and with his sister and husband living nearby in Northallerton, it had just seemed more sensible for Dad to remain in Yorkshire, rather than up sticks to move down south.