1. We drink our breakfast tea on the balcony and listening to the chickens buck-bucking below. I watch Boron do his rounds, checking on next door’s garden, and when I say his name, he looks up and slow-blinks at me.

2. Lily leans around the steps to look inside the shop, her mouth slightly open in excited anticipation of our return. By the time I step out the door, she’s stood up, tail wagging; the HEARTLESS ABANDONMENT of the previous few minutes forgotten.

3. The stillness of the evening. The silhouette of the oak tree against the fading light.