From the ensuite Chris can see a blurry Diane taking his shirt off the bed and hanging it in the wardrobe. She nudges something into position with her foot, glances around and disappears. He towels himself dry and goes into the bedroom where the shirt he just took out to wear is now back in the wardrobe, swaying and setting a whole line of faultlessly pressed shirts moving in unison. At the end of the rail, his suit droops like a bad memory. Inhabiting a suit well is one trait he has not inherited from his father. He removes the shirt again and shrugs it on.

Time for a change. Maybe a Hawaiian shirt with pineapples on it.

He goes to his den for the drawings he was working on last night. Fletcher is nestled in a gutter over the kitchen, whittling an arrow. Chris obliterates him with an eraser. At work, the small man has been popping up everywhere; in three of Noland’s apartments, peering over the window sills, giving exasperatingly sensible advice.

Flat roof? That’s inviting problems.

It’s what the client wants.

Talk him out of it.

On a penthouse balcony, spread-eagled in a deckchair behind sunglasses. This deck needs an awning.

The client doesn’t like awnings.

That’s dumb. Awnings are to windows what lashes are to eyes.

Chris wonders if he’s out of control.

Yep, I can see cracks.

Cracks don’t necessarily herald imminent disaster. A certain amount of cracking in some buildings is acceptable, as long as you know where they are and that they’re not getting worse.

Yet.

I haven’t done anything.

Yet.

Tabi, skinny ankles and smart old eyes, sashays towards him. She’s wearing a black sweater and a tight red skirt that perfectly cradles the pear of her bum, taut with youth and hormones. Chris can’t see the hormones but he can smell them. Musky, like warm hay.

She blinks slowly and puts her hand on her hip. ‘What are you thinking, Mr B?’

He pulls his chair close under his desk so she can’t see what he’s thinking and applies his eyes to the builder’s estimate for the Cost of Proposed Extensions to Existing Dwelling of Gavin and Pearl Whitbread of Indooroopilly, while the rest of his senses crawl over Tabi’s body.

‘What’s the latest on Judge?’ she says. Fatuous question. She knows how Judge is. They all do. Physically excellent but emotionally and verbally haywire.

He shrugs.

‘Poor old Mr B, you miss your friend.’

He does. He misses Judge being around and he misses Judge being the way he was.

The phone buzzes and Tabi leans over to answer it. Chris drags his eyes away from her to the view beyond the window where cars edge down Sherwood Road towards the traffic lights.

‘Baillieu & Bright Architects, this is Tabitha.’ She turns to Chris and nods. ‘Yes, he’s right here.’ She slides upright, smoothes down her skirt, blows a pink bubble and farewells him with her fingertips.

Chris watches her red-skirted rear disappear and picks up the phone. ‘Um – Chris Bright.’

‘Bertie Beaumont.’

His heart skips. ‘Beaumont? Is that your name these days? Is it your first husband’s name or second? Or is that a rude question?’

‘My second husband’s name was Hickinbottom.’

Chris laughs.

‘Good news,’ she says. ‘They found your pen. I have it with me.’

‘Really – after what – two months? I thought it had gone forever.’

When Bertie sent his gear from the apartment – including his sketches of Fletcher and a note: Don’t forget your little friend – it was minus the pen Diane had given him for his thirtieth birthday. Bertie fronted the letting agents and asked them to look again but it couldn’t be found.

‘It was under a bed,’ she says. ‘Makes you wonder how often they get vacuumed.’

‘The beds?’

‘The floors, Christopher.’

‘Yeah. How are you, Bertie?’

‘Fine. How’s Judge?’

‘Oh. Volatile as a firecracker.’

‘Dad was like that after his stroke, but once the depression lifted he was fine. I imagine Judge will be too.’

‘Hope so.’

‘Are you all right? Oh – stupid question. I suppose you don’t know your rear end from your elbow.’

He laughs. ‘Something like that.’

‘Then I won’t keep you. I’ll post your pen. Take care of yourself.’

‘Thanks, Bertie. And … just, thanks.’

Tabi comes back, waving a sheet of paper. ‘Rachel Anderson. The plumber’s delivered one round hand basin and one oval hand basin. The toilet pedestal is Caroma and it’s supposed to be Villeroy & Boch. Funny that. High-quality table-ware and high-quality toilet-ware.’ She shrugs. ‘Both ends of the tube, I suppose.’

