I HAD NO desire to return my gold to that safe. If I can’t get to it then what’s the point of owning jewellery! If I can’t do the back-and-forward then jewels and chains won’t get worn. They’re staying on my wrist and neck permanent. I said so with some purse-banging words. You warned me about sinks and the toilet. I’d dealt with sinks and toilets all my life and wasn’t about to start losing jewels down them now. I sat in my chair for The Bold and the Beautiful but my eyes admired my wrist and my neck. I watched shine from my jewellery not the television.

How could I be so sunny if bereaved? You said that and left it there. You didn’t nag. You didn’t say, ‘Cry more’ or ‘Grieve harder—your husband just died,’ though you wanted to. ‘Do not act as if death has given me, his wife, a promotion.’ That’s what you thought. In my chair as if I now was head of business, free to show my jewels and overturn Twinkle’s meddling. If I want the keys to the balcony I will get them, I declared. If I want my chequebook I will have it. I am boss of me. You’re not. I have the purse strings. I’m a well-heeled woman, aren’t I? I have not done the sums for a…for a while. I won’t be told what to do or feel.

Open the balcony, I said. Open it. I’ll do it myself. I’ll work the back-and-forward. No, you do it. Go on, I said, do it. The key. I wanted my chequebook too. Do the back-and-forward. Now, I said. Now.

You did. You opened the balcony. I sat on the banana seat. I put my legs up and stretched. I got cold from the shade and the oaf blowing. I went back inside for the television.

Did you wish me dead instead of Twinkle? Of course you did. I asked you. I was glad I asked. I could tell your No was Yes. There wasn’t frowning in your No. There wasn’t kneeling to promise No, No. I was filling with watching you. Far from filled enough to empty out.

‘I wish, I wish…you dead not my Twinkle. Him here. Not you.’ I said it for the cruelty. We were even now. Your No-Yes—I was even. I nodded my win. I snubbed you for the television. I slept and dreamt I married the parson. I told you later. You said you wish I had too. I might have been a—

You did not finish saying. Then you did say. You said you might have been a normal man, not you. Parson parts in you to balance the me.

You went to your room and wailed. I heard. I cupped my hands and caught my teardrop. I went to show you. Look. You said it was dribble. I said no, a tear just like yours. There were more in my lap. You wailed, ‘It’s just dribbling!’

Twinkle and you schemed and sniped. Him saying I’d lost my wiring. I still had wiring. Him dead and still sniping from his blood in you. So said my wiring. I said tears and you said dribble. I’ve got the purse strings, I boasted. I’ve got plans. Plenty of fish in the oaf-sea. I think I’ll marry again soon. I’m going to get new furniture. I’ll tell my new man—make me happy or else, and don’t dare touch my purse strings.