As she started up the loft ladder, the pain of his loss gripped Karen and she had to wait until she could draw air into her lungs before she continued her ascent.

She’d never expected to be a widow. She’d always presumed she would be the first to go. Jack’s father had lived into his nineties, faculties intact. His mother had preceded her husband by only a few months.

As for her own parents, they hadn’t been so lucky.

Dust motes, disturbed by her entry, danced before her as she made her way to the box near the leftmost skylight. Jack, in his tidy manner, had labelled the box KAREN MISCELLANEOUS and dated it with the year she’d left home. As such, it had seemed a suitable resting place for what she now sought.

Having extracted it, she headed back down to the kitchen, at which point she put the kettle on and made a pot of tea. In past times, during Jack’s illness and after his death, when anxiety had beset her, she would have sought refuge in a glass of wine.

Not any more.

Settling herself beside the range, mug of tea alongside, Karen opened the old school jotter, hoping whatever was in there hadn’t faded with time.

She had written the diary in pencil. In the lead-up to that day the entries were brief, like ‘practised spelling for test tomorrow’ and ‘Stephen fancies Mary. He sent her a love letter in class.’

Everything changed on the first day of May.

For a moment Karen was back in her old bedroom, sitting at the desk by the window. The street she’d lived in had houses on one side only. On the other side were two newly built primary schools. One for Catholics. The other for Protestants. The school grounds were separated by an area of open land and a small wood.

That’s where we built our den.

The road outside her house was steep and mostly empty of cars. A few delivery vans drove up and down. An ice-cream van. A rag-and-bone cart.

We played in the street all the time.

Until that day.

It was so long ago. How could she possibly remember what she’d felt like back then? Yet, she could. As Karen read the words she’d written, the horror of that day, so long buried, rose up to engulf her.

Diary entry of Karen Marshall aged 11

1 May 1975

It was sunny today. I practised my skipping.

Mary’s in the kitchen

Doing a little stitchin’

In comes a bogeyman

And out goes she

Mary’s my best friend. The bogeyman is the man who waits near the shops to show us his willy. Mary and I always run past trying not to look.

I was waiting for Mary to come and have her photograph taken in our front garden. She would be wearing her white confirmation dress and veil, which are beautiful.

I want a dress like Mary’s, but I can’t be confirmed, because I’m a Protestant. Mary says there’s a seat in heaven reserved for her because she’s a Catholic.