Perhaps it was the beginning of dementia. Jamie hoped to God his mother hadn’t done a runner. Or he and Katie might be left looking after their father as he began his slow descent toward a horrid little residential home somewhere. It was an uncharitable thought. He was trying very hard to give up uncharitable thoughts. Perhaps that was what he needed. Something to come along and smash his life to pieces. Go back to the village. Look after his father. Learn to be properly human again. A sort of spiritual thing.
