Kathy sat quiet and pale beside her, fully aware of Simmy’s fragile mood. The absence of questions and guesses reminded Simmy of how well she and Kathy had always got along. They had been known to spend a contented hour together over a picnic lunch or simply sitting in a park watching ducks, barely speaking. Kathy had been a haven from the irritations of married life, and she assumed it had worked the same both ways. With Tony there had always been a subtle sense of having to justify herself at every turn. He would want to know why she kept all the mugs upside down on their shelf; why she favoured one particular teaspoon over the others; why the cushions had to be plumped up before going to bed. The answers were always utterly obvious to her; the questions therefore intended merely to remind her that he existed and might have other ways of doing things. Tony’s sense of his own existence was oddly shaky, she’d learnt, and when their baby died it made this aspect of him very much worse.
