Ecstatic as I am now, the embrace from you would tip me further into such joy. To imagine us as I give you the news and as you listen and then smile and murmur sweetness. And I’ll embrace those words as I will embrace you; what warmth we’ll feel. What hope. A love we’ll see the end of together.

And so I spring from my chair and race into the living room. But I stop in the doorway.

The room is still. I watch you from a distance for an eternity that is my own and I realise I feel no warmth at all.