Chris smiles, then gazes vaguely into the distance. Odd how he and Bertie have resumed their easy friendship, even when …

Tabi snaps her fingers. ‘Come on, boss. Focus.’

Focus. Hold it together until it holds itself. Hold it for Judge and for the staff. They deserve it. Three, four times a day Tabi or Maureen will come in and throw him a lifeline; drop a sandwich on his desk or leave sticky notes on his computer with reminders of wages or progress payments. Most of his work is humdrum. Payroll tax, specifications, client meetings. Mrs Anderson’s toilet.

‘You’re a good girl, Tabi.’

‘I’m not a girl, Mr B.’ She taps a long nail on his desk. ‘I’m a woman.’

Judge stands in the doorway casting a Napoleonic glare over his kingdom.

Hamish, about to duck out for a meeting, stops. Mick, in the process of dressing Doris in a black tutu and fishnet stockings, pauses.

‘I’m back,’ says Judge. ‘For good.’ He wipes spit from the corner of his mouth. When nobody moves, he flicks his hand. ‘Go on, then. Hop to.’

‘Welcome back,’ says Maureen hesitantly.

As Chris heads for his office Judge intercepts him. ‘I might sound like a cretin, but don’t imagine I am.’

‘Then don’t say dumb things.’

‘Who the hell’s been at my desk?’

‘I have.’

‘Who else?’

Was he psychic?

‘Who else?’

‘Take it easy, Judge.’

‘Take it easy, take it easy. Everyone wants me to take it easy. I don’ wanna take it easy. I want to work.’

‘Good. Go for it.’

Judge picks up a piece of paper with Tabi’s handwriting on it. ‘Did you let that stringy tart loose in here?’

‘Tabi?’

‘How many stringy tarts have we got?’

‘Her name is Tabitha.’

‘Woooow, Tabitha. What’s eating you?’

‘Nothing.’

‘Doesn’t sound like nothing to me.’

Judge has been forbidden to drive for three months, so at the end of a long day, cold for early May, Chris drives him home. Judge huddles against the passenger-side door, squeezing the life out of his rubber ball. He looks miserable. Efforts to express himself, and tantrums when he couldn’t, have left him exhausted. They’ve left everyone exhausted.

Chris stops outside his house. ‘Can I pick you up in the morning?’

‘No. Karen’ll bring me.’ Judge opens his door, hesitates and half turns. ‘Sorry,’ he mumbles, but is gone before Chris can reply.

Diane is established at the dining table with her computer and a pile of notes. She has new, dark-framed glasses which make her look owlish. When Chris goes to the fridge for a beer, she caps her pen and follows.

‘Ben phoned today, wanting to know how you are.’

‘All right, I suppose. Right now, stuffed.’

‘Then tell him. Go and see him. He needs reassuring.’

‘What about?’

‘He needs to know that nothing’s changed between you two.’

Chris draws on his beer and burps gently. ‘But it has.’

‘No, it hasn’t. You’ve always been his son; you simply didn’t know it. Nothing’s actually different.’

‘Actually, Diane, it is. It’s very different.’

She glares at him through her new glasses. ‘Listen, Chris. Judge had a stroke at forty-eight. Ben’s seventy-two. How would you feel if something like that – or worse – happened to him?’

Like shit.

‘Yes, all right. I’ll give him a call.’

‘Never mind call. Go and see him.’

‘I haven’t time right now. The office is a dog’s breakfast. Judge came back to work today. Nobody could understand a word he said, everyone’s jittery and every damn thing took twice as long as it should have.’

‘I suppose it’s to be expected and I’m sorry but I dare say it’ll sort itself out. Right now, Ben is more important. You seem to forget he’s lost a son and a wife. You’re all he has left.’

‘No, I’m not. He has friends. You, Phoebe, and—’

‘Christopher! That’s unworthy.’

‘Of who?’

‘Of whom.’

‘What?’

‘Of you,’ says Diane.

‘Did you just … correct me?’

‘I said it was unworthy of you.’ Diane turns away. ‘And it is.’

When Tabi’s eyes focused on his mouth he knew she’d stopped listening. He gazed at her hungrily, an adulterer already, guilty before he began.

She touched his hair gently. ‘I thought you were getting it cut.’

‘You told me not to.’ His eyes flicked nervously about the office.

‘Nobody here, Mr B, except you and me. All at lunch.’

He tried to smile.

‘You have a beautiful mouth, you know; lovely lips.’ She twirled a curl of his hair around her finger.

He cleared his throat. ‘I have a site inspection.’

