It’s hard to know when I became a dutiful son. Mum, in later life, found comfort in the sherry bottle come the evening. Dad watched the nine o’clock news on BBC with a cup of tea and a digestive biscuit. On my last visit home, before mum died, I arrived home at ten in the evening. She was in bed and wanted to get up, but I refused to let her. She was eighty-seven. I held her hand and told her made-up stories of pebbles, sand, and seaweed. She loved it whenever I talked to her about the sea. Dad and I spoke before he went to bed. He showered, put on his PJs, and retired to their room. In that short time, mum had gone. Dad stayed with her body that night, never coming to tell me or bring me to her. It was his time.
