The two of them sit with the kitchen table between them. The raindrops slide down the window carrying tiny baubles of light. The kettle burbles to itself. Steam cools on the underside of the cabinets and drips down onto the worktop.
'What are we going to do?' she says, her fingers interlocking in a pyramid, her head bowed and gazing at the letter in the space between them.
'He says it's all a dream,' she says. 'All of it.'
He runs his hand over the table, as if to test it is really there or not. 'All of it?'
'All of it.'
'Then what do we do?' he says, his voice cracking a little.
She looks at the rack of kitchen knives.
'Wake up.'
Paddy Dobson
13th February 2022