‘So do I.’

‘You don’t do site inspections.’

‘Oh, yes, I do.’

The tide in the Brisbane River begins its journey towards the sea, unseen by the occupants of room 808.

Tabi strokes the golden hair on his chest. ‘Have you done this with anybody else?’

‘Tabi – I am married.’

‘I mean, since.’

Chris rubs his stubble. ‘No.’

‘Before you were married?’

‘I wasn’t a virgin.’

Beyond the windows, the sun breaks free from drifting clouds and smudges their bodies with late autumn light.

‘Anyone special?’

‘Tabi, this is now. Just us. And you’re special.’

‘Oh.’ She nuzzles his stomach. ‘You’re sweet, Mr B, but I’m hungry.’

‘Again?’

‘For food.’ She crosses one tanned skinny leg over his. Those thighs, firm and resilient, had pinned him to her body. Her skin was rougher than Diane’s but more willing. It shivered and swelled to his touch and her arms gripped him with unfeigned desire. Fumbling, jerking, tangling, laughing.

He looks at this sweet woman, then shuts his eyes. Forget look. Feel. She blows gently on his groin, making his skin flutter. He wants her again. He wants that sensation of fusion, when they defy the maths and became one plus one equals more than two, when flesh and hearts are wide open and for a precious few moments love flows between them. She lifts her face and he kisses her gently, smelling the fresh sweat of her neck and feeling grateful – so grateful – for this brief, blessed moment when he is not wondering what more he could do to make it work.

‘You’ve restored pieces of myself I thought I’d lost,’ he says.

‘I must be smarter than I thought.’

‘You are.’ Chris gazes at the blur of her face and realises how silly he is to resist contact lenses when there is, after all, much in this life he wants to see.

‘But?’

‘But what?’

Tabi studies her nails, shiny and purple. ‘I know what you’re thinking, Mr B. We’re not Cathy and Heathcliff.’

‘For now, maybe.’

‘Yeah, for now. Mind you, neither are me and Jeremy. I don’t know why I put up with him,’ she says of her on-again, off-again boyfriend. ‘Except I’m so used to being with him, if I stopped I’d miss him. Even if I didn’t.’ She giggles. ‘You know what I mean.’

He props himself on an elbow. ‘Tabi, you don’t feel …?’

‘Nah.’ She pats his cheek. ‘I don’t. I make my own decisions.’

He sighs, suspecting there are times when the adult is not always the oldest. ‘Are we going to be okay working together?’

‘I am. Are you?’ She cradles his chin between her thumb and forefinger. ‘You’re voolnerable, Mr B.’

His heart contracts. She can read him; why not Diane?

He kisses Tabi’s cheek. ‘Thanks to you, not as vulnerable as I was.’

She swings her legs over the side of the bed. ‘Now I’m really hungry.’

Chilli prawns; crisp and garlicky, oiling fingers and lips. They sit at the bar downstairs with plates of seafood, feeding each other mouthfuls between sips of wine.

Tabi licks her fingers and stretches. ‘Gosh. After all that food, I think we need to go back upstairs and have a nice lay-down.’

As the world outside condenses to the world in their bed Chris becomes nobody, simply awareness, emptying out, filling up, breathing all the way from his toes to the ends of his hair like a Wandjina man. Inhaling memories, precious wraiths from his 23-year-old self. Another time, another place. Forget it. There is only now; this time, this place. Now is all that matters.

He presses a goodbye kiss on Tabi’s thin, sweet lips – so different from Diane’s firm mouth – and turns the Rover homewards. He’s later than usual; the traffic has thinned and the journey is quick.

He pulls into the driveway, stands for a moment smoothing his hair, and goes upstairs.

‘Hi,’ Diane says. ‘You’re late.’

He nods. In the bedroom he hangs his jacket in the wardrobe with weak arms. His body is so relaxed, so unwound with sex and satisfaction he can hardly stand up. He catches sight of his face in the mirror. Treacherous. Triumphant. A flush spreads through his whole body. He splashes water on his face and brushes his hair, waiting for the heat to subside before going to the kitchen where Diane is draining vegetables into the sink. Watching her, so undisturbed and unsuspecting, the flush returns – hotter and sharper – with a flare of guilt. He tugs his ear. She pushed him to this. Somebody wanted him, somebody really wanted him.

‘Big day?’ She drops thinly sliced wafers of potato into a pan.

‘Been down at Cleveland on site. Traffic was constipated all the way back.’

