John started coughing. Grimaced and heaved himself into a more comfortable position. As he did so the book he’d taken off me slipped out of his pocket and landed on the floor. John barely glanced down at it. Sera picked it up. Handed it to me. I took it from her. John hadn’t wanted me to see it but I needed something to do with my hands, with my eyes, so I started flicking through those lovely creamy pages without even really knowing what I was doing.

It was all in John’s handwriting. Blue ink, sloping backwards, hard to read but pretty in its way; the capital letters just little letters done big. It was all laid out neatly. Four lines, then a space, then four lines, and a space, page after page, each with a heading and a date.

It was a poetry book. John had been writing out some poems in his best hand.

When had he been doing that? What for? I peered at a page at random. Saw our James’s name. Saw mine, too. Peter’s. The name of the church where we’d wed. These weren’t somebody else’s poems. They were his.

He’d been writing poems. Our John. Proper rhymes. About our lads. His mam. About me. He’d written one to the grandson who he was going to play Cowboys and Indians with some day. He’d written about the white horse out the back field – ‘a summer cloud, swift and proud’ – and the smell of the sawmill behind our house. He’d written about the kingfisher on the River Irthing and the big purple dragonflies ‘darting like spitfires, crumpled tinfoil wings’ out at Talkin Tarn. He’d written about me. My eyes. The ‘honey and hay and edelweiss’ of my hair, which sounded to me like a fancy way of saying that the white was overtaking the mousy brown. The curve of my back just above my bum. I snapped the book shut like I was trying to kill a bee between the pages. It took all my effort not to throw the thing across the room and duck before it exploded. When had he done this? What was I supposed to think?

‘He has a little more colour,’ said Sera, looking up. ‘I know Pelletier and he does not cause suffering or permit it if it can be avoided. He will speak for you. I will speak for you. It would be best if …’

I stopped listening then. I’d flicked to the front of the book and read the dedication. It was Cordelia’s handwriting, every bit as pretty as she was.

To a true poet. Don’t be afraid of asking for what you want. You have a voice that people deserve to hear. I’m glad to know you.

Sincerely, CH.