‘Mum, Dad, it’s me…’ Claire called from the back hall, letting herself in. She’d stopped by at her parents’ farm next door to her own house to pick up the dress her mum had altered for Amy. There was no reply, so she went straight into the large flagstoned kitchen.

She stopped suddenly.

‘Mum, what’s wrong?’ She glanced between her parents.

Her father was sitting at the kitchen table with the newspaper open in front of him but obviously not reading it. His glasses were lying beside him, his eyes looking as though they’d been glued, unfocused, to the same page for the last ten minutes. Her mother was making a point of banging pots and pans as she prepared their evening meal.

‘Is anyone going to speak?’ Whatever was going on, Claire didn’t think it seemed fair on her father under the circumstances.

‘Everything’s fine, darling,’ Shona said, glancing up. She wore a tight expression, one that gave her an instant facelift. But instead of making her appear younger – although Claire hoped she looked that good when she reached seventy-one – it made her seem weary, as though she’d had enough.

‘Thanks for altering the dress,’ Claire said, catching sight of it on the chair. ‘Amy will love it. She has a party at the weekend and—’

‘Your mother wants to split up the farm and sell it off to rich people from London, so they can bugger about with it and convert it into bloody holiday lets.’

Claire stared at her father. Surely he was confused again.

‘And considering everything, is that not a sensible idea, Patrick?’ Shona held a large knife inside a tea towel, her long fingers gripped around it. Only her mother could make drying up seem elegant.

‘Mum, is this true?’ Claire felt her heart grinding, as if trying to slow the inevitable. Neither of her parents answered directly.

‘Oh, Patrick,’ Shona said through a sigh. She went to her husband and clasped his shoulders, pulling him close to her chest. She kissed him on the head. ‘We’ve talked about this already. Don’t you remember? You said it was a good idea.’ She returned to the worktop and snipped at a bunch of parsley growing in a pot on the windowsill. A strand of hair fell in front of her eyes like a grey brushstroke on a painting. Again, Claire noticed how tired she looked.

‘It’s not a good idea,’ Patrick stated with a growl.

‘You’re really thinking of selling the farm?’ She couldn’t believe what she was hearing. She’d grown up here. Everything had happened at Trevellin Farm. The enormity of her mother’s decision swooped through her.

Someone must always be here…

They’d made a promise.

‘I don’t believe I’m hearing this.’ Claire was instantly on her father’s side. And what did she mean, We’ve talked about this already?

‘Your mother’s lost her bloody mind,’ her father said. He rose and went to the old dresser, reaching into the bottom cupboard. He pulled out a bottle of red wine, uncorked it and poured himself a large glass. The kitchen was swollen with silence. Claire felt her mother’s stare, but she couldn’t return the look. It was a relief to see her father so opinionated rather than vague and confused, but what he’d just said cut deep, even though he didn’t realise it.

‘Patrick, have some fruit juice instead.’ Shona tried to remove the glass from her husband’s hands, but he clung on to it, downing a large mouthful. ‘Be sensible, darling. You know what the doctor said about your blood pressure.’

In the days before his diagnosis, Patrick had always enjoyed a glass or two while Shona prepared dinner. They would chat, reminisce, laugh and bind themselves up in the safety of over forty years of marriage. Now, though, alcohol was strictly off limits, and usually he complied. They’d been told that raised blood pressure could worsen his Alzheimer’s, and Shona wanted to do everything she could to slow the disease.

‘Are you certain about selling, Mum?’ Claire ran her fingers over the perfect seam her mother had stitched on the dress.

‘Yes, love.’ Shona looked at her husband, a knot of concern tied between her brows. ‘We won’t leave the area, of course. We still want to be near you, Callum and the children.’

The subtext of this told Claire that her mother needed to be close, that she wouldn’t be able to cope with Patrick alone wherever they lived.

‘You know how much time and energy this place takes up.’

Claire heard her mother speaking but couldn’t take it in. Her words blended into one big truth that she didn’t want to hear – that her parents weren’t the immortal beings she’d always believed them to be.

Her father was already ill, deteriorating, and that had been shock enough earlier in the year. But accepting that they would grow older still and one day both need taking care of was unthinkable. Why had she never considered this before? Why had she thought that her mother, whippet-like and capable, elegant and stoic, would remain fixed inside an unchanging body, as if Claire herself would catch up and die first?

‘Pat, where are you going, love?’ Shona called out.

‘To the bloody toilet, if that’s all right with you.’ He banged the hallway door behind him.

‘He’s had a bad week,’ Shona confided in a low voice. They both knew there was nothing wrong with Patrick’s hearing. ‘It’s so very worrying. If we sell, then I can focus more on caring for Dad. Please try to understand, darling. It’s not easy for me.’