When Diane says nothing further he begins to elaborate. The traffic hold-up was caused by road-works. There were detours, lane merges, lights not operating properly, witches hats and speed restrictions and people doing silly things like he’s doing now – running off at the mouth with too many details – unnecessary, unbelievable details – too, too many words, and when she says, ‘Uh-huh,’ with a kind of grim triumph, he’s certain she knows.

At dinner, she keeps her head turned away from him as if he reeks of female skunk. He swallows his guilt along with the perfectly grilled steak. She doesn’t interrogate him and it’s infuriating, as if she doesn’t need a trial to prove him guilty. He wants a chance to defend himself, to tell her he’s normal and someone wanted him. Someone told him he had the most beautiful balls in the world and cradled them like eggs. Someone had wanted him so much she’d even wanted to do it again.

She had.

They had.

So.

Maybe now Diane would admit they have problems and help him sort them out.

She drops her dressing gown on the bedroom chair and reveals a silk chemise with shoestring straps. Slithery. Dressed for reclamation. In bed she moves close and trails her hand down his body, around the curve of his hip and across the hollow of his groin. He flinches. She takes hold of his penis, as spent as over-chewed gum, and strokes it. Nothing happens. She moves her hand away and he hears her fumble in the bedside drawer for gel. She brings a slippery hand back to his flabby cock and paints the underside.

Nothing. It’s had it. Fucking worn out.

For the first time in his life, he shrinks from her touch. Unable to respond and too embarrassed to pull away he suffers her pointless quest, the darkened room crowding with thoughts. Eventually, her hand falls away. They lie beside each other in silence. He waits for her to move, to turn over, to sigh or say something but she is utterly still. Slowly Chris drags the pillow under his ear; hears the dull, despairing thud of his pulse and the laboured tick of their old alarm clock measuring out each minute of the night.

He rises early, shaves, showers and goes to his den. A sketch he made of Fletcher two days before looms up from his drawing board with a knowing, almost cynical expression. He brandishes an arrow.

Go on.

I know, but …

Just do it. Now.

Right now?

Fletcher maintains his gaze. You can drag it out if you want, but now, or in ten years’ time, this day will come.

Dishes of butter, marmalade and vegemite are arrayed before him. The butter is straight from the fridge, scored and twirled into jaunty curls. The toast is rack-dried and crunchy.

Diane avoids his eyes.

He reaches for a piece of toast and stops, suddenly ravenous for the prawns he shared with Tabi; the fleshiness of them, the tang of garlic and chilli, the hint of coconut. His hand hovers momentarily over the toast, then he takes it and a twirl of butter. If he doesn’t eat Diane will ask why and it will be out between them. It’s out anyway. Every drag of the knife, every glance avoided – the debacle of last night lies between them. But it has to be said. Betrayal must be exposed and picked over until its skeleton is fleshless. Then it must be labelled, priced and stored in a space which might have been used for better things. Diane may not want all of him, but she doesn’t want to lose what she has.

‘Diane.’

‘Oh,’ she says abruptly. ‘I forgot.’

‘Diane.’

‘The laundry. I forgot the laundry. I left it out all night!’ She scrambles towards the door.

Chris slides off the stool. ‘Diane.’

She stops.

He stands in the middle of the kitchen holding a tea towel for support. ‘I slept with someone.’

She flinches.

‘I’m sorry, but I … I told you …’

She closes her eyes.

‘Things are crap. No, not crap. Yeah, well, crap, but not crap like some people’s marriages. You know, not fighting or anything, but … lonely. You don’t want me. I can feel it and it makes me feel like shit.’ He stops. How can he explain so she’ll understand?

How can you expect her to understand after what you’ve done?

Her mouth moves silently. He doesn’t know what she’s trying to say but he does know how hard it is to find words.

‘I do want you,’ she says quietly.

Shit. He’s really hurt her.

‘I wouldn’t have stayed married to you all these years if I didn’t want you. But you want to be wanted on your terms. You’re not satisfied with what I give you any more – the rock-solid things that make a marriage work. We have a life. We have children. They’re not enough. I’m not enough. Nothing’s enough. More, more, more. Always wanting more – you’re insatiable – like a spoiled brat. Where does it bloody end?’

‘It ends … I don’t know. I am grateful for what we have, Di, and for what you do for me, but I do want more. I always have. I told you months ago, years ago. I want a …’ he twists the tea towel, ‘an us, before it’s too late and we turn into fish passing each other in the night … Ships, I mean. Ah, shit. I want an us together.’

