Michael had phoned several times; at least she presumed it was him, but on each occasion she had lifted the receiver and immediately replaced it, so she couldn’t be sure. After three days she could bear it no longer and, when the phone rang, held it to her ear. He began speaking before she said a word, a rush of apologies. She had rehearsed what she would say – that she hated him, hated herself, that she wouldn’t see him again – but was seduced by how distraught he sounded. He said he was around the corner and could pick her up, and it had taken all her will not to walk out the door and stand on the kerb. She had agreed to go to the flat after school.

She walked around the room to see how the children were doing with their own letters.

Lucia wanted to go to England to see Zoe. Grace wanted to sing with ABBA. Jonathan wanted to read the news. Outlandish, yet there was more chance of Fintan playing for Liverpool than of Cushla having a happy ever after with Michael Agnew.

Davy put his hands flat on his letter and said he’d show it to her later.

She sent the children to the cloakroom to change into their gutties and carried the crate of milk outside, laying it in a shady place by the railings. It was a beautiful day, blue sky, big cauliflower clouds. Gerry was on the pitch, marking lanes for races.

You look wrecked, he said. Trouble in paradise?

Frig off, Gerry.

You need to be saved from yourself.

The contests began. Without Zoe there was an even number of children, and Cushla put Davy in a relay team. Jonathan rolled his eyes and drew the others around him for a pre-race motivational talk. They were arguing about who should finish, and Cushla intervened and said Davy would do it. Words were forming on Jonathan’s lips, but he saw the look on Cushla’s face and they stayed there, unsaid.

Gerry roared Go! and the race began. They were neck and neck with a team from Gerry’s class when the baton was passed to Davy. He seized it and took off. He ran without looking around him, leaning into the bends at the corners of the pitch. He was ungainly, legs flinging out in all directions. Come on, Davy, shouted Jonathan. The others had begun chanting his name. He picked up pace, running so hard his head was rolling from side to side, breaking through the tape at the finish with his eyes closed. He slowed to a trot, his ribcage heaving. Jonathan and the others were on him, then, hoisting him up and thumping him on the back. Cushla’s camera was in her basket. She captured him in the midst of the boys, holding his medal. The cheap glint of it in the sunshine. The smile on his face.