At that moment, Claire felt both desperately sorry for her mother and like she wanted to lash out, scream at her for even contemplating selling the farm. She closed her eyes. Apart from the obvious – that someone would always be here, just in case – she couldn’t begin to imagine not visiting her parents here. They were her closest neighbours, literally at the end of the long, shared drive, and she couldn’t imagine her father ever getting used to living anywhere else. The farm had always been the family’s home.

‘He’s been doing… odd things,’ Shona said quietly. ‘It’s very upsetting.’

‘What kind of odd things?’ Claire wasn’t sure she could stand to hear. Over the last eighteen months they’d all noticed changes in Patrick, and between them had discussed what it might be – stress, age, plain forgetfulness. In the end, they’d coaxed him to the doctor and a diagnosis wasn’t far behind.

‘He’s been in Lenni’s room a lot. Talking to her as if she’s really there.’

Claire hung her head and sighed. The clear-minded man of her youth, the capable father who’d taken control when Lenni disappeared, searching tirelessly, organising and never giving up, seemed a million miles away from the man now being eaten up by this wretched disease. She hated how he sometimes believed she had never disappeared, that his youngest daughter might walk into the room at any moment.

‘And yesterday he told me he saw her skipping down the street,’ Shona continued.

‘What was he doing out alone?’

‘Love, keeping your father indoors would be the end for him. You know how stubborn he is. He might have Alzheimer’s, but I refuse to let the disease have him. We do things our way.’

Claire folded the dress and placed it on her knee. She didn’t like hearing any of this. Until recently, she hadn’t wanted to accept her father as anything but the man she remembered when she was five. A kind-hearted, gentle giant, yet stoked with a reserve of seriousness if need be, Patrick was always up for a make-believe adventure with her and her friends out on the farm or ready to tell a good story. Hard-working, yet soft as butter in the sun, Patrick adored his family.

And Claire had taken delight in sharing him with her friends when growing up. He’d become a kind of surrogate father to them all, forming a special bond with her close-knit group. Her friends would be envious of the indomitable man as he gave them piggybacks up and down the beach, played cricket with them on the sand – how they wished their fathers were like him – yet occasionally they’d scamper home a touch frightened when he’d overreacted about inconsequential things. Sand in the porch, the fire not laid right, running through the house – any trigger that worked him into a mini rage, which would usually burn itself out after carting some bales or an afternoon’s fishing.

‘And what if she comes back?’ Patrick’s voice boomed. He was braced in the doorway, as if holding up the house.

‘Pat, she’s not coming back. You know that.’ Shona’s voice was as soft as she could make it. ‘Come and sit down.’

Only Mum would ever dare say that, Claire thought. She began to fidget with the dress again but stopped herself from ruining it.

‘Claire, I’d like someone from your office to come out and give us an opinion,’ Shona said. ‘I don’t suppose it’s fair to ask you to value the place personally, but we’d like to give your agency the business. You have such a good reputation round here.’

Claire had been working at Greene & Galloway for nearly a decade. Chris Greene and Jeff Galloway were away from the office more and more now they were approaching retirement. She virtually ran the place single-handedly.

‘Take more time to decide, Mum,’ Claire said, glancing at her father. ‘It’s Dad’s decision too.’ She watched her mother’s eyes crystallise and harden. Claire put a hand on her arm. ‘Thanks for doing this.’ She held up the dress. ‘I’ll bring the kids down to see you at the weekend.’

She kissed both of her parents and went out to her car. The sea breeze smelt like a salty soup bubbling on the stove. The tide would be out, she guessed, remembering how, as a child, she would scamper over the rocks and sandy patches between the crystal-clear pools, marvelling at the intricate gifts left behind. If the tide was out, the sea-smell was in, her father used to say, excited as a kid himself at the prospect of an afternoon beachcombing with his daughter and her friends.

Her friends. How would they feel when she told them that Patrick had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s? So far, they’d kept the news amongst close family, and besides, she didn’t get to see any of them as often as she’d have liked. And how would they react to the house sale? Patrick and the farm had been as much a part of their childhoods as it had hers. It was all heartbreaking.

Claire drove back down the long driveway, past the Old Stables where she lived, spotting that Callum wasn’t home yet, and on into the village. It was time to fetch Amy from the childminder.

‘Oh, Dad,’ she said to herself as she parked the car on the quiet lane, her head tilted back against the seat. She couldn’t bear to see her father deteriorate in such a short period of time and, since his diagnosis, she’d been desperate to do something helpful for him. Until now, she had no idea what that could be.

Behind all the worry and concern, Claire felt the first glimmer of a plan hatching. She smiled to herself as she locked the car. She’d read up on how this sort of thing could help, and she reckoned it would do him the world of good. Her mind was made up.