He turned to her with an expression of such bleakness in his eyes that she felt fear as well as hope. He wanted to talk. Properly. Such moments were gold dust.

‘The Viv brigade would probably say it was because of my mother,’ he went on, laughing harshly and averting his gaze from the flash of astonishment that escaped Esther before she could stopper it.

‘Because?’ she asked gently.

Lucas shook his head. ‘Oh, you know. The son who wasn’t enough to stop his own parent deciding to sling a noose of bed-sheets round the branch of an apple tree, then having to spend the rest of his existence proving his worth. That sort of thing.’

‘Lucas, that’s not—’

‘Don’t worry, I know it’s all hocus pocus.’ He was smiling suddenly, unnervingly. ‘I only blame one person, who, I am happy to confirm, rarely crosses my mind. But all of it does seem to have left me with this relentless hamster wheel of a need to justify my presence on the planet. And you, my dear sweet Esther, bear the brunt.’ He took the Kindle off her lap, and then laced his hand with hers.

They intertwined fingers, Esther acutely aware of the hard ridges of her marriage rings against his skin. ‘It is all right, Lucas,’ she murmured, feeling that it truly was, and glimpsing the entirety of them suddenly – how they had begun and all that they had weathered as part of an inseparable whole.

Upstairs, in the dark of the bedroom and the new quiet of the house, they had reached for each other again and differently, with what had almost felt like the tenderness of strangers. Afterwards, with Lucas asleep on his back, his arm up against Esther’s, she had lain awake, heart still pounding from pleasure, and reflected on the invisible, yawning chasm between having sex and making love; a difference that Lucas had never found easy to acknowledge. The stuttering of her libido during the exhaustion of early motherhood had, unquestionably, been integral to the start of their difficulties, Lucas insisting on taking it personally, despite her repeated reassurances. Even when more regular relations were restored, those times – Lucas’s hurt and umbrage every night she put sleep before sex – had left a sour note that had never quite dissipated.

But not last night, Esther reflected, unable to resist smiling to herself as she hopped off her bicycle outside the entrance to Lucas’s college. Last night had been of a new order. Like before but better. More honest. More loving. Respectful to the point of reverence. And the talking properly too. Communicating. It felt like a new phase. It lent the tinge of something like a second honeymoon to the two children-less weeks stretching ahead.

‘Good morning, Mrs Shaw. Long time no see.’

‘How are you, Arthur? And how’s Smudge?’ Esther laughed as the college cat hopped up onto the counter, headbutting the man’s square chin.