There was a pink neon sign above the entrance, framed by matching tinsel. ‘The Eastgate Centre’ it said, and for a moment the place seemed like a glamorous location.

Inside, the warm air felt very close to my skin. The walls were tiled in reflective grey. The ceilings were mirrored, which I thought was a bad idea, because groups of teenagers tended to gather and point up at themselves, pulling faces and laughing.

A Christmas jingle played, over and over. Every surface shone, and each shop window reflected the two of us back to me: Kathryn walking slightly ahead, her white scarf still wrapped around her neck so it looked slightly like a bandage, me a few paces behind, my heels worn, the collar of my jacket kicking up. The crease in Kathryn’s forehead sharpened as we walked further into the centre, and she held on to her patchwork shoulder bag like it was a shield, slung across her body. Her tweed belted coat looked bulky, as if she had been bundled into it.

‘When did you buy that coat?’ I asked, noticing the way one shoulder was skewed with the weight of her bag. She was walking slightly ahead of me. We hadn’t spoken since getting into the car that morning, and my voice sounded unfamiliar in the echoing shopping centre. ‘Isn’t it time you had a new one?’

‘We’re supposed to be Christmas shopping,’ she said.

‘We could get you a new one. For Christmas.’

Kathryn stepped out of the path of a child’s buggy. A woman with bags bunched up both arms pushed past me. Kathryn strode on. ‘It’s Rob’s present I’m worried about,’ she called back.

We reached the entrance to Boswell’s Department Store. Husbands waited in the doorway while their wives picked at shelves of multicoloured twinkle. There was a strong, almost nauseating, perfume. It took me a few moments to realise this was coming from the soaps that were piled in big baskets along one wall. Each one was shaped like a fruit or a flower, and was wrapped in new plastic. The whole place smelled like a just-cleaned bathroom. It gave me a headache.

We took the escalator to the next floor. As we glided upwards, we were greeted by layer upon layer of hanging snowflakes, each spike precisely cut from silver foil. A voice over the tannoy interrupted ‘Jingle Bells’ to promise us a Happy Christmas with Boswell’s own pine-scented artificial tree.

We stepped off the escalator and into the lingerie department. Kathryn had told me how to pronounce that word some months after we were first married. We’d been shopping for her birthday present, I remember, and I’d suggested that she might like to go to the ling-er-ree department. She’d laughed at my pronunciation, corrected me, and allowed me to buy her a peach-coloured silk petticoat.