Faded lettering reading always on a finger

The rain has been coming sideways through the market since six, so I've parked the van under the railway arch and I'm writing this on the back of a bread bag. Mr Okafor from the fishmonger's came round at eight with a stencil he'd cut from a cereal box. He wanted one word in gold leaf on the inside of his shop window, reversed, so it would read properly for anyone looking out from behind the counter. I told him reversed letters are the easy part once you stop trying to read them. You paint what the brush sees, not what the word says.

He wanted ALWAYS, which struck me as a lot to ask of a window that takes salt spray every Thursday. I'd done the first A and most of the L before I noticed he was standing behind me, watching the mirror-image go on backwards, one hand over his mouth. He said his late wife used to write him notes on the steamed bathroom mirror that way, so only he could read them from the bed. Then he asked whether the gold would last.

I said gold leaf lasts longer than people expect, provided nobody scrubs it with the wrong cloth. He nodded, paid me in coins he'd counted twice, and asked if I'd come back in spring to check it. I said yes. I'm holding the stencil now, the cereal box soggy at the corners, and I think I'll keep it.