My husband left his medication at home, so I stopped by his office to bring it to him. But when I asked the receptionist to call him downstairs, she said, "Ma'am, your husband has been on leave for the past week."

My sister and I have had two proper conversations in eleven weeks.

The first was in that corridor and it was about eleven minutes long and most of it was logistics.

The second was at her kitchen table in the fifth week. It was about our father. It took about three hours and neither of us ate the food that was in front of us.

I have apologised for the four years. Properly, at that table, and she took it.

I have not yet apologised for the six weeks.

She knows that I have not. She has not asked me to and she is not going to — and both of us know exactly which of those two things is the real one.

That one is going to take me a long time and I am not going to do it badly to get it over with.

She has said she is not going anywhere. She has said it twice.