Chris was relieved when Vicky suggested they head off. As usual there was a lengthy good-bye process, new conversations budding on the doorstop, Polly throwing a tantrum because she didn’t want her aunties to leave. Chris waited on the pavement. He’d once asked Vicky whether she and her sisters found it hard to say good-bye because of being separated when they were young. She’d grinned, pecked his cheek, and said, “Nah, we do it because it drives our husbands up the wall.”

As Polly began performing diversionary handstands, Chris gazed around the street as if to test whether this one, two miles from his own, gave him that same sense of being scrutinized. The house opposite had its curtains open, revealing a couple lounging at opposite ends of a sofa, reading different sections of the same newspaper, their feet entwined. With a stab of sadness, Chris turned away toward his car.

He froze when he clapped eyes on it.

There was a piece of paper on the windshield, tucked beneath the wipers. A chill zipped down his spine. His eyes swept the street again before settling on the note. It couldn’t be . . .

Vicky appeared beside him. “You all right?”

“I’m fine.” He walked on, tripping slightly on an uneven paving slab. Vicky pulled out her phone and seemed preoccupied, reading messages. Then she lifted her head and noticed the note. “Oh, what’s that?”

Chris snatched it before she could, and kept it out of her line of vision as he unfolded it.

He almost choked on a rush of outward breath. It was just a message from one of Di’s fussy neighbors, asking “whom it may concern” not to park in front of their house. Chris tore it in half, relief and irritation clashing together.

“There aren’t any parking restrictions here, mate,” he mumbled, glancing at number 52. “You don’t own this spot.”

Vicky rolled her eyes—at Chris or at the neighbor, he wasn’t sure—and prompted him to unlock the car.

As they drove home Chris felt shaken, hoping Vicky hadn’t noticed his reaction. She turned up the radio but Chris turned it down again and she looked at him in surprise.

“Why didn’t you tell me you’d moved wards?” he asked.

This was where a lot of their conversations seemed to happen: driving to and from places, each the captive audience of the other.

“Didn’t I?”

“Don’t play dumb, Vic. It doesn’t suit you. When was it?”

“Three weeks ago.”

“Where are you now?”

“Cardiology.”

He glanced toward her, but she was staring out of her window. “Did they make you move?”

“No.”

“Then why?”

“I fancied a change, okay?”

“Did something happen?”

“I said no! Stop interrogating me.”

“I just wish you’d tell me stuff.”

She made a small sound through her nostrils.

“What was that?” he asked.

“What?”