They can’t come to meet us. The car journey and sitting in the cafe is too much for her now. He read out his text last night. I think he said that her tumour is the ‘size of a supermarket swede’. He also wrote that it is beginning to ooze some nasty pus and goo. Poor, poor love. And him, to have to watch her dying when they are so close, two peas in a pod. And their children too. She is so loved. A bright, blue-eyed star, so full of joy and life. I want to hold her, and him. And I do as I write this.
The girl with the orange Pre-Raphaelite hair whose laugh through open summer windows used to drive him to distraction and her boyfriend (with equally flowing locks, though his are yellow not orange) who works in the film & photography loan department at the University have gone. I saw him cleaning out the flat at the weekend. The doll’s houses are gone too. I presume they were hers not his, though one cannot be sure. They appeared one day and lined the sills of his flat for years. I liked seeing them.
Changing, things are always changing. That’s flat life, I suppose. I also smoker (2) coming up the back lane with his two little boys. I’ve never seen him outside his flat. They looked so happy with him. I am glad.
