‘That’ll be Gwen,’ he said, and I looked at him in the reflection like he’d gone daft. My ears were getting bad and I could tell he’d already said something a couple of times and was getting annoyed with me. He was nodding at the wall like Muffin the mule. I heard it soon enough. Gwenny, God rest her, was our neighbour the best part of forty years. Lovely woman, though she was a martyr to her bowel. She had a son in the Army who’d just been dodging bullets in that silly war Thatcher got herself all excited about, but him being away meant Gwenny was always a bag of nerves and had this great fear of seeing a postman coming up the drive with a letter telling her he’s been hurt. So she had a phone put in – that’s what I’m getting at. We didn’t get a phone for another three or four years after but as John said, we didn’t need one. We knew where everybody was, near enough, and the last thing he wanted was to come home from work to listen to me having half a conversation. But we gave out Gwenny’s number to use in emergencies. My eldest was living in Carlisle with his wife and their own little lad and whenever I got a knock on the wall from Gwenny I expected the worst about one of them. He was a sickly lad, our Peter, though he’s doing all right for himself now. London, like you. Shoreditch, is that right? What an ugly word. The youngest, he’d already passed away by ’77. Never was quite right for the world, God rest him. I don’t know what comes after but I hope he’s found peace wherever he is. I know I haven’t been proper whole since he left us, but, well, let’s steer off all that sadness, it’s not why you’re here.

Anyway, look, I know that while I was washing the dishes and listening to the wireless and thinking all my little thoughts, stuff was happening in other places that was all going to impact on my life. I know that now, yes? But I didn’t know it then. I don’t think I’d have answered if I did.

‘I’ll go, if you like,’ said John, making no effort to move.