She stared unseeingly out at the garden, absent-mindedly listening to the shrieks and squeals coming from next door, where Lois’s daughter was splashing about in the paddling pool. Music started up from somewhere – the barbecuers’ house perhaps – and she found herself getting up and turning away, unable to bear the sounds of other people’s enjoyment any longer. Then, crossing the kitchen, some impulse compelled her to unlock the door to the garage where Rich’s beloved old car sat, the red Jensen Interceptor, his pride and joy. When he’d died, she’d given away or sold a lot of his possessions, but she hadn’t quite been able to bring herself to part with his car. Not after he’d spent so many happy hours ‘tinkering’, as he called it.

‘You’ve still got that old thing?’ Robyn said periodically in a disapproving sort of way. ‘And you don’t even drive it?’, as if her mother was soft in the head, far too sentimental for her own good. ‘You should flog it, Mum, I bet it’s worth a fortune!’

Yes, I’ve still got this old thing, Alison thought, opening the car door and sliding into the front seat (tan fake-leather; you’d never get that now). She folded her arms against the steering wheel and rested her head there. Oh, Rich. Why did you have to leave me? she thought, as she always did, tears leaking out of her eyes. Why couldn’t you just talk to me about how desperate you must have been feeling?

The wetness against her forearms was enough for her to sit back after a few moments and pull herself together. ‘Sorry,’ she said aloud. ‘Don’t want to get mascara all over your car.’ Then she blew her nose and grimaced at herself for talking to thin air.

She leaned against the seat, trying to breathe in any last scent of his aftershave that might be clinging to the fabric of the vehicle, but it was no good – all traces of Rich had long since evaporated. These days the car merely smelled a bit damp and old. (‘Yes,’ said Robyn, exasperated, in her head, ‘because you never drive it anywhere! Because you never use it, other than for taking up space – in your garage, and in your head, Mum!’)