Didn’t cry. Didn’t lash out at the walls. Or tear my hair. Or break everything within reach. I didn’t pass out. I didn’t even feel my heart racing or a dizziness creeping over me. All the same, I stayed sitting on the bed, just in case. I looked around me. At our bedroom. The little gilt frames with photos of the children at all ages. Our wedding photograph on Jo’s bedside table. A portrait of me by Maman on my side of the bed; she painted it in a few seconds, starting with a violet swirl and using the blue watercolour she had left on her brush. That’s you reading, she said. My heart stayed steady. My hands didn’t shake. I bent down to pick up the blouse that I’d dropped on the floor. I put it on the bed beside me, and my fingers creased it before letting it fall. I’d iron it again in a moment. I ought to have listened to my inner prompting to buy the Calor steam turbo iron that I saw in Auchan at three hundred and ninety-nine euros, number twenty-seven on the list of things I need.
