The old man stands for a moment, looking uncertain. Then he sinks back into his chair.

‘Yes, of course you’re right. They’re very competent, the Helpers.’

We walk on. The whole episode’s a shock. Never before have I seen a resident get up and take notice of anything at all. And when the old man spoke he was clear and articulate. Perhaps the rumours are true. I start to feel nervous about meeting my mother.

We reach her room, and I knock on the door. She never answers, of course, but if anything’s going on inside with the carers, they’ll tell us if it’s OK to go in or not.

‘Come in,’ says a voice very like my mother’s.

I push the door open, expecting to find a carer inside. There’s none. Only my mother, sitting in her high-backed wheelchair. She’s not slumped down like last time. She’s upright, and she’s looking straight at me.

‘Hello John,’ she says.

Her voice is clear – like that old man’s. She sounds as she did ten years ago, before grief and age reduced her.

I can’t speak. Ironically. I can’t believe what I’m looking at, what I’m hearing. I’ve got used to silence, mumbling, croaking, sometimes sentences, sometimes noises. Her lying curled up and dribbling. I used to talk to her – frankly, like I’d talk to a child.

That won’t do now. It feels wrong. Disrespectful. I suppose it always was.

‘Hello Mum. You’re looking well.’

‘Thank you. I’m feeling well, too. How are you?’

We’re now already far beyond the point we’ve reached in any conversation for several years. I hardly know how to go on.

‘I’m, erm, I’m fine. Thank you.’

There’s a pause. She continues, it seems, to look at me. I stand in the doorway, uncertain.

‘How lovely – you’ve brought the whole family. Come in, come in, all of you.’

We crowd into the room, and stand in front of her, wondering.

‘Mum, can you see us?’

‘Yes, thank you. It’s surprising, isn’t it?’

I don’t know what to say. I stare at her, as do the children. They have no memory of their grandmother as anything other than a mumbling heap. They last saw her a year ago, and it wasn’t fun.

Charlotte’s wary, too. Last time, my mother bit her. Charlotte was holding her hand, and Mum raised it to her mouth as if to kiss it, and then nipped her. For no reason at all. Which is why Charlotte’s stayed away, and we concluded that was what my mother intended.

‘Hello Margaret,’ Charlotte says at last. ‘You look much better.’

‘I am now, dear. I’ve been a bit confused about things.’

I nod at this vast understatement.

‘Yes, Mum, I know you have been. You seem much clearer now. Aren’t you?’