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chance to build them up before they were shattered for ever.
‘Do you want to borrow the book?’ Ruth asked. I was lost on the page, in the image, and her voice
pulled me back to now. ‘Ben might like to see it.’
What to answer? How to disguise my emotions? I managed only to say, ‘He would. Thank you.’
‘Bring him to see me next week. Promise you will.’
I was struggling to hold myself together. I went to stand at the window, keeping my face turned
away from her, looking out at the beds of pruned roses in the garden below, at the sweeping, gracious
branches of a mature cedar tree. But Ruth was no fool, dementia notwithstanding.
‘What is it, dear?’ she said.
‘I’m fine.’
‘I don’t like to see you like this, my darling. Come, sit with me, talk to me.’
I wanted to, I so wanted to. But the thing is that if I’d told her, it would have destroyed her. So I
didn’t.
‘I’ve got to go now,’ I said. ‘I’ll see you next week.’
I put my face to hers, said goodbye, kissed her. She clasped my head to hers and for a moment the
sides of our faces rested together. Her skin felt as smooth as gossamer, her cheek bony and delicate,
barely there.
‘Bye bye, darling,’ she said. ‘Be strong. Remember: you are a mother. You must be strong.’