I took the card but ignored the request. There was no way I could go. I’d planned a Christmas Day in front of the television. I’d been learning how to cook over the past few weeks and reckoned I could handle a Christmas luncheon of scrambled eggs with Alphabetti spaghetti and white toast, provided I washed it down with one of the bottles of sloe and damson wine that Heron had left on the back step next to a spindly silver Christmas tree and a carving of a bird. None of the gifts had come with a card and we had not spoken about them on our walks but there was something between us. It would never become more than it was, but it mattered to me.

‘I’m here if you need me,’ she said, and I was grateful to her for not making a big deal of it.

‘Me too,’ I said, though I figured I would be less use.

I opened the card when I got home. It showed a little church against a fading sky; snow on the ground and a robin sitting on a cross. Inside she had written something that made me feel like I had already drunk the wine.

To Cordy. The Strongest person I know. I am proud to be your friend. Flick (and family) xxx

It sat in the centre of the mantelpiece. I still have it, all these years later. Still can’t look at it without feeling a little giddy and nostalgic.