Small chi-rho tattoo on the hand

I have been on the motorway since five with the radio off, because the only station that comes in past Northampton is a man reading cricket scores in a voice like wet sand. The box is on the passenger seat, belted in like a child. You would have laughed at that. I did it without thinking, then sat there feeling foolish until the lorry ahead indicated and I remembered to breathe.

Grandad's tea caddy has been in the boot since Tuesday, wrapped in his good shirt. You remember the mark on the lid, the little P with an X through it that he said was older than the church on Mill Lane. He cut it with a penknife the summer we were evacuated to his cottage, and Mum never forgave him for the scratches on the oak. I always took it for a sort of signature. Now I think it was a promise he couldn't say aloud.

Somewhere past the Wash I pulled into a lay-by and sat with the engine ticking. A woman in a fleece walked a Staffie round the bins and didn't look at me once, which was a mercy. I got the atlas out. The road to Cromer runs straight for miles, then bends down through the dunes so the sea arrives all at once.

I'm not turning off yet. I'll drive on to the next junction and see how I feel, and if the sea comes up grey over the hedges, I'll let the caddy have the last word. Don't wait up.

Love, Ruth