‘RADA, you buffoon,’ she said, caressing his stubbled cheek.

He held her hand against his face and, leaning across the table, kissed her long and hard.

Kate still woke early the next morning, even though it was her day off. Force of habit after all those extra early shifts. But she didn’t just have the day off; she had the rest of the week. Imagine! She stretched in bed. Tim had left at five to go to work, and the whole day lay ahead as hers and hers alone. She decided she’d have the luxury of reading in bed and, plumping up the pillows, she settled back with a romance book she’d started several months earlier but never had time to finish. Oh, this was the life! But after a few pages, she looked around the room, twitchy. Maybe she’d just get up instead, sort out the garden or something.

After a shower, she went downstairs to see a large note taped to the fridge: ‘ENJOY YOURSELF!’ She smiled and made breakfast, then went outside with the secateurs with the intention of cutting back some of the previous year’s growth, but not even the cathartic job of tidying the bedraggled roses could settle her. She felt strangely at a loss, nothing to work towards, nothing to strive for. This wasn’t what she’d been expecting at all. She was meant to feel settled, gratified with what she’d achieved, not have ants in her pants.

Company. That was what she needed.

Even though Kate allowed an extra five minutes for Iris to get out of her chair and make it to the front door, it still didn’t open. The windowsill was clear which meant that Iris had put Constanza away, so she’d clearly got up OK. She must have gone out. Maybe playing dominoes with one of her friends. Kate looked back across the street. She didn’t want to go home, back to her empty house. She stood, indecisive for a moment, and then suddenly knew she needed to get rid of some of her excess energy and headed for the bus stop.

After a vigorous walk around the lake, Kate wandered amongst the trees, instinctively heading for ‘Becky’s’. She stopped and looked up. Yep, it was still there. Now what? She contemplated a walk the opposite way around the park, but it didn’t appeal. She looked up at the tree again and then put her hands on the lowest branch and heaved herself up. Her feet came too and, before she knew it, she was surveying the park from a metre off the ground. The impulsiveness helped ease her unsettled feeling and she had a little giggle and carried on climbing, higher and higher still, giddy on the madness, the recklessness of it, until she was a good four metres up.

She sat on a horizontal bough and caught her breath. Looked towards the ground but felt dizzy and so quickly lifted her head. She’d figure out how to get down in a minute. Up here, where the warm spring breeze tickled the new leaves, she felt a release, free from the restlessness that had been binding her earlier. She clutched the trunk, smelt its earthy reassurance. There was a hollow just below her waist and she realized she was at the spot that Becky used to call the fairy home. She instinctively looked for the knife and fork, then remembered they were no longer there – Becky had brought them down when she’d changed it to a parking spot for alien ships. She glanced in again, wishing some part of her daughter was still there, and it was then she saw a bit of clear plastic. A bag tucked in the hollow. For a moment she just looked at it, puzzled, then reached in and pulled it out. It was sealed, a small clear bag that could be used for sandwiches, only in this one there was a memory stick.