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To: [email protected]

From: [email protected]

Hi Mum,

Lovely to hear that you and Maria had such a nice tea at Fortnum & Mason on Maria’s birthday. Although, yes, I agree, that is a LOT for a packet of biscuits and I’m sure both you and Maria could do better scones at home. Yours are very light. And, no, the toilet thing in the theatre was not good. I’m sure as an attendant herself she has a very keen eye for things like that. I’m glad someone is looking out for all your … hygiene needs.

All fine here. New York is pretty chilly right now, but you know me, clothing for every occasion! There are a few things up in the air at work but hopefully all will be sorted by the time we speak. And, yes, I’m totally fine about Sam. Just one of those things, indeed.

Sorry to hear about Granddad. I hope when he’s feeling better you can start your night classes again.

I miss you all. A lot.

Lots of love,

Lou xx

PS Probably best if you email or write to me via Nathan just now as we’re having some issues with the post.

Mrs De Witt came out of hospital ten days after she was admitted, squinting in the unfamiliar daylight, her right arm in a plaster cast that seemed too heavy for her thin frame. I brought her home in a taxi. Ashok met her at the kerb and helped her slowly up the steps. For once she didn’t crab at him or bat him away, but walked gingerly, as if balance were no longer a given. I had brought the outfit she’d demanded – a 1970s pale blue Céline trouser suit, a daffodil yellow blouse and a pale pink wool beret – with some of the cosmetics that were on her dresser and sat on the side of her hospital bed to help her apply them. She said her own attempts with her left hand made her look like she had drunk three Sidecars for breakfast.

Dean Martin, delighted, jogged and snuffled at her heels, looking up at her, then back at me pointedly, as if to tell me I could leave now. We had reached something of a truce, the dog and I. He ate his meals and curled up on my lap every evening, and I think he had even started to enjoy the slightly faster pace and longer reach of our walks because his little tail wagged wildly whenever he saw me pick up the lead.

Mrs De Witt was overjoyed to see him, if joyousness could be conveyed by a series of complaints about my obvious mismanagement of his care, by the fact that within a space of twelve hours she had deemed him both over- and underweight, and by an ongoing, crooning apology to him for leaving him in my inadequate hands. ‘My poor baby. Did I leave you with a stranger? I did? And she didn’t care for you properly? It’s okay. Momma’s home now. It’s all okay.’

She was plainly delighted to be home, but I can’t pretend I wasn’t anxious. She seemed to require a prodigious number of pills – even by American standards – and I wondered if she had some kind of brittle-bone syndrome: it seemed an awful lot just for a broken wrist. I told Treena, who said in England you would have been prescribed a couple of painkillers and told not to lift anything heavy, and laughed heartily.

But Mrs De Witt, I felt, had been left even frailer by her time in hospital. She was pale and coughed repeatedly, and her tailored clothes gaped in odd places around her body. When I cooked her macaroni cheese, she ate four or five neat mouthfuls and pronounced it delicious but declined to eat any more. ‘I think my stomach shrank in that awful place. Probably trying to shut itself off from their abysmal food.’

She took half a day to reacquaint herself fully with her apartment, tottering slowly from room to room, reminding and reassuring herself that everything was as it should be – I tried not to view this as her checking I hadn’t stolen anything. Finally she sat down on her tall, upholstered chair and let out a little sigh. ‘I can’t tell you how good it is to be home.’ She said it as if she had half expected not to make it back. And then she nodded off. I thought for the hundredth time about Granddad and how lucky he was to have Mum caring for him.

Mrs De Witt was plainly too frail to be left alone, and apparently in no hurry to see me go. So, with no actual discussion between us, I simply stayed on. I helped her wash and dress and cooked her meals and, for the first week at least, walked Dean Martin several times a day. Towards the end of that week, I found she had cleared me a little space in the fourth bedroom, moving books and items of clothing one at a time to reveal a bedside table that was usable or a shelf on which I could put my things. I commandeered her guest bathroom for myself, scrubbing it thoroughly and running the taps until the water was clear. Then, discreetly, I set about cleaning all those areas of her own bathroom and kitchen that her failing eyesight had begun to miss.

I took her to the hospital for her follow-up appointments, and sat outside with Dean Martin until I was asked to return for her. I booked her an appointment at her hairdresser and waited while her thin, silvery hair was returned to its former neat waves, a small act that seemed to be more restorative than any of the medical attention she had received. I helped her with her make-up, and located her various pairs of glasses. She would thank me quietly and emphatically for my help in the way you might a favoured guest.

Conscious that, as she’d lived alone for years, she might need her space, I would often go out for a few hours in the day, sit in the library and look for jobs but without the urgency I had felt previously and, in truth, there was nothing I wanted to do. She would usually be either sleeping or propped in front of her television when I returned. ‘Now, Louisa,’ she would say, pushing herself upright, as if we had been mid-conversation, ‘I’d been wondering where you were. Would you be kind enough to take Dean Martin for a little stroll? He’s been looking rather concerned …’

On Saturdays I went with Meena to the library protests. The crowds had grown thinner now, the library’s future dependent not just on public support but a crowd-funded legal challenge. Nobody seemed to hold out much hope for it. We stood, less chilled as each week passed, waving our battered placards and accepting with thanks the hot drinks and snacks that still arrived from neighbours and local shopkeepers. I’d learnt to look out for familiar faces – the grandmother I’d met on my first visit, whose name was Martine and now greeted me with a hug and a broad smile. A handful of others waved or said hi, the security guard, the woman who brought pakoras, the librarian with the beautiful hair. I never saw the old woman with the ripped epaulettes again.

I had been living in Mrs De Witt’s apartment for thirteen days when I bumped into Agnes. Given our proximity to each other, I suppose it was surprising that it hadn’t happened earlier. It was raining heavily and I was wearing one of Mrs De Witt’s old raincoats – a yellow and orange 1970s plastic one with bright circular flowers all over it – and she had put a little mackintosh with an elevated hood on Dean Martin, which made me snort with laughter every time I looked at it. We ran along the corridor, me giggling at the sight of his bulbous little face under the plastic hood, and I stopped suddenly as the lift doors opened and Agnes stepped out, tailed by a young woman with an iPad, her hair scraped back into a tight ponytail. She stopped and stared at me. Something not quite readable passed across her face – something that might have been awkwardness, a mute apology or even suppressed fury at my being there, it was hard to tell. Her eyes met mine, she opened her mouth as if to speak, then pressed her lips together and walked past me as if she hadn’t seen me, her glossy blonde hair swinging and the girl close behind.