She looks at him as if he’s crazy. ‘You have it. It’s called marriage and I’ve given it all I can, in and out of bed.’

‘Except what’s inside you.’

‘There is no “inside me”. You’ve got it all.’

‘No. No.’ He shakes his head. ‘I haven’t. You know I haven’t.’

‘I know nothing. I haven’t a clue what you’re talking about, or what you want, but I suppose you’re going to tell me you got it with Roberta.’

‘Huh …?’ His heart stops.

‘Is it the same Roberta we went to school with in Port Moresby?’

‘Yeah, but … no. What – how do you know about Roberta?’

‘I didn’t go snooping, if that’s what you mean. You left your little love note on the floor of the wardrobe.’

‘What?’

‘Here, have the damn thing.’ She opens a kitchen drawer and flings a piece of paper on the bench.

Chris recognises the note Bertie sent with his pen.

‘But it isn’t …’

‘Don’t, Christopher. Just – don’t.’

‘But –’

Shut up. Keep Tabi’s name out of it.

‘Look,’ says Chris, putting down the tea towel and reaching for her. ‘It’s you and me who matter, not … Roberta.’

‘Don’t touch me.’ She jerks away. ‘She might be stupid enough to let you trample on her but I’m not. My father wiped his shoes on my need for affection; I’ll never let any man do that to me again.’

‘I’ve never done that.’

‘You don’t call having sex with another woman trampling on me? I trusted you.’

‘What you trusted was that I’d be satisfied with sex without emotion. I told you: I’m not your father. I’m not going to kick you in the teeth if you feel.’

‘No – only if I don’t. We have a marriage – twenty-five years of it – which I value and I thought you valued.’

‘I do value our marriage and I value you, and I’m very sorry I’ve hurt you.’

‘Do you love that woman?’

‘No.’

She curls her lip. ‘Then you’re as bad as your father.’

‘I am not! I didn’t screw your sister.’

‘No, you screwed a woman old enough to know what she was doing and who she was hurting. She didn’t give a hoot about me. You keep bleating about what kind of woman sleeps with her sister’s husband. I’ll tell you.’ Diane pokes the air. ‘Your mother was young and foolish and she imagined Ben loved her. He didn’t, because if he had he wouldn’t have done what he did, to her or to Jo. He took what he wanted and your mother paid the price. And Jo paid the price.’ Diane screws up her face as if the day’s brightness is unbearable. ‘But Ben and Jo stayed together because they valued their marriage beyond passing infatuation. Emotions, romance – they come and go; they’re not what matter. There is an “us”, Christopher, we’re right under your nose.’ She turns and clatters downstairs.

He gazes after her.

She knows. He knows in his bones that despite her denials she understands exactly what’s missing and what he wants.

Chris rolls up his drawings and takes them down to the car. He’d hoped to avoid rush hour by waiting until after nine but traffic is banked all the way up Waterworks Road. Near the lights the hold-up becomes obvious – a rear-end prang. He turns off the engine. Nobody’s going anywhere for a while. Ring the office and let them know? Nah. He’s done enough explaining for one day. What a cock-up, and what irony that Diane should think he’d been with Roberta.

You have.

A long time ago. Once. One day. One precious, perfect London day.

Some cancellation or other, a client who didn’t turn up. Coffee became lunch and after lunch, a walk.

‘I have something to show you,’ Chris said to Bertie. ‘Back at my flat.’

‘Oh, no …’ She shook her head.

‘Those wooden pieces you gave me. I need your help with them – something I’m trying to make.’

‘No, Chris.’

‘Really, I’m serious. Come on, I’ll show you.’

‘I can’t …’

He raised his hands. ‘I swear I won’t touch you unless you want me to.’ He took her hand and hailed a cab. He could feel her pulling against him and kept his grip firm. His flat, on the first floor of an old building, was shabby in a friendly sort of way, large and warmed by the afternoon sun. The pieces of wood she’d given him were arranged in two stacks on an old chest he used as a coffee table.

‘What’s it supposed to be?’ she asked.

‘This stack is you, and this stack is me.’

‘So …?’

‘We can make anything we want out of these pieces, Bertie, if we build it together.’

She glanced away – down at her feet, over towards the long bay window. She went to it and stood, arms folded, looking down at the streetscape. Sunlight silhouetted the gentle curves of her body, her long skirt and boots. She swayed a little, as if trying to measure the rhythm of some internal melody. Then she turned, came towards him and looked into his eyes. ‘I had a terrible crush on you at school, Christopher Bright.’

