Sorry, I do prattle, don’t I? Proper cure for insomnia, so they say. Cordelia used to have me ring her some nights and start telling her about what I’d been up to, just to help her drift off. She’d put the phone on the pillow and then pretend to snore. Cheeky so-and-so. You won’t know that about her, of course. You won’t know she’s a bit of a joker and that she’d give you the skin off her back if she thought you were cold. She hides all the sweetness. And there I go again.

So like I said, I was at the window, doing the pots. Can’t have been much after seven. John was sitting where you are now. We’ve redecorated twice since then but it’s not going to take much of a leap of imagination to picture it. I’ve got photos if you’re struggling. Little sofa on wooden legs, a couple of nice armchairs and that drop-leaf table with the fruit bowl against the back wall. Same fruit bowl, if you’ll give it credence. Wedding present, that was. There’ll have been a bit of a fog around our John. Smoker, our John. Was when we met and he would still be now if the grandson hadn’t given him earache for it. If you want to get it right, he’d have been sitting in his vest and pyjama trousers. He’ll have had the cardigan on – the mustard-coloured one with the harlequin pattern on the front. It was his favourite and the pocket was just the right size for his packet of John Players. He’d have been a few months shy of fifty. Bald since not long after we said our vows but he still had a little horseshoe of grey hair around above his ears and down the back. He always said it was me who did it – that marrying me put years on him. He used to tell people that he’d torn it out by the roots with me nagging. It was only a joke, of course. I wasn’t a nag. Sometimes I said what had to be said but I was a worrier if I was anything. Still am, when it comes to the family, though I’ve given up getting myself in a state. I’m not far off eighty-nine so most of my problems are behind me, I’d say.