‘I hope you still do.’

She took his face in her hands. ‘No … it’s more than a crush.’

The kiss was a firecracker, a flare that ignited every cell of his being. He flapped his arms helplessly, desperate to touch her but determined to keep his promise. She pinned them down at last, and wrapped them around her. He rested his cheek on her hair, inhaled its fresh woody scent and moved his mouth slowly over her forehead … her eyelids … ears … neck.

She pulled away and peeled off her red angora jumper.

Chris removed his jacket.

She unbuttoned her shirt and let it slide from her shoulders onto the floor.

Chris did likewise.

Bertie gazed at his blond-flecked chest, unhooked her bra and flicked it away.

He gazed at her small, perfect breasts.

She unzipped her skirt and stepped out of it.

He unzipped his jeans but when he tried to get them over his shoes he lurched off balance and collapsed onto the bed.

She stood over him, laughing, and her eyes travelled down his sunlit body to linger on his groin. Then she sat beside him and removed the boot from her good foot.

Chris removed the shoe from his left foot and flung away his jeans.

Bertie unrolled her pantyhose.

Chris peeled off a sock.

Then she stalled. Sat on the bed hunched over, staring at the built-up boot on her crippled foot.

He nuzzled her shoulder, then slid off the bed and knelt in front of her. With the ease of one long accustomed, he unlaced her boot. She put out a restraining hand but he moved it gently aside and took off the boot and pantyhose. She stiffened. He took her hands, kissed them with playful intensity and dropped another kiss on the landscape of her twisted, scarred foot. Then he pushed forward his own foot. She bent down and removed his remaining shoe and sock and then stood, listing a little to the right. She twined her fingers in his hair and gently drew him towards the smooth flesh of her stomach. He smiled into its warmth. I love you, he said.

He lost himself in his Bertie. Surrendered to the unspoken bliss of belonging – not to each other, but with each other. He didn’t make love to Bertie, but with her he re-discovered something he’d always sensed was there. Nothing to do, only to be, pure awareness, beyond flesh and beyond time, fused in an ocean of joy.

Someone behind him toots. Chris blinks, starts the motor and edges forward. Everyone is waiting. Waiting to go somewhere, towards something or someone. Maybe in this clot of cars someone like him has confessed to a liaison that will undoubtedly alter a relationship in a way yet to be measured. The lights turn green. Nothing happens. The bloke at the front doesn’t seem to register he’s free to go.

Chris waited for Bertie the next day at their regular time in their regular booth. She didn’t appear. After two hours he returned to his office and phoned her at work to find out if she was sick. She wasn’t. He hung up before he was put through. The following Friday he went back to their booth again and waited. And waited. Two hours. The next week, another two. Bertie never showed. He never saw her again, until twenty-five years later on the cliff top at Coolum.

Sure: Oliver. He understood she’d have hated to hurt him, but what he and Bertie had together was no mere fling. If she regretted it, couldn’t she tell him? Maybe she needed time. He wrote, promising he wouldn’t pursue her if she’d only explain her silence. She never replied. When he finally realised she wasn’t going to see him again he tried to escape the weight of her loss by dating other women. Other fish and all that. And there were other fish, but that’s all they were – other fish. Not his.

Until Diane.

Until marriage and kids and middle age and a fling with the office sweetie. A cliché. A nice cliché. He wonders how Tabi is feeling this morning, whether she’s still okay about what happened. He shouldn’t have let it … But it’s hard to regret. He told her she’d restored pieces of himself he’d thought lost. They weren’t. They were still where he left them – with Bertie. What Tabi did was remind him that there was more to be had, even at his age. The greedy snuffles and moans of her pleasure and the vortex that whirled them stood in heart-sinking contrast to sex with Diane. It’s obvious now that she, with her murmurs and grunts, has been faking it. Competently, of course. She’s earnestly and expertly active, as if sexual performance must be at least as good as a well-executed dinner party. But sex itself is not what he’s after. It’s the deeper connection, the surrender of self. Love. He no longer tells Diane during sex that he loves her. The words induce an insatiable longing bordering on desperation. ‘I love you’ is a message from heart to heart, an umbilical seeking to dock in a loved one’s soul. And that is what Diane avoids at all costs.

The traffic finally starts to move. Chris puts the Rover in gear and heads for work.